Book: Freedom's Gate by Naomi Kritzer


Good fantasy novel

Naomi Kritzer
Freedom's Gate
Bantam, 2004
ISBN: 0-553-58673-4
$6.99
359 pages

Freedom's Gate is about Lauria, the daughter of a freed slave and the most trusted aide of the Greek military commander Kyros. Kyros commands the Greek forces near the the empire's border and he's concerned that the barbarians to the north called Alashi are planning an offensive. He sends Lauria to infiltrate the barbarian tribe disguised as an escaped slave. They'll communicate via spirits that the Greeks call aeriko and the barbarians call djinni.

Lauria arrives among the Alashi feeling a little more like a Greek slave than she had intended to. And she doesn't find just what she expects there. And then, toward the end, things again don't go just as she expects. The ending sets the stage for the succeeding novels in the series.

The plot of the novel is pretty predictable; nothing especially surprising or exciting happens in the course of it. And the narrative proceeds at a somewhat ambling pace. Still, the story is a good one, the characters are vivid, and Lauria is believable. The book is a pleasant and entertaining read, if not a remarkable one.

Posted: Wed - November 22, 2006 at 07:56 PM   Main   Category: 

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