Spoilers:
The White-Luck Warrior is Bakker at the top of his game. It is book 5 in the overall Second Apocalypse series and is book 2 in the Aspect Emperor trilogy. It is not for casual readers. OK, now that that's out of the way, lets begin.
The book has 4 main story arcs. First: Acha, Mimara and the Skin Eaters survived (well a few of them did) Cil-Aujas and are in the sranc infested forest known as the Mop. The slog slowly becomes more and more desperate and their numbers grow ever smaller. Cleric begins dispensing Qirri- a mysterious drug that allows the band to survive the pace their journey requires but that still begins to destroy the parties sanity. Lots of other horrible things happen to the company but Acha no longer cares about anything or anyone except reaching the Coffers and then Ishual. The book ends with exactly that.
The Second story arc: The Great Ordeal continues its march to Golgotterath. Sorweel is torn between his hatred of the Anasurimbor family and the facts that keep proving their Great Ordeal is no hoax. The Goddess Yatwer has chosen Sorweel to be her instrument and she continues to help him gain prestige and even to fool the Anasurimbors into believing he has become a convert. All this to position him so that he may kill them. * A large part of me wonders if Kellhus was ever deceived by Yatwer and Sorweel or if he knows exactly what Sorweel feels but he pretends not to to draw Yatwer out somehow? Anyways, Sorweel is the main POV for the Great Ordeal. The story ends with the Nonmen of Isterebinth sending an embassy to meet with Kellhus and discuss joining the Great Ordeal. As part of the deal, Kellhus agrees to send 3 royal hostages and Sorweel is chosen to be among them.
The third story arc: Esmenet is ruling the empire and pretty much everything that can go wrong is going wrong. However, her greatest problem by far is her adolescent son Kelmomas. Kel wants to kill anyone that his mother respects or loves. First he started with Sam in The Judging Eye. In this book he sets his sights on his uncle, the Shriah (equivalent of a Pope) - Maithanet. But Maithanet is no fool like Sam and so Kel goes about this murder differently. The various cults of the Empire (especially the Yatwerians) are eager to overthrow the Anasurimbor dynasty and in an attempt to sow discord among the Yatwerians, Esmenet has the figurehead of the Yatwerians in the palace and she agrees to remove all seditious elements from the cult. However, before she leaves Kelmomas assassinates her and begins manipulating his mother into thinking Maithanet was responsible for the murder and that he is planning on seizing control of the empire. Esmenet begins acting irrationally and actually does force Maithanet to seize control.
The last story arc: The Goddess Yatwer gave birth to the White Luck Warrior in book 1. He now begins making his way to eliminate the dynasty that so offends his mother. After arriving in Momemn he kills the assassins that Esmi wanted to use to slay Maithanet and instead he kills Maithanet, and spares Esmenet (for now at least). In the meanwhile, the real leader of the Yatwerians is now joined up with/sleeping with Fanayal, the heathen Padirajah whose greatest ambition is to kill Kellhus. This arc gets less 'screen time' than the other 3 for good reason. It is the least interesting. Or rather, it is the arc which the reader probably has the least invested in. Because honestly, nobody cares about Fanayal or the priestess, and the White Luck is IMO extremely boring.
The story has a lot less of the philosophy that was so notorious (though I actually didn't mind it) from the original trilogy. There's still the little quotes at the beginning of every chapter that more than fill my cup of wisdom when I want to read something deep. The rest of the time I just want to see how my characters are developing or how the battle against the sranc is being fought. The book does not disappoint in either of those at all. Bakker writes the best fantasy battles I have ever come across. Not overly dramatic or stylized but not too abrupt. Plenty violent and chaotic. Excellent use of sorcery, monsters, sranc, heroes...etc. And he understands emotion. Nobody can put madness, fear, jealousy, addiction, fanaticism, torment and lust all in just a few pages the way Bakker can.
Overall, I give this book 5/5. The good far outweigh the few minor grievances I have, and it continues the story that I have come to treasure above any other fantasy series out today. I highly recommend it.
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Top reviews from other countries
Maxx the Cat
Brilliant second book in the Aspect-Emperor series
Reviewed in Canada on June 11, 2011
