Paladin of Souls.

Lois McMaster Bujold has won four Hugo Awards for Best Novel, matching Robert Heinlein for the most wins by any author, winning for both works of science fiction and of fantasy. Her most recent win was for her 2004 novel Paladin of Souls, a high fantasy work that seemed to me to have an extraordinarily strong religious or spiritual component, but one that was fully integrated into the story rather than one that beats you about the head like a certain large feline, sorceress, and armoire may have done.

Paladin of Souls starts about as slowly as any fantasy book I’ve read (disclaimer: I haven’t read that many) and appears to be another one of them ol’ “let’s take a long long time to get from one place to another” sort of books, which has to be the most overused plot device in fantasy or sci-fi. Ista, the dowager and former queen (royina, in the book’s vernacular) of Chalion, is bored with her fate as shut-in, having recovered from the curse that inflicted madness upon her for many years (apparently covered in the preceding book, The Curse of Chalion), and sets off on a journey with the requisite motley crew of associates, with no particular destination in mind. The group includes the portly and slightly fatuous divine dy Cabon, the courier turned lady’s maid Liss (who was the most interesting character by a mile), the warrior brothers Ferda and Foix, and a bunch of guards. The group first runs into a raiding party from the neighboring state of Jokona, then takes shelter in the town/castle of Porifors, only to find that entity fall under siege by an incredibly powerful Jokonian contingent. But there’s a mystery afoot in Porifors, and it turns out that the gods are not done with Ista – one god, the Bastard, in particular seems to have further plans to use her as the vessel to save Porifors and stop the Jokonians’ Hitlerian plans for expansion.

Ista’s madness does not return but she regains some of the powers she held during that earlier period, including her “second sight” that allows her to see souls as light and shadows on their possessors – including demons, who figure heavily in the plot, and souls damaged by the ill usage of others. Ista must learn how to utilize this ability and its related power to manipulate souls so that she can save Porifors, and Chalion by extension, while also granting salvation to several of the people around her, including those posssessed by the novel’s many demonic forces. While I know nothing of Bujold’s religious beliefs, I found it impossible to read this as anything other than a metaphor for the Christian notions of dualism, redemption, and salvation through Ista/Christ. Ista becomes the only means of saving one character whose soul is otherwise doomed to damnation because of a demon’s trick that has given him physical life beyond death – I’m being ambiguous on purpose here to avoid fully spoiling it – and also must find ways to save the various characters directly possessed by demons, a sort of absolution by exorcism that comes at the end of personal battles between man (or woman) and demon for ultimate control of that person’s soul. Whether you find that angle compelling may depend on your views of religion or of dualism; I think it works on two levels, one a spiritual one, but the other a compelling way to give a story a climactic battle scene with somewhat less bloodshed than normal and without relying on ill-defined “magic” the way so many fantasy stories do. And, unlike George R.R. Martin’s Game of Thrones novel, there’s no gratuitous violence toward the women to try to up the plot ante or otherwise depict the world as brutal and dark.

Ista herself is a less than stellar protagonist, however, because she’s strong but plain: She wishes to fight her role as Chosen One, accepts it, and powers through the final showdown on her intelligence and her strength of will, but there’s little or nothing inherently interesting about her persona. Her handmaiden, Liss, appears less frequently on the page but has more depth to her character: A well-born courier who chose that career for its potential for adventure, she spends more time helping execute Ista’s plans for battle than helping her lady dress or fix her hair, and her generally badass nature reminded me of the character Medea from Atlantis, played by Amy Manson, who now portrays Merida (with a silly wig) in Once Upon a Time. Manson’s Medea was indeed badass in several ways, and gloriously conflicted between Pasiphäe and Jason while fighting like you’d expect a stock male warrior to fight. Bujold injected Liss with that fierceness, and with that anti-feminine nature, but then gave us far too little of the character while embroiling her in an out-of-character flirtation with Foix.

The weak characterization of Ista combined with the slow start to the apparent journey plotline meant that the first third or so of Paladin of Souls plodded along without much promise, made worse by my lack of familiarity with the backstory. Once Ista reaches Porifors and the mystery starts up, followed by the intense siege and subsequent battle, the pacing was much more satisfactory and in line with better genre works (which I always find read faster than more literary and/or hifalutin works), but it didn’t leave me with the same wonder as better Hugo winners like Hyperion or Among Others, or even novels that were more clever but a bit less successful in plot like The City and the City.

Next up: Graham Greene’s England Made Me.