Tor Fantasy, $25.95

Review by David Mandeville

Web posted on: Tuesday, September 08, 1998 4:52:28 PM EDT

(CNN) -- I wouldn't normally pan a fantasy novel for being unbelievable. I'll make an exception for David Farland's "The Runelords".

That said, I'll start with the good parts. The bad parts will come soon enough.

The magical power of the runelords is the best part of the book. Runes branded on their bodies transfer the physical and mental faculties of their devotees to them. In turn, the runelords support and guard the devotees for the rest of their lives. So a runelord who received a gift of brawn from a devotee would have the strength of two, while the devotee would be left too weak to walk.

Traditional runelords accept gifts only from those who willingly give them. They support the devotees in luxury. Less scrupulous lords buy or extort gifts from prisoners, the poor, and anyone else that stands still long enough. They guard their devotees only out of self-interest.

Had this been a book about the responsibility of popular rule in a fantasy setting I'd be writing a different review. Farland only touches on this as an overall theme. Instead he reserves this distinction to define and contrast his characters. Their personal view of rune gifts, whether power is taken from or received of their people, provides the deepest view into the characters' inner selves. Unfortunately the rest of their emotional development only qualifies as an overabundance of angst.

The plot

The story revolves around Gaborn, a runelord, the crown prince of Mystarria. Traveling in disguise to arrange his marriage, he encounters assassins on their way to attack his father-in-law to be. He rides to the rescue, but finds it's more than a assassination: it's an invasion. The runelord of the southern empire, Raj Ahten, wants to conquer all of the northlands in order to gain enough power to halt the alien threat even further south. Both prince and conqueror learn of an ancient prophecy. It foretells the destruction of the world in fire and only the reborn Earth King can preserve what remains of humanity.

Guess who gets to be the Earth King and who turns into the front man for the element of fire? Guess whether or not this will turn out to be a trilogy? If you said Gaborn, the southern runelord, and yes in that order, you are correct. I'll bet you can guess the rest of the plot, too.

And that's the biggest flaw. You already know what's going to happen. In some instances you can even guess how it happens. The only real surprises come up when Farland steps outside the bounds of the books reality and into the realm of nonsense.

A few examples: