Scars of Mirrodin: The Quest for Karn

Magic: The Gathering

by Robert B. Wintermute

Mirrodin—a world of living metal, an artificial ecosystem created by the Planeswalker Karn to support organic life—is on the cusp of cataclysm. When the Planeswalker Venser goes in search of his former mentor, he learns Karn’s life hangs in the balance—and with him the entire plane of existence. For fans of the mega-selling trading card game, the Gathering ®, the full story behind Scars of Mirrodin, a revisitation one of Magic’s most popular settings.

Genres: Fantasy, Magic, Fiction, Ebooks

304 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published April 6, 2011

Reviews

[Gabriel Veiga · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad, but the pacing is really off. The book feels like it was written with a direct sequel in mind that never happened: it is needlessly long and repetitive for what it is, and ends abruptly with no real payoff and a lot of new questions.
Most of the characters feel one-dimensional, though I'm very fond of Venser and his analytical points of view. The way one particular character was handled, namely by being completely ignored during a series of chapters, annoyed me immensely and further illustrated the repetitiveness of the book.

[Quinton Baran · Rating 1 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this book, but I couldn't finish it. I struggled through about 40 pages before deciding to put it down. That has been a wonderful discovery to me, enpowering myself to not finish a book (or other entertainment) when it isn't enjoyable, instead of forcing my way through.

I found the characters to be bland and boring. None of them pulled me into the story and I found I didn't care about them or what was going on (I say this when I was really interested in this story going in, being a big Magic fan and having a good supply of Vorthos in me).

[Scott · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was hot garbage. It was almost beat for beat identical to Zendikar: Here's 3 characters, 2 of whom are planeswalkers, and they journey through this plane to reach some central location. Along they way they run into random, minor inconveniences, kill a bunch of faceless enemies, and reach their goal.

Boring.

[Matthew · Rating 4 out of 5]

I guess this book messes with the constraining Magic: The Gathering world's continuity. And it has a couple of typos.

I'm indifferent to the world's continuity. I am aware that at all levels of publishing, a typo or two will get through. Neither of those things bother me enough to push me out. Feel free to use that caveat to disregard the fact that I really liked this book.

Seriously bleak. Blood and bone and viscera. A bit of a Heart of Darkness/Apocalypse Now journey into the depths—the setting like a vast, corrupted body. The bodies of the three on the journey themselves tainted with forms of corruption: Venser's addiction, Elspeth's memories, Koth trying to connect to the corruption of his home.

Tube after tube, deeper and deeper movement, layer after layer of blood and black oil and muck.

[Ieroklis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Venser nooooo

[Miguel Pinto · Rating 4 out of 5]

i gave it a 4 but it should have a 3.
the plot is very slow, it is hard to follow, some of the characters are shallow. for those who don't know Karn he is only introduced so many pages intro the book, that for those unaware of the character might make feel the book unsavory.
the details on the description are very good, and it gets you into Mirrodin, but fails miserably at making you feel engaged to the story.
its a pity a good story so shallowly approached ... a pitty

[Eric Sanchez · Rating 3 out of 5]

Far from perfect but I enjoyed the disturbing imagery and was entertained the whole way through. This was my first MTG novel and I'm excited to read many more.

I will admit the characters were a bit one note, the author forgetting a character for a bit was not very professional and the ending was abrupt, but as long as you don't take your books too seriously you should still be able to enjoy this book.

[Etti Cohen · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book was quite disappointing, it felt like the characters were ooc,
It annoyed me greatly because both Elspath and Venser were characters I truly liked in other books.
Also The adventure itself was pretty odd and confusing at times.

[A.L. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've read a handful of the recent Magic: the Gathering novels and of that group this is my favorite. It's not a book that's going to win an awards (gaming novels are unfortunately the literary equivalent of made for TV movies), but if you like the game, it will make you want to play even more - which I'm sure is the point. :)

This book is, as the title suggests, a quest. The three main characters, Venser, Koth, and Elspeth, traverse the metal plane of Mirrodin in search of the plane's creator, a demi-god-like golem, Karn. The three heroes are a dysfunctional team but they eventually learn to work together through a series of trials. Along the way they face incredible peril, starvation, dehydration, and certain death. While this is a common formula for the fantasy genre, it's common because it works.

[slight spoiler warning]
My favorite piece of this novel is the interaction among the three protagonists. I thought the author, Robert Wintermute, did a great job in creating three distinct heroes that have separate reasons for wanting the villains defeated. Every great hero has an origin story (Batman loses his parents, Spider-Man sees his Uncle Ben die, Superman's planet blows up, etc. etc. etc.) and the three protagonists of this book are given their own unique backgrounds and motivations. I won't ruin the book by relaying them all in detail here, but I suffice to say that Wintermute does a good job of slowly revealing their motivations throughout the story.

It was also interesting to me that each hero had a dark secret (unlike heroes like Superman, or even early versions of Batman): Venser is an addict, Koth has suffered public humiliation, and Elspeth is the victim of shameful acts. These three secrets - addiction, humiliation, and shame - are universal struggles. Most readers (I imagine) can resonate with at least the fear of one or more of them, if not the reality of one or more of them. Whether that was intentional or not on the part of Wintermute I don't know. But I think it makes for great characters.

I also appreciated how the use of magic was subtle in this book. The author didn't interrupt the story by trying too hard to explain how everything worked. I think if he had it might've slowed down the quest. The magic was simple, the characters "uttered words of power," and grasped at "tethers of mana."

This book was also the goriest of any Magic: the Gathering novel I've read. That's not my taste at all. I did not enjoy the graphic descriptions of the inner chamber of a Phyrexian stronghold. There was a lot more blood 'n guts (for lack of a better term) than I expected. That said, I don't fault the book for being gory. If you know the game at all, you already know that the Phyrexians are a pretty horrific bunch. So, the gore was not misplaced, it's just not my cup of tea.

When it's all said and done I'm glad I read this book. It had a group of interesting heroes, terrible villains, and it made me want to play Magic.

[Brian Berry]

So my choice for my book was a novel from the card game series Magic the Gathering. Each novel tells the story of a planeswalker, a being that can travel between dimensions. My book is about three planeswalkers that must travel across the plane of Mirrodin, a vastless metal plane that is currently being invaded by the evil Phyrexians. The story’s characters are Koth of the Hammer, a planeswalker who is an inhabitant of Mirrodin and one that I would like to be because his specialty is fire and metallurgy. Another character is the artificer Venser, a planeswalker that can teleport. Finally there’s Elspeth Tirel, a planeswalker that can fight ferociously and can support her team with magic. The main reason why they were on this plain was to find Karn, a silver golem who is also planeswalker but the creator of Mirrodin. A lot of times they ran into dangerous situations outmatched but managed to survive and each part the of the book had a different outcome so I couldn’t chose my favorite part. The main thing I liked about this book is the fact that the emotions I had felt about this is because it was ominous and spooky and you never knew what was going to happen with all the fighting. And every line that was said within the book had a meaning whether it be Koth ranting about how he should lead his fellow inhabitants or Venser always trying to keep morale up. But the one I liked the most was from a major character that you only saw in two scenes. His name is Tezzeret, another planeswalker but he is an agent for the millennium old planeswalker dragon, Nicol Bolas. He had quoted ‘I simply want to give a gift for you. You must come with me and my assistants to get this gift-I cannot hold it any longer”. This gift he is implying is about a fleshling girl who could Phyresis, a deadly disease that the Phyrexians spread to increase their numbers because it turns other creatures into Phyrexians. She had actually healed Karn, the silver golem, but only with the help of Venser who sacrificed his life for Karn to regain a new heart that had been corroded form Phyresis. All in all the book was a good read for the science fiction/ fantasy lovers.

[Bas · Rating 1 out of 5]

I've read a substantial amount of Magic the Gathering books so far, 36 of them in total. Of course the quality varies strongly between them, as a lot of different authors have contributed to the series. And while some of them aren't exactly amazing this is the only truly bad one I've read so far.

None of the characters have the faintest shadow of depth. On the other hand the ones that are already known from other books (like Venser, Elspeth) are completely ruined by Wintermute.

The story mostly consists of the protagonists cluelessly wandering around the metal planet of Mirrodin, infected by the evil machinophile Phyrexians. Actually interesting plot is nonexistent outside of the last 5 pages of the book (and there it is of course rushed, at least that keeps Wintermute from ruining it). All of the "action scenes" are amazingly boring, analogous to the rest of The Quest for Karn.

Probably the worst part of this disaster is Wintermute forgetting one of his characters for multiple chapters. Instead of editing her back in her absence is explained by everyone thinking she was mute (even though she was wandering around with them for a couple of weeks) "No I'm not mute. You just never asked me anything."

Aditionally I was hoping to read about what happened to the people and places from the old Mirrodin books. Wintermute however was not just not talented enough to write a good book, but apparently also too lazy to do his homework. Only Glissa is there and she's corrupted, we'll never know why though (outside of mtg.com articles perhaps, which are better written than this book anyway). So there's not even anything in this one for avid mtg readers and storyline completists.

There are enough good Magic the Gathering books out there, don't bother with this one.

------------

This review was translated from my German review for Amazon.de.

[Drew Perron · Rating 3 out of 5]

Look, I understand that New Phyrexia is supposed to be an unpleasant place. But this was just too much unpleasantness, too much bleakness, and too little emotional payoff for it, bogging down the adventure aspects and getting in the way of the worldbuilding.

[Matthew · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was horrible. Slow moving, and poorly crafted. The author loses track of his own characters, settings are poorly described, and the plot is plodding at the best of times. Stay away.

[Dagan · Rating 1 out of 5]

I know tie-in fantasy novels are expected to be bad, but this is literally the worst book I have ever read.

[Allan Chen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not very well written throughout, lackluster for most of it, but there were certainly parts that swept me up in the action, so it was a satisfying read.