15 years have passed since Swordspoint. The Duchess is long dead (*sniff*). The Hill is little changed. And the Mad Duke will drop his lawsuits against his sister if she sends her daughter to Tremontaine House to learn the sword. Welcome to the second Riverside Read-along.
Riverside
In an unnamed city, the nobility literally look down on Riverside from the Hill. They love Richard St Vier, common swordsman, for his grace and his style. He kills with a single thrust to the heart. Welcome to a world of barbed wit, disguised malice and exquisite fencing.
It’s the penultimate week of the Swordspoint read-along, and that kitten appears to have become a cat already. Other characters too are making giant leaps, some of them in inadvisable directions. It’s getting messy.
It’s week 3 of the Swordspoint read-along, and the politics on the Hill are getting as sharp as the swords in Riverside. Who is Alec? What is Lord Ferris up to? Will Richard’s overconfidence be his undoing? Why did someone give him a kitten?
It’s week 2 of the Swordspoint read-along, so the important question has to be: how’s that Dangerous Liaisons comparison doing? I’m delighted to say that it holds as a note on setting and tone, and that other questions are bubbling up as the water gets warmer.
Ellen Kushner’s Swordspoint gets regular mention as one of the classic modern fantasies that I should have read by now. But why oh why did nobody ever say ‘it’s fantasy Dangerous Liaisons with gay fencing’?
Seriously, if that doesn’t do it for you…
