A Sorcerer and a Gentleman

I am finally getting around to reviewing this. When I first read this book, years ago, I couldn't get past the first few pages. It was NOT like A Well Favored Man at all. However, on a second attempt, I found it to be so much better - how the different Magical Sources work are expanded on, as well the politics of the family.

This is a much different world than the more gentle Argylle. Freia is a wild thing, but innocent of the larger worlds and brutal customs. Prospero is wild, fierce, willing to sacrifice everything to get back at his brother who stole his throne. Than we have Dewar, a Sorcerer with mysterious intentions. These are not the same people in the Well Favored Man, but they have elements of who they will become.

Not like the first book at all.: Which isn't a bad thing, just don't go into this book thinking it'll be like _The Well-Favored Man._ Willey goes back in time, long before Gwydion was born and Argylle transformed into the beautiful realm it had become in the first book.The tone is harsher, much more solemn, much more tragic. While I miss Gwydion's first-person viewpoint, Willey has a larger story to tell, and needs a grander canvas on which to paint it. I supppose this could be read on its own without first reading _Well-Favored Man,_ but readers of the first book will be nodding their heads, seeing the seeds of later conflict and entanglements sown here. It was also gratifying to learn more about the touchstones of this universe only show more hinted at in the first book. show less

Disappointing prequel to The Well-Favored Man purports to illustrate the backstory leading to that book's events, but contains massive contradictions in incident and character.

I barely recall reading this.