Well of Shiuan

The middle volume of a trilogy is always a difficult animal: It lacks both the background and set-up material necessary to introduce the story, and the climax promised for the final third. Here, Cherryh forthrightly treats it as the "bridge" story it is, and it's a rather depressing read -- though necessary for what comes after. Where Andur-Kursh in the first book was a land of armed holds on crags and hard winters, Hiuaj is a slowly-drowning land of earthquakes under the thumb of the qual halflings of Shiuan to the north. Jhirun is a young barrow-folk girl of the south, dangerously fey in the eyes of her family and neighbors, who rejects her home for the legendary prospect of safety in the north when Morgaine and Vanye, her sworn right hand, appear suddenly before her. But where Morgaine spent only a hundred years in the Gate between coming and going, the army she led in Andur-Kursh, and which disappeared into the Gate of Ivrel, landed in Hiuaj a thousand years in the past, and Jhirun is one of their distant descendants. Morgaine's quest this time is to pursue Vanye's cousin, Roh -- who is no longer what he seems -- in an attempt to close Shiuan's Gate before Roh can use it for his own ends. It's a much darker and much more unpleasant journey than the straightforward quest in the first book, but Roh is a fascinating character: How much of the original man is left, how much is now the body-changing qual who inhabits him? You should have all three volumes lined up on your shelf so you can read straight through this one, put it down and pick up the third volume. The whole epic runs to 700 pages and it's well worth your time.

This tale of Morgaine and Vanye following Roh through the gate into a world slowly being engulfed by rising seas is a good deal more engrossing than "Gate of Ivrel". It's a very dark tale, Roh, the halfling qhal, and the humans from the Barrows-hold all seem to be only out for themselves. But it is definitely a fine story, raising important moral questions mainly about Vanye's loyalties and the nature of evil. Many books claim to have transcended the black/white portrayal of good and evil, but with this book (and its even better follow-up, "Fires of Azeroth"), Cherryh truly does achieve what most of them couldn't; exhibiting the ambivalent nature of the border of good and bad. Superb.

This whole series, consisting of "Gate of Ivrel", "Well of Shiuan", "Fires of Azeroth", and "Exile's Gate", is my favorite of any author's, and I've read A LOT. Cherryh's style is clean and dry, but at the same time very intense and passionate. Instead of using flowery words and melodrama to spoon-feed emotion to the reader, she uses common words and short, almost aggressive phrasing. The tension and passion and danger are drawn with a sharpness and clarity that is almost painful. A deceptively simple word or glance between these characters, whether friends or enemies, will at times bring that tension to a breathless peak, but without the expected release afterwards. This is not an easy, exciting Harlequin-esque roller-coaster of peaks and valleys. This is a sharp ridge on a bare mountain with an occasional rock slide. This is not a graceful Puccini aria that makes you want to weep and feel melancholy. This is avant-garde jazz where a single painfully high note is drawn out in the background for so long that you find yourself begging for a release that you fear may never come but then again do you really want it to? It's exhausting, but in the best sense. And about the 4th time I read the series, I found that it was funny too! It is, of course, a very dry humor, but it's there. And not a joke or eccentric comedic bit player to be seen. It's easy to fall in love with these characters. They're very different from each other, but they're both excruciatingly familiar! Cherryh creates the perfect male characters for a straight female audience. Cherryh's men are the kind many of us would create for ourselves. (Which is very different from the men male writers create.) Cherryh's men are capable of great valor and honor, but also of very deep emotion and affection, and self-reflection. Also, her men often feel strong love and affection and respect for other men, without there being any sexual element to it. This is not only unique, but very difficult. The ability to create tension between male characters who love each other without it reading like sexual tension or a Sunday night "family drama" is something I rarely see. I appreciate it when I do. My circle of friends has a shorthand way of expressing our reaction to this exhausting mix of physical danger and emotional tension, just by groaning "AAAAAHHHHGHHHHGHGHHHHHG!!!". If one of us starts off a conversation this way, another might say "Are you dying, or did you just finish a Cherryh?"