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Faction Paradox #4
Faction Paradox: Warring States
The Year of the Metal Rat has brought with it greed and self-preservation. The Everlasting Empire is dying, eaten up from within, and the young upstarts Britain and Russia are circling like carrion-birds, for crows of every nation are equally black. The peasant-sect of the Righteous Harmonious Fists attacks all foreign devils. In the capital, the ancient heart of the Empire, the Europeans are besieged by the Dragon Empress' army and the blood of a thousand Christan converts runs in the gutters. When there is War in Heaven, there is War in the Land. A dagger can be concealed in a smile and this House of Paradox smiles often. Its servant here carries grief like dead petals in her hands and wakes the ancient spirits. Their anger makes the sky weep blood, and we shall pay dearly for her trespass. This is the fourth original Faction Paradox novel.
192 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
October 21, 2017
A great book, Halliday has a way with beautiful little phrases that epitomise the world of Faction Paradox quite unlike any other writer, going into explicit and sometimes scary details of the nature of the rituals performed by the Faction. It made multiple references to my favourite element of the Faction Paradox universe (The Thirteen Day Republic), the structure is a wonderful Mobius Strip, and it taught me about a period of history that I knew nothing about. Please write more Faction Paradox books, Mags L. Halliday.
May 7, 2023
https://fromtheheartofeurope.eu/warring-states-by-mags-halliday/
I gave the Faction Paradox series a try last year before abandoning them as just not really interesting enough. This short novel would have been next in the list if I had persisted. It’s actually not bad, with the Factions of the series getting tangled up in Chinese politics (and European interference) of the Boxer Rebellion period, and the return of the enigmatic Doctor Who character Compassion (featured in several of the Eighth Doctor novels). I was interested enough to finish reading it, though not enough to try getting back into the series again.
I gave the Faction Paradox series a try last year before abandoning them as just not really interesting enough. This short novel would have been next in the list if I had persisted. It’s actually not bad, with the Factions of the series getting tangled up in Chinese politics (and European interference) of the Boxer Rebellion period, and the return of the enigmatic Doctor Who character Compassion (featured in several of the Eighth Doctor novels). I was interested enough to finish reading it, though not enough to try getting back into the series again.
April 23, 2024
An intriguing adventure/mystery novel, told by two opposing forces, during the Boxer Rebellion of 1900: Cousin Octavia, of Faction Paradox vs Liu Hui Ying, a translator sent to retrieve archeological artifacts stolen by British colonizers.
Can't recall all the details off the top of my head, but it was a lot of fun slowly picking up on the fact that something was very strange about Liu's abilities, and that there was definitely something more going on with her than met the eye (even more than she herself was aware of, in fact)
Hilariously enough, this is more of a romance novel than Erasing Sherlock was, and that's only subtext towards the very end.
Will leave a more detailed review whenever I re-read this.
Can't recall all the details off the top of my head, but it was a lot of fun slowly picking up on the fact that something was very strange about Liu's abilities, and that there was definitely something more going on with her than met the eye (even more than she herself was aware of, in fact)
Hilariously enough, this is more of a romance novel than Erasing Sherlock was, and that's only subtext towards the very end.
Will leave a more detailed review whenever I re-read this.
June 22, 2025
FINALLY! A Faction Paradox book that actually talks about the Faction Paradox and follows things in detail. This is the best (and only one I've liked!!) of the series so far.
April 20, 2014
Peking, 1900. An time-travelling steam-train pulls into an imaginary station, carrying two Cousins of Faction Paradox. They've come to investigate artifacts discovered (by Westerners) in the legendary White Pyramid of China. Not the *actual* Chinese pyramidal mausoleums, mind you, but the legendary one. Cousin Octavia will soon encounter a translator named Liu Hui Ling, and then everything will go to heck in a hurry -- the Boxer Rebellion, you know.
For the first time in this series, the Faction isn't hidden between the lines. We get a Faction narrator, someone who knows the score. The story gives us a blizzard of references from _The Book of the War_: witchblood, biodata, the Eleven-Day Empire and the Thirteen-Day Republic, shadow weaponry, timeships. Or *a* timeship, anyway -- Compassion, the thread running through all the Faction books so far -- no points for guessing how she manifests to the Chinese.
I'm pleased to finally get a "real" Faction Paradox story. The description of time-active ritual magic/technology is pleasingly evocative; it has a sense of depth, rather than just being a stack of notions out of a lexicon.
Of course I'm using "real" ironically. I'm glad the earlier books took an outsider slant to the Faction. _This Town..._ is great the way it is! Anyhow if four novels in a row had rolled through the same set of Faction tropes, I'd long since be sick of it. (Like Lin Carter's Cthulhu stories, each of which iterated Lovecraft's gods and grimoires to the point of exhaustion.)
Also, the Faction setting is nicely balanced with a well-researched Boxer-era Beijing. Not that I know anything about the period, but the detail comes thick and fast and laden with the smell of the streets. Later, the smell of the streets on fire.
This is an excellently bouncy adventure. And yes, the Westerner Cousin Octavia and the Chinese Liu Hui Ling wing up getting equal time in the story. Liu turns out to be trained in kung fu, and if the book is somewhat fuzzy on how that happened, it's absolutely worth it. A wuxia heroine squaring off against a Faction shadow-fighting ritualist -- that's the cover art, and it's selling the right stuff.
Really the entire story skimps on setup, preferring to throw you straight into the action. If that's an error, it's on the correct side. Some early comments lead me to believe that this is Octavia's second adventure -- following something about Princess Anastasia -- but I'm not sure where that was published, if anywhere, outside of _Book of the War_ entries. At any rate this one stands on its own. If you've been befuddled and intrigued by my Faction reviews so far, hit _This Town..._ and _Warring States_ and you'll be in good shape.
For the first time in this series, the Faction isn't hidden between the lines. We get a Faction narrator, someone who knows the score. The story gives us a blizzard of references from _The Book of the War_: witchblood, biodata, the Eleven-Day Empire and the Thirteen-Day Republic, shadow weaponry, timeships. Or *a* timeship, anyway -- Compassion, the thread running through all the Faction books so far -- no points for guessing how she manifests to the Chinese.
I'm pleased to finally get a "real" Faction Paradox story. The description of time-active ritual magic/technology is pleasingly evocative; it has a sense of depth, rather than just being a stack of notions out of a lexicon.
Of course I'm using "real" ironically. I'm glad the earlier books took an outsider slant to the Faction. _This Town..._ is great the way it is! Anyhow if four novels in a row had rolled through the same set of Faction tropes, I'd long since be sick of it. (Like Lin Carter's Cthulhu stories, each of which iterated Lovecraft's gods and grimoires to the point of exhaustion.)
Also, the Faction setting is nicely balanced with a well-researched Boxer-era Beijing. Not that I know anything about the period, but the detail comes thick and fast and laden with the smell of the streets. Later, the smell of the streets on fire.
This is an excellently bouncy adventure. And yes, the Westerner Cousin Octavia and the Chinese Liu Hui Ling wing up getting equal time in the story. Liu turns out to be trained in kung fu, and if the book is somewhat fuzzy on how that happened, it's absolutely worth it. A wuxia heroine squaring off against a Faction shadow-fighting ritualist -- that's the cover art, and it's selling the right stuff.
Really the entire story skimps on setup, preferring to throw you straight into the action. If that's an error, it's on the correct side. Some early comments lead me to believe that this is Octavia's second adventure -- following something about Princess Anastasia -- but I'm not sure where that was published, if anywhere, outside of _Book of the War_ entries. At any rate this one stands on its own. If you've been befuddled and intrigued by my Faction reviews so far, hit _This Town..._ and _Warring States_ and you'll be in good shape.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews