Lords of Rainbow

"Lords of Rainbow" firmly afixed Vera Nazarian as one of my favorite writers for her incredible ability to get inside the characters' heads and make us feel *exactly* how it is. The novel is a traditional fantasy (very readable quest story) yet so lyrical and beautifully written, it could well be the best (certainly the most lovely) book I've ever read. Highlights of the book for me included the most accurate description of how it feels to be depressed; the sex scenes, which for all their lack of sex or anything explicit, simmered with warmth and tension and seemed all too real; the honest portrayal of the pangs of unrequited love; the weaving of several parallel minor character arcs. Weaker spots were the prologue, and a few areas with abstracted descriptions of magic/deities. The ending is also a little limp compared to the strong beginning. I would love to see Nazarian take things farther, more and bigger with drama and emotions - her strength is definitely in speaking from people's heads, while exercising restraint in any abstract musings, and taking care to avoid occasional repetition of words (like "dandelion hair"). The main character is a woman warrior, supremely capable, and yet realistic. Ranhe wears men's clothings and fights well with a sword, but isn't a ravishing beauty - instead, she's rather homely, and her insecurities are achingly believable. She thinks and talks like a real person, with suprising humor, warmth, and self-awareness. She crosses paths with a beautiful, mysterious nobleman and, intrigued, accepts his offer of a job to be his bodyguard. Rahne thus becomes a heroine in an unlikely story of unrequited love, as the glimmering decadent city of Tronaelend-Lis is threatened by invaders with dark magic, and the secret of the world without color is revealed. The books deserves the highest praise for its exceptional writing, deft world-building and story-telling, and incredible ability to relate the poignancy of relationships and emotions. Vera Nazarian is an exciting writer to watch. I also highly recommend her Dreams Of The Compass Rose, a more polished and fancyful (but less emotionally charged) series of vignettes reminiscent of Arabian Nights, and Salt of the Air, a collection of short stories.

Lords of Rainbow has invaded my dreams. It was suspenseful, emotionally gripping, beautiful, original, pervaded with lush, idiosyncratic sensuality, and challenged by a conceptual quirk of world that at first I thought wouldn't really work, but the story proved me wrong. The romance is both more satisfying than any book I can remember for a long long time, and wonderfully strange. As a political intrigue, the story is fresh, believable, and lightly satirical, but it is the emotions that Lord of Rainbow brought forth, and the feeling of being there, and wanting the characters to . . . and not to . . . that made me get quite cranky when my reading was interrupted for tasks like work, eating . . . Sometimes I was so taken up in wanting to advise and to change events I anticipated (and you can't anticipate anything in this book) that I found I was sitting tensed as a spring. In addition to being a touching and complex love story, the themes in Lords of Rainbow as a whole are powerful. The society and politics are portrayed in depth but with a light and assured touch, as were the characters' individual portrayals. Indeed, I was surprised by the level of subtlety in the telling, and pleased. This writer writes respecting a reader's brains. I found a very emotional involvement, too, especially with the warrior woman, Ranheas, who often made me want to yell at her. This book could have been another (yawn) improbable female warrior tale, very 90s. But this is nothing like that. I also enjoyed the sense of humour running through the book, often with a bittersweet flavour to it, so that I found myself interspersing quiet smiles with some loud goose-honks. The final denouement was totally perfect. I could hardly breathe. And there is one speech in this book that alone is perhaps the most gloriously quirky, yet romantic that I've ever read. As for the concepts of colour and Rainbow, I was suspicious at first because I thought I'd find myself disappointed, but I was wrong. Very much so. So as I reached the great buildup towards the climax, I experienced a conflict of reluctance and greed to consume and be consumed. Reluctance, because I didn't want to reach the end, of course, conflicted with extreme need to know and to once again be in the world of Lords of Rainbow. Even in the crucial parts, I never knew how it would end at all. There was never an inevitability, except that I knew even before the end, that I'd want to keep Lords of Rainbow for my small read-again-and-again collection. The city lives with me, and the forest and the White Roads Inn. I can smell those onions roasting now, and hear the sizzle of the eggs . . .

In Lords of Rainbow Vera Nazarian takes a difficult concept and renders it beautifully. In a world without color, she captures how color affects our perception and character. I was especially struck by the richness of character and description as well as its being a damn good read. I recommend this for all thinking readers.

In this book, which is structured more along the lines of a conventional novel than the equally mesmerizing Dreams of the Compass Rose, Vera Nazarian has created something wholly her own, a narrative voice and an invented realm that are a striking rendering of her unique authorial heart. This is about as far as you can get from regurgitated genre. It's got the exciting battles and the intricate plotting and the sense of enchantment--it doesn't stint on any of the things that we love in fantasy--but it also has a cutting depth of insight into character, and an intriguing eroticism (sensual, sexual, and aesthetic), and a delicious style unlike anything else available right now. It's really the perfect novel for just this point in time: a spicy exotic new flavor for the jaded fantasy palate, but in no way offputting for those who love what's out there and crave more.

Nazarian seems to be hitting her stride with this, her second novel. The story is more coherent than her first, the prose more under control, while still giving the reader little pocket surprises: humor, poetic insights, action, and a really splendid idea in this world leached of all color. Anyone who is tired of the same old medieval fantasies ought to give this novel a try; about all you can predict is that the world will probably regain its color, but how you get there is full of fascinating discursions and distinctive characters. Be prepared to laugh, to nod and contemplate, and to go right back to the beginning for a slow and leisurely reread!