Godspeaker Trilogy

Finally finished the Godspeaker Trilogy by Karen Miller. Much, much better than the Kingmaker, Kingbreaker series. I enjoyed the first book, but the second book, "The Riven Kingdom" somehow didn't catch my attention, so it was a bit of a plough through until I got to the third book, "Hammer of God", which was much much better and tied the earlier two books together.

All in all, brutal in nature, good fight scenes (the Hotas!), and after finally watching "Red Cliff 2" yesterday, the attack on Ethrea was made even more real. A warring nation in the name of their God, the power of being "Right" and to exorcise the demons in the world.

This is a brief description of the 1st book taken from Amazon.com (by D. Gibbons):
Hekat is an interesting character; she comes from the humblest of beginnings in a remote, mostly abandoned part of Mijak where women and girls (or, in the local vernacular, bitches and she-brats) are seen as less than stray dogs, worthy only to breed more male children. Hekat grows up with no sense of love, only anger and disdain. She first starts to feel love when a caravan master who has seen how beautiful she will become and has purchased her for a great purpose, pampers her and treats her like a special child. She believes he loves her, but when she discovers his real purpose for doting on her, it shatters her ability to ever trust anyone again. Thus she takes life into her own hands and joins the military, rising in rank from canteen slave to soldier and upward. She does work very hard for her rise to power, not through seduction but though training in war arts, personal study and defying death on the battlefield. Her troops admire her because she is willing to face the same conditions they are. And she does seem to have some supernatural talent with divine support from the scorpion god.

That is as much good as one can say about her. She may be clever and a fierce war leader, but she is also manipulative, cruel and obsessed with her destiny. Her devotion to the god is such that she has no room in her for any other emotions but fulfilling its will. This makes her a very terrifing villain. She has no room in her to respect others and no room for compassion, even for herself. Her son Zandakar and the godspeaker Vortka seve as an interesting counterpoint to Hekat, a sense that there are people in Mijak who do believe in compassion and that all is not about sacrifice and death.

Personally, I enjoyed the trilogy (more so for books 1 and 3), and especially about Emporor Han from Tzhung-tzhungchai! More! More!