Book Report: "Magic's Pawn"

Yaoi alert!!! (and a slight disclaimer: I <3 the Valdemar books. The romantic fantasy is a perfect fit for my fondness for girly romantic fantasy and manga.)

Vanyel is a misfit. And boy oh boy, is he emo.

He's small and quick, and he can't fight like his emotionally distant father and abusive swordmaster. He's the heir to his father's lands and titles, but he'd rather be a bard. He won't play pawn to his mother's hysterics, or respond to her ladies' seductions. He has no friends among the siblings and cousins populating his father's keep, and his older sister, who was his only protector, is being sent away.

But Vanyel gets an unlikely exile -- he's sent to the High Court of Valdemar. Most people would see this as a blessing -- he sees it as another curse.

Van's lonely and lost, and confused by the feelings awakening in him. So his relationship with Tylendel, a Herald-Mage trainee, has a difficult start. But as their love grows, so does Van's dependence on Ty. When tragedy strikes, he's left more changed than he could ever think possible.

Now with the help of his aunt and her friends, Van must learn to accept and control his newfound power, before it controls him.

"Magic's Pawn" is set hundreds of years *before* the first Valdemar trilogy, in which Vanyel is mentioned as a legend. So this is a different world. The openness and acceptance that mark Valdemar aren't as prevalent here. The Heralds are more of an entity to themselves, and less likely to open their hearts to a lost boy -- they think he's a difficult, stuck-up brat. It doesn't help that Van very often acts like a difficult, stuck-up brat.

Yes, he's terribly, terribly emo. And he and Ty treat their affair like the GREATEST LOVE IN THE HISTORY OF TIME and anything that goes wrong is the MOST TRAGIC TRAGEDY EVER.

But they're teenagers. They do stupid things. They take things too seriously. I actually like this -- it made Van more human. He's arrogant and proud and vulnerable -- perfect is boring.

And I remember doing some really stupid things when I was a teenager -- I had my emo phase too. And melodrama? Big on the melodrama. So I can relate.

Now, it did seem that while Mercedes Lackey lavished attention on developing the characters, at some point she said "dang -- I need some plot! Let me have his bad guy show up and start causing trouble for no real good reason!" And that's my biggest problem with the book -- the end especially seems tacked on.

But I can forgive that -- this time. I'll be looking for a bit more substance in books two and three of this trilogy.