Customer Reviews

King Kelson's Bride: A Novel of the Deryni

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(16)
3 star:		(19)
2 star:		(16)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Gentle readers, fellow reviewers, hear my tale of woe. Although I know that I am courting the deadly `was this review helpful to you- not' vote, such is my disappointment in this novel that I feel I must continue. It is a testament to the excellence of the proceeding novels in this series that readers are so committed to liking this book that they are giving it 4 and 5 stars. Unfortunately I cannot agree that it deserves them. If you have read the other reviews you know the plot of the novel, but bear with me as here we go again, sort of.

With much public weeping and knashing of teeth, our young king, Kelson, has spent the three years since we saw him last pining and brooding petulantly over a lost love. This bizarre behavior was so out of character that I never really recovered from the shock, and it was all downhill from there. Metamorphosising from a rational, independent and fiercely practical character in the proceeding books into a whiny and emotionally immature teenager, this book begins with Kelson allowing his former betrothed, Rothana, who betrayed him, to order him around. He passively and obediently proposes marriage to the woman she chooses for him, showing a complete lack of pride when he publicly admits to his friends and advisors why he has finally chosen to marry. This from a man whose resume includes, as per the previous books in the series, the following: With his father's murder, he becomes king at 14 by outsmarting his advisors. Upon learning that he is heir to illegal magical abilities, he accepts it with equanimity, using them to fight and win a duel to the death at his coronation. As a result he is rejected and abandoned by his mother, something he accepts and copes with. He is excommunicated by the church but triumphs over it, neutralizing those who wish to see him dethroned and reorganizing the church structure so that it is friendly to him by executing or otherwise eliminating those who oppose him. He chooses and protects advisors whom the bulk of his subjects would like to see burnt at the stake. He fights and wins a war against an invading country, and personally executes his enemies. He then forces into marriage the captive daughter of a family trying to take his crown, all the while planning on eliminating the rest of her family to prevent it from ever happing again. When she is murdered, he fights a bloody civil war that ravages his kingdom, again executing all that oppose him, or threaten to. He then revokes centuries-old laws outlawing magic, which most of his subjects like, thank you very much. Know that I but chip at the surface of the iceberg here. He does all this with great courtesy and much soul searching, but really with utter ruthlessness. To have this character become so passive and unfocused, and even squeamish at times made no sense whatsoever.

Outside of this glaring flaw, I found the other story arc of this novel, Liam's return to Torenth, to be interesting and I too liked the bride, the Paragon of Virtue, Araxie. Yet I fail to believe that any woman in her situation, no matter how practical and self-sacrificing, could not end up at least a little jealous of her husband-to-be's former betrothed, especially when she is still front and centre in his thoughts for most of the novel. Also disappointing was the speedy and almost perfunctory final chapter covering Kelson's self-revelation that he likes his bride and is happy and content about the marriage, and the actual long-awaited marriage itself. Call me a voyeur, if you will, but with four whole books basically leading up to this moment, I would have liked this part of the book to be more than a quick footnote.

In spite of all this, for me it is not so much the events of this novel that disappoint. What I enjoyed so much about the previous books in this series were the strong characterizations, the intimate interpersonal relationships, the vivid colour and feel of Ms Kurtz's alternate universe. In this novel, we never hear the character's inner voices, and as a result never learn to care about them. In general, I felt I was reading a novel with characters who had the same names as in the proceeding books, but they were completely different people. The old characters talked to each other and depended on each other, overcame obstacles and made difficult decisions together. The characters in this book are cardboard, walking and talking yet rarely interacting and as a result they have little substance. If I had not read other books in this series, I would have spent the 300+ pages of this novel in confusion, stopping frequently to say to myself `Morgan - who is that again?' and `Who is Duncan and what has he to do with Dhugal?". After finishing this book, over the next couple of days I kept picking it up and reading it at random, hoping that somehow it would resolve itself into a good satisfying book I could like. Alas, it was not to be.

Yesterday, I finished my first complete reading of Katherine Kurtz's new Deryni novel, _King Kelson's Bride_, which I had been eagerly awaiting ever since I finished reading _The Quest for Saint Camber_ nearly fourteen years ago. Katherine Kurtz fans may rest assured that this book was worth the wait! The only way this book could possibly be improved in my view is if it had been LONGER. In King Kelson's Bride, the reader travels with Kelson and his close friends, the Dukes Alaric Morgan and Dhugal McArdry McLain to the Hort of Orsal's exotic summer palace on the Ile d'Orsal, and then onto the Torenthi capital, Beldour. Both have been mentioned in earlier Deryni novels, but readers have only rarely glimpsed Torenthi court life, and have never visited the Orsal's court before. Now that his vassal, King Liam-Lajos of Torenth has come of age, Kelson travels with him to oversee his safe installment on the throne of Torenth. As the author herself has observed, "Things are different in Torenth." Indeed they are, as the Deryni of Torenth have never been subjected to the same persecution Deryni in Gwynedd have experienced. Their magic is far more of an accepted part of Torenthi court life, even unto the installment of their Kings. Without giving away the plot, readers may be assured that there is plenty of danger, treachery and Deryni magic afoot on the day of Liam's royal ceremony. Regarding the Bride herself, in the beginning of the novel, we see Kelson is still in love with Rothana, but is fored to accept that they will never be able to marry. At Rothana's instigation, he proposes to his cousin, Princess Araxie Haldane on the night he visits the Ile d'Orsal. Araxie accepts him willingly if with some trepidation. But the love between them only has a chance to grow once Kelson returns to Rhemuth and gradually comes to appreciate Araxie for her intelligence and the sensitivity of her spirit. By their wedding day in the final chapter, Kelson has found a new love and far more compatible Queen than Rothana, his original choice. Many loose ends are tied up in this novel, including that of Kelson's mother Queen Jehana who experiences an epiphany regarding her Deryni heritage while Kelson is in Beldour. Also resolved are the fates of Kelson's cousin Prince Rory, and of Prince Nigel who is at last persuaded to accept his two grandchildren by the late Prince Conall. Readers new to the Deryni world should understand that this novel was written with Ms. Kurtz's already established fans in mind. Knowledge of the people and places of the Deryni universe is assumed on the part of the reader, and indeed is necessary to understand the events of the novel. But there is a happy solution to any confusion this newest book may bring to new Katherine Kurtz fans: Read the rest of the Deryni books!

I admit it, I have a deep personnel connection with this series. I read DERYNI RISING during labor with my daughter, who is now married with children of her own. I was reading THE BISHOP'S HEIR while in labor with my son. That was fifteen years ago. And while labor and pregnacy can seem endless, NOTHING compares with the 10 year hiatus we have endured waiting for Ms. Kurtz to finish her story. Poor Kelson, our handsome, noble, powerful, kind, young, yadayada king can not hold onto a bride. Considering the title, I'm not giving too much away if I say that third time's a charm. There's alot that's really great about this book. Ms. Kurtz explores great new cultures and de-demonizes the Torenthi. The political intrique is intriguing, although the Liam's Torenthi uncle was clearly a good guy from the first. I really liked Kelson's new bride, mostly because Rothana and her guilt (and eternal whining) were really getting on my nerves. Kurtz does a good job of explaining why Rothana REALLY can't marry Kelson - not the nonsense she spouts about it. Problems? A few. I wish that Kurtz had taken a bit more time with the relationship between Kelson and "his bride." Couldn't she have given them a bit of an adventure together? Jehanna's seachange is rather short-changed. After so many years of fananticism, ignoring facts and logic, she throws away "salvation" for a pair of eyes? I don't think so. Another thing, what happened to Morgan? He was so powerful and talented in the first three books and so whimpy and conservative in the last few. I know the focus has switched to Kelson but poor Morgan! Not to mention, poor Derry...the eternal bad guy's deus ex machina...the trusted, warpable human lord. Still, practically everybody's here and ending happily; the new countries are an intriguing patchwork of our world cultures and Kurtz's invention; most of the bad guys are punished and the heroes get the girls. What more can you want in a fantasy!

As a reader who was disappointed by The Quest for Saint Camber for various reasons, I was somewhat reluctant to purchase King Kelson's Bride in hardcover, but having done so, I find myself fairly glad that I did. KKB delivers with a solid plot and a thorough depiction of an alternate culture. The storyline involving Kelson's ward, Liam-Lajos, future king of Torenth, is especially strong and resolves, for the most part, a thread that has been left hanging since Kurtz's first Deryni trilogy. Torenthi culture is also explored in detail--on occasion, perhaps a little too much detail. At times, Kelson and Liam's progress through Torenth, where they have journeyed for Liam's full investiture as king in his own right, the narrative occasionally resembles a travelogue, with the necessary stops at mosques and cathedrals.Somewhat surprisingly, the other main subplot--Kelson's quest for a bride--gets rather short shrift by comparison. The proposed candidate, Araxie Haldane, is only onstage for about a third of the novel. What we *do* see of her, however, is quite promising. While Araxie does possess the conventional virtues of sweetness and gentleness, she also displays a calm strength and a sure grasp of politics that may serve her better in her new position than the "fiery" nature that is fast becoming a fantasy heroine cliche. Frankly, I was more disappointed by the conduct of Kelson, who spends an inordinate amount of time obsessing over what he cannot have--namely, marriage to his former betrothed, Rothana, who has chosen a life of service over him. The revelation that Kelson has been carrying this torch for three years since Rothana made her decision seems more than a little self-indulgent, as does Kelson's incessant moaning over having to marry for reasons of state. I found myself reminded of a passage in Patricia McKillip's fantasy, The Sorceress and the Cygnet, in which the heroine, exasperated by the demands and importunities of a former lover, accuses him of clinging too hard to his memories and selfishly closing his heart to women who might have loved him freely and whom he might have loved in return. I rather wish someone had spoken so to Kelson about 100 pages before he finally experienced his epiphany about his future bride. Araxie, however, does show some spirit when she reminds Kelson that she, no less than he, is possibly denying herself experience of a grand passion by agreeing to marry *him*!Overall, KKB is a worthwhile read, though lacking some of the "oomph" that characterized even the earliest of Kurtz's works. Although her first Deryni trilogy was marred by the occasional roughness or awkwardness of style, there was an immediacy and urgency in the viewpoints of her main characters, especially Kelson, Morgan, and Derry. In KKB, by contrast, the viewpoint seems oddly muted and even remote, which blunts some of the emotional impact of events. We still get Kelson's point-of-view, but Morgon, along with Duncan and Dhugal, seems to have receded into the background. And Derry's perspective is never explored at all--a surprising choice given one of Kurtz's main plot twists.

Reading this book makes me glad I only borrowed a copy and didn't pay for it.

First off, like a lot of people, I read the Morgan and Camber books around the ages of 13-14 and enjoyed them immensely. The people were fairly complex and the author didn't seem to be afraid to let Bad Things happen.

As I grew older, the books faded into nostalgia for me; pleasant memories and an occasional re-read.

However, with this book, I agree with all the other reviewers who spoke about King "Never Met a Topic I Couldn't Whine About" Kelson. Good Lord. I kept hoping that someone could invent Prozac and forcefeed it to him. Working through grief at a betrayal and the loss of the woman you felt you were in love with is one thing, but dragging about like Eeyore for *years* is quite another.

There were too many new characters to allow anyone to be introduced beyond a basic sketch of their personality which then got repeated again and again. The appearances of Morgan and Duncan were akin to David Duchovny's contractually obligated seconds of screen time in most of the XF season.

And Derry...yikes. Derry has been the most well-rounded human (i.e. non-Deryni) character in the Morgan/Kelson books, IMO. He's stuck by Morgan through thick and thin, believing in the tolerance and acceptance that they all seemed to hope for in human/Deryni relations; and how does Kurtz repay him? By letting him not once, but *twice*, serve as the deus ex machina of plot betrayal. It was effective in the first trilogy because, as was pointed out in an earlier review, she wrote it with no holds barred. This time, I could barely suppress the urge to yawn as Kurtz cribbed from her past plots to try and bring about some drama to this otherwise tepid tale of a depressed groom-to-be and the women that run roughshod over him.

All in all, definitely not worth the years of waiting for something that reads like a sale from the Bargain Bin at Plots 'R' Us.

Let me preface my review by saying that Ms. Kurtz's other Deryni books are amazing, worth reading again and again. I strongly recommend the Camber series in particular.

However, King Kelson's Bride lacked the rich detail, headlong pace, moral dilemmas, and compelling characterizations of her previous works.

Only Kelson and his bride feel fleshed-out as realistic characters. Other characters who were dynamic in the past trilogies - such as Morgan, Dhugal, and the villains of the novel - have been sketched in as bare props, shoved into place whenever the plot needs a boost. These sketchy characterizations show up primarily in the lack of significant conversations between the characters, conversations which in previous trilogies could be moving, exciting, hilarious - in fact, one of the primary reasons to read the novels. Likewise missing were the soul-deep magical communications between the characters.

The court and people of Torenth received equally patchy treatment. The landscape and the architecture are described in full (frankly excessive) detail, while many interesting questions are ignored. Do the Torenthi comunicate in the same style as the people of Gwynedd? Or were there subtle, or not so subtle differences, which created awkwardness and misunderstandings between Kelson and the Torenthi? Are court politics played in the same manner? Do Torenthi men and women interact together in the same manner as in Gwynedd? Do women and children have more or less rights? How do lesser nobility regard their rulers? Are the laws generally more harsh? Does their sense of morality differ shockingly? Many questions such as these could have been answered in this novel, yet the reader leaves Torenth having learned only of minutia such as the temperature, the color of the domes, and the manner in which they cross themselves. A whole new country long left mysterious in the trilogy has been visited - and largely bypassed. What a wasted opportunity!

The plot of the novel seemed to suffer from lack of consistency. New threats developed suddenly, only loosely connected with the rest of the novel, and left insufficient time for the reader to become apprehensive. The subplots involving formerly peripheral characters such as Jehanna and Meraude were charming indeed, and perhaps one of the novel's strongest points - but alas, we mainly see the conclusions of these subplots rather than the development.

The pace of the novel was oddly variable, approximating that of a limping snail when covering insignificant details, and stubbornly refusing to develop the parts most dear to readers. Kelson's long-awaited wedding was covered in the merest summary, while his wedding night - the perfect opportunity for Ms. Kurtz to tastefully expand upon the growing rapport and closeness between the two - was skipped entirely.

I can only hope Ms. Kurtz's next novel shows all the talent of which she is capable.

It has been a long climb for the forces of the Light in the Deryni world of the Eleven Kingdoms, but the summit has been reached in King Kelson's Bride. From this vantage point it is easy to see the roles that the major characters in the Kelson series are to play out in their lives. As such, it is not anti-climatic, for Ms. Kurtz has written a book that carries a strong storyline and provides plenty of action and some suspense. In binding up the loose ends, I still was drawn through the book to the concluding lines and left the book with a satisfied feeling.

I did feel that this book, coming ten years after the Quest for Saint Camber, carries strong influences from Ms. Kurtz's Adept series. She takes more time in describing the scenery and clothing. I will be looking forward to the next book, hopefully to describe the period 40-50 years prior to Kelson's coronation, to see how well Ms. Kurtz can put together a new trilogy.

This is a recommended read for everyone wishing to complete the story of King Kelson and the restoration of Deryni fortunes.

Hard for me to believe, but I have been a fan of the Deryni series for about 25 years now, and I waited eagerly for this installment. I guess since I read about Kelson and company first, I enjoy those books much more than the Camber books (although the Camber books are probably better written). I have to agree with the readers who found King Kelson's Bride a disappointment. The book read more like a history, almost as if Ms. Kurtz has become so wrapped up in the genealogies of the Deryni families, and the history of Torenth (although I did find that kind of interesting), that she forgot to tell an entertaining story. Other folks have commented that Kelson seems like a whiny, love-sick teenager; I agree that he seemed more mature in the first series at the age of 14. Morgan is hardly more than a walk-on character in this book. And Derry -apart from the fact that the mind-control plot from High Deryni was rehashed (and less convincingly this time), when the heck did Derry turn into a babysitter for Morgan's kids? Not enough that the old favorites seemed like strangers, in my opinion, Ms. Kurtz made a serious mistake by killing off the two most interesting villains in this installment - Mahael and Morag. What was the point of this - just to introduce yet another Torenthi brother? Finally, the title of this book is misleading; it's hardly the story of Araxie, who actually grew on me (much more than the martyr Rothana) and seemed too good for the Kelson of this book. The final straw was Queen Jehana's lickety-split change into a Deryni-lover. I enjoyed her more as the harpy who was out to save Kelson from the "evil" Deryni influence. Having really grown fond of the characters in the Kelson series (and impressed by Ms. Kurtz's writing), it pains me to have to give this book such a poor review. Here's hoping the next one will be better.

I've been waiting for this book over 10 years but I figured the wait would be worth it (if only to read more of the adventures of the enigmatic, powerful, strong yet vulnerable Alaric Morgan and his equally magically powerful priest-cousin, Duncan).

Kurtz' rich characters have been my all-time favorite fictional entities. But King Kelson's Bride left me bereft, sad. Morgan and Duncan are barely recognizable, when they do show up at all. Maybe because I'm over the age of 40 now, but teenage angst irks me. If I wanted a romance novel I'd have bought a romance novel.

I'm hoping, praying, that Miss Kurtz will rejuvenate her beloved (our beloved) characters of old in her next novel. I'm so upset with this one I'm even considering sending it back (but my Katherine Kurtz keeper shelf would look a little bare without it there, I guess).

Please, Miss Kurtz, bring back Morgan, Duncan and Derry. The original Morgan, Duncan and Derry!

What a disappointment this book was for me. After waiting years and years for another Deryni volume to finally make it's way into my greedy little hands, it was a real let down. As other reviewers have said, the author spent more time describing clothing than action, rehashing the same details over and over again and giving us a plot so thin you could hang a cloak on it. In addition, I found that the entire plot was telegraphed over and over again so there were no real surprises. Basically, characters would sit and discuss what someone else might be planning to do and what they would do in case it did happen -- and then said things did occur. It also felt like she needed to continue Kelson's story but didn't want to waste the time really spending time telling it. Either she should have put in the effort to make this another trilogy or trimmed the excess to make it a better book.

On the positive side, it was nice to see an expanded world and experience places and things we'd never seen before. As much as I enjoy reading about her fantasy Britain, it was great to see new vistas and learn about her fantasy Byzantium as well. The new characters were worth the introduction except perhaps for Araxie -- mainly because the whole situation seemed forced. Oh well, hopefully the next book (or 10) will be better.