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July 29, 2019

The Fifth Season by N. K. Jemisin

Filed under: Fantasy — Tags: , — Randolph @ 1:41 pm

The Fifth Season is a fantasy novel set in a similar world to our own. The world is a single continent with a few short-lived islands along its perimeter. The people’s technology is roughly equivalent to Roman equivalent, although their science is more advanced by a bit. Their society is fractured into villages, called comms, short for communities. These are tribal and heirarchical with people at the bottom working for the right to live within the comm.

They have a magic technology based on Earth science. Their practitioners, geomancers, can sense even the smaller movements of the Earth and, when needed influence them. So they can suppress earthquakes, stronger geomancers can influence volcanoes. This comes at a cost, they draw heat from life and earth around them creating a small frozen waste around them, thus they are shunned by society and forced into strict training.

The writing is odd – in a pleasant way. Most of the story is in third person with limited access to the thoughts of a couple of characters. One of the threads is told in second person, which feels weird, especially being inside the head of other characters. The writing itself is easy to read, the sentences are not very complex. The characters are complex enough to be interesting and make the story compelling.

The book includes a glossary at the back of thematic words used in the book, making a nice reference. I found it helpful early on. There is also a map of the continent in the front of the book.

The book is good. I kept looking for time to read more of it and am looking forward to the two other books in the series.

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