And now for some pimpery: the Attolia trilogy, and why I love it (and you should all read it)

I was going to do a proper, dispassionate sort of review, but the urge to squee was too strong.  Instead, I'm just going to wibble for a bit, and hopefully you'll be able to find some sense between exclamations of "OMG!" and "FLAIL!"  So:

The series: three teen fantasy novels published between 1996 and 2006, with a fourth due in 2010.  In order: The Thief, Queen of Attolia, King of Attolia.  Some will tell you that you can skip The Thief and start with Queen of Attolia.  These people are LYING WRONG SADLY MISGUIDED. 

The context: the series is set on a mountainous peninsula (I think) whose geography and culture are inspired by Greece (more on that in a bit).  Three nations occupy the land:

- expansionist Sounis, ruled by an ambitious king dogged by problems with his succession
- Attolia, wealthy and powerful, ruled by a queen whose iron will is all that keeps her barons from eviscerating each other (or her).
- tiny Eddis, occupying the mountainous region between the two larger countries.  The only country that still recognises the old gods, ruled by a queen whom Sounis would quite like to marry. 

In the distance is the Mede Empire, which has grown to vast size in recent decades, and which will certainly be turning its attention to the peninsula in the foreseeable future.  We know little about the Medes, but so far they're basically Persians.

(Monarchs bear the names of their countries; their given names are rarely used, certainly never in public.  "Attolia" is the feminine; Eddis should be Eddia, but she chose to use the male form instead.)

Despite parallels, this world is not Greece, and the stories are not set in the Bronze Age.  Turner suggests, in her notes for The Thief, that this is a vaguely Byzantine society, but with technological advances that might have arisen in our world, had the collapse of the Roman Empire and the Black Death not stifled Europe for a few centuries.  There are guns, which are difficult to use and less accurate than more baisc weapons, and books, and watches, and glass windows.  King of Attolia makes mention of a country where old knowledge is being revived, and artists are widely patronised; it sounds a lot like the Renaissance is hitting.

The books

The Thief: a boastful and rather foolish young thief, Gen, is plucked out of the Sounis prison and given a task.  The king's Magus, his advisor, chief intellectual and all-around one-man brain-trust, has a job for him: they're going to sneak into Attolia, find an ancient temple, and Gen's going to steal an old, possibly mythical mystical artefact that would give Sounis the right to rule Eddis.  What the Magus doesn't realise is that Gen is not remotely what he appears to be, and has a few schemes of his own.  This is the only book told in the first person, and it contains a marvellous series of twists that had me flailing like a flaily thing on the tram, then flipping back to read whole chapters again.

Queen of Attolia: About a year later, Gen is captured by the Queen of Attolia, who carries out the traditional punishment for thieves: she cuts off his right hand.  (Not a spoiler, it's in the blurb in some editions.)  What follows is the collapse and reconstruction of Gen's life and sense of self, as he recovers from his loss and learns to become a different kind of thief.  Meanwhile, the three nations have gone to war -- a series of alliances follow -- while the Medes play their own game.  And Attolia struggles with her own trauma, the result of amputating Gen's hand, and the emotional cost of being a ruthless monarch.  Told in close third person with shifting POVs as the plot requires.

King of Attolia: Gen didn't want to be King of Attolia, but it sort of came with the job of being married to the Queen.  Problem is, if he can't be king, Attolia will eventually collapse -- sooner, rather than later.  And it isn't easy, being married to the woman who cut off your hand.  This is told in the third person, largely narrated by a new character, Costis.  Costis has made the mistake of punching the new king in the face, and his punishment is ... to be Gen's personal guard. 

The characters

Gen -- Eugenides -- is terribly young.  He's probably about fifteen or sixteen when The Thief begins.  He's a trickster, a liar, a mad schemer.  He's also a little god-touched, although his divine messages tend to be mostly along the lines of "for Our sake, go to bed and stop whining at us".  It's difficult to describe his character fully without giving away the lovely twist in The Thief, but the closest literary comparison I can think of is Miles Vorkosigan.  (Turner mentions Bujold in her notes about books she's loved, and there's a distinct thread of Bujoldishness in these books.)  Eugenides has a similar mixture of chivalry and insanity.  He is the living embodiment of "quixotic".

He's also a terrible whinger, which is a bit difficult to overcome if (like me) you like your heroes a bit stoic.  Gen spends much of The Thief (a) complaining, (b) demanding food and (c) sleeping.  It took me a while to warm up to him, I have to admit, but he likes to be underestimated.  And you get used to it; when he's injured in King of Attolia, people don't freak out until he stops complaining.

Oh yes, and he's possibly a genius.  Not only tactically, but in terms of remembering random facts, noticing what he's not meant to notice, and putting two and two together and spotting a conspiracy.  He's a good man to have on your side, even if he does like to believe he's mostly out for himself.

Attolia is a few years older than Eugenides.  She ascended to the throne as a very young woman, following the assassination of her male relatives.  She spent the next few years quietly removing, controlling and otherwise manipulating the men who wanted to rule through her, and has a reputation for being utterly terrifying.  On her first, brief appearance in The Thief, she seems little more than the stereotypical Beautiful, Evil Queen.  Next time we see her, she's cutting off his hand.  So it probably seems sort of odd that she's not only the love interest, but my favourite character.  However, Attolia is fascinating, and although going into details about how she and Gen wind up married would involve Great Big Spoilers, it's a rather fantastic story.  And she's in no way lessened by marriage, nor does she suddenly become a model of an enlightened, non-tongue-removing ruler.  (My favourite bit might be the scene between Attolia and her spymaster, who taught her all she knows about politics.  Now he's betrayed her, and he's so proud that she's learned her lessons well enough to send him off to the dungeons.)  (melengro, I think she might be just your type.)

And the supporting characters are wonderful, too -- the Magus of Sounis, who is wise, witty and terribly clever.  (*bats eyelashes*)  The Queen of Eddis, who is short, round and has a crooked nose from when she broke it in sword practice as a girl.  (I love that Attolia is beautiful, but Eddis is desirable.)  The Magus, I have decided realised, is secretly in love with Eddis, which makes it all the more gloriously wonderful that he wants her to marry the king of Sounis.  Who is frankly a bit of an ass, but we rarely see him, and his heir (more spoilers) is marvellous.  Then there is Gen's father (more spoilers), and Relius, Attolia's spymaster, who rose from humble beginnings and nearly falls right back into the gutter.  Or lower.  And Costis, the protagonist of the third book, who is either a sane man surrounded by lunatics, an honourable man surrounded by thieves, or a normal man surrounded by geniuses.  Or all of the above.

*sigh*  I JUST LOVE THESE BOOKS SO MUCH, GUYS.  I want MOAR, but I'm scared to seek out fanfic ... hold on -- okay, the Pit of Voles has two crossovers, three schmoopy, out of character fluffy romances, and one slashfic that doesn't even involve the Magus.  (There is a fic comm, but I'm as scared of finding goodfic as I am of hitting bad.  I DON'T HAVE THAT MUCH FREE TIME.)

Curses, the Yuletide archive is closed!

...Wait, this crossover is rather good.  Even if I haven't read the Diana Wynne Jones series--

Oh bugger.