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From: aaron@amisk.cs.ualberta.ca (Aaron V. Humphrey)
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Subject: Prograde Reviews--Antony Swithin:The Nine Gods of Safaddne
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Antony Swithin: The Nine Gods of Safaddne

A Prograde Review by Aaron V. Humphrey

Antony Swithin, when he was a boy in England, made up a land called
Rockall, which was in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.  He continued to
elaborate on it, even as an adult, until somebody said, "Why don't you
write stories about it?"  So he did, and now he says there's no stopping
him.

The Perilous Quest For Lyonesse is the first cycle of stories.  It follows
Simon Branthwaite, whose father and brother left England around the time of
Hotspur for a mysterious land called Lyonesse.  Lyonesse is on Rockall, but
nobody is sure where.  Simon sets off to join them, taking the only ship he
can, to a place called Sandastre, where they haven't even heard of
Lyonesse.  For the next three books, he searches for it, and in this book
finally finds it and is reunited with his family.

The writing is in a slightly archaic style--not archaic language, but the
writing reminds me of some 18th-century adventure novel, which is no doubt
what Swithin is imitating.  And Swithin falls into the inevitable trap of
thse who know the world of their writing too well--he spends pages
digressing into the minutest, most painfully detailed descriptions of how
the various cultures function, the whole book grinding to a halt as he does
so.  Generally, he will spend about the first half of the book on this,
then the second half foiling some evil plot, and then moving on to the next
stop on their tour of Rockall.

The third book in the series, _The Winds of The Wastelands_, was the freest
of this problem, since they spent their time traveling through lands that
were deserted, and had to figure things out for themselves instead of
getting a huge dump of exposition by the author.  But things went back to
normal with this one; we go, once again, into minute detail about all
things Safaddnese.  Swithin has sure done his homework, but this falls into
the category of "I've Suffered For My Writing, Now It's Your Turn" from
time to time.

To make matters worse, rarely do Simon and his friends actually have
_problems_.  You know that the author is too soft-hearted to do anything
really mean to them, and he never really does.  Just _one_ death among his
friends might have spiced things up a bit.

And in this book, the gods of the title, although their existence is not
accepted by the Christian main characters, seem nonetheless to make
themselves felt...by coming out of the machine everytime there _does_ get
to be some tension.

I thought that the series would end here.  But apparently, at the end,
Simon and his friend Avran (prince of Sandastre) decide to go back to
Sandastre, where Avran's sister, who is also Simon's fiancee, awaits. But
they decide to go back by a different route.  Why?  Clearly, so that the
author can show us some realms he hasn't yet managed to...

I'm hoping that, eventually, Swithin will settle down and tell us some
stories.  The germs of them are visible in the books so far, but he
obviously needs to get us intimately familiar with every aspect of the
world in which they occur, first...

I would actually be interested to see the series become more of an
alternate history.  How would the presence of Rockall affect European, and
American, history?  I somehow doubt Swithin will get too heavily into this
matter, but one can hope...


%A Swithin, Antony
%T The Nine Gods of Safaddne
%I Fontana
%C London
%D Copyright 1993
%G ISBN 0-00-617855-3
%O GBP4.99, AUD10.95, NZD15.95, CAD6.95
%P 270pp, pb
%S Perilous Quest For Lyonesse
%V Book 4

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