Changes

And yet… much as the entrails our man uses, there is enough in there to suggest the life and future connected to it. Arcane tests in subterranean, blood-spattered laboratories, twists to what we think of how deep everyone is involved in things… Eventually, we get something the genre can bring, the drama and hefty activity of people needing to put their all on the line to get their intended outcome. Certainly, the second half of this book is as it should be, even if perhaps there isn't quite the sting in the tale you are led to expect. Bear with it that far and fantasy fans will be happy – but I do think that for them, indeed for anyone, the first half is just too talky, with too much conversation between people with too little agency in the story covering people we never really meet, to make it an unqualified success.

More political machinations and sham marriages can be had in [[Children of Earth and Sky by Guy Gavriel Kay]], which may well focus you on a land a lot closer to home than the book here. You might also enjoy [[Domain of Illusion by E A Sunden]].