Customer Reviews

Dark Ages Setite (DA Clan Novel 4) (Vampire: The Dark Ages Clanbooks)

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This series is beginning to unnerve me. Three out of the first four have a great deal of action and interplay and the last two have been almost compelling. I'm used to White Wolf's novels being slow and detailed, full of the minutia that is invaluable to a game player, but less of a draw to a casual reader. Cappadocian, and now Setite have been novels that could stand in their own right, and I couldn't be more pleased.

As the dust settles in Constantinople, many of the undead are leaving, heading for old homes or fresh starts. But travel, for vampires is difficult and dangerous. The world is divided up into kingdoms and principalities with rulers of all sorts, and a lone voyager is in danger on all sides. Enter Andreas the Settite, also known as Ankhesenaten who makes his living transporting the deathless to other demesnes, when he isn't pursuing other, even more dangerous agendas.

His immediate problem is that, instead of the five vampires he expected to guide into France, there are eleven. Vampires, even when they travel in boxes, require a large support staff. Those that are not in torpor require even more since the must hunt without drawing too much unwelcome attention. And Andreas has another worry - he must coax a box or vessel containing the withered heart of the heretic Khay'tall of the hands of the undead craftsman with whom it has been entrusted.

As this caravan rumbles across Europe on its three year voyage, one adventure opens up after another, like a nourish Canterbury Tales. Greedy kings, mad pilgrimages of the faithful, and even the peccadilloes of vampire love affairs keep up the story's interest and make all of the characters come to life. Even Andreas has his personal moments as he deals with the problems of having a Frankish Setite, the beautiful Meribah, in his entourage. Will he protect her, will he love her, or will he simply use Meribah and throw her away?

As you can tell, there's more here than in the usual clan novel, and this bodes well for future volumes. Especially if they are all as well written as Setite. Despite being part of a series, this book stands well on its own if you have even a vague idea of the underlying plot.

I dunno maybe im just falling into the idea of the sterotypical setite that most camarilla would like everyone to beleive but i was expecting something rather more from this one. I found the setite characters far far to nice but maybe that was the point? they are a clan widely hated across the board, why? cuz they hold beleifs that are alien to most other clans of vampires. Set was actually Caine? hereritics! and well i guess they dont understand them and what they dont understand they try to destroy. I think the whole point of this clan book was to portray them as a rather misrepresented clan that is less monsterous than say the Lasombra or Tzimisce and that they are just merchants and religous zealots. The actual plot i found slow and truging and well not really much happened till the end. In this book one of the main characters Zoe the Ravnos is a rather annoying fledgling and i feel like just hitting her and saying get a grip girl! but i guess thats what whelps are like when they are first embraced.All in all it wasnt a bad book but theres not much plot to it and its just(as the one before was) setting up the sceane for the really good stuff to follow.