Hello everyone!
Then, around the start of this week, I saw a tweet by the book author about the next installment in the series, and I thought to myself.
Did I not actually read those?
That sent me on the hunt through my e-library, and lo and behold, the first two books were sitting there, right as rain, and completely untouched.
I figured that was a bit of an insult, considering, and so I opened up the first one so that I might actually read through it and then decide whether or not it might be worth continuing on with the rest of the series, which, admittedly, is always a daunting task.
But I needn't have worried one bit.
Because Gordon Doherty delivers - and Son of Ishtar is one explosive beginning!
Doherty is a newer author for me so I actually only have the one book review I'd done of his, and I'll be linking it below even though it doesn't really have much to do with tonight's choice - that one's a book version of a video game, this one is actual historic fiction.
And if you're like me, you LOVE historic fiction.
I'll be the first to say it. Because history has been my all-time favourite, right next to languages, for basically all my adult life, and I kind of still regret not heading into studying something of the sort, but I digress.
As much as I love history, I don't specifically remember much about the Hittites, the topic of this particular series.
And that may just be the point.
The Hittites were an empire before Greece managed to drag itself out of city-states into something more, way before Rome was a thing, and at a time when Egypt was definitely hitting its stride. The so-called bronze age was also the age of heroes, which ended with the fall of Troy, some say, but for this book, at least, heroes still live and breathe.
We follow one of them: Hattu, prince of the Hittites, fourth born son of the king and born under a curse, so people say, though he is blessed by Ishtar, goddess of love and war (so is it a blessing or a curse then? That's the question). We don't get to see one brother, who dies of a plague before the book even proper starts, but we do see Muwa, the firstborn and the king's chosen heir, and Sarpa, the other brother, lame from a climbing fall (some people attribute it to Hattu, actually).
When we clock into the story proper, after the death of the Queen by the decree of the goddess (the king could only save one, either his queen or his son, but equally Ishtar never truly left him after and kept swirling in his thoughts and dreams) and when Hattu is learning to become a scribe, safely out of sight for the most part, conscious of his two-coloured eyes which don't bring him many blessings from his people.
He's also in the throes of his very first teenage love, having fallen for the priestess Atiya, but she is favoured by Muwa, too, and the two of them seem to be sort of going strong? Maybe? It seems to be so by the time news reaches the capital that Pitagga, warlord of the Kaskan people who terrorize the northern border of the empire, is on the move, and the king and Muwa both head out to meet him ...
... only to end up chasing their own shadows because Pitagga wages guerilla warfare on them.
They do find a few survivors of a raid though, whom they take with them and turn back to the capital city, which is even at that point suffering an attack - by Pitagga himself!
General Kurunta, who most people believe would betray the king first chance he gets, defends the city while Hattu rescues Atiya from the Kaskans, only to see his brother Sarpa fall during the battle, and Pitagga carry his head away off into the wild.
This is an affront to the Hittites as a whole, but equally Hattu is now squirming in the scribe school, sensing his father's loathing, though it is later revealed that the king DOES love him, he simply fears a prophecy which Ishtar gave him on the day of Hattu's birth, which says that Hattu will covet the throne and fight his brother for it.
Still, having secured the services of Volca, one of the survivors of that Kaskan raid, the king finally relents and sends his son to the Fields of Bronze, to train as a warrior - but in secret, he asks Kurunta to break the boy and send him back to the scribes.
Well, we have to give the general points for trying and an A for effort, but Hattu overcomes everything and excels, both in the infantry and with the Hittite war chariots, probably their strongest weapons in the field besides the iron-hard center of their infantry army. He also continues to see two visions of himself: as a scribe, and as a warrior, and consciously chooses the warrior path.
By the time he 'graduates' from the academy, it becomes clear his father has fallen deathly ill, and taking up the spot of the former leader of the king's bodyguards (who died during a hunt for what was supposed to be deer but ended up being elephants) is Volca, who has proven himself loyal to the king and to his sons. However, the king suffers a stroke, even as news reaches him of Pitagga being on the move once more.
This time, Hattu marches with the army, but not before expressing his love to the priestess and sending her on her way for the annual pilgrimage, which quickly turns into a nightmare as the Kaskans ambush the party, steal the effigy of the Thunder God, and run off with the priestesses too.
This news coupled with the troubles during the march has the two brothers, Muwa and Hattu, at each other's throats more often than not as it turns out that there is a serpent in their midst: just in case you weren't paying attention, Volca is the bad guy here, throne-crazed after being denied the one in his homeland (since he committed an atrocity) and is now poisoning the king with potions, and Muwa with words.
Turns out, Muwa might be much too susceptible to ever rule effectively, but oops. Anyway.
The army nearly falls into a trap right at the entrance to what they call the Lost North, lands they used to hold but now belong to the Kaskans, because Pitagga is waiting for the king there. Luckily though, the scouting party manages to send up a flare to warn the army, and Hattu takes the mountain fortress, though the guerilla lord escapes once more, while the rest of the army comes rushing in.
The decision is then made to pursue him and recover the effigy and the princesses, so the entire army troops into lands none of them have ever really seen, in the 300 years since their capture, but they persevere on in pursuit and overcome obstacle after obstacle.
It begins with eating bad honey in a forest, though luckily Hattu figures it out soon enough (with the help of his one grey eye which seems to be a direct line to the divine, either sending him visions or making him just exceptionally observant, it's debatable) so they can still mount some defense against the Kaskans and thus prevent an attack; an unsanctioned killing spree against unarmed villagers which does nothing for the army's honour; and some sawed-off ropes at the only bridge across to the Plains of Nerik, the army's final stand against Pitagga.
In the process, Hattu is raised into command of his 100 soldiers, the Wolves, and they lose their bowman general so THAT's also fun (if you're guessing how or why, well, he figures Volca out, and Volca manages to kill him through treachery; you'll get what's yours, Volca, especially for killing Arrow, Hattu's falcon!).
They also conveniently walk right into a trap at Nerik, but the army's made of stronger stuff than that, and because Hattu had suggested a bridge repair instead of finding another, the chariots can catch up with the rest at a crucial moment during the battle to turn the tide.
Hattu then takes off to finally rescue Atiya from Pitagga, but even so he might not have succeeded if not for Kurunta's sacrifice which buys him time, at the expense of the old general's life at Nerik.
Hattu pursues the other chariot into the mountains and there defeats Pitagga, finally, laying to rest both the war against the Kaskans (who unite only under a strong leader) and his brother's ghost, not to mention reunites with his love just in time for Muwa and Volca to arrive.
Volca, having spurred Muwa on, is gleefully awaiting the brothers to fight, but Muwa finally comes to his senses and embraces Hattu instead, the brothers truly one as they realize both of them love the priestess - who, conveniently, also shrieks when she sees Volca and names him traitor.
They don't succeed in killing him, and he escapes, later to be picked up by Egyptian ships which indicates Egypt is about to march to war with the Hittite empire, something to explore in further books.
Because first, they feast, as their ancestral lands are now returned under their dominion, the two brothers are friends again, and just in time too, because the old king falls into a stupor - aka I would say he dies, honestly - and Ishtar suddenly decides she has no more use of an empty husk so she goes and camps out in Hattu's head instead.
Such fun, much wow!
Honestly though, this series gives me very strong Conn Iggulden vibes with his Conqueror one, all the way to the bickering generals and impressive army of the Hittites (now I kind of wish they and the Mongols could have clashed, THAT would have been epic ... but probably epically bloody to be honest, so maybe not), but also in terms of storytelling. I'm very, very picky with my historical fiction, but Doherty has managed to hook me right in with Hattu's story, and I learned a little bit more about the Hittites to top it off!
The story at its very core is honestly quite simple when you look at it, too: a prince that's favoured vs. a prince always set aside, but it turns out the other one might be the better choice (not only because the older apparently can't think for himself and is all too happy to blame the mistakes he makes on 'Hattu made me do it', which is a very easy way of going about things, but also not the most productive either at that). Then, of course, there's a woman - there is ALWAYS a woman, why doesn't that surprise me at all?
Add in a spy in the middle of court and toss in some poison to the old king's drinks, and you have yourself a setting, my friends.
Especially with war brewing on the horizon.
I really liked the battle descriptions; I'm partial to those and enjoy the tactics and twists that come with them, both from the terrain and the people fighting in whatever battles are being described. I was very fond of Kurunta, the old Bowman, and Colta the Lord of the Bridle, who each brought their own separate personality into play (the infantry general being the quintessential soldier who nobody can bring down, the archer his gentler counterpart who has more wisdom than brawn, and finally the horse lord who's not afraid to hitch a ride on the king's wagon to save his own strength, because it makes no sense to exhaust himself and his masculinity isn't threatened by it either).
Authors have to have a flair with battles, I find, and Doherty has it, because he uses sentences in a way that almost evokes the sounds from the battlefield itself, which is a special skill to have.
The love story is simple enough and mostly in the background, used as the by-play for the two brothers to go at it, but we do see some more machinations when a woman is sent to marry the king so that there might be peace between the two nations, which brings home the fact that, even though we see Atiya as a fairly liberal girl and quite free in her life, women of the time usually couldn't make decisions for themselves, if they were high-born at least, because they would probably have been used as pawns.
So, to sum up, the book hits all the right notes, touches all the proper points, and sets the stage for what's to come next.
Because while the Hittites were traipsing around one end of their border, the other sides have lifted their heads to sniff the air. They can sense a change in the wind. The army hasn't been seen on any of the other fronts while it was busy with the Kaskans. Might begets right - and the borderlands are always in dispute, no matter what time you live in (heck, even MY country's borderlands are sometimes in question on three sides, trying to figure out who belongs to who).
Plus, THEY may not know it yet, but the Hittites know their victory against the Kaskans comes at a steep cost, and their army stands on shaky legs.
Will it blow in the next breeze that hits it? Or will it continue to stand?
We'll just have to check out Dawn of War and find out!
xx
*image not mine
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