The Dark Shore

Irth, the world of The Dark Shore, is a place where magic, or Charm, is as useful and as accessible as electricity is to us. Perhaps more so, for as well as being practical, it's also a medium of exchange in the form of amulets. Having the industrial and economic basis for society dependent on magic has led this world in some interesting directions.

The book opens with a sequence that illustrates the uses and ubiquity of magic from the lowest levels of society to the highest - Lord Drev. Drev is the most powerful man on Irth, and he comes into contact with a newts-eye (unit of magical exchange) that his scrying sense tells him is ultimately from the hand of the commoner woman he's fated to love.

The opening scenes with Lord Drev searching for his love aren't too impressive, but bear with them. Maybe I'm just averse to fantasy novels that focus on royalty. Fortunately, once the Conquest begins, things pick up markedly.

Out of nowhere, hordes of unstoppable cacodemons start attacking the residents of Irth. These creatures are immune to magical weapons, and the defense of the realm crumbles quickly. Attanasio wonderfully describes their "horrid abdominal snouts".

Their leader, rather unfortunately for a quite original book, is the Dark Lord - wait for it - Hu'dre Vra. This appalling name is mitigated by the fact that it's self-chosen by the insane, and somewhat pathetic Dark Lord, and is described as puerile in the book.

The Dark Lord began his life as a scavenger who, upon recovering an object of power, led a rebellion against the Peers, and was cast into the Gulf, to land on the supposedly legendary Dark Shore. There he found dark magic and darker allies.

In my mind, this makes the Dark Lord quite an interesting character, at least potentially, and it's a shame that Attanasio doesn't explore the inequities of this society better to explain the genesis of the Dark Lord's hatred of the elite Peers. Instead he is presented as intrinsically and irredeemably evil.

The story shows us the travails of half a dozen major characters following the surrender to the Dark Lord. They travel a lot, and take a while working out a fairly obvious strategy to defend themselves against the cacodemons, who as I've said, are immune to magical weapons.

But their journeys are interesting and take you through some vivid settings. I particularly liked the city of Saxar, with tiers of "smouldering factories and tilted streets hewn into titanic sea cliffs", a fleet of black trade dirigibles and a skyline of colossal retorts and alembics. Overhead fly the cities of the Peers.

Aside from Hu'dre Vra, Attanasio makes some more missteps with place names - such as Lake Apocalypse or the Mere of Goblins - but overall his vision is an intriguing, Vanceian world.

In fact, part of what drew me into the book was my curiosity to uncover the mysteries of Irth's cosmology. Attanasio provides no easy introduction to the world, just tantalising clues about the Dark and Bright Shores, the Gulf, and the Abiding Star.

The author's strengths are the power of his description and his worldbuilding. Like China Mieville, he's well mastered the trick of giving you just enough to whet your imagination. At the very end of the book he mentions the sunken continent of Gabagalus, with its salamandrine inhabitants, that rises from the sea daily ...

The book's weaker in characterisation and at times the plot seemed to cover some well-worn ground. Nevertheless, it's an enjoyable read and I recommend it.

N.B. In the United States, this book was published under the pseudonym Adam Lee.