The Inheritance Trilogy — (2010-2011) Publisher: Yeine Darr is heir to the throne of the Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. She is also an outcast. Until, that is, her mother dies under mysterious circumstances. Summoned by her grandfather to the majestic city of Sky, Yeine finds herself thrust into a vicious power struggle for the throne. As she fights for her life, she comes ever closer to discovering the truth about her mother’s death and her family’s bloody history — as well as the unsettling truths within herself. With the fate of the world hanging in the balance, Yeine will learn how perilous it can be when love and hate are bound inseparably together, for both mortals and gods alike.
  
Available for download at Audible.com .
 The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
 I’m not quite sure where to begin talking about N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. I guess I should start with my pre-reading impressions. This book came recommended to me from a few here at Fanlit, and from many authors and blogs, but I resisted reading it for quite some time. There was nothing in the descriptions that really caught my fancy. It sounded like a typical high or epic fantasy, and even the title, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, seemed to confirm my initial thoughts. I kept thinking, a whole hundred thousand? Will there be a hundred thousand royal family members with a hundred thousand titles? How about a hundred thousand political squabbles? I’m not a big fan of the type of fantasy with long lists of families and loads of political intrigue, and I was so sure that The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms was going to be just like that. I was an idiot.
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is the first person account of Yeine Darr. Yeine is one of three heirs to the Arameri crown. After her mother’s death she was whisked away from her northern barbarian home to the capital city of Sky. She is to compete with the two other heirs for the right to succeed the reigning king, Dakarta. No one knows why Dakarta brought Yeine out of the rural north to be a part of the succession events. You can imagine what would happen in a game of deadly politics between a highly intelligent and savage young lady and the spoiled and educated master schemers of the royal family. To say the least, things quickly get interesting.
The most amazing part of this book is Yeine herself. She is one of the most engaging and charming characters I’ve ever read. She is the sole voice of the story and always stays in character while describing the events of the story.
There are also plenty of gods with unique personalities who each bring something different to the table. There are only a few characters who Jemisin spends a lot of ink on, and the rest are left a little underdeveloped. The world itself is also left a little unexplained. The story’s focus is on the capital city of Sky, and the Arameri family that resides there, so the other lands and peoples, except Yeine’s homeland of Darr, are left in the background. I hope that will change in the sequels.
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is beautifully written and I enjoyed the story a great deal. The fact that this is Jemisin’s debut novel is disgusting. That one person could contain this much talent is a crime upon humanity. Jemisin will join Pat Rothfuss on my “List Of Disgustingly Talented Authors Who I Should Hate From Jealousy, But Can’t Because They Are Too Awesome Not To Love” (The LODTAWISHFJBCBTATANTL, for short). Seriously, the writing is both vivid and entertaining with a very reader-friendly pace and I appreciated that there was none of the hoighty-toighty self-indulgent Arthurian hooey in The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms.
I listened to The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms on Brilliance Audio CD. It was narrated by Casaundra Freeman. Casaundra was amazing. It’s extremely important that the voice actor of a first-person story become that character in the reader’s mind. If a voice is too different than what you would imagine then it is difficult to become engaged. That is definitely not a problem in this version of the book. Ms. Freeman is Yeine, and a delight to listen to. I highly recommend this version, and I’ll be eagerly awaiting the sequel, The Broken Kingdoms coming in November 2010.
—Justin Blazier
 The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
CLASSIFICATION: The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is epic fantasy that mixes together court intrigue, mythology, romantic/family drama, and celestial magics. It brought to mind everything from Jacqueline Carey, Lane Robins' Maledicte, and Marie Brennan’s Midnight Never Come to Gregory Frost’s Shadowbridge / Lord Tophet, John Scalzi’s The God Engines, Daniel Abraham’s THE LONG PRICE QUARTET and the Valkyrie Profile video games.
FORMAT/INFO: The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is 432 pages long divided over 29 titled chapters. Also includes a Glossary, a Clarification of Terms, a Historical Record, an interview with the author, and an excerpt from the second book in THE INHERITANCE TRILOGY. Narration is in the first-person exclusively via the protagonist Yeine. The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is the opening volume in THE INHERITANCE TRILOGY, but acts as a self-contained novel with the book’s major plot points satisfactorily concluded.
February 4, 2010/February 25, 2010 marks the UK/US Trade Paperback publication of The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms via Orbit Books. Cover art provided by Cliff Nielsen.
ANALYSIS: Every year, it seems like at least two or three novels are hyped as the fantasy debut of the year. Some of these books actually manage to live up to the hype, like Scott Lynch’s The Lies of Locke Lamora, Patrick Rothfuss’ The Name of the Wind or this year’s Spellwright by Blake Charlton. Most of them do not. And some books, like N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, aren’t receiving enough hype...
The best thing about N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is the narrative voice of the novel’s main character, Yeine. Accessible, charming, and elegant, Yeine’s first-person narrative grabbed me from the very first page and kept me hooked throughout the novel with her warm personality, vivid and colorful descriptions, thoughtful insights, and fairy tale-like storytelling:
“I am not as I once was. They have done this to me, broken me open and torn out my heart. I do not know who I am anymore. I must try to remember.”
“My mother was the most beautiful woman in the world. I say that not because I am her daughter, and not because she was tall and graceful, with hair like clouded sunlight. I say it because she was strong. Perhaps it is my Darre heritage, but strength has always been the marker of beauty in my eyes”.
“Once upon a time there were three great gods. Bright Itempas, Lord of Day, was the one destined by fate or the Maelstrom or some unfathomable design to rule. All was well until Enefa, His upstart sister, decided that she wanted to rule in Bright Itempas’s place. She convinced her brother Nahadoth to assist her, and together with some of their godling children they attempted a coup. Itempas, mightier than both His siblings combined, defeated them soundly. He slew Enefa, punished Nahadoth and the rebels, and established an even greater peace — for without His dark brother and wild sister to appease, He was free to bring true light and order to all creation.”
After Yeine’s narrative voice, what I loved most about The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms was its uniqueness and imagination. While parts of the book reminded me of other authors and novels like the court intrigue and sensuality conjuring memories of Jacqueline Carey and Lane Robins; the clashing of mortal and immortal worlds evoking Gregory Frost’s Shadowbridge/Lord Tophet and Marie Brennan’s Midnight Never Come; and the enslavement of gods bringing to mind John Scalzi’s The God Engines; as a whole, N.K. Jemisin’s debut is not quite like anything else that I’ve read before.
Imagination-wise, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms may play with a number of familiar concepts like succession wars, mortals enslaving gods, and a floating city, but the book is just brimming with creativeness with the Arameri family divided into nobles or servants based on their status (fullbloods, halfbloods, quarters), petitions which gives a country permission to begin a war, Nahadoth’s many different forms (day, nighttime, etc.), and the history between Itempas, Nahadoth and Enefa some of my favorite ideas in the book.
Another area of the novel that really impressed me was N.K. Jemisin’s polished writing. In addition to Yeine’s compelling narrative voice and the author’s vibrant imagination, the prose was skilled, and at times, poetic; the book’s supporting cast was well-crafted and engaging, particularly Nahadoth; world-building, while scarce in some areas, was for the most part, rich and informative; and the story, which is full of riveting twists, revelations and drama, featured excellent pacing and execution, leading to a powerful and rewarding conclusion.
Negatively, there is very little to say. World-building, like I mentioned, was scarce in some areas with the book focusing mainly on the Arameri, the city Sky, and the Three Gods and their children (Itempas, Nahadoth, Enefa, Sieh, Zhakkarn, Kurue), but it sounds like this is an issue that will be addressed in the sequels. Other than that, I wish the author would have further explored Arameri court politics & intrigues, and felt that the book was sometimes overwhelmed by all of the emotional drama going on.
CONCLUSION: Even though N.K. Jemisin’s The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms has been on my radar ever since Orbit first announced the title in 2008, the book really took me by surprise. Part of the reason is because the novel hasn’t been receiving the same kind of hype and publicity that other 2010 titles have enjoyed, but a lot of it is because The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is much better than most of the debut novels that I’ve read over the years. Extremely well-written, imaginative, emotionally gripping, and featuring a compelling narrator, The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is an almost-perfect debut that deserves far more attention and could end up being one of the best fantasy releases of the year.
—Robert Thompson
 The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms garnered a lot of buzz in 2010 and 2011, and rightfully so. N.K. Jemisin’s debut novel takes a fresh look at gods and humans. She creates a suspenseful story along the way.
The hundred thousand kingdoms all worship one god, the Dayfather, Itempas. The human Arameri, from their floating palace called Sky, rule the kingdoms — all of them. Centuries ago, the priests say, there were three gods: light, darkness and dawn/twilight. Two of them turned on light (Itempas), betraying him. In the war that followed, the god of twilight was killed. The proud god of darkness and the gods’ children who had followed him and “the betrayer” were enslaved, and the Arameri, Itempas’s human allies, given dominion over them.
It is important to remember that history is written by the winners.
Yeine Darr, ruler of the kingdom of Darr and daughter of a rebellious Arameri, is summoned to Sky after her mother is murdered. Although Yeine ruled Darr, she was never fully trusted by her people because of her Arameri blood, and at the palace she is considered nothing more than a barbarian. Her grandfather has named her one of three “chosen heirs” to succeed him as the supreme ruler of the kingdoms, but it is clearly not his intent that she actually rule. She is at best a pawn, at worst a sacrifice.
The enslaved gods, though, have other plans for Yeine.
About a third of the book follows the history of the original three gods and their children. Jemisin puts a new spin on the old “duality” tradition of deities. The rest of the book focuses on Yeine’s struggle to discover her place, and her role, in the corrupt palace; her investigation of her mother’s death and life, and her attempts to figure out whom she can trust. Her two cousins, the other chosen heirs, plainly do not fall into that category, so Yeine must also dodge their murderous schemes. I think Jemisin named the woman cousin “Scimina” for just that reason.
Jemisin also remembers the rules of romance novels, and a key one is: Chicks Dig Bad Boys. She gives Yeine a bad-boy of cosmic proportions. When she writes about Yeine’s infatuation, Jemisin perfectly executes the do-what-you-will-with-me swooniness of a romance novel, but she also gets the tone right when Yeine remembers that she comes from a society of women warriors. Throughout the book, Yeine is believable as a person lost in a strange and dangerous place with, ultimately, only herself to trust. In fact, descriptions of Yeine’s life before coming to Sky, and life in the kingdoms in general, are pretty thin in this book, and for me the societal “rules” of Darr didn’t hold together very well. Fortunately, since all the action and political intrigue takes place in the floating palace, that wasn’t a big deficit.
I really liked The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. The ending is emotionally and dramatically right, and plausibly sets in motion the subsequent books. Jemisin’s writing is smooth and goes down easy. The book was a quick read for me and I appreciated how, even with a first-person narrator, Jemisin managed to maintain suspense, since Yeine’s life is believably in danger from the opening paragraph. If you are looking for an engaging and different fantasy, check this one out. —Marion Deeds
The Broken Kingdoms
 The world has changed over the last several years and the opportunities that are now possible are too hard for Oree to resist, so she left home to seek a new life in Sky. Oree is an artist with a gift for seeing magic, but magic is the only thing she can see. She has set up shop in a promenade section of the great city and has created a pleasant life for herself there amongst friends and Godlings. Things start to get ugly, though, when Oree stumbles upon a dead Godling. The gods have become angry and the religious factions are looking for someone to blame. Oree’s unique abilities and proximity to the crime make her a prime suspect.
When I read The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms I was taken completely by surprise. It was one of those rare moments where I read a book I was confident I wouldn’t like, only to be left speechless at my misjudgment when I was done. I had tremendous expectations for The Broken Kingdoms right from the start. I would even admit to saying my expectations were unreasonable, since there would be no way to repeat the feeling of surprise I had during the first book. Keep that in mind when I say that The Broken Kingdoms is one of the most enjoyable books I’ve ever read.
The relationship between mortals and gods is expanded upon exponentially in this book. You learn about “Godlings” and some more about the original few gods introduced in book one. After the events of the first book, the Godlings have been confined within the city limits of Sky. Oree can see magic, so having Godlings running around leaving traces of it everywhere provides Oree a way to describe things in a very unique way. This is the primary device N.K. Jemisin uses to skirt around the fact her narrator is blind, and it works quite well.
The writing in The Broken Kingdoms feels uncluttered and natural. N.K. Jemisin is the very definition of a good storyteller. There is not a single moment anywhere in this book where I am taken out of her world by an awkward turn of phrase or a careless word. Considering how many words there are in the novel, that’s just a little more than impressive. In my opinion this is as close to flawless as you can get.
I was a little disappointed again that we still know so little about the actual Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. We get a glimpse at a few more lands and people, but not many when you consider how large the world is implied to be. This is not really a big issue, since I was kept in rapt attention from page one. I just hope Jemisin has plans beyond this trilogy for the world she created.
The tone of The Broken Kingdoms is a bit darker than that of the first book. A beautiful mesh of adventure and tragedy make up the heart of the book. I was definitely emotionally affected by the events that transpired. I was horrified, excited, and heartbroken many times over the course of the story. It’s been awhile since I read a book that took me on such a rollercoaster.
I listened to this story on Audio CD by Brilliance Audio. They retained Casaundra Freeman from the first book, which I was glad to hear. Oree has a subtle fearlessness that Freeman’s voice portrays very well. Freeman gives life to Jemisin’s characters in a way I think very few could. The Broken Kingdoms is a wonderful story, and is on my shortlist for book of the year. —Justin Blazier
The Broken Kingdoms
The prologue of The Broken Kingdoms, the follow-up to N.K. Jemisin’s well-received debut The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, picks up right where the first novel left off, as Oree Shoth, a blind Nimaro girl, witnesses the conflagration caused by the freeing of the gods and the (re-)birth of the Gray Lady. After this brief prologue, the story jumps about ten years forward. Oree is now an artist who scrapes together a living by selling art and trinkets to pilgrims. Right in the first chapter, she is a direct witness to two unimaginable events, although at first she doesn’t realize the true importance of the second one. First, she discovers the body of a murdered godling in an alley, and shortly after this she finds a glowing, silent man who she decides to give shelter in her own home. It’s the true identity of this man that’s the real stunner — and while anyone who has read The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms will realize quickly who he is (maybe helped by the unlikely nickname “Shiny”), it takes Oree quite a while longer to understand his true nature and the impact of the events she is quickly becoming part of.
The Broken Kingdoms is a great way to continue the story begun in The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms: even though there’s a brand new protagonist and ten years have passed, this second novel feels like a completely natural continuation. The story effectively builds on the events of the first book, and the returning characters, who are sometimes almost unrecognizable because we now see them from Oree’s perspective, play important roles in the new plot without taking away from Oree’s development. Especially the background information about the Gods’ War adds a welcome new dimension to the back story of The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms.
The narrative style of The Broken Kingdoms is very similar to its predecessor, with Oree telling her story in the first person much like Yeine did, frequently stopping to interrupt herself or consider her words, which occasionally leads to several short segments of text in a row. While this staccato-style narration can sometimes be a bit much, it does give the story a pleasant, personal tone, as if the main character is sitting with you and telling you the story one on one. In contrast with the occasional hesitancy of her narrators, there’s a real confidence to N.K. Jemisin’s prose that was quite surprising to find in a debut novel, and it’s nice to see that this carried through in this second effort.
As for the new narrator, Oree is an interesting character in her own right, but she doesn’t have the same pull as Yeine, who made the first novel such a pleasure to read. While The Broken Kingdoms is a fascinating story, it doesn’t have the same hook as Yeine being thrown into a complex court and a disputed succession. The (admittedly highly original) relation between mortals and gods in this world is by now also familiar to the reader, making this new novel feel like an interesting second chapter, rather than the burst of originality and intrigue found in the first book. (To be fair, the book does introduce an interesting new aspect to this relation, but explaining it here would constitute a spoiler as it’s the hinge-point of the entire plot.)
There’s also a large helping of tortured romance to be had, once again of the mortal-in-love-with-a-god variety, which maybe echoes the first book a bit too strongly. Nevertheless, N.K. Jemisin knows how to write of (and with) passion, so if you don’t mind a dose of romance in your fantasy, this might be exactly your thing. Jacqueline Carey fans, you really ought to check out these books.
One thing missing again, unfortunately, is a more in-depth look at the greater fantasy world. For a series of novels that starts out suggesting one hundred thousand kingdoms, and continues with at least plural “kingdoms” in its second title, it’s a bit disappointing that by far the largest chunk of the action so far is still set in just one city, and aside from a few scenes here and there and some vague references, we haven’t really had a good look at the layout of this theoretically huge world. It would be nice if this fantasy world got fleshed out a bit more in future novels (although a map detailing thousands of kingdoms probably wouldn’t be practical.)
In the end, The Broken Kingdoms is a healthy second helping of what made the first book good, but with a different narrator, some new godlings, and a few new twists. It’s hard to imagine that you wouldn’t enjoy this novel if you liked The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. The Kingdom of Gods, the final volume in the INHERITANCE trilogy, will be released by Orbit in 2011. —Stefan Raets
|
links. Or donate.
