Scholar is the newest book from fantasy and science fiction author L.E. Modesitt, the first of what I presume is a new trilogy that follows up on his highly successful Imager Portfolio. Where the original Imager books were set in a kind of black-powder fantasy European capital city that was vaguely reminiscent of a late renaissance or early Victorian Paris or perhaps Venice, the new trilogy takes the hero, Quaeryt, outside that single-city setting, allowing Modesitt to fully explore his newest fantasy world, albeit at a time that is something like four hundred years prior to that first trilogy’s events. Personally, I really enjoyed that first Imager Portfolio, particularly because of its focus on street-level events and the day-to-day aspects of policing a large pre-modern city, and with that in mind, I was very much looking forward to reading Scholar once I heard that it was scheduled for release.
The story here is classic Modesitt. Quaeryt is a young magician—an Imager in the series’ parlance—who’s employed by what is essentially the series’ King of France analog as a court Scholar, a kind of cross between a classic vizier and a simple in-house librarian. However, Quaeryt has dreams of organizing his guild of Scholars into something greater and of perhaps organizing an Imager’s Guild as well—a thing we know from the previous series that he will succeed in doing—making this newest series more of a historical fantasy triumph than a simple coming-of-age tale. With that in mind, when Quaeryt is dispatched to far-off Tilbor to settle the regional governor and end the local rebellion, we know ahead of time that it’s the beginning of Great Things ahead. In essence, Quaeryt is the new series’ Darth Vader—the hand of the Emporer sent to set things right when the local governor can’t quite put an end to those pesky rebels. The fun in this story, therefore, comes from the fact that the hero is really the story’s heavy, and all of the secondary characters immediately see Quaeryt for exactly what he is—a direct challenge to their positions and perhaps even to their very lives. And while Quaeryt as the story’s viewpoint character doesn’t come across as evil or particularly high-handed, he also doesn’t shrink from overt manipulation, illicit spying, and even targeted covert assassination.
By far my favorite aspect of this story came from the fact that the hero, though written as a nice enough guy, is decidedly calculating, manipulative, and unapologetic. He knows what he wants, and he maneuvers the people and events of the book to get it in what Modesitt is at pains to show is exactly the same manner as the book’s primary antagonist. In fact, one could easily imagine this same series of events turned on its head to give an entirely different conclusion—Quaeryt as evil calculating bastard.
Beyond that, this series, and indeed Modesitt’s work in general, is excellent for its use of the day-to-day facets of life that make up the existence a person’s world and worldview. Modesitt doesn’t tell us that his world is an early Renaissance Europe before the Thirty-Years’ War. Instead, he shows us the reality of the lives of the people who inhabit his creation, touring us through their lives and their shops and houses, giving us a guided tour of his imagination that is in the best tradition of Tolkien and the legions of writers who’ve walked in his footsteps. I therefore recommend this book strongly to fantasy readers with an interest in European history or backstabbing duplicity, a group that I suspect is probably pretty large. There’s plenty to like here, and I personally look forward to the book’s follow-up, Princeps, which is due out in May.
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