The Orc King
category: fantasy, author:R.A. Salvatore
book 1 of Transitions, in the Forgotten Realmsoriginal copyright 2007
read in January 2012
Agamedes' opinion: 7 out of 10: well worth reading
If I understand the chronology of the Forgotten Realms books, The Orc King begins with a flash-forward. Just to show that yes, there will be an orc king. Then we jump almost back. Then back again.
Followed by a lot of activity by people who are well known -- if you have already read every other book of the Forgotten Realms...
Plenty of well-established characters. At least I could remember Drizzt, from a book I read a few years ago. Most of the others, I did not know.
You can tell that all of these characters are continuing characters. They suffer guilt from the earlier deaths of friends. Or they are dead but still an essential part of the story. Or they apparently were dead but are now alive...
All too complicated for me!
And surprisingly little action involving the eponymous orc king!
As I read the first few chapters, I was worried.
And then it all improved.
I'm used to not recognising characters as I read a book. If there are too many characters, I only remember the main ones, and only if the author does a good job of making them memorable. Salvatore does a good job of making his characters memorable.
Okay, it's "memorable" as in "cartoonish", "exaggerated", "extreme"... Which is all part of the dungeons & dragons fantasy adventure!
I began to know the key characters. And accepted that others will come and go as they please. If they do anything really important then, perhaps, I will remember them on their next appearance.
So there are characters coming and going, talking, fighting, exploring. Having extreme adventures. But...
It all ties together!
Well, okay, except for the character who takes his adopted child back to the child's real mother. As far as I can tell, his sub-plot is there so that he will be placed for his own -- independent -- adventures in a later book.
There is a lot of fighting. Bloody, extreme fighting.
There is also a moral dilemma.
Yes, a moral dilemma. And this dilemma lifts the book above its game-play simplicity.
Some of the orcs... well, one of the orcs... is hoping to establish a long-lasting peace for his people. Can he be trusted? Can he convince his people?
More importantly, can the non-orcs set aside their orc-hatred long enough to give peace a chance? After all, orcs have been killing non-orcs for many a long book. The Orc King itself includes orcs killing several good friends of the heroes.
The good guy characters have to decide. Should they accept the risks associated with a possible peace with the orcs? Or should they continue their long-standing approach of, the only good orc is a dead orc...
It is this moral dilemma which lifts the book above the ordinary.
The Orc King is one book in a long series of adventures. Can this book break the standard of who is "good" and who is "bad"?
This is more than just a grand fantasy adventure.
It is, also... a grand fantasy adventure.
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