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johnnytomatoseed's review
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Content Warnings
Moderate: Fatphobia
Minor: Grief
tracey_stewart's review
5.0
D'Shai is a wonder. The book is named for the country, and a magnificently realized country it is: Asian flavored, without beating a reader over the head with it, and with its own wonderfully unique system of - everything, from magic to language to time-keeping. (Rosenberg had fun with the latter, replacing the traditional Japanese hours with his own innovations. The Japanese hours are Hare, Dragon, Serpent, Horse, Ram, Monkey, Cock, Dog, Boar, Rat, Ox, Tiger) There are 52 Ways, meaning 52 vocations for which some are born, for which some have an added ability. A kazuh runner can, once kazuh is raised, run for hours; his only limitation is the endurance of his body, and while in the state of kazuh that doesn't matter to him: he can and might and will run until his bones break and his muscles snap and he dies.
A kazuh acrobat, therefore, is something spectacular. It is also something that our hero and narrator, Kami Khuzud (which means Eldest Son Acrobat), is not: acrobat, yes, because he was born into a family of (mostly kazuh) acrobats and he has been trained since infancy; kazuh, no. What else he is: of the peasant caste, yet not quite: he does not work the land, so peasants don't own him, and he certainly isn't bourgeois, much less one of the "beloved ruling class". He is part of the best acrobatic troupe in D'Shai, though, and Lord Toshtai enjoys acrobatic troupes, so his status is not as lowly as it might be. Still, being in love with NaRee, a daughter of the bourgeois class, is a generally very bad idea, because there isn't anyone besides the two of them who are going to be in favor of that...
And far from favor, this romance leads to terrible things. Kami Khuzud has a rival, and the rival is much higher than he - and the rival does not take well to being or having a rival. Tragedy ensues - and it is down to Rosenberg's great skill that what happens is truly a terrible thing. Kami wangles himself an order from Lord Toshtai to investigate the death, and in doing so discovers he can raise kazuh after all - just not as an acrobat, or any of the other 51 Ways known for centuries. He becomes something new: Eldest Son Truth-Seeker. When he is in the zone, he can match Sherlock Holmes – and he does, working his way through the scanty available evidence and his new-found abilities to bring the book to a satisfying – and surprising – conclusion.
I've seen this called a light fantasy mystery, and I suppose that about covers it, but it's more than simply that. It could never fit into the typical "cozy mystery" category. It is very much a fantasy, and it happens to have a good mystery built into it; the lightness comes from a great sense of humor built into the narration, not from the sort of slapstick/madcap comedy of most cozies.
I love this book. It is wonderful when old favorites surpass expectations: this did. I remembered loving it long ago, and have been intending a reread, and finally gave it one when prompted by word of Joel Rosenberg's untimely death in June. I wound up raising my rating from four to five stars. It's a beautiful book. With utter confidence Joel Rosenberg set the story in a thoroughly new milieu, and taking the reader in via the first-person narration he never sets a foot wrong: we always know what we need to know, because both Kami and Rosenberg know everything. Kami is young, a little dense at times though very intelligent, honest with the reader and himself even when he's not being honest with others, and generally what used to be called a boon companion. I like him a lot – and I dearly wish there was more than one other book set in this world with Kami Dan Shir.
One thing I have to say going back to the unique structure of the world: as I mentioned, it is given an Asian feel, down to people eating with "eating sticks". But they are called "eating sticks" – never chopsticks. While elements are recognizable, there are no jarring and out of place references to anything readily identifiable as specifically Chinese or Japanese or Korean or otherwise terrestrial: everything is unique to and part of D'Shai. I don't think I've ever seen it so well done, outside of Guy Kay's work.
A kazuh acrobat, therefore, is something spectacular. It is also something that our hero and narrator, Kami Khuzud (which means Eldest Son Acrobat), is not: acrobat, yes, because he was born into a family of (mostly kazuh) acrobats and he has been trained since infancy; kazuh, no. What else he is: of the peasant caste, yet not quite: he does not work the land, so peasants don't own him, and he certainly isn't bourgeois, much less one of the "beloved ruling class". He is part of the best acrobatic troupe in D'Shai, though, and Lord Toshtai enjoys acrobatic troupes, so his status is not as lowly as it might be. Still, being in love with NaRee, a daughter of the bourgeois class, is a generally very bad idea, because there isn't anyone besides the two of them who are going to be in favor of that...
And far from favor, this romance leads to terrible things. Kami Khuzud has a rival, and the rival is much higher than he - and the rival does not take well to being or having a rival. Tragedy ensues - and it is down to Rosenberg's great skill that what happens is truly a terrible thing. Kami wangles himself an order from Lord Toshtai to investigate the death, and in doing so discovers he can raise kazuh after all - just not as an acrobat, or any of the other 51 Ways known for centuries. He becomes something new: Eldest Son Truth-Seeker. When he is in the zone, he can match Sherlock Holmes – and he does, working his way through the scanty available evidence and his new-found abilities to bring the book to a satisfying – and surprising – conclusion.
I've seen this called a light fantasy mystery, and I suppose that about covers it, but it's more than simply that. It could never fit into the typical "cozy mystery" category. It is very much a fantasy, and it happens to have a good mystery built into it; the lightness comes from a great sense of humor built into the narration, not from the sort of slapstick/madcap comedy of most cozies.
I love this book. It is wonderful when old favorites surpass expectations: this did. I remembered loving it long ago, and have been intending a reread, and finally gave it one when prompted by word of Joel Rosenberg's untimely death in June. I wound up raising my rating from four to five stars. It's a beautiful book. With utter confidence Joel Rosenberg set the story in a thoroughly new milieu, and taking the reader in via the first-person narration he never sets a foot wrong: we always know what we need to know, because both Kami and Rosenberg know everything. Kami is young, a little dense at times though very intelligent, honest with the reader and himself even when he's not being honest with others, and generally what used to be called a boon companion. I like him a lot – and I dearly wish there was more than one other book set in this world with Kami Dan Shir.
One thing I have to say going back to the unique structure of the world: as I mentioned, it is given an Asian feel, down to people eating with "eating sticks". But they are called "eating sticks" – never chopsticks. While elements are recognizable, there are no jarring and out of place references to anything readily identifiable as specifically Chinese or Japanese or Korean or otherwise terrestrial: everything is unique to and part of D'Shai. I don't think I've ever seen it so well done, outside of Guy Kay's work.
dmi3283's review
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
rixx's review
4.0
Hidden gem among early 90s Fantasy: In an Asian-inspired world, everybody has a kazuh: a talent, one of 52, that they discover and then hone to the point of genius, by entering a deep flow state. The protagonist, Kami, belongs to a family of acrobats, but clearly acrobatics are not his kazuh. This doesn't make him crippled or outcast or anything, he's just less good at some things than his father and his siblings.
Acrobats are slightly special in the rigid class hierarchy of this world, because while they belong to the peasant class, they play for and interact with the nobles – who can, if they want, have them killed on a whim. Fun. When a murder happens while they perform for a local noble, a standard mystery begins – but I'll forgive it for being a mystery, because it's more fantasy than mystery, and the worldbuilding is just delightful.
How about the fact that castle guards have to have a good singing voice, because guests are traditionally announced in four-part harmony (as are sudden alarms)? And seing traditional professions with their own kazuh, for example the smith, was just enjoyable and fun. Kazuh runners can run nearly limitless as long as their kazuh is raised (which, as any flow state, of course isn't sustainable indefinitely).
I'm not one for mysteries, and I tried to ignore the romance (not bad, just a bit YA-y), which mostly serves the purpose of driving class hierarchy home.
Overall an enjoyable light read. There's a second book to the series, which I probably won't get around to. No more than that – the series was not successful enough at first, and then the author died.
Acrobats are slightly special in the rigid class hierarchy of this world, because while they belong to the peasant class, they play for and interact with the nobles – who can, if they want, have them killed on a whim. Fun. When a murder happens while they perform for a local noble, a standard mystery begins – but I'll forgive it for being a mystery, because it's more fantasy than mystery, and the worldbuilding is just delightful.
How about the fact that castle guards have to have a good singing voice, because guests are traditionally announced in four-part harmony (as are sudden alarms)? And seing traditional professions with their own kazuh, for example the smith, was just enjoyable and fun. Kazuh runners can run nearly limitless as long as their kazuh is raised (which, as any flow state, of course isn't sustainable indefinitely).
I'm not one for mysteries, and I tried to ignore the romance (not bad, just a bit YA-y), which mostly serves the purpose of driving class hierarchy home.
Overall an enjoyable light read. There's a second book to the series, which I probably won't get around to. No more than that – the series was not successful enough at first, and then the author died.
edgeworth's review
3.0
Joel Rosenberg wrote a series of very fun fantasy novels I enjoyed in high school called Guardians of the Flame, which is basically about a group of D&D players who get transported into their fantasy world and find it’s not quite as much fun when your real life is at stake, and who also end up staying there for 25+ years and using their own college degree knowledge to kickstart an industrial revolution. It was a silly premise but very earnest and enjoyable, and I need to get around to re-reading it one of these days. D’Shai, on the other hand, is a more traditional fantasy story – one which is also a mystery, as the narrator and his family of travelling acrobats get caught up a tit-for-tat revenge drama while performing for a week at the court of a local ruler. (The blurb, shamefully, gives away a fairly critical plot development which doesn’t happen until the last fifth of the book!)
The key fantasy gimmick at the heart of D’Shai is the concept of “kazuh,” a form of magic in which the performer of a task – someone already at the height of their profession – can phase into a supremely focused and powerful rendition of that task, whether they’re an acrobat or a warrior or a runner or a cook or whatever. This seems a logical line of thought for Rosenberg, who (as I was reminded early in this book) is a writer with a lot of other hobbies who often writes about the physicality of certain acts: juggling, karate, guns, and in this book acrobatics. The most obvious example of this kind of writing was Hemingway, but you see it with lots of others, people who you can tell are channeling their love of a particular pursuit into their fiction: classic rock and baseball with Stephen King, mountain climbing with Kim Stanley Robinson, animal husbandry with John Marsden. I wish I was that kind of writer, mostly because I think it would be nice to be one of those people who can just lose themselves in an activity, even a mundane one like cooking. Instead I’m the kind of writer who’s an easily distracted scatterbrain and dislikes working with my hands, not because I’m lazy but because I find it dull.
Anyway, D’Shai is a light and easy read for a fantasy fan, the kind of book which would probably sit well alongside Barry Hugart’s Bridge of Birds. I suspect Guardians of the Flame is probably his better work, though I’d need to re-read that, because for all I know it doesn’t hold up.
The key fantasy gimmick at the heart of D’Shai is the concept of “kazuh,” a form of magic in which the performer of a task – someone already at the height of their profession – can phase into a supremely focused and powerful rendition of that task, whether they’re an acrobat or a warrior or a runner or a cook or whatever. This seems a logical line of thought for Rosenberg, who (as I was reminded early in this book) is a writer with a lot of other hobbies who often writes about the physicality of certain acts: juggling, karate, guns, and in this book acrobatics. The most obvious example of this kind of writing was Hemingway, but you see it with lots of others, people who you can tell are channeling their love of a particular pursuit into their fiction: classic rock and baseball with Stephen King, mountain climbing with Kim Stanley Robinson, animal husbandry with John Marsden. I wish I was that kind of writer, mostly because I think it would be nice to be one of those people who can just lose themselves in an activity, even a mundane one like cooking. Instead I’m the kind of writer who’s an easily distracted scatterbrain and dislikes working with my hands, not because I’m lazy but because I find it dull.
Anyway, D’Shai is a light and easy read for a fantasy fan, the kind of book which would probably sit well alongside Barry Hugart’s Bridge of Birds. I suspect Guardians of the Flame is probably his better work, though I’d need to re-read that, because for all I know it doesn’t hold up.
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