The Compass Rose

If the fight finale took as many pages as the lead-up anticipated, then the book would be three times longer. That is to say, there was a lot of set-up and presentation, which was very intereting!, but then the big fight was over extrememly quickly, and suddenly the book's over.
I loved the description of the matriarchal culture; it was extrememly well thought out, down to men having a glass ceiling in military rank, and ancient laws allowing them to be forced to marry. The interaction between the two main characters was a perfect blend of secret love, military respect, and long-time friendship.
I was, however, rather confused about the magic/compass direction relationship. Certain types of magic are associated with certain compass show more points, but the specifics aren't fully explained, other than West, which is death.
Overall, very good! show less

The Compass Rose is set during a war between a matriarchal country, Adara, and a patriarchal one, Tibre. In Adara, about one in five girls and one in ten boys is born with magical powers. Those whose powers are only good for martial purposes wind up as career military, and those who need practice to learn how to control their powers will often do a stint in the military until they have the control to compete in the civilian workforce. Our heroine, Kallista is one of the former: a captain whose magic is the ability to summon lightning. The patriarchal culture distrusts magic and kills anybody who is caught using it, except for some whom they cripple and use to sniff out magic. What they do have is cannons. The city where Kallista and her show more bodyguard (it's hard to focus on immediate surroundings when working magic, so the magic users have bodyguards who work with them) are fighting is about to fall, and the rest of their group has already been killed, when Kallista calls out to the One God for protection and is suddenly given enough magic to kill every one of the attacking army within two hundred paces of the city walls except for one prisoner. Once she is cleaned up from the battle, her bodyguard discovers a mark in the shape of a compass rose on her neck.

The different kinds of magic that exist in this country are associated with different points of the compass. Roughly, North magic is mostly earth/weather magic, although IIRC having the ability to distinguish if somebody is telling the truth is also North magic. East magic is healing. Fire is South magic. West magic is in some way dark and creepy. The ability to kill things directly by magic, instead of using lightning to kill somebody, or setting a fire, or anything overly mysterious like seeing the future. Kallista's magic had always been north magic before, and her control over it was exeptional, but now she has some signs of West magic, too, and the new magic is difficult to control. Besides the spell she cast that killed the invaders, she is also having prophetic dreams. There are legends of women who were Godstruck, and given magic from every compass point, but the most recent legends are set a thousand years ago and nobody thought they were true.

The enemy warrior who survived, Stone, has a similar mark on the back of his neck: a circle, without the compass points. From the best she can tell from the way the magic reacts and what few answers can be found about the Godstruck of the past, she can now tap magic within him. Because the previous Godstruck and their marked companions linked in this way were married, the ruler arranges a marriage between the captain and the prisoner. Group marriages, preferably of at least four, are the custom of the land, so the ruler suggests that the captain invite her bodyguard and a female refugee from the invading army, whom the captain had taken into her care, marry them as well. But only the captain and the prisoner are ordered to do so.

The fact that they have been marked and brought together almost certainly means there is some remaining threat for them to overcome, and in the legends there was always more than one person marked to support the Godstruck. So the problem is to find who else has been marked, learn to use the new magic, and figure out what it is they are supposed to defeat: and considering how much magic she is being given to fight it, it's probably something pretty vicious.

Kallista's family winds up consisting of six partners, called iliasti (one is an Ilias, the group is an Ilian), all of whom are fully formed, interesting characters. The relationships between them shift and balance believably as different tensions work, and as the foreigness of some of the iliasti affect the situation. Both of the cultures have complete social systems, although what exactly the culture of one member of the Ilian, who is apparently neither Adaran nor Tibran (if he's Adaran, he's from some distant province with radically different customs), is like I haven't seen yet. Also, neither culture is utopian. Patriarchal cultures in fiction being depicted as rigid and requiring the complete submission of women is nothing new, but in Adara, men have to deal with a glass ceiling and on the occasion that one does rise to power, remarks tend to be made as to how well he controls his temper in the same tone that somebody in an old-boys-club type workplace might be impressed with a woman for not breaking down in tears when things get tough, when they're secretly worrying that once a month she's going to go crazy and screw up the place. Not to mention that male war prisoners can be given in marriage to Adaran women.

Great fantasy world-building, great characters, and, if I might add, psychic sex. What more need I add? show less

Have you ever read a book that immediately wrapped you up in its magic and refused to let you go? That's what happened to me with Gail Dayton's THE COMPASS ROSE, the first in the One Rose Trilogy. From amazing characterizations to a world unlike any you've read about before, this book takes you straight into the heart of the story and makes you a part of the action, the mystery, the romance, and the unimaginable magic that is the nation of Adara.

Kallista Varyl is a Captain in the Adaran army, a woman intent on saving her city from the invading warriors of their neighboring kingdom, Tibre. The army of Tibre, unlike that of Adara, relies on man-made instruments such as guns and cannons to win its battles, instead of the magic that show more Kallista and her people use. Now, though, outnumbered over ten to one, magic doesn't seem to be enough-until Kallista, in desperation, calls upon a power that was thought to be only legend, and changes the course of history.

Kallista, beyond being a warrior, is also a naitan, a magic wielder. Some have even called her a witch. But her normal magic powers aren't enough to out-battle and out-smart the hordes of the Tibre army, and so she calls upon the One Goddess, something that her kingdom's myths and legends are made of. Only it wasn't a legend, as after calling upon the powers that be, the entire Tibre army is struck dead where they stand-all, that is, except for Stone, a warrior who stirs within Kallista feelings she's never before experienced.

Now she's conquered the rival Tibre warriors, but she's left with even more questions than answers. With a mysterious mark on her neck and the brooding Stone, Kallista faces her elders-only to find out that she's been Godstruck, an occurrence that hasn't happened in her nation for over a thousand years. With power beyond belief, Kallista must learn to control the magic that has made her the fulfillment of a prophecy, for she is now the one destined to save her people from the Tibre, and their demon-possessed king.

As if defeating the evil king and harnessing her powers weren't enough, the ruler of Adara decrees that all six Godstruck players, not limited to Kallista and Stone, marry and form an instant magical family. They're then ordered to infiltrate the kingdom of Tibre to overthrow its king, and everything that such a coup entails.

Gail Dayton has created a magical world unlike anything I've ever experienced. The strange sense of family that abounds in Adara becomes understandable as the story unfolds. The bond that Kallista and Stone share goes beyond mere passion and intertwines with their combined magic. The secondary characters in this book are so real that without them, the book wouldn't be the same. I can honestly say that I'm eagerly anticipating the continuation of this story with the release of THE BARBED ROSE. show less

Ahh! At last I found the kind of smut I've been looking for in a book. Very much in the fantasy/alternate universe genre. Romantic without being unduly insulting to the reader's intelligence. Plenty of sex (the language is more romantic than graphic) and an adventure at it's core.

AND as an added bonus - it contains NO vampires!! (Hooray!)

The book features polyamory, multiple-marriage, group sex, and some very very mild elements of same-gender sex and bondage. I should say that if you're looking for gay erotica or bdsm, you probably won't like this book. We're talking hints here people - not full on pony-boys on parade.

I really enjoyed this book - it was pure fantasy, easy on the brain, titillating, good story, good characterizations, show more tawdry, but not smutty enough to make a person feel guilty for reading it. If you like fantasy and are looking for a good sexy beach read - I highly recommend giving it a try. show less

Great ideas - the different types of magic (North, South, East and West) and the ilia, a group marriage where the one is greater than the parts - and the sexuality is stimulating! On the other hand the characters are fairly ordinary and the writing is erratic - in fact the battle scenes are weak, and the book trails off rather limply at the end, but all in all a good holiday read! Well worth looking at the next book the Barbed Rose if you like this one - more of the same!

This novel was first published by Luna, a Harlequin imprint marketed toward fantasy readers that drew from both romance and fantasy writers. I generally felt most of their books were too romance aisle and not strong fantasies. The Compass Rose is actually one of the exceptions in that respect among the Luna books that I liked with some creative world-building.

I thought the world Dayton created was intriguing: Adara, a matriarchal society, practices group marriage requiring at least four members. This society is magic-based--there's North, South, West and East magic. The protagonist, Kallista, is a naitan, a magical practitioner of North magic and captain in their army who can call down lightening. When it looks like she might lose a show more battle she calls on the Goddess--and finds herself able to destroy the invading army--but there's a catch. She's now "god marked" and tied to others so marked she must marry and with whom she can tap magic to defeat the forces arrayed against her nation: her bodyguard, with whom she's been partnered a long time, two prisoners of war, a female refugee and a foreign merchant.

I'm generally not a fan actually of fiction involving polyamory--or forced marriage, and in a sense the "god mark" acts as such a device. I prefer stories that develop intimacy between just two, not only because multiples aren't appealing to me and to my mind just two in real life terms hard enough, but in fictional terms more than two major characters can become unwieldy and there's little chance to develop six.

I think I liked this work involving polyamory more than most for several reasons. Unlike say LK Hamilton's Anita Blake series, I didn't feel this was some piled-on harem--each character had their own conflicts and brought something into the mix--the inclusion of foreign characters, even ones from an enemy nation, meant Kallista and the others really had to work to form themselves into a family. Together with the matriarchal culture and the magical system I thought this brought an interesting dimension to the plot. In that regard this brought to mind Marion Zimmer Bradley's Forbidden Tower with its clash of personalities and cultures within a group of people who must find a way to mesh together magically and sexually in order to survive and flourish.

I also thought this novel was on the whole well-written. It's a complex plot and world and Dayton builds it well--gradually letting you in on its ins and outs through the story itself instead of wads of infodump. I think the novel's biggest fault is that I think its conflicts both internal to the group and in terms of the menace they face was resolved far too easily.

The novel was a good, entertaining read--a solid work of fantasy even if not a favorite or one that has me rushing to read the next book in the trilogy. show less

Captain Kallista Varyl is engaged in a siege and it looks like the enemy is going to win when she calls on the One for aid and her call is answered. However along with aid comes power, power she can barely contain, there's also companions for her who help her and hold the power like wells. In this country people can join in marriages that contain between 2 and eight people. All of these people are joined to her in marriage. Not only does she have to deal with the magical relationships but also the interpersonal relationships.

Weak in parts but also interesting in others. This actually deals with people who have compulsions and powers that are very strong and unavoidable. It also has enough secondary plots and backbiting to keep me very show more interested. show less