Hello everyone!
Suffice to say, when I'm bored out of my skull (and, by Murphy's law, want to read EXACTLY those books I currently can't), dangerous things will happen.
This does include cutting into every single chocolate in my chocolate box to ensure I only get the good stuff, but that's beside the point, as when I'm THIS bored, I usually pull out books that have been known to kick me out of my reading slump before.
My sister is probably rolling her eyes so she can examine the back of her skull.
She KNOWS what this means.
Usually she'd also be right - as she always is, natch - but I haven't gotten that far yet. What I HAVE done, however, is re-read one of my favourite series of all time. Or, I'm re-reading it now, actually, as I'm still munching through the last, fifth book.
I realize I have issues.
Oh, not just because of this reading deal I have going on, obviously, but because apparently I can very rarely be counted on to write book reviews in their actual order, you know, the way they follow each other chronologically.
Like, for example, with my OTHER Iggulden series, Wars of the Roses, (still unfinished, maybe I'll get to it now though), where I started with Stormbird and went on to Trinity, and am currently gnawing Bloodline before I hit Ravenspur upside the head so hard it won't know what happened.
If I'd been following THAT example, I'd have started with Wolf of the Plains tonight, made a swooing rise to Lords of the Bow then banged into Bones of the Hills before I got to Empire of Silver. And don't even get me started on Conqueror itself, but it looks like the last two books, my least favourite, too, will be the first ones up here.
Oops.
In any event. Let me just do a BRIEF recap.
In the original trilogy (and I do believe that the books were originally meant to finish there, because why else would there be a recap needed in the beginning of EoS plus a hundred other details at the end of BoH?), we see Temujin go from young boy, to young man, hunted and hunter, with his brothers eventually forging a nation out of the warring tribes by sheer force of will (and the help of just being merciless really). This then morphs into the greatest conquest probably known to man in sheer velocity, violence, and complete anihilation as Genghis Khan, the Great Khan, brings the world he encounters to its knees and creates an empire.
And then he dies.
I know. You're staring at this page with a WAIT, WHAT? expression.
Been there, done that, got the T-shirt.
This is where Empire of Silver begins.
The fourt book in the series picks up a couple of years after Bones of the Hills ends, with Ogedai, third son of Genghis and his chosen heir (because, surprise surprise, the crochety old man got fed up with firstborn Jochi and secondborn Chagatai duking it out for that right), calling the nation together to accept their oath as their khan. He'd been secreted away in what has now become Karakorum, a city he built out of the wilderness in the middle of literally nowhere, which he hopes will become the capital of the people.
Side-note: he actually does accomplish this, because the princes after him understand that only holding Karakorum will give them the right to rule.
But now it's time to actually get everyone to swear, and he's left the people waiting long enough that Chagatai can rip the khanate out of his hands if he's not careful. And, indeed, that's what the other prince actually wants, considering he sends men into Karakorum the night before the oath-taking to kill Ogedai and Tolui, who are both in the city.
Unfortunately for him, however, he didn't count on the fact that there is no one to fear more than Tsubodai Bahadur, orlok of the army and general of Genghis Khan, when he's backed into a corner.
Even so it might have gone badly if not for the fact that Kachiun, one of the surviving brothers of Genghis himself, had wits enough to send his own men around and into the city, led by another of the generals, Jelme (or was it Jebe? At this point, I can't decide anymore, but I THINK it's Jelme). In any event, the khan lives, forges a contract with his brother, and takes the oath from his people.
He also drops a bomb on Chagatai and Tsubodai both, admitting his heart is weak and could give out at any moment.
Right then.
Still, he rallies enough to head into Chin lands, there to give the emperor a good kick in the backside and try to anihilate him, something that his father had already begun in the previous books. Unfortunately, the emperor escapes to Sung lands to his cousin (with a very timely epilogue with the same emperor warning the Sung about a probable, impending Mongol invasion), but he does show the Mongols how to use crackling powder (which is the predecesor of actual cannon, by and by).
This is also where Ogedai suffers some sort of seizure, either a stroke or epilepsy, which forces the shamans to do their thing and eventually ends with his brother Tolui's sacrifice for him.
This transfers Tolui's power to his wife, Sorhatani, who gains influence over the Mongol heartland, where Genghis was born. It also gives her an excuse to barge into Karakorum when it looks like the khan is doing nothing, and try and whip Ogedai back into shape. Power never rests, or sleeps, and Chagatai is always waiting to see what'll happen, when he can ride to claim his birthright, something Sorhatani understands well. Which is why, by the time Ogedai's heart actually DOES fail him and he dies, she and Torogene, Ogedai's wife, begin fortifying Karakorum and send an express rider to deliver the news of his father's death to Guyuk, his firstborn son.
And where's Guyuk, to you ask?
Why, on the Great Trek West, with Tsubodai, naturally.
After securing Ogedai on the throne, Tsubodai asked to see what lay beyond the lands Genghis Khan had already conquered, and Ogedai sent him out, with Batu, Jochi's bastard-born son (and thorn in Tsubodai's side) and Guyuk. Later on, they're joined by Mongke, Tolui's first-born son, as well as Baidur, Chagatai's firstborn. Which basically means Tsubodai has the princes of the nation, the future khans, in his charge, just as he did before while Genghis still lived.
Batu (being the annoying idiot that he is, grating on nerves from beginning to end), having never known his father and being an outcast until Ogedai set to right the wrongs of Genghis by raising him to the army, keeps challenging Tsubodai's authority at every turn, but luckily the orlok is smarter than pretty much everyone on the trek combined.
And he has to be as he sweeps into Rusia in the dead of winter, catching the nobles off-guard and burning the country as he goes, making what is the only successful winter attack in history. Then again, the Mongols live by the cold of their homeland, so Russian tundra was nothing new to them.
After the fall of Russia, Tsubodai reaches even into Hungary, where he not only smashes any and all resisting armies, but equally sends packing the Knights Templar, who are historically noted to have been the best fighting force ever seen. Well, the Mongols made short work of THEM, and were getting ready to sweep further to Vienna and Paris when news came of Ogedai's death.
I can't adequately describe the majesty with which Iggulden writes his battles - you'll have to read for yourself. But that's where he's strongest, where his books take wing, and everything else honestly just feels like window dressing.
Tsubodai wants to push forward - even with a fraction of the army, but Guyuk (backed by the other three princes) persuades him that they need him home. If Guyuk loses the homeland, what does anything else matter?
Also, the man who has the backing of the orlok is basically guaranteed to be khan, too.
So the general has to bow to the wishes of the khan-to-be, turning the army to home.
I swear I think I cried a little bit, reading how defeated Tsubodai was that he wouldn't be able to go from sea to sea, knowing there was no army to oppose him (since the Templars made a statement that no one and nothing would stop the Mongols, under the orlok, which says something doesn't it). Knowing that, for him, this was his life's achievement, that he wouldn't be riding on a battlefield again, considering he was getting on in years, broke me. Especially after seeing more of his character in this book than maybe in previous ones, whre he got the chance to shine and to show some aspects of humanity when he saved a Russian girl from two of his men, giving her his cloak.
Needless to say, right after Genghis, Tsubodai is probably my favourite character in these books.
It's easy to think of the series as just mindless killing, but it really isn't. It's a retelling of how a nation came to be out of a sea of grass, and how the name of Genghis Khan is known even today if you speak it in the right company.
Also, knowing that, if not for the fact that the khan was dead and the princes were with him, Tsubodai wouldn't have stopped on his conquest, is a sobering fact. Because history might have looked a whole lot different if he'd succeeded.
xx
*image not mine
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