Paul S. Kemp - The Erevis Cale Trilogy (review)

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The Erevis Cale Trilogy - Paul S. Kemp
(includes titles of Twilight Falling, Dawn of Night and Midnight's Mask)
Rating: 3.5/5
5/5 among D&D novels.

It has to be noted that the character of Erevis Cale stretches beyond this one book trilogy, both in past and future. But it is, by any standard, one of the most important ones. As such, his origins will not be fully transparent, but enough is explained (and seen) for the character not to come across as a blank page about to be written.

This is a faithful D&D trilogy. It follows all the rules, but isn't afraid to get world-altering in scope. Its actors are distinct and none too many. You will not get confused with names you can't place reappearing again after an obscure reference to it several hundreds of pages back. It's simple and straightforward, it won't trick you or try to divert you. That said, its plot may be a bit tunnel-visioned, but it's not without surprises. One plot twist in particular comes to mind, being particularly well made. It's likely you won't see it. While that may seem the point of it, most we encounter today fail to deliver. Not so here.
Being faithful to D&D has its advantages and disadvantages. Many who are familiar with the system and particularly the world of Faerun, specifically Abeir-Toril will find themselves right at home. To those unfamiliar with it, it will probably seem unnecessarily convoluted. The adventure feel is one of its strong points. Inhabiting a very well developed world has its advantages and Kemp used them well. Through the story, we're taken on a far-spanning journey across the continent and even into other planes. The places we traverse are diverse and painted vividly.

Now for the negative points. Especially at the start (the first 100 odd pages) I've found the protagonist's and his best friends self righteousness nauseating. What I think Kemp tried to do is for them to come across as being of Good alignment, according to world rules. It made little sense and twisted the early story into quite a few incomprehensible decisions. They drove the plot and made the two characters lean towards "good", but it didn't fit in with the rest. While this calms down once they "get in touch with their dark side" in the case of the protagonist, and "keeps being persuaded evil is necessary to do good" for the best friend, there are still a few baffling decisions and reasons for them that rear their ugly head along the way. The character of Erevis Cale definitely comes off two-sided, but not in an "OK, this makes sense" way.

The romance part of the story is extremely shallow in my eyes. The protagonist has two romantic interests, one of which is decently developed, yet reasons for which escape me. The other is superfluous, its whole sum could probably be written on two pages, yet portrayed as "deep". It's hard to find it deep if it hardly affects anything and has less page-time than a landscape. It's also sadly extremely stereotyped in a "hero has to save the world/cat/whatnot other excuse so no time for romance, yet makes all the right noises for the damsel to stay in the ivory tower waiting for his return". Disappointing. The damsel is also simply unrealistic.

The third member of the good guys, Drasek Riven is probably the best character in the book. He is the most realistic and his development is quite amazing. The antagonist side of the story is also very well made I must say. It's actually not even clear who the antagonist is, and keeps us guessing and deciding right to the end. "Bad" guys are also well made and believable.

Conclusion:
Overall, the trilogy is an enjoyable read, especially so if you're not bothered too much by an occasional moralistic stretch and reasoning of a mouldy cheese solidity. The characters are intriguing, the locations exotic, spells soar, wands fly and swords clash. In the D&D universe, you would be very hard pressed to find anything better.

(P.S.: I'd very much like criticism and comments on the review itself. It's my first attempt at one and to me, it looks chaotic, even after spending the last hour trying to make a readable, informative text.)

 

Thanks!

Engrish grammar comes from typing it up in wordpad as opposed to reply box here. Lack of the red wavy lines of spell check really makes a difference. I forgot to run it through one before copying&posting
An intro-core-conclusion sounds like a good plan!
I kinda skipped the first two, just jumping to write whatever came into my head. Once i got that out on the paper and tried to shelve parts into proper places among same issue it just became jumbled hell. Remembering what i actually wrote and what i only meant to and where it was. Then just about anything i wrote related to another few things i wanted to cover, so instead of having sections about one topic i kinda ended up having several sections covering same issues.

And to think how short it actually is! It's like getting lost in a one room apartment
Back to work it is ^^