Ill Met in the Arena
From bluerise to whiteset Dave Duncan spins an intriguing tale of adventure across the continent of Aureity at the center of a world that blends elements of fantasy and science fiction into a unique speculative reality. As a reader I was seeking a title that would fulfill a number of requirements; a fantasy or science fiction title along the lines of those I enjoyed in my teenage years, I wanted a quick read that would last more than a day, but less than a month, that meant no Tolkienesque epics and one more along the lines of Edgar Rice Burroughs pulp and I found just what I wanted in Dave Duncan’s “Ill Met in the Arena”. While it involves elements of fantasy, romance, intrigue, and even mystery, at its core Duncan’s tale is a relatively straight forward quest for revenge although he tells it in a far from straight forward manner. The story revolves around a nameless warrior in a society where your name is everything; therefore our hero adopts the name Quirt of Mundil while his true name is eventually revealed as Mudar of Quoin. The setting is the continent of Aureity on a world that revolves around twin suns, one blue and one white, for which author Duncan has created a unique calendar based on Pentads which equal approximately 5 earth years. The people of Aureity have developed a matriarchal feudalistic society in which caste, rank and breeding are paramount. This is because the ruling families have developed psychic abilities that magnify the mental acuity of women and the strength of men. The quality of the candidates for marriage is based on their family history, but also on their ability to perform in the arena with the goal of developing men and women of ever increasing psychic abilities. Mudar’s plan requires him to return to the arena where he hopes to confront the youth his lady love Tendence is being forced to marry for political reasons. The youth is Humate an arrogant and powerful newcomer to the arena and over the course of the story as confrontations take place and secrets are revealed he moves from being a definite enemy to a potential ally in Mudar’s quest. Aside from some occasionally stilted dialog my only real complaint is Duncan’s decision to tell his tale in a series of Tarantinoesque flashbacks and third person narratives. While I never found this structure confusing I am not sure that it was necessary or helpful to the telling of this otherwise imaginative and engaging tale of revenge. Author Dave Duncan is noted for several fantasy series including “The King’s Blades” and although “Ill Met in the Arena” has been written as a standalone story with a definitive and satisfactory conclusion I would not be surprised to see him revisit the richly imagined world of Aureity.
