Customer Reviews

Daughter of the Empire

5 star:		(61)
4 star:		(14)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

"Daughter of the Empire" is a powerful story of Mara of the Acoma who, upon the murder of her father and brother by an sinister plot of the family's arch-enemy, is left as the only remaining heir of the Acoma estate. In a world where life has no meaning, so long as it is forfeited via subtle political strokes through great Game, Mara needs every scrap of her wits, stubborness and determination to survive and continue the Acoma line.

In this book and the rest of the series, the innocent girl from convent life becomes a powerful and dangerous Player. Determined to be unmoved by her unfortunate position, Mara's keen political sense ensures her survival. Her resolve, persistance and imagination (unusual for the ever traditionally minded Tsurani) propels her family from what is, at best, an uncertain position to one of the most powerful in the world. BUT, not without paying a price. Mara must learn that she is, first and foremost, human, before she is a player.

Based on Feist's Kelewan world, the "aliens" as created in the "Magician" series, Wurts adds her talent for detailed plot, intrigue and human emotion to Feist's imaginative series, to create one of the most powerful stories in fantasy today.

For those who've read the "Magician" series, you will be excited to recognise a number of characters and learn to understand what drives the "aliens". For Wurts fans - this book will not disappoint you - it has every speck of Wurts-ness that make her other series so darn good.

In one word: "unputdownable".

Daughter of the Empire and the two books that follow are a must for any Raymond Feist fan. It matches the rift war saga in enjoyability and surpases anything else that Feist has worked on. I haven't read any Janny Wurts stuff, so I don't know how it compares.

The book is almost historical fiction, except the events take place in a completely ficticious asian style world. There are enough fantastical elements (the black ones and the Cho-ja) to keep fantasy enthousiasts entertained, but this goes far beyond run of the mill fantasy novels. The writing moves along at a great pace, it starts fast and never stops. The characters are almost always cool and fun to read about, there are seldom characters who you are sorry to get back to when their plot line rotates back again (especially the spy master, I loved that guy).

If you've read these books and are looking for something along similar lines, you'll almost certainly be entertained by Sean Russell's "Initiate Brother" and "Gatherer of Clouds" which are very similar and just as fun to read.

I am a great fan of Raymond E. Feist, and have read all of his books numerous times. In fact, most of the books are so worn out that the pages are falling out. The Empire trilogy is almost as good or better than the Riftwar Saga. It explores the strange culture of Kelewan touched on in Magician:Master and a little in Silverthorn.

Lady Mara is an intriguing character, and is extremely loveable. She is one of the greatest fantasy characters I have ever encountered. Despite the length of the books in this series, it is impossible to put them down. The intrigue and trials in the "Great Game" are unmatched in any other book that I have read. If you are a fan of Eddings, Jordan, McCaffery, or any other fantasy author, READ THIS SERIES, you won't be disappointed.

This trilogy explores the world beyond the rift with it's vastly different culture and belief system. It is definitely influenced by all the major Asian cultures which Feist had already established in his Riftwar Saga. It is amazingly told by Wurts and I got the sense that Feist's role was to fill in the gaps and check continuity since the style of writing is completely different.

One servant girl ends up overcoming incredible odds, countless spies and intrigue to kill an army of men. She ends up becoming the most powerful woman in Kelewan history ... but not without sacrifices and compromises. This trilogy shares some similarites to the Riftwar Saga (servant to most powerful being for example) but there are so many other things that set it apart too. I really identified with the main character Mara, but the spy master definitely stood out above the rest.

Make sure you read the other books in the series if you like this one: Servant of the Empire (book #2) and Mistress of the Empire (book #3).

Does the world of Kelewan enthrall you? Then pick up the the Riftwar Saga (starting with Magician: Apprentice) which shows you how it all began.

The authors created a world which infuses a variety of aspects of medieval Japanese culture with elements of fantasy and even an alien species. The Japanese influence can be seen even without the use of Japanese terms. The roles of emperor, shogun, daimyo and samurai are all easy to see. Also important is the code of honor that all Tsurani must play by. The soldiers must abide by a code akin to the Japanese bushido (way of the warrior) and the lords (and lady in the case of Mara) have to play according to the rules of honor.

Infused with all of this is the politics, known as "the Game of the Council." Aspects of this are also derived from Japan. The heads of all of the houses seek to gain advantage over the other, by all honorable means possible. The dishonorable is allowed so long as you are not caught.

Enter into this intriging world Mara, a seventeen-year old girl just a few gongs from becomming initiated into the Order of Lashima in the Holy City of Kentosani. Soldiers from her house arrive during the ceremony to announce that the is "Lady of the Acoma," a chilling announcement that meant her father and brother were dead. Thus, she was not only thrust into the Game of the Council, she was faced with a life and death struggle with the Lord of the Minwanabi, a clan with whom the Acoma had a long-standing blood feud. While the Acoma had been weakened by Minwabi treachery, the Minwanabi were the most powerful House in the Empire.

Mara has to use her wits and her feminine wiles to make gains in the Game of the Council and to secure her House from its enemies. Her greatest triumph in this volume occurs in the very house of the Minwanabi, where she is able to force dishonor on the host Lord.

The reading is compelling and the story well thought out. You get a feeling for the complexity of the characters in the story. The plot thickens with each of Mara's triumphs in the Game. Unlike some stories, not everything ends well. Good people as well as bad die through Mara's triumphs. This book makes good reading and I am eager to get on to book two.

I'll just review one aspect of this trilogy. I read Feist's four prior books, including Magician, and found myself strongly preferring the Europe-like Midkemian world over the Japan-like Kelewan world in which the Empire Trilogy is based. I wanted to read Feist's books in order that he wrote them, so I decided to next attempt to bear through the Empire books.

Boy am I glad I did. I now count the final book of the trilogy, Mistress of the Empire, one of my two all-time favorite fantasy novels. The Magician series, as much as I loved them, now seems almost amateurish by comparison. The Empire story is carefully crafted, the characters vary from two-dimensional to fully three-dimensional, and the end of the trilogy is exhilarating.

However, reading the trilogy was not always easy. I developed a love/hate relationship with the main character, Mara. There were times when I thought her a cruel monster and other times when I thought her a saint. There were at least two occasions where I got so angry with her, thinking her ugly, that I considered not bothering to finish the series.

But now I know that this is all by design. Mara is struggling with the culture she lives in. The first book, Daughter of the Empire, shows Mara as a person of that culture with some inclination to question it. The second book, Servant of the Empire, shows Mara coming to understand her culture and finding herself at odds with it. The final book, Mistress of the Empire, shows Mara in a final struggle with her culture, a struggle that starts out intensely personal but which later engulfs the entire Empire.

So don't you put those books down! Keep reading! Love Mara at times, hate her at times. It is as it should be. You won't experience the euphoria of the ending with out it; and because of it, you might just count Mistress of the Empire one of your all-time favorite books.

Daughter of the Empire is the first book of a fantasy trilogy that I count among the best I've ever read. Janny Wurts leads us to the world of Kelewan, which R.E. Feist had introduced in his much-lauded Riftwar saga as the counter world to Midkemia beyond the Rift. Wurts spins a mesmerising tale around young lady Mara of the Acoma who must stand up to the unwanted and unexpected task of preserving her noble house and her ancient bloodline against foes who are seeking nothing but obliteration of Mara's family. We accompany Mara as she struggles through her first steps to learn the Game of Council, how the political strife for domination among the houses on Kelewan is called. We suffer with her when political reasoning forces her to marry the unbridled and brutal son of one of her enemies and when she fights and plots to regain her hold over the Acoma. And we cheer for her when she repeatedly beats all odds against her - sometimes in the most unusual and unexpected manner.

But Janny Wurts novel isn't only a captivating tale of rise-to-power. It's also a masterful description of a fantasy society with an intruiging concept of rules and traditions, inhabited by fierce warriors and strange alien creatures amidst a setting with unique flora and fauna. Janny Wurts exploits all openings given to her by Feist to present new and fascinating aspects of the world of Kelewan which was just briefly outlined by Feist in his Riftwar saga.
Still this isn't everything to praise about this great series. To compliment a wonderfully woven story with unexpected twists and turns in every new chapter Janny Wurts uses her adept grasp of language to let the emotions and motivations of both main and side characters become as vivid as the events unfolding around them. Janny Wurts masterfully manages to involve the reader with the tale and her characters - something I've always appraised in all of her works since I had read Daughter of the Empire for the first time.

When comparing Wurts' Empire trilogy with other contemporary fantasy series Martin's Song of Ice and Fire immediately cross my mind. Both are similarly complex, breathtaking and fast-paced. But where Martin is mainly focussing on the overall grandness of his epic work, Wurts keeps her plot quite manageable. And while Martin features a whole cast of main protagonists, Janny Wurts builds her story mainly around Mara, who is the dominant bearer of the readers affections - something that makes it easier to stay focussed in comparison to the multitude of viewpoints featured by Martin. I wouldn't judge any of these two great fantasy series better than the other. I love both of them and I think, that Janny Wurts has started a great fantasy trilogy with this book that can easily stand up to the top series of this genre.

Raymond E. Feist's and Janny Wurt's fantasy novel, Daughter of the Empire, is wonderful. It is the first in the so called "Empire Trilogy". The "Empire Trilogy" is filled with political intrigue and intricate schemes, and slight hints to the Riftwar that rages through the counterpart books, Magician: Apprentice and Magician: Master. If you read only one book in your life, I feel sorry for you, but if you read three... read the Empire Trilogy: starting with Daughter of the Empire. (you should also read the Riftwar Saga) :)

This book saw the joining of forces of two acclaimed authors of fantasy. Set in the complex world of Kelewan that Feist gave us glimpses of in the Riftwar saga, Wurts brings her skill at weaving intrigue into dizzying layers.

To most, the sound of a political book set in a fantasy world may not sound exciting, yet I know of no place on earth where the wrong move in the political arena could result in your death and that of your family.

So it is, that on this knife edge of tension, a young girl assumes the position of Lady (ruler) of the ancient Acoma family, as a result of the betrayal of a powerful enemy in another family. With assets aplenty, but 37 soldiers left to guard it, Lady Mara must boldly plot to ensure the survival of her family name.

Turning enemies into unwitting allies through marriage, surviving assassins, and using every resource at her disposal, the book comes to a head in a confrontation against the one responsible for the death of her father and brother.

This book is truly worthy of the 5 stars, and is a tribute to the two masters who penned it. Brilliant in its enactment, enlightening in its descriptions of this tantalizingly familiar world (one cannot deny the asian feel to the Tsurani culture), well crafted in characterization, and truly amazing in its plot twists and turns, I highly recommend this book.

Of particular note is Arakasi, the Acoma Spy Master. He will feature more prominently in the next two books, and is a character not to be missed (or messed with!).

The plot is great, the background a twisted version of Asia's culture, making it old and new. Makes you want to go read the other two (which I did). I can't help but compare it's sweeping, epic-like story to the novel 'Shogun'.

Mara is a smart and strong female character in a world which has limited her greatly. It is nice to see her work out her problems both with her mind and her clan's loyal soldiers.