re:mote voices

Title:Abhorsen
Author: Garth Nix
Publisher:Collins

Abhorsen is the third in Garth Nix's Old Kingdom trilogy, completing the cycle started with Sabriel, and launching straight in from the cliffhanger ending of Lirael. That being the case, it may be difficult to talk about the novel Abhorsen without getting into what could be considered to be spoiler territory.

Sabriel introduced us to the Old Kingdom and the role of the Abhorsen. At that point Sabriel was a 17-year-old girl, learning to come to terms with her true role in the Old Kingdom. As a novel it is pretty much self-contained. With Lirael time has moved forward, Sabriel is now something like 40-years-old, has married and has children. Giving us instead Lirael, her novel following her life amongst the Clayr, a race of clairvoyants. To a degree Lirael is the opposite of Sabriel, Lirael knows exactly what she is. Except of course, that she seems to be the latest blooming Clayr ever.

Through the second novel Lirael explores her place with in her surroundings and comes to terms with the fact that perhaps she is different from her family and friends. As the novel progresses it becomes clear that something very wrong is happening, and that Sabriel and the King, who should be dealing with it are across the border dealing with something else. With the end of Lirael, Lirael has met Sameth, Sabriel's son, and it is clear that together they are going to have to save the world. With the varying help of Lirael's magic talking dog and Sameth's magic talking cat they must fight a host of zombies and prevent the rise of something incredibly old and evil.

While Lirael covers a period of years, following Lirael's life, Abhorsen is a lot quicker paced. A somewhat mad dashed struggle to determine what is going wrong and what can be done about it. The result is energetic, and even though these novels seem to be marketed at kids, there is a real dose of the gruesome mixed in with the high adventure. This isn't the elves and goblins of safe fantasy novels, its all zombie monsters and elder gods. The result is a novel that is as much fun as the previous two parts in the series.