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Keys to Paradise #1-3
The Keys to Paradise
The golden key glowed darkly, the inset gem flashing green fire. Inscribed runes spelled out a promise beyond belief. The Key To Paradise. A promise and a quest.
Giles Grimsmate, world-wandering survivor of the Trans wars, had won it fairly in a game of chance. The second key - along with a goodly haul of coin - had been stolen from a rich merchant by Keja Tchurak, master thief.
And when they set out for the invisible Gates of Paradise, Petia, half-cat, half-woman, tracked them with silent night-skills. Yet to enter Paradise, three keys more were needed:
The Flame Key, watched over by a cave-dwelling fire sorceress.
The Key of the Skeleton Lord, devil-guarded in a desert place of scorpions and snakes.
The Key of Ice and Steel, fast-locked in an underground smithy, protected by a frozen demon-prowled maze.
Five keys, scattered throughout a realm of supernatural happenings, strange creatures and otherworldly powers:
Giles Grimsmate, world-wandering survivor of the Trans wars, had won it fairly in a game of chance. The second key - along with a goodly haul of coin - had been stolen from a rich merchant by Keja Tchurak, master thief.
And when they set out for the invisible Gates of Paradise, Petia, half-cat, half-woman, tracked them with silent night-skills. Yet to enter Paradise, three keys more were needed:
The Flame Key, watched over by a cave-dwelling fire sorceress.
The Key of the Skeleton Lord, devil-guarded in a desert place of scorpions and snakes.
The Key of Ice and Steel, fast-locked in an underground smithy, protected by a frozen demon-prowled maze.
Five keys, scattered throughout a realm of supernatural happenings, strange creatures and otherworldly powers:
540 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 1986
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
August 18, 2012
Highly underrated, this was Vardemann's best work and yet almost nobody has heard of it- I read it at least 5 times.
September 13, 2020
I picked up this book for fifty pence from a second-hand stall in a Slough shopping centre (don't ask) because there's nothing I like better than big, trashy fantasy epics with huge f*cking dragons on the cover. The first book in the trilogy, The Flame Key, more than lived up to my expectations. We're introduced to our three protagonists: Giles Grimsmate, Keja Tchurak and Petia in a thoroughly engaging way, as each of them gain awareness of the keys to the Gates of Paradise. Initially mistrustful of each other, they bond after a daring escape from a flame sorceress and her cult of fire demons. Yes, I thought. This is good. I REQUIRE MORE.
However, the second and third books in the trilogy were a bit of a letdown. It seemed like Vardeman hadn't gone through his final edit, or at least had forgotten how to use pronouns. Paragraphs like, 'Giles looked over the map. It was a good map, thought Giles. 'This is a good map,' said Giles to Petia. Petia looked at Giles. Giles liked the map, thought Petia. Giles put the map away,' start to pepper the text. There's also a lot of really good world building in the first novel which was never really expanded on in the subsequent books. While I applaud a fantasy novel that eschews a 'chosen one' or 'who's going to get the throne/magical artefact/magical throne artefact' type of plot to focus more tightly on a handful of characters, I still wanted more of a sense of the wider world. Perhaps that wouldn't have been such an issue if the characters had been more, well, characterful, but in this regard again the sequels fell quite flat. Giles is an engaging anti hero; a grizzled and arthritic old warrior whose family were killed in the Trans Wars (the Trans Wars being those between humans and a race of half-animal people, not a concerted effort to disembowel Graham Linehan, more's the pity). However Keja and Petia are very two dimensional: Keja is a randy lad who likes nice clothes, Petia is a WOMAN and a bit cat like. Later they are joined by Anji who is a CHILD and also a bit cat-like. Exactly how cat-like either of them are is dependent on whether or not the plot needs them to be good at smelling things, or good at fitting into holes or good at just generally being a bit psychic. Some of this can be explained away by them gradually learning how to use their Trans' senses on the quest, but a lot of it is totally arbitrary.
There were a lot of plot points towards the end of the book that I felt were going in a certain direction but then just did...nothing! One of the big bads is revealed to be an actual demi-god, but he acts in a way that is completely human, thus rendering his divinity completely pointless. He has an intriguing hunchbacked dwarf advisor with psychic powers who really hates him, whom I felt certain was going to turn tail and join our heroes but nope. Possibly crushed to death by some rocks, possibly just left behind in an old castle. There's also a running plot about Petia being chased by her rapist; he ends up being killed by Keja and Giles while Petia is sleeping. If you're going to use rape as a backstory because your character is a WOMAN and you can't think of anything else to do with her, the least you can do is let her kill her rapist.
The ending is also a total let down. After all of their questing and searching and comradely antics together, Giles decides to abandon the gang and go to the Gates of Paradise by himself. He justifies this decision by claiming that Petia (the WOMAN, remember?) doesn't want to hang out in Paradise with all its riches and glories and pleasure and shit, because it's better for her to stay and be a mother to Anji. Because that's what women do. That's what women lurrrve to do. And Keja shouldn't be allowed into Paradise because...I dunno, but Giles tries to justify it to himself. Ultimately, and frustratingly, he gets away with it. Admittedly, Paradise is framed as a place you can only enter once you are done or 'content' with your life, and Keja himself admits that he is not ready to enter it, but still the others seem to gloss over the fact that Giles abandoned them all for what he assumed was a realm of endless riches. 'Oh Giles, you grumpy old bastard,' Petia sighed. 'Cheers for randomly running off and leaving me because you thought being a mother is the only thing a woman could ever want,' Petia sighed.
That said, until the last few chapters threw three books' worth of (mildly engaging) character development out of the window, I was generally onboard with the whole thing. There's a couple of really good scenes, like the one where Petia gets drunk and fails to rob a bank, or the bit where they're trapped in some ice tunnels and meet a morally ambiguous blacksmith. I also only counted three evil fatties and one evil cripple, which isn't bad going for a book of the time. But ultimately all you can really call this is a case of diminishing returns.
However, the second and third books in the trilogy were a bit of a letdown. It seemed like Vardeman hadn't gone through his final edit, or at least had forgotten how to use pronouns. Paragraphs like, 'Giles looked over the map. It was a good map, thought Giles. 'This is a good map,' said Giles to Petia. Petia looked at Giles. Giles liked the map, thought Petia. Giles put the map away,' start to pepper the text. There's also a lot of really good world building in the first novel which was never really expanded on in the subsequent books. While I applaud a fantasy novel that eschews a 'chosen one' or 'who's going to get the throne/magical artefact/magical throne artefact' type of plot to focus more tightly on a handful of characters, I still wanted more of a sense of the wider world. Perhaps that wouldn't have been such an issue if the characters had been more, well, characterful, but in this regard again the sequels fell quite flat. Giles is an engaging anti hero; a grizzled and arthritic old warrior whose family were killed in the Trans Wars (the Trans Wars being those between humans and a race of half-animal people, not a concerted effort to disembowel Graham Linehan, more's the pity). However Keja and Petia are very two dimensional: Keja is a randy lad who likes nice clothes, Petia is a WOMAN and a bit cat like. Later they are joined by Anji who is a CHILD and also a bit cat-like. Exactly how cat-like either of them are is dependent on whether or not the plot needs them to be good at smelling things, or good at fitting into holes or good at just generally being a bit psychic. Some of this can be explained away by them gradually learning how to use their Trans' senses on the quest, but a lot of it is totally arbitrary.
There were a lot of plot points towards the end of the book that I felt were going in a certain direction but then just did...nothing! One of the big bads is revealed to be an actual demi-god, but he acts in a way that is completely human, thus rendering his divinity completely pointless. He has an intriguing hunchbacked dwarf advisor with psychic powers who really hates him, whom I felt certain was going to turn tail and join our heroes but nope. Possibly crushed to death by some rocks, possibly just left behind in an old castle. There's also a running plot about Petia being chased by her rapist; he ends up being killed by Keja and Giles while Petia is sleeping. If you're going to use rape as a backstory because your character is a WOMAN and you can't think of anything else to do with her, the least you can do is let her kill her rapist.
The ending is also a total let down. After all of their questing and searching and comradely antics together, Giles decides to abandon the gang and go to the Gates of Paradise by himself. He justifies this decision by claiming that Petia (the WOMAN, remember?) doesn't want to hang out in Paradise with all its riches and glories and pleasure and shit, because it's better for her to stay and be a mother to Anji. Because that's what women do. That's what women lurrrve to do. And Keja shouldn't be allowed into Paradise because...I dunno, but Giles tries to justify it to himself. Ultimately, and frustratingly, he gets away with it. Admittedly, Paradise is framed as a place you can only enter once you are done or 'content' with your life, and Keja himself admits that he is not ready to enter it, but still the others seem to gloss over the fact that Giles abandoned them all for what he assumed was a realm of endless riches. 'Oh Giles, you grumpy old bastard,' Petia sighed. 'Cheers for randomly running off and leaving me because you thought being a mother is the only thing a woman could ever want,' Petia sighed.
That said, until the last few chapters threw three books' worth of (mildly engaging) character development out of the window, I was generally onboard with the whole thing. There's a couple of really good scenes, like the one where Petia gets drunk and fails to rob a bank, or the bit where they're trapped in some ice tunnels and meet a morally ambiguous blacksmith. I also only counted three evil fatties and one evil cripple, which isn't bad going for a book of the time. But ultimately all you can really call this is a case of diminishing returns.
September 17, 2017
The first time I read this I was ten, give or take a year or two, and I absolutely enjoyed it. So, over a decade later I decided to give it another read and...this was really something that should have stayed in the past. Less than a third of the way through I decided to give up on it. Not that the book was absolutely awful, and I'm positive that there are plenty of people that will enjoy it, but it wasn't for me anymore. I'll always remember the first time I read it, and was enthralled with the idea of part-animal people, but... what was once fresh is now stale to me, and I've become more critical of the things I read. Suffice to say that this is quite an old book now, and it shows.
March 11, 2013
The War of Powers has to be Vardeman's yardstick, and when comparing it with The Keys to Paradise, I have to say close, but no cigar. A good story, with some solid, believable characters, but it was just a bit too dry. A few more nasty characters, and let's face it, a bit more spice in the story could have made this one an absolute winner.
December 17, 2014
A good story, told well, with an interesting twist on 'quest fantasy'. If you're a fan of fantasy fiction, you'll enjoy it - the characters are well-drawn and the plot holds together well.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews