Titanchild

This is another exciting and well written fantasy novel from Jen Williams. I particularly enjoy her solution to the perennial problem of the boring middle volume of the trilogy, which is to simply not write it. In my review of the first volume I moaned about how analogous the setting is to Britain, and the reasoning for that becomes clearer here, as we dig deep into the myth and folklore of the country, even glancing at the Matter of Britain. These elements are far more weightily felt this way than they would have been had they been entirely fictional. They are part of our shared consciousness, freighted with import that the most skilled writer in the world couldn't manage from scratch.

But this became something that niggled me about the book, something that took me out of the escapism of reading for pleasure. In a time when fascists are weaponising asylum seekers, small boats full of foreigners are the new folk devil, and children are being demonised for fleeing warzones, then a novel that's about how terrible creatures from over the sea will land on our shores and cruelly destroy our way of life, and how the way to beat them back is go back to the traditions and lore of the old days lands ...awkwardly. I don't suppose for one minute that Jen Williams wrote this book as an anti-immigration screed (it's very good on LGB depiction for instance), but it's one of those things where once you've seen it, you can't unsee it.

So yeah, it's entertaining as always, and I'll certainly be around for another epic fantasy series from Ms Williams, but this one sat a little bit funny for me.