What is fascinating about The Sun Eater is that
as a series it is spanning an incredibly long period of time but still
following a central protagonist which is a trick to pull off well. Demon in White is the third
installment to build the series further into the future of Hadrian Marlowe and
feels as if this is the point where Hadrian is reaching the apex of his power
before the dreaded reputation will actually surface. Much of the novel is concerned with Hadrian
as the Halfmortal and dealing with the emotional fallout of Howling Dark,
but Christopher Ruocchio as an author has finally pulled off the trick of
making his extended narrative actually feel focused for the entire novel. If there was something holding back Empire
of Silence and Howling Dark it’s that both novels had at least one
major diversion from the plot or one transitionary sequence that doesn’t quite
work, but Demon in White has none of that. Hadrian is thrust back into the world of nobility
and cannot avoid those responsibilities, he is given a squire in Alexander and
engaged to the heir to the throne while still being in love with Valka, this
being a classic marriage proposal for political reasons. Hadrian of course makes some of the same
mistakes because despite every change he has undergone, he hasn’t fundamentally
changed as a person despite the journey he’s going on seeing his position in
the universe changing. This is a novel
that deepens Hadrian’s place in the universe and how the universe itself is toying
with him, making him the demon and Halfmortal that the people have declared
him. Ruocchio has set up Hadrian to fall
in a universe that is bigger than him, the Chantry drawing on Dune for
its influence and Ruocchio specifically honing in on the general hypocrisy of
the religion which uses technology. It’s
an idea Ruocchio introduced explicitly in the short stories preceding this
third novel.
The way Hadrian uses his privilege in this novel is of
particular interest for where the novel goes.
He clearly does not wish to be a mentor to Alexander, but is assigned
the young royal as his squire which places Alexander in the center of the narrative. Alexander is written as a rich child,
perceived very much as a spoiled rich kid paralleling the way Hadrian was seen
by the reader in Empire of Silence, but Hadrian in the mentor role is
one that he is clearly not suited for.
There is a moment where Hadrian breaks Alexander’s vision of him, a
small moment in the grand scheme of the novel and one that relies on a trope of
overhearing Hadrian complain about how Alexander isn’t wanted. Hadrian as a character would rather not deal
with the royal family and the only portion of the novel where he seems actually
at home is reuniting with Tor Gibson who by coincidence is alive and studying
where Hadrian can find the answers to what made him Halfmortal. It’s perhaps the longest sequence in the
novel and the one where he is genuinely at peace with the universe, integrating
Ruocchio’s general sense of stretching time and giving into the fantastical of
the universe. Ruocchio obviously already
established this as the human race in the future, but there are several points where
the reader will realize exactly what happened to “modern” Earth history in the
future with the idea of the Quiet as essentially technogods. There is also the Mericanii technology
obviously being American, an obvious example of language decay. Ruocchio also wears his influences on his
sleeve with subtle references to essentially every other major science fiction
series that you can think of.
Overall, Demon in White is actually a novel
that largely deserves its title and justifies its length. It’s the longest installment of The Sun Eater
so far yet Christopher Ruocchio has put in the work to refine his pacing to
make the novel cohesive. The climax
which takes up basically the last 200 pages of the novel, give or take, is
particularly interesting as it sets up Hadrian in the position for his actual
fall. His politicking ends up taking him
down a peg and pushing people away who almost wish he would intervene and make
them say. Ruocchio is beginning to snowball
the tragedy of The Sun Eater and makes this one his best installment. 10/10.
No comments:
Post a Comment