Path of Honor – Diane Pharaoh Francis

Category: Fantasy

This is the follow-up to Path of Fate. If you haven’t read it then don’t read this. Read my review of that one first.

Following the events in Path of Fate, Reisil has made her way to Koduteel to meet the other ahalad-kaaslane and get the training she needs. However instead of friendship and acceptance she finds suspicion and mistrust from both her fellow ahalad-kaaslane and the upper classes. Only the lower classes favour her.

The Iisand has become a recluse following the death of his wife in childbirth, another event for which Reisil is blamed. Reisil could have healed the Mesilasema however she was afraid of Reisil and refused to allow her near until it was too late to save her life, and only then to save the life of her child.

The friends she made during her travels in the first book have all left the city following the paths the Lady has set for them. However it is now looking as though the Lady has abandoned her people, a plague is spreading across the land, and Reisil is having trouble finding and then using the powers the Lady bestowed upon her. Especially the power to heal.

Another good book following on from the events in Path of Fate. In it we become reacquainted with friends and enemies from the first book and meet new ones. A new land and its people are introduced who seem to be loosely based on the Aztecs. An enemy only previously mentioned is now embodied.

There is however one really annoying thing about this book. Well it’s two annoying things that combine into one really annoying thing.

First: The book ends quite abruptly, not quite in the middle of the story but it feels like it at the time.
Second: The following text found on the page after the last page of the story
Reisil and Saljane return in Path of Blood… …coming from ROC in 2006.

2006! It’s barely 2005. You expect me to wait a whole year to find out what happens next. Aaaargh.

So fair warning for you all. If you hate having to wait like I do, don’t read this book until the next one has been published.

Rating: 8/10

The series:
1. Path of Fate
2. Path of Honor
3. Path of Blood (due 2006)