Product Description

Jem, true prince of Ejland, sets out on the second stage of his quest, seeking the long-lost mystic crystals of the gods. Jem heads for the city of Agondon seeking the green Crystal of Viana. Meanwhile his true love, Cata, is caught in the machinations of her evil Aunt Umbecca. Robbed of her memory, scrubbed and civilised, the wild girl has been turned into a lady. Cata recalls nothing of her powers - or of Jem, but her memory is beginning to stir ...

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #257308 in Books
• Published on: 1999-11-11
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 736 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
It's highly refreshing to find an epic fantasy that escapes mediaeval "Fantasyland" settings. Opening with The Harlequin's Dance (1997) Tom Arden's five-book "Orokon" sequence has a late 18th-century flavour, mixing swashbuckling adventure, Hogarthian lowlife and Regency high society. The King and Queen of Swords begins in a city resembling Jane Austen's Bath during ballroom season--though here events in the Pump Room and bedroom can be much spicier.

Young hero Jem's quest for five magic crystals is complicated by suitable melodrama: abductions, betrayals, impersonations, secret identities, notorious highwaymen, inheritances conditional on unlikely marriages and a pistol duel with a shocking outcome. Meanwhile heroine Cata has had her memory wiped and is being remade (with difficulty) as a young society lady; and the old, drunken usurper King of Ejland is a mere puppet of his First Minister, who's involved in schemes to bring back the horrid anti-god Toth. Exactly why do enigmatic mentors want Jem to gather the crystal keys to Toth's power?

Crystal number two lies in the adjacent land, Zenzau, against which Ejland is busily going to war. Jem stumbles through a battle zone, guided by unreliable fairy tales and cryptic, haunting repetitions of the Swords Song:

Everything is lemon and nothing is lime, But even the truth shall be revealed in time...

The climax features battle, dragons, shape-shifters, court cards that come dangerously alive and multiple revelations. Witty, stylish and gloriously convoluted. Next, the saga takes an Oriental turn in Sultan of the Moon and Stars. --David Langford

About the Author
SALES POINTS * HARLEQUINS DANCE marked the debut of a major new talent * Epic, sweeping fantasy in the tradition of Robert Jordan, Tad Williams and David Eddings * Unique 18th Century setting * Major marketing campaing and author PR * 'builds to a stunning climax while putting a new twist to some well-trodden ground' SFX

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Customer Reviews

Brilliant fantasy!
This book is set in an 18th century type reality which reads like a Jane Austen-with a society that is very believable as all the haughty snobishness and morality of a time that you hope never comes back.

The fantasy continues about Catayne, the wild girl who after being made to forget about her past and the love that she had for Jemmany is made into a Lady in a strict accademy for unentered girls of polite society to transform them in to ladies, while her former enemy has conviced her that she is her aunt. The powers that she commanded over her beloved animals has also been forgotted.

While Jem, the cripple boy who is destined to bring the five great crystals of power lost by the gods aeons ago, has already gained the first crystal which has healed him and allow him to walk. Disguised the son of the disposed rightful king of the land (Jem) heads out to fulfil his destiny.

It is a very rich story that has just about every thing; love,hope,betrayal,highwayman,rape,longing etc. The characters and the reality is very much alive and believeable.

Refreshing addition to the fantasy genre
This is the second book in the Orokon series so brilliantly begun with The Harlequin's Dance. The once crippled boy known as Jemany Vexing has left Irion to pursue his quest for the crystals of The Orokon. The book is populated with a host of unforgettable characters who are constantly evolving; the scheming, grotesque Aunt Umbecca not least among them. Tom Arden has a refreshingly unique style which by turns amuses and intrigues.

Too Much by Far
I read the first part of Arden's quintet (The Harlequin's Dance) and felt that the abundance of extraneous material almost sank the ship. I hoped to see more of the quality of that first book expanded upon here. If anything, this book reaches greater heights of wordy excess. I found the letters between characters especially annoying. Each one was overflowing with unrequited words. (And would all those characters really write that way?) Once Arden finds a phrase he likes he murders you with it until its initial impact is lost. His use of the word "prosecute" in this book drove me mad! The proliferation of characters and events persists (I mean even the male organ becomes a character in its own right!). Jem is supposed to be on an urgent quest but only gets on it in about the last hundred pages. One strength of the previous novel was the Grand Guignol streak running through. I feel even this has been exaggerated here. One rape scene was especially unsettling, not that I should be entertained by it, but I felt that it was gratuitous. There are still good things to be found in the book, but they are fleeting and separated by great chunks containing the sort of thing detailed above. I will probably read the complete series, hopefully with excitement rather than endurance.