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The Spriggan Mirror | Rating | |
| B | |||
| Lawrence Watt-Evans | |||
| Series | Related Books | ||
| Legends of Ethshar | The Misenchanted Sword, With a Single Spell, The Unwilling Warlord, The Blood of a Dragon, Taking Flight, The Spell of the Black Dagger, Night of Madness, Ithanalin's Restoration, The Spriggan Mirror | ||
When it comes to finding that hard-to-find item, be it rare spell components or unique bespelled items, Gresh the Supplier was the go-to guy for it all. So of course it was he that the Wizard's Guild hired to find the Spriggan Mirror in hopes of halting is endless production of the annoying creatures. But finding the artifact isn't the only task ahead of him. Getting past the spriggans is going to be a chore in itself!
Watt-Evans doesn't waste time getting to the plot. The characters are simple enough to understand easily without any lengthy segment detailing what they're like and their past history. Gresh is no charicature or shallow creation, but he is definitely not a complex one.
So, for that matter, is the book as a whole. The story is generally rather sparsely described, never spending longer than it needs to describe what the reader needs to know or see to understand what is happening. It certainly never waxes poetic. While some might consider this a problem, I think it helps the book, rendering it very readable. The effect is to let the audience form their own images and ideas rather than forcing them to see exactly what the author envisioned.
This volume is also a great addition to the Ethshar setting as a whole. It brings back several old characters — most noteably Tobas from With a Single Spell, but some of the others are brought in with lesser roles or at least mentioned. It offers some real continuity for Tobas and helps unify the stories into a more cohesive whole.
Watt-Evans excells at writing friendly, personable characters. There's a good theme to the story, as well, that even in a world as full of magic as Ethshar, the intelligent use of more mundane resources can still win out. It's a fun story, as well, if never a deep one. There's plenty of complications that arise even once the mirror is tracked down, and they're not all obvious ones. The Spriggan Mirror is a nice addition to the series.
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