January Book Reviews: Thief Mage, Beggar Mage by Cat Hellisen
Picked up from the library new purchases. In Thief Mage, Beggar Mage, Tet is a nameless mage rejected by his order and cursed by the gods. Suffering from constant pain, he strikes an unwise bargain with a thief lord in the city of the despotic White Prince—risking both his soul and his freedom.
Thief Mage, Beggar Mage is based on Anderson's The Tinderbox, which I would think was an impressively deep cut if there wasn't another book with that premise coming out in June. In the way of the best retellings, some of the elements are familiar—there's a soldier, and a princess, and a tinderbox that summons three dogs—but they're mixed so thoroughly with Hellisen's strikingly original worldbuilding and prose that they're almost unrecognizable. This is not a book that holds your hand as it gallivants through gods and priests, horrible curses, a city held in thrall by mechanical monsters, a thief lord, and secret dragons.
But above all, this is a book about pain. Tet is having a truly horrible time through most of the book: the gods have cursed him with a deteriorating right knee that leaves him in constant, excruciating pain. And THEN the gods appear to him early in the book to give him a task and curse his left knee, too. I don't know how they expect him to get anything done with no legs. Tet's constant agony is a steady presence throughout the book that the reader is never allowed to forget. His options have been cut off, and most of the plot is the deadly consequences of his desperate, pain-clouded decisions slowly unfolding. It's an interesting choice that gives the story the bittersweet tang of a tragedy rather than something brighter.
A striking indie fantasy novel. Hellisen is clearly an author to watch, and I look forward to going through their extensive backlist.
