The Fall of Neskaya - Marion Zimmer Bradley & Deborah J. Ross

Points

Violence: 3/5
Drug Abuse: 0/5
Nudity: 1/5
Language: 0/5
Sexual Content: 1/5

Violence: There is war and so there are descriptions of brutal deaths.

Nudity: Taniquel suffers from hypothermia and the person saving her strips down to lend his body heat but there isn't any sexual description about it rather just that he climbed in to keep her warm.

Sexual Content: There is the explanation that in the Tower laran users are a little more exploratory with sex such as two friends have sex but it doesn't explain it in sexual terms but that it happened. Also Aran a sub character admits his love for another male on accident.

Summary

Coryn is the son of a King with many siblings. Thankfully he is a middle child and doesn't have to worry about taking over the kingdom unlike his older brother Eddard. His father seeks an alliance with another kingdom and they desire to have one of his daughters that is the strongest in laran. Laran is the psychic and magical power used to control, build weapons, and create peace. Each person's laran can also have unique abilities from animal communication, telepathy, and various others.

While Rumail a seeker of laran tests the daughters they test Coryn as well and he tells his father that Coryn needs to train in the tower so that he can better tame his laran and that the physical sickness it causes can be curbed in that environment.

After a few chapters we meet Taniquel who is a strong spirited woman that endures a lot of hardship. Her life is forever changed when Damian conquers her kingdom through illegal uses of laran leaving her husbands dead body at the castle gates. Damian is old and seeks to marry his son to Taniquel but she plots a different ending for her once kingdom.

Review

I wasn't very sure about this story because it explained a lot of background for Coryn such as his family who they are and what their relationships are like. But it does play an important role later on in the book so I wasn't bitter about it.

Once Coryn leaves for the Tower everything begins to churn really fast. What I really like was that the relationship between Coryn and Taniquel isn't mooshy gooshy or cliche. They rescue each other multiple times when they are trapped or in desperate standing. For the most part both of them are pretty level headed knowing they have obligations to other people because of their role in society.

There isn't a whole lot of background with the introduction of Taniquel it just starts off and you learn as you go. She is just one of those people that loves the honest truth and refuses to surrender in any situation though it might seem like she is. Kind of like Captain Kirk from Star Trek but prettier.

What I really liked was that it was a clean book overall and it threw curveballs. I really liked the creation of Laran as well that they could enter a psychic world and battle there. Check it out if you want some adventure, pain, friends, and war.


                                  By: J Feistner