The Claw of the Conciliator

OK, it is clear now that this “tetralogy” is going nowhere. As I have said in the previous book review, I only gave it two stars because of the beautiful prose and assuming it was split in four parts for an apparent unknown reason. But it was not a fluke, these series of books were intentionally written as they were in order to make a tetralogy. And so, I can say the previous book was awful, and this one does not seem to be doing any better.

The story starts ignoring the previous book. That's right, it begins nearly as a standalone reading. I was desperately hoping that the first chapter would redeem the non-ending of Shadow of the Torturer, but it quickly dismisses previous events as “So they got separated, and now Severian is alone again and continues on his journey.”. This is all it says about the previous book. The story does use one other character from the previous book, but as long as you know that someone has a reason for wanting Severian dead, you don't need any more context.

So, Severian now is hailed as some kind of hero, because wherever he goes his skills are needed. He is staying on an inn with his good friend Jonas (it doesn't matter who he is) and finds out that the man he is charged to execute is a friend of Vodalus, the leader of the rebels.

Severian had previously met Vodalus when he as a young teenager, and have since fantasied about joining him in order to take down the Autarch. Vodalus is also accompanied by his lover Thea, Thecla's sister, whom Severian had also met when he first saw Vodalus.

There have been some good amount of build up for those two characters. Severian is not exactly portrayed as the hero that will save the world the “evil” Autarch. Rather Vodalus is, and Thea is the first woman Severian had actually fallen in love with, and he also have spent a lot of time with her sister.

So you would expect something interesting to happen when they finally met. Maybe a psychological unraveling from one of the characters, a soul pouring dialog, a clever laid out plan to take over the Autarch, an explanation of why they want to take down him in the first place. But no, those characters are pretty much insignificant to the plot, and their encounter was very uneventful, plain and and boring.

The other subplot of notice was a re-encounter with Agia, which I did not care about appearing again. She coordinates an ambush in order to kill Sevarian but fails. When defeated, Severian motions his sword to execute her, but does not. Because he is in love with her. And Dorcas. And Thea. And Tecla. It is indicated that Agia would try that again, but he does not care. What could maybe be perceived as an attempt to make the character seem “psychologically interesting” just made for bad plotting in my opinion.

Also, no explication for how does she managed to pull that off. You could expect an account further on the book, but the author has proven that explaining things is not on his agenda. And also, WTF IS HER MOTIVATION? I hated the first time Agius said to Severian he was to blame for his death, since it was his fault to have money when he did not. And so he was justified to kill him. An now Agia carries off with this absurd vengeance. Severian is not that interesting to deserve such attention, nor is Agia deserving of an reappearance. This subplot should have died in the first book.


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