Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5559 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-04
• Binding: Paperback
• 550 pages

TRUDI CANAVAN, author of The Black Magician Trilogy and the Age of the Five Trilogy
'A visually rich, satisfyingly dark tale of a city of chains, ancient bloodlust and unshakeable loyalty.'

HAL DUNCAN, author of Vellum
'urban fantasy at its best."

GREG KEYES, author of The Charnel Prince
'The setting is richly imagined...the entire topography is permeated with mystery that itches for discovery.'

Customer Reviews

Barbarella goes Gothic
In a world where the field of fantasy writing is as rich and fertile as it's heyday in the 50's, with luminaries such as Fiest, Martin, Hobb and Eriksons still knocking out the 'hits' and bright new talent seemingly emerging all the time like Lynch, Abercrombie and Rothfuss it gets very hard for a guy to stand out from the crowd.

However in this field of fantasy writing is a corner that is forever Deepgate! A very weird, slightly disturbing gothic fantasy / horror highbred. Very original though the early chapters more than tip a wink to Mervyn Peake.

Picture a city suspended over an abyss by giant chains where the cheap streets are determined not by the expense of the architecture but by how likely they are to tumble into the void! A city menaced every 'scar night' by a fallen she-angel who takes PMT to previously un matched heights. A crazed poisoner out to avenge his dead wife on the whole city and a God who is definately not what the populace hope he is!

A heady brew! Unusually for a book written by a man, the most complex and engaging charactors are female.

The writing style is witty and fast moving and the story if you haven't already realised is incredible far fetched and fantastic, so if you can't suspend belief or find yourself shouting 'oh that's just stupid!' at Dr Who then this book may not be for you. If you just go with the flow, strap yourself in for the ride and see the black humour I think you'll enjoy it I certainly did.

don't buy
This has to be one of the worst books I've attempted to read in a long time. I found it to be slow, disjointed, and utterly un-finishable.

Worth a look
Not the worst book I've ever read and not the best either. The idea of a city suspended by chains over an abyss is an interesting one at first but starts to seem a bit contrived as the book progresses and I generally felt that the story became more and more 'incredible' as it went on. Although some of the characters are quite interesting others aren't quite so well developed or convincing. Another thing that didn't quite sit right was the fact that although Deepgate is supposed to be quite a hard-nosed, bustling metropolis, characters seem perfectly able to wander around after dark unseen and unaccosted. That said, these weren't serious enough to prevent the book from being quite enjoyable. The author has a great imagination and I'll certainly read the next installment.