The Promise of the Child

The Amaranthine Spectrum #1

by Tom Toner

Lycaste is a lovesick recluse living in a forgotten Mediterranean cove who is renowned throughout the distorted people of the Old World for his beauty. Sotiris Gianakos is a 12,000-year-old Cypriote grieving the loss of his sister, a principled man who will change Lycaste's life forever. Their stories, and others, become darkly entwined when Aaron the Longlife—the Usurper, a man who is not quite a man—makes a claim to the Amaranthine throne that threatens to throw the delicate political balance of the known galaxy into ruin.

The Promise of the Child is a stunning feat of imagination set against an epic backdrop ranging from 14th-century Prague, to a lonely cove near the Mediterranean Sea, to the 147th-century Amaranthine Firmament. Toner has crafted an intelligent space opera filled with gripping action and an emotional scale that is wonderfully intimate, a smart and compelling debut that calls to mind the best of Kim Stanley Robinson or M. John Harrison.

Genres: Science Fiction, Fantasy, Space Opera, Fiction, Space, Speculative Fiction, Unfinished

460 pages, Hardcover

First published May 23, 2013

About the author

Tom Toner was born in Somerset, England, in 1986. The Tropic of Eternity is the concluding volume in Toner’s debut trilogy, following The Promise of the Child and The Weight of the World.

Reviews

[Sean Barrs · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Promise of the Child is a hard book to read, but it is also incredibly rewarding. It’s not the sort of book that gives everything away at the start. You jump straight into the lives of the characters and have to connect all the pieces together for yourself. It reveals how everything relates to each other as time goes on. My advice: stick with it! If you're overwhelmed or a bit lost, that’s part of the magic. It may sound strange, thought this needs to be read until the very end to appreciate it.

For some readers this may be off putting, for those that like plots plain and straightforward it will probably be difficult, but it really kept me reading. Slowly, ever so slowly, the mysteries began to become a little clearer. Part of this effect was created by Lycaste. He is an artist, and has spent years scale modelling his own ideal house, and he’s very reclusive. He’s fallen in love with a close friend, ultimately, trying to deal with the pain her rejections have caused him. And that’s it. That’s his world. He literally has no idea what else is really happening because he hasn’t been anywhere.

This is where the story begins to feel dystopian. Lycaste’s life is unimportant to the immortals, to those that have true power. They’ve lived thousands of years and they control everything. Lycaste isn’t really aware of any of the history associated with his existence. He knows nothing of the wars or the politics that have caused his present situation. So as the story progresses, and we see deeper into the perspective of the other characters, this universe becomes increasingly complex. In the beginning the reader is a little like Lycaste, bewildered by the world at large, but by the end begins to understand the complexities of the situation.

And the situation is very complex. There are a number of characters bidding for the immortal throne, a right normally granted to the oldest of immortals. The current leader appears to have gone insane to his followers, though in reality he seems to have tapped into a higher state of consciousness. Hopefully this will be something explored later in the series along with his talk of ghosts and the suggestions made by other characters of strange happenings across the story. Despite this political upheaval, there are other wars brewing.

It’s a rather large story, and it’s a rather large world. It has a massive sense of history with its segments in ancient history and flash backs. Another important thing to note is the glossary at the back of this book. It is an invaluable recourse when reading this. If you want to be able to follow the plot, you have to refer to it frequently. This isn’t a bad thing. If anything it’s a good thing because it means that the narrative isn’t constantly interrupted with lengthy explanations of everything. Without the glossary, this book would probably have had to be around 800+ pages for it to make any sense. There are a lot of people to remember, even more places and the distinguishing factors between races are quite detailed too.

So this is a massive story with a plot too large to condense fairly in a review. I’ve only mentioned one character, though there are many interesting figures in here. It’s worth a read if you want an epic space opera told in an unconventional way with lots of originality.

-The author provided me this copy in exchange for an honest review

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[Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Final review, first posted on Fantasy Literature:

The Promise of the Child (2015), an ambitious space opera that spans centuries and multiple planetary systems, begins with a prologue set in in fourteenth century Praha (Prague), where Princess Eliška, married to King John of Bohemia, meets with a man named Aaron to discuss his help with her son’s ill health. The story then jumps to AD 14,647 … but we will meet Aaron (“the Long-Life”) again.

In this distant future, humanity has spread to many worlds and “prismed” into many vastly different races, including giants (the Melius, who can change their skin color at will, and who inhabit Earth, now known as the Old World), a fairy-like race known as the Oxel scouts, and others in between. Overseeing all of the Firmament empire is a small, powerful group of humans known as the Amaranthine, who are virtually immortal due to a mysterious treatment they received long ago. The treatment isn’t perfect, though, and the Amaranthine tend to go insane after fifteen thousand years or so. This causes a problem when the oldest Amaranthine is the ruler of the Firmament, and various factions are intriguing and conspiring to gain control of the empire. But now there’s a disruptive development: an invention called the Shell that might upend the immortality treatment, and society in general.

The three primary characters and plots threads in The Promise of the Child:

• Lycaste, an extraordinarily handsome Melius who is painfully shy and childlike. He lives a quiet life, shunning most company except for a handful of neighbors, including Pentas, a girl for whom he has an unrequited passion. When a glib census-taker from a ruling province arrives and gains Pentas’ affection, a conflict with him will result in Lycaste fleeing through the Old World Provinces.

• Sotiris, one of the oldest Amaranthine, is deeply mourning the recent death of his sister Iro, but meets Lycaste and interests himself in Lycaste’s welfare. Aaron the Long-Life approaches Sotiris with an offer he finds difficult to refuse.

• Corphuso, of the Vulgar race, is the inventor of the Shell. He finds himself and his invention in the midst of a galactic tug-of-war. Ghaldezuel, a Lacaille knight, steals the Shell ― and Corphuso along with it. They embark on a perilous journey through the empire to deliver the Shell to Ghaldezuel’s employer.

There are some marvelously imaginative scenes and ideas at work in this far-future science fiction novel: the splintering of humanity into different races that fill the galaxy (there is no competition from aliens; Earth is the only planet that produced intelligent life). The discovery that a type of theropod dinosaur (think T Rex's) were once a space-faring race, when their spacecraft is found on one of the rings of Saturn, with dinosaurs in spacesuits at the controls. The color-changing Melius: Lycaste’s people default to a bright red skin tone, resulting in them being derogatively called “Cherries” by other Melius. Strips of silk cloth as currency. Hollowed-out planets (“Vaulted Lands”) that people live inside of, lit by an artificial star suspended in the middle. Tom Toner is endlessly inventive.

The background and plot of The Promise of the Child is highly complex, fragmented and opaque. There are multiple moving parts and a whole host of characters to try to keep track of. I kept one finger in the glossary at the end of the book, which helpfully lists characters, breeds, places and general terms, but was still a little at sea for most of the book. It was difficult to get a grip on this universe. There were several different plot threads going at the same time, which will be confusing, possibly even frustrating, for all but the most attentive reader. It didn’t help that a large chunk of the novel was spent with the childish Lycaste, whose debilitating shyness makes him rather slow-witted, which made me rather impatient with him and his storyline … though he appears to be gradually maturing as he travels and gains more experience.

The Promise of the Child ends on somewhat of a cliffhanger, with most of the key conflicts in the plot left for resolution in the next book in the series, The Weight of This World, or future books. This is not a book that will appeal to all readers, even if you like space opera, as I do. But if you’re a reader who thrives on complex, creative world building that requires close attention from the reader, and where the significance of various events is revealed only gradually, The Promise of the Child is worth checking out.

I'm reading the sequel now, so it'll be interesting to see if my take on the series changes.

I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for a review.

[Lyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Promise of the Child, Tom Toner’s 2015 novel begins his anticipated Amaranthine Spectrum of books.

An ambitious mix of Jack Vance and David Mitchell, with a pleasing hint of Alistair Reynolds, Toner has crafted a complex world building with a vast scope, encompassing centuries of narrative backstory. This is also reminiscent of Aldous Huxely and Guy Gavriel Kay with a tapestry like intricacy of ideas and interrelated character detail.

Essentially this is a byzantine space opera told from various perspectives, but centering around three storylines that are held together by Toner’s impressive imagination and storytelling. After many millennia, humanity has changed into several sub-species. Another storyline is told in 14th-century Prague and still another in a Mediterranean setting.

Toner has demonstrated an impressive and imaginative talent.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

The First Fifty Pages of The Promise of The Child: A Play in One Act.

Cast:
Drill Sergeant Tom Toner: Played by author
Tom Toner

Group of readers: Played by themselves

Location: An army parade ground.

(Drill Sergeant Tom Toner stands on an asphalt parade ground before a motley group of readers, his hands clasped behind his back. His gravelly voice rings out in a martial bellow)

"Welcome to literary boot camp!"

(Tom paces around the nervous group of readers, his spine straight, aggressively eyeing each of them in turn)

"You are all here to read The Promise of The Child, book one in the Amaranthine Spectrum series. This is a great book, filled with creativity and a compelling plot. You will see a far distant future world, and explore a brutal gerontocracy that is on the verge of being toppled.

(The readers begin to chatter happily among themselves)

Don’t get too excited. Some of you will not make it beyond page fifty. Some of you are used to having it easy. You read writers who lay everything out for you with few characters and locations, writers who simply communicate their simple plotlines in their simple books for simpletons. You are not going to get that here."

(Angry muttering starts among the readers. Tom begins yelling)

"I am not going to spoon-feed you! This isn't some Paulo Coelho, by-the-numbers comfort-read! You are flabby, unconditioned readers and I'm going to make lean, book-devouring machines of you! Assume the reading position, and we will work through the book's main characters one by one!

(The readers each open their copies of The Promise of The Child and hold their books out before them. Tom paces around the group, snapping out commands)

"Character One! Lycaste - the near-autistic, wealthy, colour-shifting non-human humanoid who lives in a cove where meat grows on trees and has an unresolved crush on a local girl with a traumatic past!"

(The readers calmly flick through the books in their hands)

"Character Two! Sotiris - a politically neutral Immortal of a second humanoid species who lives inside a hollowed out planet and sees his recently deceased immortal sister in a series of weird dreams!"

(The readers turn through several more pages, some having to flick back to re-read a page or two)

"Character Three! Aaron - A 14th century human man who serves a Czech princess and who may or may not have some bearing on the already complex narrative!"

(A couple of readers lose their places in the novel and cast confused glances at Tom, who barks at them)

"Stay focused! You haven't even hit thirty pages yet!

(The readers doggedly find their places again)

"Character four! Corphuso - a member of a third humanoid species and inventor of a mysterious history-altering device stored in a castle that is currently under siege from another humanoid species, using troops comprised of a fifth humanoid species, who employ scouts from a Sixth humanoid species!"

(Fully half the readers lose their places and drop their books to the ground, lost in bewilderment. Tom boils over into fury)

"You are the sorriest bunch of readers I have ever had the misfortune to write for! Login to Amazon and order yourselves a novelization of a Star Wars movie! That’s all you’re good for!"

(Tom takes a deep breath and visibly calms himself. His voice softens)

"The first fifty pages are hard. I know. I wrote them. You must be strong. Once you make it to page fifty-one you will be immersed in an original and entertaining story, brightly lit with sharp, flourish-filled writing. Occasionally things will wander slightly into Science-Fantasy, but you will forgive me, and you'll find yourself becoming genuinely excited at the prospect of reading book two in my planned trilogy.”

(Tom's voice hardens again)

"Now, resume the position. We have twenty pages to go."

The End.


Postscript: Listen to Tom. Get through those first fifty pages. It's hard work, but it's worth it.

Postscript two: I’m sure Tom Toner is a lovely man and is nothing like this IRL.

[Olivia · Rating 5 out of 5]

After my re-read I'm upping this to five stars in July 2018. (First read was in 2016.)

Tom Toner may be the new Steven Erikson of Science Fiction, because he drops the reader straight into an unfamiliar world without any explanation. I'm a fast reader and sometimes tempted to skim more than I should, which works with books set on our world where not every third word is strange and unfamiliar. After reading a third of this novel, almost putting it away for good because I had no idea what was going on, I decided to start from the beginning and take my time.

Whew, what a ride. I've hardly ever been this immersed in another world. Tom Toner presents a world so rich and so fleshed out, I was blown away. It's a creative mix between Science Fiction and Fantasy presenting an innovative future filled with diverse, unique cultures and breathtaking ideas.

Now, let me mention two negative things, because I think they're important. The first thing that bothered me is that this the first book in a series, and it does not stand on its own. It's more a chess board, and now all the pieces have been set, ready to attack.

The second thing is the complexity of the book. While I personally do not mind not knowing what's going on for a good portion of a book, I think Toner expects a lot of attention from the reader, introducing many characters and a dozen different species and places. I was actually taking notes in the beginning. It's not a fast read either, the prose is beautiful but dense. However, the fact there's so much world building, lore, and attention to detail in this book, made it absolutely worth devoting so much time to.

The characters are well developed. Lycaste was a tough one to emphasise with at first, because his mind is so very childlike, but I am very intrigued to see where Toner takes him.

Everything else is fantastic. Toner has definitely created something ambitious and memorable.

I received a copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review, but I loved this so much, I have purchased a paperback copy of this one and the sequel, The Weight of the World.

[Bradley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is an extremely hard book to review not because I can give too much away (I can't) or because I'm conflicted about how much I like this (I'm not).

Indeed, I actually want to rave about it and tell the world that something really special has finally been published that dives seriously deep into future history, has an amazingly complex world-building, and it even manages to remain connected to the things we understand DESPITE adding a zero to the time-frame. Can you say Culture novels? Or some of the far-future Reynolds books?

Enter Toner with a novel that will NOT be on the top of most people's reading lists, unfortunately, but it is not because it's a bad tale or written in a way that will turn people off. Indeed, while reading it, I'm rather impressed that it's easy to follow, but at the same time, it's the little disturbing details that always trip us up.

Far future humanity has splintered into many different races. There are no aliens. We are the aliens. But for these people living in the future, it's all kinds of normal as if they were only traveling to different lands with strange cultures. And indeed, there are many strange cultures. There are immortals who have lived so long that they have forgotten their own names. There are hollowed-out planets. There's boating, void-ships, bird-people, and an empire intrigue.

But mostly, all the devils are in the details. It requires careful reading to pick up on all the best tidbits.

In other words, this is a book to be savored, re-read, and held onto for the sake of a fandom that will eventually, if slowly, rise to cradle this work. What it needs is a cult-following.

I'm willing to join the throng. :) Help contribute to a wiki-page devoted to it. Help find the easter eggs. :)

I only wish that this was READ more so we could all find each other and show off our knowledge of the worldbuilding :) Of course, that means I need to read the two other novels and re-read this one as well. Maybe several times.

Did I mention that I'm conflicted? It's not flashy and it's definitely not a throwaway book. It is, however, one that demands effort.

[Justine · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a really difficult book to rate. There were parts that were really engrossing, but there were also parts that were confusing and hard to mentally fit into the story.

The book starts off by dropping the reader into a completely foreign environment, with no explanation or context. It wasn't until I was about 30% or so into the book that I had a fair sense of what was going on in the different story threads that we follow. This is similar to what Kameron Hurley does in her Bel Dam Apocrypha books, but in a much more confused and vague way that left me feeling adrift at times, which is something I never felt with Hurley's books.

That said, I do think the book is worth sticking with. The scope and imagination of the story is impressive, and I did enjoy the story quite a bit once I got past the halfway mark. I was disappointed that all the main characters were male, and the few minor female characters seemed rather weak or vindictive (or both), but it may be that this will change in future books in this series.

I haven't decided whether I will continue with the series or not, but given that this is a debut novel, I expect that future books will only improve as the author gains more experience in telling this very complex and imaginative story.

[Liviu · Rating 5 out of 5]

wants to be the most innovative sf of the year (and to pick up where sf giants IM Banks and Jack Vance left off by their passing) and it mostly succeeds, though the prose is yet not as polished and elegant as Vance, nor as energetic and powerful as Banks, but considering it is a debut, I would say that the author is by far the most exciting new sf writer in a long time

the story-line(s) which end at mostly tbc points (though some could be construed as cliffhangers) intertwine in ways that make sense only towards the end, so I strongly recommend to persevere through what is a fairly abrupt introduction of the milieu of the Firmament (the artificial habitats under Amaranthine rule), Prism Investiture (the multitude of polities under the races of the prism - human variations evolved/genetically constructed across millennia which the Amaranthine used/helped/fought with/gave technology and which in time spread across space wherever they could) and the Amaranthine (original humans, quasi-immortal as they do not age biologically and have various powers, but they tend to go mad a few thousand years after their 10th millennium when they become part of the elite, the so called, "perennials"; currently we are ~14 k years in the future and the Amaranthine still dominate while having a quasi-democratic, quasi-autocratic polity based on age which is challenged by an enigmatic figure - Aaron the Long life or the Pretender - claiming to be the oldest of all)

quite a few notable characters, including Lycaste who is our most immediate introduction to the prism races and the one with most pages, though until mid-book we do not even realize that/what kind of Prism he is, Sotiris, the most respected of the Amaranthine, Ghaldezuel, a Lacaille knight (the most ambitious Prism race which tried for supreme power not long ago, but was defeated in a 200 year long war by the Amaranthine and its Prism allies, defeat that impoverished the Lacaille, but also empowered other Prism races who may be even more dangerous and rapacious) with an agenda, Lycaste's companions and more

the story-line follows three threads - Lycaste's life (which is to start the uneventful one of an owner of a far away estate in a thinly populated province where nothing really happens at least this is what we and he believe, though among many other things, humanoid birdlike servants, naturally growing food and the ability to change skin color to reflect moods/status show things are quite weird), Sotiris's odyssey in Amaranthine space and more generally, the pretender (Aaron)'s saga seen through various Amaranthine response to it (this includes the casual destruction of a habitat and more) and a mysterious artifact wanted by many


highly, highly recommended and the one new series I am really looking forward to see where the inventiveness of the author takes it, while I expect his writing will only improve and the juggling of intertwining stories, multiple (and quite distinct) pov's and locations will proceed more smoothly

[William · Rating 5 out of 5]

Provided to me by Tom Toner and NetGalley in return for a review.

Fabulous climax, terrifically relaxed and gentle first half, great puzzles and extraordinary variety. It seems slow and confusing to begin, perhaps better chapter segmentation and interleaving would help, but for a first novel, a triumph!

In the early parts of the book, we see short segments and events concerning several characters. These are interesting, but are then mostly abandoned to later parts of the book. A good editor would have paced these disparate stories better, interleaving them with the other characters and events of the book. They are good, but the focus is uneven.

The main first half of the book concerns Lycaste, a gentle and somewhat timid young man, living in an almost idyllic part of the world. Although this is beautiful world- and character-building, I would think that perhaps this should have been a short novella or side story, as James S.A. Corey has done with several characters in The Expanse series: Background novellas on their past lives.

We see several other characters, but their relation to the book as a whole is unclear until the final 1/3 or even 1/4 of the book. It's all interesting, and again the world-building is wonderful, but we feel lost.

In the middle of the book, we see more of Lycaste and changes in his situation and life, his confidence and outlook.

After this, two of the main characters' paths cross, and we begin to see the books epic as a whole.

And the final part of the book is really very good suspense, battle and political manoeuvrings.

Because this is a first novel by Toner, I heartily recommend this, but you must be committed to reading the whole, substantial book to find the real rewards.

I will definitely be reading The Weight of the World, the sequel (continuation, really) soon.

Some notes and updates as I read:
8% It's very, very hard for new authors to get noticed these days, regardless of the quality and originality of their work. So far, I am extremely happy to continue this fine book. Net galley provided it, but this is Quality work truly worthy of purchase. Well done so far, Tom.

10% Quote from the book: "Sometimes Lycaste would sit at his favourite spot, beneath the tall windows of the third tower, its vista encompassing the sea and the hills as well as the far-off blue haze northwards. Not even the highest tower could show you all that, its own view obscured by its position between the other four outposts. In the evening, the sun’s rays slanted crimson into that top room as the flowers wailed, and he wondered if his uncle in all his years had ever felt the same peace and contentment as Lycaste did, sitting quietly and alone in that airy chamber."

12% This is a lovely book, with a wonderful variety of characters and cultures. What a surprise! Love it. Finally getting more time to invest is this rich, complex, wonderful book.

31% The more I read, the more impressed I am with this book. Confident, complex, extraordinary for a first novel. Highest recommendation.

37% Quote from the book: "It was like growing tall enough to reach the building blocks of reality and discovering they were chipped and shoddily painted, a crude message or drawing scrawled up there for good measure, nothing more."

50% Surprise meeting of two of the main characters today. Very nice with great possibilities.

59% Quote from the book: "Corphuso’s first fully formed emotion after realising his device worked was one of profound fear. It raised the implications that there might, after all, be a God...."

[alittlelifeofmel]

I finally admitted to myself that this is not the book for me.

I need to start by saying that the author sent me this book in exchange for an honest review.

I need to say that this book is not a bad book by any means. It does have a low average rating and the reviews are very polarizing but the writing in this book is actually quite outstanding. Tom Toner is a very very talented author, simply in the fact that this is such a complex and deep book and he is able to build all of it so well. The 250 pages I did read were captivating and I was eager to follow the story. There is such a vast world in this book and a great cast of characters and I think that Tom Toner did such a good job with it. This book is hard work. Those who put in the time and energy on this book are the ones who give it such high ratings because there is so so so much good in this story. As well as being hard work, it's very apparent when reading that Tom Toner put an immense amount of effort into this novel and it so shows.

However, I simply do not have the stamina to get through this book. It's vast, it's excessive, it's very complex, and for me that is not what I like in my books. I enjoy complexity but this book for me became more of a chore than enjoyable. It is a very political space opera with an overflow of new terms and species and universes and I was not able to wrap my head around it in the same way that I know others have. You are dumped into this world and left to figure out everything on your own. There is no hand holding by the author to introduce you to the setting and characters, you simply need to read. I found that quite a bit jarring and if I had known I would have been taking notes. The only thing that kept pushing me to pick this book up is honestly the fact that the writing was so good. It amazed me that, while, I absolutely never wanted to read this book, when I did pick it up I enjoyed what I was reading. I read 250 pages over the span of 6 months and I still remember plot points and characters and settings.

So as I said, I really think that the book is good. It is not a bad book at all, I honestly think it's only flaw is that it's a little too much. But for those who love science fiction, who love stories like Tolkein where you are thrust into a new complex world with new characters, and who love space operas and political intrigue, there is so much offered in this book if people just take the time to read it. I, unfortunately, just found it to be too complicated for my brain to comprehend.

[Lashaan Balasingam · Rating 4 out of 5]

You can find my review on my blog by clicking here.

It has been a long time since my mind was challenged this way. Debut novels are often riddled with characters who are easy to cling onto, stories that pave the way for us to follow and settings that are so vivid that your imagination doesn’t need to suffer to visualize it all. The first book of a trilogy usually sets up the narrative and teases the bigger picture slowly but surely, but Tom Toner had other plans for us. With a multi-layered imagination that seems out of control, the author of The Promise of the Child brings us a space opera that seems to envelop countless numbers of creatures, stories and generations.

The scope of this book is immense and is definitely not suited for everyone. The level of complexity in the scheming is insane, and I’m going to straight out admit that I was completely lost for a good portion of the book. While reading, I tried really hard to see where things were headed and why there was so much exposition that left me completely clueless. In order to appreciate the depth of this series, note-taking is almost a necessity as the very premise of the story envisions a universe that has never been brought to life like this before. In fact, I strongly recommend making use of the glossary and to give this series your undivided attention as the mere deviation of thought will leave you floating in limbo.

It is almost impossible to truly summarize this story, but it is safe to say that it takes place in a far away future where mankind has evolved into dozens of different creatures and inhabit distant worlds all around the galaxy. Following a couple of character’s adventure—notably Lycaste, Corphuso, Ghaldezuel and Sotiris—readers are thrown into a universe where immortality is sought by some, but so is salvation and purpose by others. Each of their stories might seem completely unconnected, but The Promise of the Child is only out to set the pieces in motion for the eventual interconnectivity that is tremendously wished for by readers. As you fight the compelling desire to succumb and quit at the mere sight of this story’s intricate and unfathomable vision, it is the boundless freedom embraced by Tom Toner to create this refreshing and original universe that will keep you going until you finally start piecing things together.

The Promise of the Child is not a story that can be taken lightly. It is a leviathan that requires your whole mind and body to be ready and committed. It will drown you in its world-building, and require you to learn to swim as fast as humanly possible in order to survive. For Tom Toner to dish out such an epic science fiction is incredible, and only readers who are ready to sit down and read what his mind has elaborated will find reward in going through this story. Flashbacks and dreams play an essential role in understanding certain events, but ultimately, the adventure doesn’t end with The Promise of the Child. Putting on your most heavy-duty armour might be necessary to trudge your way through this beauty, but it is important to not give up and to get to the end to see how complex this universe is. Even re-reading this novel might prove to be even more gratifying with details so easy to miss. Of course, there’s also the option of robbing Tom Toner’s notes, but that would just ruin the fun of solving this galactic enigma for yourself.

Thank you to Skyhorse Publishing and Tom Toner for sending me a copy for review!

Yours truly,

Lashaan | Blogger and Book Reviewer
Official blog: https://bookidote.com/

[Paul Sánchez Keighley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is completely bonkers.

At first, with the opening Byron and Wilde quotes and a prologue set in mediaeval Prague, I thought it would be a Hyperion sort of deal, mixing far-future sci-fi with classic history and literature. But as I advanced it turned out to be a very different animal indeed.

While it’s certainly a space opera and includes AIs and FTL travel, I don’t think it can be considered sci-fi. Saying this book is sci-fi would be like saying The Lord of the Rings is a historical novel because it has kings and castles in it.

It takes place in the 147th century. It’s one of those cases where the story’s set so far into the future, the author can pretty much do whatever he wants and get away with it. I mean, think about it, 12,000 years in the future! 12,000 years ago we only just learnt how to domesticate the goat!

Everything about this book feels deeply strange and alien, from the multiple species humanity has splintered into to the architecture, social hierarchies, animals, weapons and even the food. It’s a world that takes a couple of hundred pages to get used to, and even by the end you’ll still be re-reading passages to understand what’s happening.

The worldbuilding is borderline steampunk. There’s no trace of anything resembling a computer, and some technologies seem to run on alchemy. Spaceships are often referred to as ‘galleons’ or ‘schooners’ and the captains navigate solar systems using actual physical ‘charts’. Not a complaint, I loved all the scenes that took place on the Wilemo Maril, but I’m pointing this out to highlight how far this is from actual sci-fi.

While the story is bonkers, and the moment in the end when everything clicks together is truly riveting, there’s no denying it’s a first novel. Toner has said in interviews that he mostly improvised this book as he went along, only discovering the benefits of plotting in further books. And it shows; the structure is a bit of a hot mess, with long passages lingering on inconsequential moments, some strange POV changes that come from nowhere and don’t help move the plot along, and way too many questions being answered in the last 50 pages. In all likelihood, Toner will be slightly embarrassed to reread this book in the future, when he’s a more accomplished writer.

The style is odd too. The prose is grand and poetic, with almost impressionistic descriptions. There’s a lot of mention of colour, and considering the saga is called the Amaranthine Spectrum I kept wondering whether it’s intentional. Things are often described with a single colour adjective, which comes across as a bit childish, but ends up having a nice aesthetic cumulative effect… The author studied fine arts, so that might have something to do with it.

Now, I’m not the first person to point this out, but this book has a major problem with female representation. About 90% of the characters in the book are men, and I’m not sure it passes the Bechdel test. At first I thought it was just the Melius species, with whom we spend a lot of time, who live in an antiquated patriarchal society, and I was fine with that. But as the book goes on, you start to realise that every single species and society in the galaxy treats women like procreating ornaments. And that’s jarring. Also, only two 6-page chapters are told from female POVs. 12 pages out of 534.

I struggle to believe this comes from a bad place, and it didn't completely ruin the book for me (I know for some people it might), but I hope someone brought this to Toner’s attention before he went on to write more books in the saga.

[Claudia]

On hold @25%

I thought of giving up totally, but I am putting it on hold for now – maybe I’ll resume it later, if I’ll be in a better mood.

So far, I have found nothing I’m interested in: ideas, vastity, technology or extrapolation of science. There are only three characters PoV:

- Lycaste’s – which is pretty much the story of Adonis (from Greek mythology) before he saw his face in the water
- Sotiris’ – one of the Perennials, who more dreams than lives
- Corphuso’s – the inventor of the Shell, a device of some sort, hunted by everyone

It has a strong vibe from Zelazny’s Immortal and PFH scope but lacks badly on tech part and universe worldbuilding. In fact, for a society of the 147th century is rather primitive, despite the genetical changes and immortality treatment.

I saw in other reviews that it resembles Al Reynolds’ style. Nope, it doesn’t. The only part would be the lack of aliens (the dinosaurs' part on Saturn I chose to ignore, for it completely blown up my suspension of disbelief) and the timeline length but nothing else.

What I read so far is disjointed – the reader is thrown directly in the story – I can’t tell if all three characters are on/underground the same planet or not and which one is that. The only hint is Sotiris remark that the stars are not really stars, him being inside of a dome of sorts.

I read that everything comes together in the end, unfortunately my patience run up now. Hopefully I will regain it in the future.

[Peter · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's the 147th century and mankind has divided, or prismed, into many different subspecies, with radically different looks and cultures and, in many cases, in conflict with one another. At the top of the heap are the Aramanthine, near-immortals with almost unimaginable levels of technology that they use to rule over many of the others, although when a new challenger to their throne appears, they're thrown into conflict. Meanwhile an average citizen living his life gets into a situation where he may need to leave it behind and live as a fugitive. There's also a mysterious device that may change everything. Other stuff also happens.

This is an incredibly ambitious book, particularly for an author's first novel. And I really, really wanted to like it.

I did, sometimes. There parts where I was enjoying it, and a few moments of greatness, but the flaws, although perhaps small at first, by the end of the book wound up snowballing and making the book as a whole faltering significantly.

Maybe the problem was that in some ways it was too ambitious

Let's start with the basics of the setting. Attempting to portray something as far ahead in the future as the 147th Century is a tall order for any SF author. Less than a century back in time on our own world and how we live and interact is practically unrecognizeable. One of the most common ways to deal with the problem is to make the future like the past, and indeed, that seems to be the approach Toner's generally taken here. Not everything mind you, there are obvious pieces of high technology, but many of the plotlines seem to take place in pastoral, somewhat socially regressive societies, ones that still have things like sexism and other bigotries I'd hope we could move past permanently. Made even worse because the Prism races are often very different from baseline humanity. Hold that thought, because we're going to get back to them, but my main point is that the society didn't seem as ambitious as the timeframe. The book has tons of wildly imaginitive differences from our world, and small details of everyday life sometimes crept up in cool way that hit home with the idea that they were in the future, it felt rather boring to me. There was still bigotry. Family dynamics seemed more or less the same. There were still noblemen who lorded their power over commoners. Leaders who get chosen by some arcane set of rules rather than any particular competance. People even still fought with swords!

But where that was boring to me, where the novel differed from things I'd read a thousand times before, the novel suffers from an overdose of complexity, exacerbated by the author not handholding at all. Terms are thrown around and often you don't get explicit explanations for what's going on for a hundred pages or so. Some people like that... and indeed, I sometimes like that. But there's always a balance, and, at least for me, this time, the balance went too far on the side of impenetrability. Take, for example, the Prism races. We don't know exactly what they are for a while. That's actually okay in my book. But the author keeps tossing off names of these various races and factions and it was just far too hard to keep straight who was who and what each race looked like. I completed the book and I still could not tell you which race was the closest to recognizable 21st Century Humans, or any feature of a race's appearance save for one or two. The author may have mentioned it, but there was so much being thrown at me none of the information stuck. And it's not just the people, it's the places. I had no idea where much of the action was happening at any given time, nor how the locations related to each other. I didn't know if different plotlines were on the same planet, the same solar system, or the same galaxy. Sometimes I'm not even sure it's the same time. Eventually we get some answer about the type of environments people sometimes live on, but... I still don't really have a good sense for it all in my head, and locations named fall flat. I remember at one point they ended a chapter with the revelation of the location/destination of a trip traveling in space. It seemed obvious that it was supposed to mean something to me, and I recognized the name being spoken before, but I had no idea what it signified. Now that I've completed the book and remember that moment... I still don't. They probably explained it, but it just didn't stick in my head because there was too much going on.

Too much going on in terms of the details and factions and arrangements, but the same can also be said for the plot. There were, I think, three or four main plots, different viewpoints that the author jumped back and forth between (and occasionally straying to others for a short scene or two). Only one stuck in my head to a significant degree (and it spent most of the book with a rather weak, not-especially-sympathetic character, though at least interesting and mildly relatable). One other one I remember somewhat, but it was hampered by not really being clear what was going on or what the stakes were. And the rest, I remember the occasional scene from. I remember reading the official synopsis of the book to remind myself of things to talk about and one of the intertwining stories I thought, "Wait, who was that? Was he even in this book?" before I finally remembered that he was, though he seemed to be an exceedingly minor character. Maybe I just forgot.

Or maybe he's more important in the next book. Because that is another factor in my lack of enthusiasm, after going through all that, the book doesn't complete the story. That's not a dealbreaker on its own... earlier this year I read Too Like the Lightning that similarly read as one half of a longer work, but in that book it didn't bother me as much. I think one of the reasons is that, in this book, even if I decided to read it, there's no way I'm going to remember even the barest parts of the continuing story when the next book comes out, without rereading it, whereas in other books, it's simple enough that I won't need an extensive reminder. If I read the sequel, I said, at this point, I don't think I will.

Again, it's not that it's fundamentally bad... there is a lot to like, some really cool ideas, and the prose seems to be pretty good from a line-to-line, paragraph-to-paragraph level, and some moments where I genuinely felt emotional investment in some scene or character, even scenes of brutality that give me chills... it just seems the author overdid things, I think, and as a whole it didn't work for me. I really wanted to like it, to love it, but while I was willing to go along with the complexity at first, the more the book went on and on and I couldn't keep track of what everyone was doing or why I should care, I cared less and less. And, there was one other thing, an explanation long in waiting that hit on a personal pet peeve, that made me angry and ruined what little lingering interest I had in the plotline, that pushed it firmly into science-fantasy (which it was already trending towards) when it didn't need to be, when an actual science-fictional explanation would have not only sufficed, but been much better. When they revealed that, I knew I would not be reading the sequel. Maybe I'll change my mind in months to come as some of the ideas settle and stick and stay interesting, but right now, nope, I feel completely done with this universe.

But since, as I said, this book doesn't actually complete any of the stories, I have to rate it on the merits of what I've read so far, an unfinished, unsatisfying story. And, as half a story, it doesn't really measure up to any more than two stars. I doubt I'll be reading the sequel. But what the author did well impressed me enough that I am willing to try him again if he writes something unrelated. There's a lot of talent here, I think it just needs to be channeled a little better.

[Edward Cox · Rating 4 out of 5]

I used to be a reviewer and as such I occasionally had a love/hate relationship with books like The Promise of the Child. I love it because it is unlike anything I’ve read for years, and there is something rather brilliant about it. I hate it because I’m not entirely sure I’m articulate enough to explain why. That’s not Tom or the book’s fault, but still…shut up :)

Two names that get mentioned alongside this book are Gene Wolfe and Michael Moorcock, and I can understand why as it has a fabulous Science Fantasy feel to it. The human race has made it far into the future, and they have evolved - or devolved - into strange and magical creatures spreading out across realms of genuine wonder and imagination. The plot is intriguing, clever, drawing together characters and threads to weave a fascinating tale. As the last of Gollancz’s Class of 2015 to be published, The Promise of the Child caps off the year with style.

Ambitious, beautifully written, Tom Toner has created something memorable and unique. You should read it, even if I’m too dim to properly explain why. I’m still thinking about it, to be honest :)

[Nannah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I received this book in exchange for an honest review.

For someone's first book, this is incredibly ambitious. Unfortunately, a lot becomes muddled and lost in that ambition.

Book content warnings:
rape
sexual assault
sexism & misogyny
homophobia
ableism & ableist language

This epic space opera is told in several PoVs, some less or more important to the overall story (and given more or less scene time, though that's not directly related to their importance).

But first, some background info: it's the 147th century. Now take a look at that again. Whew! That's pretty far future, even for sci-fi (ambitious, like I said!). When humanity eventually took to space, they found the one thing they never expected to find: nothing. Eventually, humanity prismed into several different fairy-tale like races inhabiting different planets on different solar systems, but those on top are clearly the Amaranthine, those closest to us original humans. Basically, they're humans gone immortal. The most powerful of them are the oldest (the oldest that haven't gone "insane", that is), gaining powers as they age in place of body hungers and functions.

One of our main characters is one of these ancient Amaranthine, a man named Sotiris who mourns the loss of his sister. He eventually meets our next main character and ends up changing his life in a major way (for the better or worse).

Lycaste is a Melius, a giant-like race with a famously handsome face from a small, rural cove on the Old World (Earth, as we know it). He lives in the Tenth Province of the Old World, a province of general unimportance as things are--the First and Second are where things really happen, although out in the Tenth . . . it doesn't really feel like it? There's really no mention of law or anything coming from the First or Second provinces until someone from those provinces actually comes into town--and even then, it's not really clear how those provinces impact the Tenth until the last 1/4th of the book. Lycaste is a pretty shy recluse with love troubles (or something . . . ), who really comes into his own as the book progresses.

Corphuso is a gnome-like inventor of a ground-breaking machine known as the Shell. It's a machine shrouded in mystery, so I won't give anything away, but it's something many people of many races covet, including

Aaron the Longlife, another Amaranthine (or is he, really?) who seeks to claim the Amaranthine throne.

As awesome and shiny and creative as the story sounds, it ultimately doesn't live up to expectations because of its sexism, misogyny, homophobia, and as hypocritical as it seems, its lack of creativity.

Sometimes stories set this far in the future develop its culture by taking a huge step in reverse. That is, much of our protagonists' ways of life seem even to our lives right now, outdated--even if there are mentions of super-advanced tech from time to time. I mean, there aren't really any advanced means of communication or transportation between the common people of most races, weapons seem pretty archaic, family structure remains frustratingly similar as it is today (man + wife + children, with the husband the most important head of the family), and political structures that clearly have only men in power.

In fact, save for three women (who serve only as love interests), every main and secondary character is a man. And there are a lot of characters, which only proves how little women matter in this universe's future. They're even derogatorily nicknamed "butterflies" by men, and the more I read the more I became bitter. Why read a story that obviously isn't made for me to enjoy?

Delving further into this, Lycaste is a character that's most often the PoV protagonist. He's obviously someone the reader's should sympathize with, but he's so distasteful that I could never like him. He spends the first half of the book pining after a girl who's obviously not into him that way, and I thought he'd eventually get it, but instead he kept thinking, "she'll understand someday that we're meant for each other." Which is, of course, not okay. He even goes so far as to feel betrayed and angry when she falls for someone else, as if they were something, which they weren't . . . This kind of "nice guy" mindset is really dangerous for women, and the fact that it was never corrected in the book makes me incredibly uncomfortable.

Speaking of uncomfortable, the homophobia in this book is confusing, to say the least, because it serves absolutely no purpose. There's even a man who sexually assaults Lycaste, because why not have the predatory gay trope in a book that already has homophobia, right?

Sure, the concept of humanity becoming all these different races, the concept of the Amaranthine, the Shell, etc., were all very cool, but outside of those ideas, things were far too close-minded and familiar for me to ever feel entranced or intrigued. Cool creatures; but why are there still two genders? Cool powers, but why are only men still in power?? Cool ships, but why are these people/people-ish races still mostly white?

Most importantly, though, the story didn't grab me because the stakes didn't feel personal enough. Stories grow from the main characters wanting and needing something, but these characters were more or less pushed around by outside forces, and weren't proactive at all. Over 500 pages of being led by events rather than having a purpose or drive or wish. In that sense, the conflict felt wandering and less immediate. My heart just wasn't in it.

[DarkChaplain · Rating 4 out of 5]

Review also published here

Disclaimer: The author contacted me back in early February to offer me a review copy of the book. I liked the premise and sample I got on Amazon, and agreed to read & review it. I've also ordered a paperback copy on my own.

The Promise of the Child is a tough book to judge. As a debut novel, it does a lot of things right, some things wrong, but it is so utterly inventive and refreshing, trusting the reader to piece things together on their own rather than over-explaining every single factoid, that for the most part I enjoyed my time with the book a lot. There are just some things left dangling that I'd have liked to see addressed in this book rather than the next.

The big thing to say about this book right off the bat is that it is difficult. It is by no means a quick and easy read. Clocking in at around 550 pages as a paperback (including glossary), this will take time to get through, and moreso because you'll often find yourself checking earlier chapters for things you might have missed, or clues that are being put into new light as the story progresses. It really doesn't hold your hand and expects you to take a wild plunge into the Amaranthine Firmament and its peculiarities.

For the first 100 or so pages you'll probably feel lost and like you are missing something - and you are, because Toner holds back a lot at first. The setting he presents is incredibly complex and in parts convoluted, giving a lot of strange vibes that I'll wager make more sense on a re-read of the novel or the series as a whole. But little by little, mysteries are being peeled back and small explanations offered to the reader. Suddenly your perspective shifts and appreciation grows.

By the end, though, I still felt a little lost in the universe. There are dangling plotlines that are obviously going to come to a head in the sequel(s), which I am determined to read as well, but they made me wait for continuations that just didn't happen in this book, or were still very opaque to me. I have my suspicions, but clear answers on many aspects still elude me - by design, but it does make me worry a bit that I'm simply missing something, or should have re-read a few more chapters after the fact. A little more context and explanation wouldn't have gone amiss, in my opinion, as much as I love it when authors trust their readers to make their own connections. As inventive and exciting as this debut novel is, I cannot deny that it appears somewhat daunting.

Beneath all the complexity, there lies a lot charme, however. Once you start getting the hang of it, you'll find yourself deeply invested in the Melius Lycaste's somewhat reclusive life, his struggles with romance, model house building and his eventual fall from grace. Lycaste's plotline serves to reinforce the strangeness of the world 12,000 years into the future, with its trees growing materials and food, an odd class system and abhuman servants.
Lycaste's progression through his home province and outside allows the reader to cling to something relatable while increasing the scope of the book as the character experiences new things and slowly loses more and more of his youthful innocence. He grew up rather sheltered and most of the world is beyond his understanding. Toner found a great way to gradually introduce the reader to technologies, the wider intrigue and events unfolding.

To me, Lycaste's almost tragic tale was the strongest part of the book, in terms of plot points. His unrequited love, being introduced to outside influences and discovering things he never paid attention to before all made for a dramatic tale. Where a lot of the other plotlines are mysterious and led by characters far from regular humanity, Lycaste just works out to be a relatable point of view character.

On the other hand we have Sotiris, a Perennial Amaranthine, an immortal human of old, getting invariably involved in a fierce play for the crown of Most Venerable emperor of the Amaranthine Firmament. The old leader has seemingly given up and a pretender to the throne is manipulating pieces and people to get what he wants - although what exactly that may be is a mystery for most of the book, and even beyond. Aaron the Long-Life, said pretender, is an enigma. Undeniably powerful, he is stranger than strange, invades the Amaranthines' dreams and Sotiris is hard-pressed to make his choices throughout the book.
I quite liked Sotiris, his personal tragedies and role in showcasing glimpses of our present day, and his reflections on the changes wrought upon the world since.

Besides these two central plotlines, there are others, of course. I have to admit though that, looking back, I am not quite sure they needed to be as elaborate as they ended up being. While the book kicks off with the various Prism-species fighting over a mysterious invention of the Vulgar Corphuso, I wasn't quite sold on how much time was spent on having them chased by the point of view character of a second plotline, some skirmishes and spacefaring. It was great to see some corners of the galaxy and get a broader understanding of how the Amaranthines' rule works and what rivalries exist between the Prism - a collection of various human-descended species, most of which appear to be dwarfish - but in the end little of it all had an immediate effect on the book.

Toner really managed to weave an intriguing and dense net of viewpoints and characters, but it did introduce a few pacing problems to hop around so much. I personally enjoy the switching perspectives in books, but here I was really eager to get back to the most intriguing characters. Though, admittedly, without these plotlines there'd be little enough space travel and void warfare to make things seem a bit awkward.

I know this review is sounding nitpicky, or even negative. But I really didn't get a negative feeling from the book. I liked it a lot, and wish I had the time to go straight to the sequel, The Weight of the World , partially because I really enjoyed Toner's style and courage, but also because I am hoping for more answers to what is going on in the Firmament. There are entire chapters in the book hinting at something even bigger going on, yet these bigger factors barely materialize until the very end, and even then just briefly. There is a lot to the Amaranthine Spectrum, and The Promise of the Child makes me think that I have barely seen the tip of the iceberg.

This is a highly unconventional novel, which does a lot of things I appreciate about good space opera stories. It is a book that demands a lot of attention and thinking on the reader's part, which can be problematic if you feel stressed and want to unwind with a good novel. The Promise of the Child is so full of intricate details that a slip of attention can cost you, especially as this debut focuses a lot on worldbuilding aspects over direct plot movements.
I'd advise against reading it in stressful environments like public transportation or waiting rooms - you'd do yourself and the novel a disservice getting distracted. But if you decide to take the plunge and stick with it through the early sections filled with confusing ideas and wondrous concepts, you'll find a rewarding and intelligent adventure with great twists and a promising future.

Despite my gripes, I want to stress that I had a good time with it. It was not an easy read, but all the more rewarding for it. It is a flawed gem with many breathtaking ideas. I am excited for The Weight of the World and exploring more of this setting. Now that I've gotten to grips with what Toner is doing with his debut universe, I'm ready for more.

[Roddy Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

So, I had this e-mail from Tom Toner in January 2017 asking me if I wouldn’t mind reviewing this, ‘The Promise of The Child’. I was in two minds about this as, being a generally kind sort of person, I was worried that, if I hated the novel, I would have to post a negative review. This has happened before, and I’m sure that I feel far worse about it than the authors involved who no doubt take bad reviews as part of the job and aren’t likely to track me down and give me a good kicking. They haven't as yet, but I guess there's still time.
My fears, it transpires, were groundless, as this is probably one of the best debut novels I have encountered since Alistair Reynolds’ ‘Revelation Space’, which it resembles in some senses. Others have compared it to Gene Wolfe’s ‘Book of The New Sun’ , Jack Vance, Moorcock, M John Harrison and various others who have pursued a somewhat baroque exploration of SF. The style has a fascinating history which extends back beyond Moorcock to Vance, Charles L Harness, Leigh Brackett, and beyond there to Edgar Rice Burroughs and Clark Ashton Smith. One is impressed to see it so freshly reinvented.
Some twelve and a half thousand years from now, Humanity has spread out into the galaxy, finding no other life (barring the one glaring discovery of two incredibly ancient corpses of what appear to be sentient dinosaurs preserved in the icy cold of the outer Solar System.).
All life outside of Earth is descended from that of Earth, and Humanity itself has splintered into various species which exist in a complex hierarchical system, at the pinnacle of which are the immortal Amaranthine.
The narrative follows several key figures. Lycaste is a Melius, a larger human form that can change the colour of its skin. Lycaste lives in what we presume to be a far future Cyprus, and is famous for being – at least in Melius terms – beautiful. Lycaste is a sensitive individual, deeply in love with Pentas, although the love is unreturned. His life is thrown into turmoil by the arrival of a Plenipotentiary, Callisthemon, a noble of a higher caste who is, he claims, carrying out a census. Pentas’ attraction to Callisthemon leads inexorably to an event which causes Lycaste to flee on a journey across the Old World.
Sotiris, originally himself from Greece, is one of the most ancient Amaranthine and suffering from a condition to which the older immortals are prone; a succumbing to delusions. There is strife among the Amaranthine. Traditionally their leader is the oldest of them, and a Pretender, Aaron, has arisen who claims to be older than any living immortal.
War is spreading across the Old World, a war in which Sotiris is a principle manipulator, and in which Lycaste gets unwilling involved.
Meanwhile, a machine which could potentially threaten the balance of power across the galaxy has been stolen and, along with its kidnapped creator, is being shipped between the stars through hostile territory.
This is, it has to be said, a work which demands concentration. Much like Wolfe’s ‘Book of The New Sun’, there are some elements only partly explained, at least at first, which the general reader will either recognise or hopefully pick up on later, such as the vaulted worlds. These are essentially planet-sized Dyson spheres, hollowed out worlds with an artificial sun at the centre. One also has to contend with the various branched off species of Humanity, the baroque and complex societies and their equally complex political and social dynamics. It does however reward careful reading.
There are some devices which are hard to justify under rational science, such as the Amaranthine’s ability to bilocate using a planet’s magnetic field, apparently because of the build up of iron in an ancient body. The Shell, or The Soul Machine, has an even flimsier rationale for its operation, although these are minor quibbles.
One would have expected the presence of some form of Artificial Intelligence but, as with Dune (another baroque series infested with aristocratic class levels) there is a prohibition against creating such things although this becomes an important issue much later and explains some aspects of the earlier narrative.
Toner manages to convey a sense of languid and wistful decadence which pervades the novel, reminiscent of that of Vance's 'Dying Earth' and Harrison's 'Viriconium' sequence. The Old World is divided into rigid divisions of class and race, where everyone it seems has learned to know their place. One can also see a sense of Moorcockian entropy in this ancient society with its arcane rules and casual cruelty.
There is a very interesting scene where Callisthemon, the higher level Plenipotentiary visiting Lycaste's region. discovers that one of Lycaste's friends and neighbours is gay, although the term is never employed. Pentas enquires of him whether men can love each other in Callisthemon's region. Callisthemon appears both amused and horrified by the idea, implying that it would never happen, and insists on changing the subject when he is pressed for an answer. It's a very subtle moment, but it neatlly clarifies for the reader what form of society Callisthemon represents, as is indeed shown in later events.
Lycaste and Sotiris, despite some excursions to follow events and characters elsewhere, are the central two characters, and one could possibly argue that this is to the detriment of the other players. Some, without giving too much away, are unexpectedly despatched.just as one thought they were going to play a major role in the story.
It's a tad vexing that other reviews I have seen posted have noted that they read (whatever) percent of the book and gave up. If this is the case, why post a review? It helps nobody, and one can't be expected to provide a valid judgment having only read a tenth or a fifth of someone's work. I would suggest that the author cannot be held responsible for other people's laziness, although that may well be an oversimplification of the situation. There will always be occasions when one starts a book and realises that one is never going to finish it. One really has to ask the question, is it the book's fault?
In this case, I don't think it is. As a society we have learned to be spoonfed and we tend to shy away from entertainment (particularly books) that might be slightly challenging. This is challenging, but that's not the book's fault. If you can't get into it, don't blame the book. Move on. Find something you like.

[Kari Rhiannon (Moon Magister Reviews) · Rating 1 out of 5]

1 star

Ok, so I actually had a couple of other reviews lined up to write before this, but I feel I need to talk about this one now. I'm usually a fan of darker books, I don't tend to get turned off by violence, or gore, or things that are just plain weird, but I do have a real bugbear with the unnecessary use of sexual violence…that, and books without a single female character of note.

So, the book…

It's touted as an epic space opera in the style of Banks or Reynolds, and it is pretty big…but also wallowing and lacking direction. We follow the POVs of a good ten or so different characters throughout the story, but only two that you'll actually have any interest in. It's basically set in our universe but approximately 12,000 years in the future. Humans left earth, some became the immortal Amaranthine, others evolved into strange Prism races, all seeming to be at war with one another. The Amaranthine, being immortal, ended up holding power, but a power that seems to be waning as infighting weakens their society.

Chapters leap around a bit, there's one set in 14th century Prague that seems to be literally never mentioned again, a couple in the 20th century Mediterranean that turn out to be dreams, and most set in the 147th Century. I'm sure that some of the more superfluous seeming chapters may be important in later books, but since I found them horrendously dull and pretty irrelevant I won't be reading the later books to find out.

This book could have done with some serious streamlining. I know it was supposed to be some grand space opera, but it wallowed in a way that the greats, the Herbert's and the Bank's did not.

Lycaste, the main POV for the novel, is a member of a colour changing race of giants living on Earth. The blurb describes him a 'lovesick recluse'. What that doesn't tell you is that he spends the entire book bemoaning the fact he has been friendzoned, and basically ends up trying to kill the man that his 'beloved' loves instead. I also really did not like that his 'reclusiveness' and the fact he is generally unlikeable seems to be 'explained away' by him being on the autistic spectrum…seriously, if you're going to try and write an autistic character, maybe talk to some autistic people beforehand and don't make already rare autistic characters into gross stereotypes. Needless to say, I didn't like how Lycaste's character was handled at all. There was some really cruel ableist language chucked around that could really hurt readers on the autistic spectrum.

The second POV that gets the most page space is Sotiris, a 12,000 year old Amaranthine, who originally lived his life in contemporary Cyprus. Personally, I think this entire book would have been much more interesting and much more readable if Sotiris had been the main character. I want to read books about amoral space Immortals, not whingy young men (well, giants) from Earth. Sotiris also gets the most interesting, and least offensive plot line. I'm going to sit here and mourn the epic story that could have been.

So, what is wrong with this book…

Whilst the inclusion of rape, sexism, homophobia and ableism in a book isn't in itself a red flag, how it is dealt with, and whether it is given the grief it deserves in book, really is.

I mentioned the problematic depiction of a character on the autism spectrum earlier, and the fact that the book is just generally too long and poorly paced, but there's more.

There are only a handful of named female characters in this enormous book and pretty much all of them either get raped or die…sometimes both. There's even an attempt to explain away the lack of older female Amaranthine by saying they all 'go senile' earlier than the men…which doesn't follow medical statistics at all, but, well, you do you. Also, I'm not going to go into detail about it here because I know it could hurt people, but the character I mentioned earlier, the one who doesn't love Lycaste, literally…I'm not sure the author really intended it to be this way…but it reads like a friendzone revenge fantasy . I had to skip that part entirely, it was so gross and hurtful and unnecessary. All I'll say is that it involved pregnancy and sexual assault…

There's also some really rampant and completely out of place homophobia in this book. One character goes on a rant about how he thinks it's disgusting that two men loved one another, just, out of nowhere, for no real reason. Later, a character is goaded by another character that he's a 'pretty man' and 'gay', as if it's a bad thing?? Then later some dude, that looks like a kid, drugs Lycaste and tried to sleep with him?? Why a) are any of these scenes necessary and b) how did no-one read any of this and think 'maybe this is a little bit homophobic?'

As I mentioned earlier, you can put the most horrible, disgusting content in your books as long as you justify in text that the actions are abhorrent. You're allowed to make points, to use shock and horror, as long as it doesn’t read like torture or revenge porn. Using rape to make a character look like a monster is maybe not advised but possible, however, take care with context! If you're writing a book and you don't take care not to romanticize that act, then you've written something that actively damages rape victims of any gender.

Conclusion…

This a big book with an interesting plotline and envious scope…but it rolled some critical fails when it came to nuanced use of gendered violence. As a woman, specifically a queer woman, this one was not for me.

Many thanks to Netgalley and Gollancz Publishing for a copy in return for an honest review.

Review originally posted at Moon Magister Reviews

[Esme · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is more like a 3.5 for me.

I received this as a review request, it may appeal to those who like space opera. I listened to it on audible so my spelling may be off.

r/fantasy Bingo

Indie Published
Under 2500 GR
Space Opera

Plot:
Hello Malazan fans, are you also into sci fi? If so, this may be your kind of thing. I skimmed through reviews after picking it up because I needed to be sure that I wasn’t the only one mystified by what was going on at around 15%. If you read through the reviews on Goodreads, most of them will mention that the plotline is hard to follow and doesn’t “hand hold”, often being described as a “difficult read”. You’re thrown into a fully realized world and you’re given little explanation for a number of places, people, and timelines. I think audiobook was the wrong choice for this, I usually fly through audiobooks, but for this one, I had to go back and listen a few times to certain parts to understand what was going on, and it’s just one of those books where audio would be great for a re-read.

The book starts out in Progue in the year 1319 with someone named Aaron who comes up again in a storyline that’s 12,000 years in the future. He’s named the “Longlived” and in the future, he’s trying to win over the throne of the Amaranthians.

The Amaranthians are the leaders of all the subspecies of humans that have emerged over the last 12,000 years. The different subspecies are all called “prisms”, and there are 11 different subspecies. The Amaranthians have a king that’s going insane, he’s committing genocide and talks to himself frequently as if someone else is in the room. This isn’t uncommon for Amaranthians, many go insane the older they get and travel to a place called Eutopia to live out the last years of their lives. The Amaranthians are called ‘immortals’, although they do die, it takes thousands of years for them to get to that point.

There’s a new machine that’s been invented by one of the protagonists, a prism species called the Vulgar, and this new machine is highly coveted and word spread quickly about its existence – many different factions of prism are trying to steal it, and it passes from one hand to the next as it’s usurped by one group or another. It’s just referred to as “The Machine” for a large portion of the book so you don’t really know what it is.

Final Score: 12.25/15



Characters:

Lycaste is a younger Melian prism who’s pretty much a social outcast by choice, he doesn’t like being around people and would prefer to be left alone to his model building. He likes to build models of castles and other buildings in his spare time, it helps him think as well as relaxes him. He’s besotted with a woman who doesn’t return his feelings. I didn’t know what was going on here at first, but it looks like that woman was sexually assaulted and doesn’t want to pursue any relationship at the moment. But, he’s pretty persistent and doesn’t understand why she can’t be in a relationship with him. He’s famed for his beauty and people come from all different providences just to see him, to see if the rumors are true. He’s had a number of suitors come looking for marriage as well but isn’t interested in anyone but Penta. He eventually has to flee his home on the run from the law, and has to find a way to get away without getting caught.

Sotiris is a 12,000-year-old Cypriote prism and is more of a serious person, he is grieving the loss of his sister. She went mad and went to Eutopia and died in a drowning accident. There are a lot of flashbacks to modern day times through his POV, and a lot of it gives some backstory to Aaron, the one who’s trying to take the throne. He’s also arachnophobic and paranoid about dying via accident. It’s one of the most common ways for an Amaranthian to die since they don’t age or get sick. He’s much more of an egalitarian than most of his prism. He doesn’t treat Melian’s poorly just because he can, and he’s probably the character I liked the most.

Aaron the Long Life was old when most of the eldest of the Amaranthians were children themselves. He’s an enigma and no one knows where he came from or what his true species is, there are many who don’t think he’s an Amaranthian, or even a human.

There are a few minor POV characters that were in and out like Merril and Corfuso, but those were the major characters.

Final Score: 10.5/15




World Building:

The world building in this is ridiculously complex, and I was trying my best to take notes along with the audiobook. It’s set in multiple time periods, on multiple worlds, and they all seem to be totally separate at first.

The book starts out in 1319 as an alternative history, there’s mention of King Edward of England and the Roman empire. This is where you’re first introduced to Aaron, the long lived.

Lycaste is living in a cove in the Mediterranean sea, back on the Old World, which is Earth. He’s a Melian prism, and on the Old World there are at least 18 different Providences which each have their own language, culture, and belief system. The First Providence is where the ruling class live, and I think that the level of importance is correlated to what providence you live in. The Second Providence also has the elite noble class, and their language is considered to be a close cousin of the ruling class of the First Providence. Lycaste lives in the Tenth Providence, there are only 315 people living in that part of the world, and they mostly keep to themselves. Travelers and strangers are rare, and usually gawked over and fawned upon when they arrive. There are a lot of fish, tropical weather, fruit, and beaches. It’s a rather calming environment and since Lycaste is a calm and cautious person those chapters were rather relaxing. There are a sentient bird species that live on the island and help out Lycos with a lot of household upkeep, they’re considered people since they’re able to talk and have the normal gambit of human emotion. The Melians are a giant species, reaching 10 ft tall, the Amaranthians think of them as an intelligent ‘pet’, most don’t treat them with any sort of respect.

The Black Rainforest is what Corphuso is trudging through in the beginning of his arc. There’s no difference between light and day, and there are predators lurking in the forest picking off members of his group. They all have to tie themselves together so no one accidentally gets lost. It’s hot, it’s muggy, and it’s full of fungus.

The Threen are the prism subspecies that’s suffered the most. They are a tall prism species, almost as tall as the Melians. They are lanky and almost look childlike with huge round eyes that can see better in the dark than any other prism species. They lick themselves clean with long tongues and have a strange creol language – most people consider them to be the most primitive of the prism species, and due to a debt from long ago, they serve the Amaranthians as slaves.

Other than the Threen, the Baphoon prism is one of the most stepped upon. They have been bred for hundreds of years to be servants to the Amaranthians.

There have been prism species that have been wiped out as a response to an attack on the Amaranthians.

Amaranthians, or the “immortals” can live for up to 12,000 years, before going insane most likely caused from living far beyond what’s normal for a human species. The Amaranthians travel to a place called Eutopia when they hit this cycle in their life, it’s where men and women go after they’ve gone insane due to living for so long. Amaranthians eventually stop ageing sometimes being stuck looking as young as 22.

There were some odd things mentioned about homosexuality, “I believe that a man can not love another man, it’s a perversion”. I don’t know how much I buy into the fact that homosexuality would still be treated like this 12,000 years in the future. I would sincerely hope not. There was a counter voice to that opinion, but I find it odd there would even be an argument.

Final Score: 11/15




Writing/Tone:

It’s hard for me to place a tone on this one, it’s not exactly light hearted, it’s not dark either, it’s just sort of tense. There’s a lot of tension between the different species of humans, and with the upcoming fued over the throne for the Amaranthians everything is set on edge.

The writing is very descriptive, but not a lot of simile and metaphor. It paints a rather vivid picture without being overly flowery. I listened to it on audiobook, so I can’t say much about spelling and grammar. The audiobook was good, it’s not the best narrator I’ve ever heard, but it didn’t bore me and it’s far from the worst that I’ve heard.

Final Score: 11/15




Pacing:

The pacing in the beginning is a very, very slow burn. It’s not something you can read quickly, the author expects you to be paying attention to the details so you’re able to keep up with what’s going on. There are a lot of characters, places, and timezones introduced all at once and it’s a lot to take in. I was about 35% in before I started to get the hang of who was who and why they were important to the story. It took about 50% for me to start finding it going at a faster pace, for a lot of Lycaste’s beginning there wasn’t a lot going on, it was focused on character and world development.

Final Score: 8/15



Originality:

This is a pretty original book, it took on so much all at once it was hard to keep up. I liked the split of species, once I got the hang of all of their names and where they live and where they stand in the political upheaval.

Final Score: 12/15




Personal Enjoyment:

This was a very ambitious debut novel, there was a lot going on. There was a lot to like about what was happening with the world building and plot. I wasn’t so keen on the characters though, I never do well with one-sided romance plots, so a lot of Lycaste’s lamenting over someone who doesn’t love him back took away from the story for me. But, a lot of people don’t mind that, so it’s not a flaw with the book per se. I did really like the world building, especially all the alien planets. I think it was a wise choice not adding alien species into the books, it would have made things even more exponentially complicated, but an alien fauna would have been nice (everything living in the galaxy has been transplanted from Earth). I’m a pretty firm believer in that there’s some form of life somewhere on one of these trillions of planets, even if it’s just microbial. The total lack of alien life outside our planet, although it sets an interesting tone, was kind of a bummer. I like aliens 🙂

Final Score: 6.25/10



Audience:

For People who like:

Space Opera
Multi POV
humans evolved into different species
settings far in the future (12,000 years)
epic scale
extensive world building



Final Score: 71/100 (3.55/5 stars on GR)

[zxvasdf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Immortality is drowning in waking dreams that are remembered yesterdays. The phantasms of memory come and go like dense fogs overlaying the present, and when it doesn't matter whether it is really now or remembered, the balmy Utopias beckon.

Light, pure and blinding, enters a prism and bursts into multiplicity. From a technological singularity, man has colonized the stars and become the Prism, each cultivar of homo sapiens distinctly [i]alien.[/i] And the long lives, the Amaranthine, pass the slow, slow, slow, then timeless years in rule.

Fourteen thousand years have passed when we, dear readers, are dropped into this universe. It starts off innocuously enough, deceiving in its placid beginnings. The scope of things aren't apparent until we follow the Amaranthine, the Mellius, the Vulgar, the Lacaille. This many stranded narrative twists and twines, shedding self-referential truths, until it becomes intoxicating. The reader, injected into dramatic beginnings with absolutely no knowledge of this universe and its vernacular, are required to piece together their understanding from quiet eddies within the larger narrative flow. For the impatient reader, perseverance pays off; it becomes very rewarding.

This is the book I was desperate for after reading Gene Wolfe's The Book of the New Sun. Tom Toner's The Promise of the Child, doesn't have that pervasive feel of [i]ancientness[i/], and is less punishing to the reader's ability to connect dots, but is right up there as a masterpiece of SF and the imagination.

Hats off to you, Mr Toner.

[Aoife · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF - 25%

Unfortunately i had to put this down, I wasn't getting anywhere with it and i was just really confused about everything that was happening. There were way too many characters and they all became a jumble to me and i couldn't remember who was who and where they were - they all seemed to be different sort of creatures as well, which could have done with more explaining. AT 25% the story still hadn't kicked off properly and at another time, I would have kept going but unfortunately at the moment I'm too busy and have other books I need to read on my TBR, so chose to make the choice to DNF. Maybe I will go back to this book at a better time to finish the story, I don't know - the writing skill is there, and I really liked the chapters with Lycaste. I just didn't care about anyone else.

[Tudor Ciocarlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

An extremely rich and innovative debut novel that was not what I had expected. I thought that The Promise of the Child will be a hard-SF post-human novel like Quantum Thief, but it was a space-opera with a science-fantasy flavor. I'm very much looking forward to the next volume.

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although not an easy read, it rewards the reader's attention and is, at times, truly wondrous. Not to be missed.

[Jules · Rating 4 out of 5]

A horse walks into a bar and joins his friends at a table.
“What is this?”
“It’s a cake.”
“Looks like a book to me.”
“No, it’s a cake. Look, it’s written on the cover.”
“Oh, you’re right. What kind of cake is it?”
“I am not sure how to define it yet. It's a bitter kind of cake, like black coffee. At first you hate the taste of it, after a while you can't get enough of it. Probably it has to be one of those on the high fiction end.”
“This is My Rule of Thumb: if it’s confusing it’s sci-fi, if it's ridiculous it's fantasy.”
“What if it’s both?”
“Then probably it is new adult romance.”
“Why do you always have to make your reviews in a bar? People will think you’re a hopeless alcoholic.”
“You can’t start a story with ‘A horse walks into a library’. People already know I’m a bookaholic, nothing is worse of a drug than that. Also, I do not write reviews, you do, now we just have a chat about books.”
“You should write your own reviews on some point instead of sucking dry the ideas from the book and tossing the hard work on us.”
The door burst open and in came a tall man with a red-flashing top hat.
‘Telegram! Telegram for Mr. Terrace! Telegram!’
“That’s me.”
“But you’re a horse.”
“Sure I am. Here is my business card.”
*reading* “Mr. Terrace, horse & medical doctor. You are indeed Mr. Terrace. I’m glad you noted horse on the card, else I wouldn’t have believed it. I’ve seen talking doctors before, but I have never seen talking horses. If you don’t mind, what kind of flesh doctor are you?”
“I’m a licensed proctologist.”
“Ah, politician. Brilliant. Here is the telegram, sir.”
*reading* “Please inform the readers that your review might contain minor spoilers that otherwise would not make sense unless you have read the book already.”
“That was kind of pointless.”
“I have this theory that either there are several different writers of this book, or there is one metamorphosed in a kafkaesque way, always changing the…”
“You mean cake not book.”
“Oh, right. As I was saying, changing the style of his approach. At first the… cake is so introspective, the narrator is like a film director panning and zooming, highly descriptive. Despite this you still get a tunnel vision as the author is focusing on color and not on shape, on substance and not on form, leaving the rest on the reader’s imagination.”
“That’s like one of those slow and boring books I never got past the table of contents.”
“Like I said, the book change, sheds its thick skin, if you are patient enough you will be lead to a decaying climax of events, all the blurred pieces sticking together and showing the beautiful painting of the story.”
“You sound so confusing with these words, are you sure you’re not drunk?”
“Alright, I’ll focus on small ideas then. The first part of the book reminded me of Fowles’ Magus.”
“That’s one of the books I stopped at the table of contents.”
“Then you get a taste of Stendhal’s Red and Black, you meet Charon and his boat, the persisting smell of the allegory of the cave, even the book as a whole, by making me out of place at first, reminded me of Reynold’s Revelation Space.”
“I have the feeling the author has the same perverse pleasure as you do, to leave references to obscure things all over his writings.”
“Did he used fantasynamegenerators(dot)com to name his characters?”
“No, he just picked up a botany book and copy pasted from there. I rather liked this, having nice round names with a meaning behind.”
“Can’t we just use these ideas alone instead of a full review? To me it seems a waste of time trying to analyse everything instead of enjoying the cake.”
“You have to, I haven’t covered the complexity of the layered plot and the writer’s beasts, how he humanized some and dehumanized others, making them the hot potato and tossing it to all the ancient Greek philosophers camped in hell. Now, Steve, be a nice bird and read the book, write the review or else you might get eaten.”
“I’m a rabbit not a bird, and you don’t have to be such a hanging proboscis. I’ll make a review when the next one comes. Now, can we eat this cake or what?”

[Terence · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really a 3.5+. I'm rating it, however unfairly, relative to Ada Palmer's and Yoon Ha Lee's efforts. It's a slower burning narrative than either of the other's novels, and depending upon subsequent volumes, I may have to revise my opinion (hopefully, upwards).

[Clare O'Beara · Rating 1 out of 5]

Unpleasant, misogynistic and unreadable.
I have reviewed it on Fresh Fiction.

I downloaded an ARC from Net Galley and this is an unbiased review.

[Catherine Edmunds · Rating 4 out of 5]

“Give me a child until he is seven and I will show you the man,” was supposedly said by the founder of the Jesuits, St Ignatius Loyola. The minute I encountered Aaron at the start of this novel I thought ‘Jesuit’! Okay, maybe that’s just me, but still – this is how Aaron operates. He manipulates. But he also makes promises.

The Prologue opens in Prague, 1319, though most of the story is set unimaginably far in the future. Aaron makes the first of his many bargains, this one with a princess who is to bring him her son when he is seven years old. She has no choice. If she doesn’t hand him over, he will die, so she loses him either way. So far, so historical novel. The next section takes a huge leap forward in time. We meet Sotiris, but he’s dreaming. He understands this is an illusion, he knows what is going on. St Ignatius Loyola (yes, I’m thinking Jesuits again) also experienced a series of visions which appeared as “a form in the air near him and this form gave him much consolation because it was exceedingly beautiful ... He received much delight and consolation from gazing upon this object ... but when the object vanished he became disconsolate”. After Sotiris’ dream, we’re flung straight into classic space opera territory with a fortress under attack, various species mentioned, names that are clearly sci-fi. There is something called the ‘Shell’ that needs protecting, but no clues yet as to what that is. At this point the reader who has noticed there is a glossary at the back of the book will be breathing a sigh of relief, as the names and races are adding up rapidly.

Now then, if you don’t customarily read fantasy or sci-fi, you will probably give up at this point, fling the book down saying, too many races, too many characters, too many weird names, too much unexplained, too much chopping and changing between places and scenarios. If you persevere, however, you’ll realise you’ve got to the end of the prologue, and Part One is about to begin. The various strands will now start to be woven together, though it will be several hundred pages before you’re sure how everything relates. You’re about to meet Lycaste, and he’s going to be your guide through pretty much everything that happens from now on, which is useful because he doesn’t understand it either so we’re all in the same boat.

I’m not going to give away any more of the story, because I’m trying to tell you what it’s about, not what happens, and that’s an entirely different thing. For me, this first volume of the trilogy is about the corruption of innocence, but other readers will see different themes. There are echoes of Faust, Kierkegaard, Jonathan Swift, even the Epic of Gilgamesh, but I’ll come back to them. The whole thing is wildly weird until you start seeing it in its own terms. It is undoubtedly a great piece of complex world-building, in the grand tradition started by ‘Dune’, a book which knocked me sideways when I first read it all those years ago. The book is similarly high concept, though its world is entirely different. I’m glad it avoids the extremes of the modern steam-punk trend, while still giving a healthy nod in that direction with its rusting and patched up space ships. There’s nothing glossy and futuristic here, no clean lines; this is baroque, this is mannerist, this is as far from the anodyne sparseness of old-style futuristic sci-fi as you can get. It’s also a very long way from being hard sci-fi, and aficionados of that genre are regrettably not going to be gripped. They’ll dismiss it as soft fantasy, which is a shame. Sci-fi does not necessarily need to be bristling with hard science to be effective.

If it’s not sci-fi exactly, should we file it under fantasy? It certainly comes under that umbrella through its use of its own mythology, but it’s not sword and sorcery fantasy by any stretch of the imagination, and I’m pleased to report there are no bearded wizards in tall hats.

What we do have is intricate plotting. A large number of promises and bargains are made and broken as the story moves from the tiniest details of a young man on a beach, to a vast breakdown of society at a cosmic level. The strength of the telling is in the fact that the fate of the young man matters to the reader, more and more, and the ‘great events’ that are going on may be vitally important and inform everything that happens to Lycaste, but it’s the man himself whom we grow to care about, on a personal level.

Kierkegaard said, “...every historical era will have its own Faust.” I’m not saying our era has an exact equivalent in this novel, but some striking parallels are undoubtedly there, which I will leave you to discover. Ditto the Epic of Gilgamesh, with its long and perilous journey to discover the secret of eternal life. Gilgamesh learns that “Life, which you look for, you will never find. For when the gods created man, they let death be his share, and life withheld in their own hands”. If people don’t die though – what then? Jonathan Swift was the first writer in the modern era to fictionalise this concept. In Gulliver’s travels, eternal life is a curse, as the extremely elderly become more and more decrepit as the years go by. Very few film versions of the story include this nightmarish section of the book. We prefer little people and giants – and they happen to turn up in ‘The Promise of the Child’ too. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, only two humans have ever been granted immortality, and when seeking these immortals, Gilgamesh enters a paradise full of jewel-laden trees; and ‘The Promise of the Child’ is also full of paradises, of Utopias – but these are where the incredibly old go because they have become insane.

There are people in this book who are effectively immortal; they are ‘perennial’, and while there are enough of them, the old contracts hold, there is peace – but even perennials can be killed, and their numbers are falling. Old age won’t get them, they are relatively safe from that, though they will go quietly insane eventually. But anyone can have a fatal accident, often in the most banal circumstances. Throughout the novel, vast wars are being waged and old alliances are being destroyed. Aaron sees it all and knows precisely what he wants from the outcome. He is getting close. Sotiris knows what he wants too. As readers, we start rooting for Sotiris, but even he will use people, sometimes cruelly if he has to. The critical point is this: Sotiris has – or had – a sister. Aaron knows this, and uses the knowledge.

But we also know, and have known all along, that there’s something downright odd about Aaron’s shadow.

Ultimately, perhaps what this book is asking is the perennial question of what it means to be human – and its corollary: what does it mean to be something else entirely?

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ornate and ponderous, the literary juggernaut that is The Promise of the Child takes its own sweet time to get rolling. Once it does, though, this first volume of Tom Toner's projected Amaranthine Spectrum series is well-nigh unstoppable. Proper nouns proliferate at a dizzying rate—not just individual characters but regions, movements and factions, events and structures... the sort of thing that might prompt fans to build a wiki, obsessively cataloguing the story's manifold minutiae and retconning the inevitable minor discrepancies. Of course, that's all part of the fun, and Toner does have some twelve thousand years of human, post-human and humanoid history to play with.

There is, in general, a tremendous sense of scale in The Promise of the Child—not just of space (despite its Galaxy-spanning scope) but of deep time as well. The Amaranthine Firmament is an old regime, its parts well-used, even decrepit. And while its rulers are immortal, wise and powerful, it turns out that with great age comes great... distraction as well. The Amaranthine have forgotten more than most of the mayfly branches that sprang from old-style humanity ever knew, and while they did build their empire using classic materials—eschewing plastic and other more exotic synthetics for solid substances like iron, leather, stone, rubber and silk—nothing lasts forever without maintenance.

Not even the Immortals themselves...

"He's mad, my dear, like the rest of them." It looked up at him. "Why else would he be here?"
—p.235

Madness is perhaps the most dangerous predicament facing the Perennials, in the long term, although it's not the only one. The mysterious entity known as Aaron the Long-Life is backing a challenger to the Most Venerable Emperor, a threat which has already resulted in the destruction of at least one entire Vaulted Land—a hollowed-out planet enfolding more souls than a solar system's worth of more solid worlds. Proper nouns... Toner must've worn the letters off his Shift keys while typing out this book. I keep wanting to compare him to Jack Vance, although to my discredit I have not read enough Vance to be certain of this comparison. It feels right, though.

I was asked to read this by the author (which is not something I really like to do, in general), but I have to admit I enjoyed it a lot. The writing is solid, and while Toner's milieu is extraordinarily complex, I seldom felt lost within it. And, despite The Promise of the Child being only the first volume of a projected series of unspecified length, it does end well, tying up enough threads to avoid disappointing me even though I am normally series-averse. If you're looking for a novel that rewards a little concentration, one that has more beneath the surface than what's showing on the page while promising even more to come... I think you might like this one too.

[Pedro L. Fragoso · Rating 5 out of 5]

First things first; in one word: Magnificent.

Some ancillary considerations.

This is very much a "mosaic" novel (as per Jo Walton in her indispensable "What Makes This Book So Great", reviewing Maureen F. McHugh's China Mountain Zhang: "A normal novel tells a story by going straightforwardly at it, maybe with different points of view, maybe braided, but clearly going down one road of story. A mosaic novel builds up a picture of a world and a story obliquely, so that the whole is more than the sum of the parts.") Quite. A rich, complex, ultimately rewarding one, and also, viewing as this is the first in a series, very promising.

Speaking of other reviews, in the New York Times piece on Alan Moore's Jerusalem, these terms were used: "lushness of language, grandness of scope, luscious turns of phrase." These are all applicable, without further qualifications, to this book.

Also used was "sheer monomaniacal duration." The Amaranthine Spectrum is also on its way there, these first 400 plus pages clearly being just the beginning of this space opera saga. I for one will be here for the duration.

Writing recently in Whatever about his own latest space opera effort, John Scalzi mused that "because while giving the book a full and complete arc in itself — I mean, come on, you have to do that — I also get to intentionally set up a lot of stuff that will pay off in later books." Toner definitely missed that "come on, you have to do that". This feels more like half, or less  — we'll see, of a book, one that got separated into two or more volumes, as they do in some markets (like in France, where Murakami's 1Q84 was published as a trilogy) than a single independent volume, in any assertion of the concept (well, except the purely physical one).

One last thought: in "The Transformation", I couldn't take out of my mind Voldemort's resurrection...

James Patrick Cronin's narration of the audiobook is portentous. Kudos to Audible Studios for getting this one right!

"Tau Ceti, known as the last harbour, had once been the Twenty-Fourth Solar Satrapy and the border of the Firmament. It was a huge system of fourteen planets: four of them hard little globes of stone pocked with mine-shafts; three completely liquid water-worlds like suspended raindrops; and a collection of sixty-nine moons shared between seven vast, multiply ringed and splendidly coloured gas giants towards the system’s edges."