This one starts with a bang, as a mysterious woman in white appears out
of nowhere, seemingly, into the middle of a peaceful village. She stays
exactly where she is for the rest of the book, but the story races about
all over the Kingdom of Tyrland as the former Queen, now exiled into
Eferum, the ‘other’ world, tries to make good her return.
There
are two main characters, of whom Rennyn is the more interesting by far.
Intelligent, competent and entirely self-sufficient, yet she never
becomes a Mary Sue, and it’s always clear that she has hidden depths, as
well as (perhaps) an agenda of her own. She’s accused of being
arrogant, but perhaps it’s more a question of self-awareness. It’s not
arrogance to know what has to be done and to go about doing it with
minimal fuss. Kendall is the bratty not-quite-child, whose major role
seems to be to ask the tricky questions so that essential elements of
the magic system or necessary plot points can be explained to the
reader, or to act as a window to events not seen by Rennyn. Despite her
heroics at the big confrontation, she always felt a bit extraneous. I
rather liked Rennyn’s younger brother, Seb, however, who has a very
focused view of magic and simply refuses to acknowledge the validity of
any viewpoint other than his own. He will ring a bell with anyone with
knowledge of a certain geeky type of teenage boy.
The Kellian are
the most intriguing aspect of the book. The stained glass monsters of
the title, because of their ability to reflect or absorb (not quite
clear which) the colours around them, they are magically created beings
(golems, originally) who have subsequently interbred with humans, with
interesting and very creepy results. Given that they give the book its
title, it was always obvious that their role would be pivotal to events.
Even so, I wasn’t expecting the way things turned out; as always, the
author has the power to astonish and disturb in equal measure.
I’m
a big fan of the author, who creates believable worlds where women are
just - well, people, everything from Queens to mages to soldiers to
farmers and everything in between. In addition, her worlds are always
very different from the standard fantasy tropes and themes, so that just
when you think you’ve got a handle on things the plot shoots off at a
completely unexpected tangent. I love to be taken by surprise,
especially when (as here) the surprise is totally logical and in line
with everything that’s gone before. And as always, this is not just a
retelling of the traditional good versus evil story. It’s not at all
clear where, if anywhere, the distinction lies, and there are more
shades of grey than black and white. There is also a more philosophical
depth, for those who enjoy such things, about the rightness, or
otherwise, of making decisions for other people, of controlling people
with magic, of using people against their will.
If I have a
complaint, it’s that the first half of the book is overfilled with
exposition - details about the magic system, for instance, which is
moderately complicated, or about the underlying politics, or about the
plot itself. The Grand Summoning is a complicated process, and I got
lost in the details sometimes. There were also too many characters for
me to keep straight, and I wasn’t even clear, sometimes, which of them
were human and which weren’t. Most of this, however, either resolved
itself before the final confrontation or ceased to matter, and there was
compensation in the array of very different locations where breaches
from the Eferum occurred, necessitating some innovative solutions, both
practical and magical.
The finale was appropriately epic, with
innumerable twists and turns, the main plotline tied up with a very
satisfactory little bow on top, yet with enough dangling threads to
carry forward into book 2 of the series. This is a relatively short book
with an interesting magic system, the fascinating non-human Kellians
and some thought-provoking ideas. Apart from Rennyn and Seb, the humans
are mostly walk-on parts, but they still feel like properly
three-dimensional people. Another enjoyable read from Ms Höst. Four
stars.
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