WRITTEN ON THE DARK

Reviewed by Steven H Silver

Guy Gavriel Kay's novel Written on the Dark opens with a murder, a robbery, and a whim, all of which work together throughout the novel until it reaches an end based on those disparate beginnings. The novel, while retaining the familiar aspects of Kay's pseudo-historical works also brings something new, for the murder means this book opens as a mystery novel.

Thierry Villar is a poet who frequents the taverns of Orane, where the court of Ferrieres tends to be located. The current king, Roch, has been suffering from a form of insanity and his brother, the Duke of Montereau, has been acting as regent. Montereau uses his good looks and his power as a license to sleep his way through Ferrieres, acquiring numerous enemies in angry husbands, fathers, and jilted lovers. As the novel opens, Villar is preparing to rob a sanctuary of Jad in order to acquire money needed to pay off large debts to powerful, ruthless, and unnamed people. As he steps out of his door, he is accosted by the provost of Orane, Robbin de Vaux, who had been tipped off by the drunken confession of one of Villar's erstwhile conspirators. Rather than take Villar to the Chatelet for torture and imprisonment, on a whim de Vaux uses him to help investigate a brutal murder of the Duke of Montereau.

For the most part, Kay follows the consequences of that evening for Villar, but at the same time he builds out Villar's circle, from his longtime friends: Silvy and Eudes and his parents: Adelie and Ambroise, to people he met because of that evening: de Vaux, Medor Colle, and the poet Marina di Seressa. This gives the novel a grounding in humanity even as the events describe spiral on a macro level, involved King Roch, the Duke de Barratin, the High Patriarch of Rhodias, and the fate of kingdoms.

Based on fifteenth century France, Kay's world has depth, detail, and believability. It is also not a slavish recreation. Kay uses the template of the period to tell his own stories in his own world, where characters like Gauvard Colle can live in a strange demimonde while being fully accepted by society and whose ability to see future events, if not clearly, can be relied upon enough to be used in planning. There are also indications that the god Jad may take a more direct interest in the world than previously displayed. Kay also includes oblique references to his previous novels, vague enough not to alienate new readers, but a welcome callback for those who have read his various works.

Not only is Villar's role as a poet integral to the plot, his poems occasionally help drive the action, but it also plays into Kay using Written on the Dark to make points about storytelling, legends, and the way events enter into our conscious. Minor characters who only appear briefly are occasionally given summations of their lives when they exit the narrative, sometimes juxtaposed with what is believed to have happened to them, other times, the stories of what happened to them achieve primacy over their actual lives to the extent that they would be forgotten save for the legends.

Written on the Dark is a welcome addition to Kay's novels, expanding his version of Medieval Europe. Not only is Villar a likeably character, but he surrounds himself, by choice or through happenstance, with similarly likeable characters. Initially depicted as a financially desperate poet, over the course of the novel he shows surprising depth and is able to help others, just as others help him. The novel's villains, from the murderer of the Duke of Montereau to those who cause various levels of inconvenience to Villar have their actions rooted in their character flaws rather than being evil simply for the sake of villainy.

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