Fantasy Book Critic: The Wall Of Storms by Ken Liu (Reviewed by Achala Upendran & Mihir Wanchoo)

AUTHOR INFORMATION: Ken Liu is a Chinese-American science-fiction writer, poet, lawyer and computer programmer. His short stories have appeared in F&SF, Asimov's, Analog, Lightspeed, Clarkesworld, and other magazines, as well as several anthologies, including the Year's Best SF. He is also a translator of science fiction and literary stories from Chinese into English. He is a winner of the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy awards for his short story "The Paper Menagerie". The Grace Of Kings is his debut fantasy novel. He currently lives near Boston with his family.

OFFICIAL BLURB: In the much anticipated sequel to The Grace of Kings which NPR called “A magnificent fantasy epic.” returns with Kuni Garu, now known as Emperor Ragin, running the archipelago kingdoms of Dara and struggling to maintain progress while serving the demands of the people.

But when an unexpected invasion force from the far distant east known as the Lyucu Empire comes to shores of Dara, chaos erupts from fear. Emperor Ragin cannot go and lead Dara against the threat himself as he has a recently healed empire fraying at its weakest seams, as conflict within rival faction, even with the Emperor’s own family threaten the raw peace that he has established.

Amidst traitorous rebellion and false accusations the emperor’s grown children rise to face the invaders, some with armies, and one with the guile and savvy intuition to empower the unlikely genius that surrounds her, his eldest daughter Théra.

The Wall of Storms is a breathtaking sequel that builds with a towering diversity of action and tragedy that embodies the best of epic fantasy.

FORMAT INFORMATION: The Wall of Storms is 880 pages long divided over sixty-two chapters that are spread over four titled sections. The book features multiple third-person POV characters and also has a glossary, a pronunciation note and a list of characters. The Wall of Storms is the second volume of The Dandelion Dynasty chronicles.

October 4, 2016 marked the hardcover and e-book publication of The Wall of Storms via Saga Press.

ANALYSIS (Achala): When I finished Ken Liu’s The Grace of Kings, I felt as though I’d been on a long, satisfying journey. It had begun with that most reliable of fantasy openers: a seemingly invincible ‘evil’ empire, a heroic prince thirsting for vengeance, a cunning and street-smart nobody who knows better than most lords and ladies how to play a political game. But the reliability didn’t last for long, and through the course of its long and episodic length, Liu tweaked and pulled at expectations and conventions, landing up with a conclusion that was as spectacular as it had been, for me, unforeseen. I couldn’t imagine what he might follow this first serving with, and it’s a good thing I didn’t try, because The Wall of Storms will take almost every ‘settled’ notion or attitude you might hold, and shatter it as effectively as the ‘wall of storms’ in the book breaks apart the ships of those who dare to push beyond the boundaries of Dara.

The second book in the Dandelion Dynasty begins shortly after the first leaves off, and in an almost comically similar manner. The royal children, Timu, Thera, Phyro and four-year-old Fara have sneaked out of the palace in Pan, and are enjoying a day of truancy in a tavern, listening to a storyteller spin tales of days past. Only, these are days we know about, if we’ve read Grace of Kings. The storyteller speaks of the dead Hegemon, Mata Zyndu, perhaps the greatest figure from the uprising against Emperor Mapidere. Phyro, the more military-minded of Kuni’s sons, is quite the fanboy of the Hegemon, and the children are having a good time, until someone thinks to stir up trouble by proclaiming the storyteller is being treasonous by invoking the dead Zyndu in such an admiring spirit. After all, the Hegemon did try, multiple times, to kill Kuni Garu, the man who now rules Dara. A new character, a young woman looking to sit the Imperial Examinations, enters the fray, and her life and those of the royal children are never the same again.

It’s impossible to fully communicate the sheer range of events that take place within the covers of Liu’s book. There’s the slow, boiling politics of discontent that were hinted at towards the close of Grace, with the court splitting between the more militaristic mindset of Gin Mazoti, Marshal of Dara, and the bureaucratic organisation watched over by Empress Jia, a conflict that finds new pawns in the persons of bookish Timu and adventurous Phyro, both of whom are sent off to test their skills in governing their father’s empire. There’s the inevitable fallouts and rebellions that take place between old allies, a result of misunderstandings and the all too human failings of pride and ambition. There’s the meddling of the gods, the same unpredictable figures we met in Grace, each of whom has a stake in the events that unfold, and a pawn to help make their ends come to pass—though some of these gods have a more obvious and kinder agenda than others.

But the event that really rocks the crumbling empire arrives only about a third of the way through the book: a force from outside the islands, intent on crushing the world Kuni and his peers, his allies and enemies, and all his subjects, live in. The Lyucu, a strange and ‘barbaric’ people, have done what none in living memory have managed to do: pass through the ‘wall of storms’ that barricades the seas of Dara from the rest of the world, and they certainly don’t come in peace.

The Wall of Storms is a huge book, and I mean that not just in terms of volume. The sheer amount of action and events packed into its pages is stunning, and it amazes me time and again how Liu, with just a few strokes of a pen, conjures into being worlds and characters, has them move through events that would, in the hands of a less deft writer, take chapters, if not whole novels, to recount. In the space of a few paragraphs, Liu paints the complete portrait of a character, giving you a reason to love them, root for them, fear for them as they move through inhuman trials and come face to face with the gods themselves. I will always envy this talent, and admire him for it. He proves that to be a truly ‘epic’ writer, you need not lose yourself in long-drawn out descriptions and conversations; a few well placed words, some quick exchanges and pointed comparisons, and your readers can gain as good an understanding of your world and the people who dwell in it as any companion encyclopaedia might give you.

But what makes The Wall of Storms great is the manner in which Liu handles his themes. In Grace, Liu allowed his comic spirit to roam free, and while kingdoms and an empire rose and fell, there was never an overwhelming sense of darkness or dismay. Sure, readers felt sadness when Mata Zyndu died, but it was a bittersweet feeling; we knew he had no place in the world that Kuni had built, and he went out in a matter worthy of his mythic status: falling in combat, and being whisked away by the gods. The world was a more stable place for his absence, and that was a price Liu makes you think worth paying.

But there is no such palliative here. Storms has much more brutal themes running through it, most obviously (and perhaps importantly) the question of who has a ‘right’ to a land, who can claim a territory as their ‘own’. The Lyucu come in force, and they strike hard, forcing the inhabitants of Dasu (the site of their landing) into servitude, slaughtering thousands, and unleashing their garinafins—dragon-like creatures—upon peaceful towns. Honestly, the chapters detailing their arrival, and all that precedes it (for Liu, brilliant storyteller that he is, makes sure you know about their background, and refuses to paint the Lyucu as purely evil) are quite difficult to read, but it is precisely his delicate handling of such thorny issues that cemented, for me, Liu as a master novelist.

He writes without ever becoming preachy, without clumping you over the head with morals and easy dismissals of characters and their goals; like Martin, he makes you appreciate each and every person in his universe, god or mortal, Lyucu or Daran, as a being capable of both ‘good’ and ‘evil’. ‘The individual is the intersection of multiple spheres of identity,’ he once commented to me in an interview; he bears that out in the stories in Paper Menagerie, and even in the fantasy world of Dara, he ensures that it holds true.

ANALYSIS (Mihir): Ken Liu's epic fantasy debut The Grace Of Kings was a book that fascinated me and won over my friend Achala entirely. It was a book that managed to mix Chinese mythology along with epic fantasy tropes however the author's prose and characterization made this a standout story. The book focussed on Kuni, Zyndu, Jia and many others and ended on such a terrific climax that it seemed almost hard to imagine how the sequel could top its predecessor.

The Wall Of Storms opens up Kuni who is now Emperor Ragin and his various children who are different as can be expected. The story in the first half also introduces a new character by the name of Zomi Kidosu, she's a strange one and her path to importance will be difficult and fantastic. The story then runs on two parallel tracks as we see things happening in the royal court as well as the lands of Dara. The story focusses less on action and more on characters, setting them up and letting us know what their motivations, thoughts and personas might be. The second half then focusses on an invasion as well as internal rumblings that threaten the peace and integrity of the empire. That's when the story goes into action overdrive but the author also manages to make the characters shine. The children and newer characters introduced are as good if not better than the ones in The Grace Of Kings.

Ken Liu is an absolute genius with his prose and characterization and he doesn't make it a black-white situation. There are flashes of good and evil on both sides and he makes sure that the readers see that. I loved this aspect of the storyline and in the end the story ends on such a terrific note that I can't wait to see where the author takes the story next. This book though is a solid sequel and is the Godfather II to its predecessor. I loved it and the many characters within. For sure, this volume will be featuring in my year-end lists and Ken Liu makes himself known as a talent that will only brighten in future.

CONCLUSION: I cannot stress it enough: read The Wall of Storms. All the old favourites are back, Kuni, Jia, Luan (my personal favourite), Gin. Then there is the new, younger batch, coming into their own: Phyro and Timu, the clever Princess Thera and the ambitious, idealistic Zomi Kidosu. There are fun capers, incredibly detailed worldbuilding, surfacing crubens and swooping garinafins, supernatural encounters and ‘silkpunk’ science fiction devices that (sometimes) save the day. There’s an ending that makes you realise that sometimes, the old world has no choice but to be swept away completely to make way for a new, exciting one. Sometimes, change is a risk worth taking; just ask Luan Zya, or his divine mentor, Lutho, God of Wisdom.

Or better yet, don’t ask; just read Liu’s saga, and see for yourself.