Ken Liu's short story collection was reviewed here some time ago. He's best known as the translator of Cixin Liu's (no relation) novels and short stories. The Grace of Kings is the first book in his Dandelion Dynasty series, of which four books have been published so far. He was born in China but grew up in Connecticut.
The Grace of Kings follows the exploits of Kuni Garu, a clever man who rises to a career in politics after the empire of Xana disintegrates. As Kuni's legend grows, he is opposed by Mata Zyndu, an imposing figure bent on conquest. Mata and Kuni's disagreements over the nature of honor and the value of tradition frame this saga of empires, with both men slowly coming to new understandings of how their collective history shapes their present day.
While reading this book three other works of fantasy came to mind, these being The Lord of the Rings, George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones and the type of Chinese wuxia novel Ken Liu was channeling when he wrote The Grace of Kings.
Tolkien's books are, like Game of Thrones, one of the pillars of the fantasy genre. They are books heavily reliant on the Icelandic sagas which Tolkien studied before writing his famous trilogy, and more than anything they are products of language, of the fusion of modern English, Middle English, German and the shared pre-Christian history of northern Europe. Tolkien wasn't just fascinated with these subjects, he was steeped in them, and these interests produced the lyrical, highly poetic work that has proved an inexhaustible source of inspiration to so many who followed in his wake.
The Grace of Kings, as you might imagine, dabbles in the same kind of linguistic myth-making, but to a far less satisfying degree. I wouldn't, however, blame the author too much for this. At this point in time it's just part of the genre. His digressions into "classical Ano" fall short of the mark, but they can be ignored at the reader's discretion.
George R. R. Martin's Game of Thrones, to the delight of readers and viewers alike, offered a morally ambiguous take on fantasy tropes. In this respect Martin was imparting more Medieval history and less Medieval literature into his novels, and the results, dragons and zombies aside, feel a lot more immediate than what Tolkien was doing. It's to some extent easier to see ourselves in Martin's novels, even if we're not always comfortable with what we're seeing.
The Grace of Kings embraces this same kind of moral ambiguity, but here the weakness of its attempts at characterization impair the reader's enjoyment of the moral dilemmas present in the story. For all of the ambiguous moments to matter we have to care about the people experiencing them, and The Grace of Kings never really makes us do so. Ken Liu does a decent job with the two "heroes" of his story, but despite the size and scope of his tale he never manages to give us a feeling of who the other people in this story are, and why they're doing what they're doing.
Which leads me to what is, I think, one of the more unfortunate choices in this book. About halfway through two of the characters decide, almost completely out of the blue, to give polyamory a try, and this "modern," "enlightened" decision seems so out of step with the times in which they live that it takes you almost completely out of the book. Likewise a woman sacrificing herself and her reputation for the sake of her people falls just as flat. The sentiment she expresses in that moment, valid as it might be, seems out of step with both the times in which she lives and the person she's supposed to be, and claiming that a deity informed her choice only makes this choice less compelling.
Lastly, there is the Chinese wuxia genre to consider. I haven't read much of this genre, but I am well enough acquainted with it to say that yes, wuxia is this book's direct ancestor. The emphasis on naming weapons, feats of strength and military maneuvers are all there, right down to "Marshal Gin" learning strategy through a game that sounds a lot like Go. Unfortunately The Grace of Kings shares another thing with wuxia novels, and that thing is its paper-thin characterization. Western readers are probably going to find this aspect of Ken Liu's novel particularly hard to relate to, given the more personal, less objective type of fantasy many of us are used to.
Is The Grace of Kings bad? I wouldn't say so. It is in fact the most thoroughly OK fantasy novel I've ever read. This said, it's also extremely forgettable, and aside from a well-paced scene near the end involving Mata Zyndu there's just not much in The Grace of Kings for those who enjoyed Tolkien's or Martin's more famous works.
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