Whoever read the previous volume – or at least the previous review – knows that the author invites us to a world full of magic, often dark and bloody, and of spirits that can be wise and helpful reflections of dead ancestors or ruthless children of Koré who are hungry for human souls – demons. An interesting approach to the issue of witchcraft and exotic realities inspired by the culture of the peoples of West Africa and voodoo practices native to the south of the United States are a big advantage of this series, but … how will the main character’s story unfold?
New outfit, the same mannequin
Let me talk about the Reaper of Souls in a “general to particular” fashion, because in fact, it was the general that disappointed me the most. The first volume very clearly outlined a strange plot pattern, according to which at the beginning of the novel we find ourselves in Tamaru, where we spend a few moments living in the city life and getting to know a handful of insignificant third-plane characters. Then the idyll is interrupted by an episode of political intrigue at the court of the All-Powerful Kingdom, then the heroes set out on a risky journey, spend a few chapters in a new place of action that is both dangerous and sketched, only to hit yet another, where the “epic” finale takes place. And unfortunately the second volume follows exactly the same path, with only cosmetic changes.
And why am I actually pointing it out? After all, many fantasy fiction plots can be made shallow so that their abbreviation sounds absurd, right? The thing is that the segments of the story I have mentioned are very visible while reading and they unpleasantly stratify the story. In the face of the impending change of setting, we hear an ironic voice from the back of our head saying “Ah, it’s okay, so we won’t go back to that. At most in the next volume “… and worse, that voice is right. It’s not a Song of Ice and Fire, in which one hero travels, fights and discovers the world, and another in the same city carries out all his battles with words and decisions made at the desk of the same office. Here, everyone has to do successive stages of one and the same path. And although there are many threads and characters, they appear and disappear without much meaning – they lack depth, no time to resound. Often they go aside without a real climax, because something even more urgent happens to the protagonists.
Theater of two actors
Reaper of Souls, even more bluntly than the Kingdom of Souls, signals to us that only two characters count for history – Arrah and Rudjek. The rest of the characters function only in the form of “entourage” of someone from this couple. And, surprisingly, this even applies to antagonists. Everyone here has a clearly defined relationship to Arrah and / or Rudjek and, simply put, wants something from them. You get the impression that no one in the world depicted has a life of their own and has no goals unrelated to any of the protagonists. Even the higher beings, the capricious orishas, and the Demon King and his most powerful servants, such as Shezmu and Efiya, are involved in this.
This state of affairs becomes really tiring at some point and in a way ruins the author’s efforts in fields other than the plot. The second volume tries to expand the universe by offering us a detailed map of the world included in the book, a little closer to the customs of countries other than the Almighty Kingdom. It even allows us to look into completely new lands on other planets, because, as it turns out, Zöran, in which we find ourselves most of the time, is only one world out of many. Unfortunately, the quantity does not translate into quality, and the hastily made comments about whether that country or people or temporary visits to previously unknown regions are not enough to create a coherent and interesting picture of the local reality. Ultimately, we can learn little about the world by being “glued” to Rudjek and Arrah,
Less teenage pain, more divine struggles
While in the previous review I complained a bit about the annoying internal monologues of the main character, related to her feelings for Rudjek and family problems, here I could breathe a sigh of relief. Arrah’s considerations, at least for the most part, have grown more mature, more self-aware, and, thank the gods, rarer. Their role is taken over by visions related to the life of Dimma, the Unnamed Orisha. These, however, are much more interesting, offering us a glimpse into the origins and the broader context of the war between demons and the Orishas, as well as presenting the life and fall of the Demon King known to Dimmie as Daho.
And although we have a lot of emotional dilemmas here again, the young shaman is completely understandable and even engaging, as the girl struggles with the increasingly returning identity of Dimma, who was the original incarnation of the soul now reborn as Arrah. The present-day bloody battle with the beastly Demon King with swords and an army of mortal soldiers as Arrah knows, seems to have nothing to do with Dimma’s vision of the past, in which she and the good-natured, angelic youth Daho were drawn into a struggle on a cosmic scale against Dimma’s divine siblings, angered by her deeds, which drastically affect the shape of reality. Together with Arrah, we discover the next elements of this metaphysical puzzle and try to understand what is actually going on here and how it should all end.
Rich world, intriguing ideas, change of narrative needed immediately
This is more or less how my impressions of the Reaper of Souls are presented . The presented world has enormous potential, the main characters – especially Arrah – undoubtedly undergo the necessary personality development, and the whole thing is quite pleasant to read. The themes related to cosmogony and the struggle of the divine orishas take the second volume of the series to the next level and were for me the most interesting fragments of the story. I will not deny the depth and some intriguing attraction of the characters of Dimma and Daho, whose role increases slowly as the action progresses. Unfortunately, the novel loses a lot in non-core areas, such as worldbuildingor the use of supporting characters. The final effect is somewhat reminiscent of a painting in which the central figures are painted with great care and detail, while all the others, along with the background, are strewn on the canvas with a few careless brush strokes. I keep my fingers crossed for the third volume to avoid similar shortcomings.
