Modern Arthurian Knights

I am embarrassed to admit that I was halfway through the book before I recognized that this was a King Arthur retelling, on the other hand that could speak to McKillip’s ability to weave story threads around so that only the bare bones of the legend remains. On the other hand, once I recognized the bones as being King Arthur and his knights, the bones became extremely obvious.

Patricia McKillip has long been one of my favorite authors, I absolutely adore her writing and she hasn’t yet failed to touch me with the stories she tells. I waited a long, long time (Goodreads is telling me that there was only six years between this book and the previous novel- Goodreads is obviously LYING-it was eons) for Kingfisher, and I think the novel is an excellent contribution to her works.

The novel follows three characters. Pierce Oliver is the son of a sorceress, Carrie a gifted cook and daughter of a wizard, and Daimon the bastard son of the King. All three characters are caught up in a the search for an ancient, powerful artifact which could either be the cup that brought their god back to life or the cup the goddess used to restore a dying god to life (conflicting religions and cultures all captured in one teeny little book, mastery), or it could be the cauldron of life that the fae used to stay alive and was stolen from them when they were conquered so many years ago. The novel weaves together magic and technology, so that it feels as though it could be a modern earth though it’s has no recognizable history from our current earth.

I highly recommend this one.