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'The Eleven Domains were forged in blood a thousand years ago. The blood is about to flow again. Bramble is as wild as the animals she follows deep into the forest near her village. Her dark eyes betray her heritage - she's a Traveller, one of the despised original people of the Domains. And for as long as she can remember, she has wanted to take to the Road like her grandfather. But the gods who dwell near the alders always say no ... In Turvite, where the ghosts drift along dark cobbled streets, Ash must leave his parents, and the Road, to begin an apprenticeship with the only person who will accept a Traveller - the scheming, yet irrestible, Doronit. But the gods who linger in the gloomy square have other plans for him ... From different ends of the Eleven Domains, death casts Bramble and Ash on journeys across valleys and mountains, deep into themselves and the dark history of their ancestors.'
Source: Australian 'blurb' from The Castings Trilogy website (Sighted 11/01/10)
Epigraph: Thus said the Well of Secrets:
You want a prophecy? Fine. Here it is. 'The dead will be reborn, the quick and the quickened will both taste blood, the killers will be brought together to confront the killed. The voices of the dead will echo through the world, and the evil dead shall triumph over the evil living.' If we're lucky.
Blood Ties [and] 'Kings. What a Good Idea' : Monarchy in Epic Fantasy Fiction
2006
Z1661819
2006
single work
thesis
Blood Ties is a novel in the epic fantasy tradition. It is intended to be the first of 'The Castings Trilogy'. A synopsis of the second and third books of the trilogy is also included. The exegesis, '"Kings. What a Good Idea": Monarchy in Epic Fantasy Fiction', examines some of the reasons writers from democratic countries may choose to use monarchical political structures in epic fantasy novels. It considers evidence from folktale research, primate behavioural studies, literary traditions, both ancient and modern, and the effect of religious doctrine and history on the symbolic role of the monarch. Folktales are found to have had very little effect on the role of kings in epic fantasy, which has been influenced by a combination of literary traditions, including the Arthurian saga and the historical romances of Sir Walter Scott. More profoundly, the meaning of the king's role has been influenced by the Christian mythos in two ways: the king is a Christ surrogate who sacrifices his own safety for the good of the body politic and, in being successful against evil, restores a version of Paradise/Eden for his people. (Source: UTSiResearch website)
