Hello again everyone.
Today I’m reviewing The Enduring Flame Trilogy as a whole by Mercedes Lackey and James Mallory. There will be no individual book reviews posted for this second series of the Obsidian Universe. The Enduring Flame Trilogy was published in 2007-2009. Click here for more information on this series.
General Thoughts
I’ll begin this review by saying that I intentionally did not read this trilogy for the longest time. I thought about buying it several times and always decided against it, until I finally said, “Screw it,” and bought all three books on a whim. I had already decided to re-read the Obsidian Mountain Trilogy and had already purchased the first and second books of the third trilogy set in this world, The Dragon Prophecy Trilogy, when I said, “I’ll read these too…why not?”
Here’s the thing. I never knew why I always put these books back on the shelf at my local bookstore all those years since I first read the first trilogy, considering that I had loved the Obsidian Mountain trilogy so much. I really wanted to get back into this world, and I was excited that the authors had decided to continue exploring it. But I just couldn’t bring myself to read these books, and I never did. Until now. And I understand now why my gut told me not to read them in the first place.
They are completely different than the first three books.
First off, the tone and writing style are drastically different from the first trilogy and it seems as if somebody else entirely wrote these books. This second trilogy of the Obsidian Universe reads like YA fantasy; don’t get me wrong, I don’t have anything against YA books. In fact, I read YA and will review some of those books in this blog. But this difference in tone and writing style was jarring to me for the simple fact that I was not expecting it. I was expecting a tone and writing style similar to that of the first trilogy (especially after I had just finished re-reading it again), and that is not what you get here.
Second, the story felt like it was written in a hurry and the books felt a little bit like cookie-cutter books. The Phoenix Unchained begins in Armethalieh, like The Outstretched Shadow, and we have two boys that will save the world, like Kellen and Cilarnen, only their names are now Tiercel and Harrier, and just like them one is a High Mage and the other a Wild Mage. We also have a female protagonist, Idalia, whose name is now Shaiara, and a warrior who trains Harrier to become a warrior/Knight-Mage, just like Jermayan once trained Kellen; all spaced out differently of course, but still the same. We also have a unicorn, who brings Harrier his three books of Wild Magery, and a dragon. Two dragons, actually.
Third, the villain in this trilogy is very disappointing. Especially after all the build-up to make her the pure incarnation of Darkness; not a creature of Darkness, like the Endarkened, but the personification of Darkness itself. And in my opinion, she doesn’t live up to those expectations. And doesn’t come anywhere near to the sheer evilness and greatness of the Endarkened.
Now, let’s go into specifics. Like all my reviews, this one has spoilers too.
Setting
The Phoenix Unchained starts with the Festival of the Great Flowering, a celebration of Kellen’s and Idalia’s victory over the Demon Queen a thousand years after the characters in the first trilogy lived. What’s interesting is that this is where the third book of the first trilogy ends, with the first flowering. Armethalieh, however, is now a different city; there are no more High Mages and though Wild Mages still exist, they are rare enough that someone may spend the entirety of their lives without ever seeing one. Personally, I did not like this new Armethalieh. It gave me vibes of a contemporary city, and I did not like this. I also felt that it lacked originality. Like Armethalieh was now a copy paste version of modern New York. Also, the elves have decided to leave the nine cities, including Sentarshadeen, where they once lived and now live further away, in what was once an empty and barren land a thousand years before, and now humans live in these previous elven cities… first off, I get that a lot can change in a thousand years, I just didn’t connect with the way the world is now in the Obsidian Universe and that affected my overall enjoyment of this first novel and consequently the entire trilogy as a whole.
Characters
Tiercel is the son of one of Armethalieh’s minor nobles while Harrier is the son of the Harbormaster. They are from different walks of life, but the best of friends and Harrier has been keeping Tiercel out of trouble all his life. The main topic of the novel is friendship. Now, most people that have read these books don’t like Tiercel and Harrier. They say that they complain and whine a lot; especially Harrier. This is true. Harrier does complain a lot, but he complains mostly because all he wants to do is be a kid, not a wild mage or the savior of the world. He’s only sixteen, after all. And to a point, I understand him. He’s behaving like a 16-year-old, and I don’t fault him for that. This fits in nicely with the beginning of Harrier’s character arc, which is to learn to accept that he is a Wild Mage now, and even more so, a Knight-Mage.
But I finally understand why most young protagonists’ parents’ die in the story or the main characters start out as orphans in most books… Because most parents would never let their kids travel the world by themselves. It’s just not something that happens in the real world.
We see Tiercel with his family and we see Harrier with his family. We also see Harrier with Tiercel’s family and vice versa. The boys are pretty close. It is Harrier’s birthday, and he receives an old book from one of his relatives, a book that Harrier is not very interested in reading. But Tiercel’s interest is piqued, and he offers to read the book for him. What Tiercel encounters in the book, however, is unexpected and discovers that it is a High Magic spell book. So he casts a spell. The thing is, he isn’t supposed to have been able to, and now he can’t stop dreaming about a woman in a lake of fire. The dreams themselves are frightening and Tiercel stops sleeping altogether just so he won’t dream about the woman in the lake of fire anymore. But lack of sleep makes Tiercel sick, so he decides to travel to Sentarshadeen to look for a Wild Mage that will heal him. And Harrier decides to tag along to keep Tiercel out of trouble…
…and their parents just let them.
I didn’t buy this for one second. Harrier’s reason to come along on the journey was not believable at all, and no parent is ever going to let a sick child travel by himself even if it is to find a doctor. But anyways…
As you might have already gathered though, the woman in the lake of fire is the villain. The first issue I have with her is that we never find out what her name is until the third book. And that’s a long time to keep a reader in the dark about who a main character is, especially if she is the villain. But before I talk more about her, I need to talk about Bisochim. Bisochim is a Wild Mage who thinks that the balance between the Darkness and the Light is shifting too far to the Light and that it is his life’s mission to bring the True Balance back into the world by bringing back a little Darkness to balance it out. This is a promising plot, but unfortunately it is very poorly developed.
Though not the protagonist of the book, Bisochim is however still an important character but I always thought he was not given the importance he deserved. His backstory is ‘told’ in the chapter that introduces him, including how he became a Wild Mage and later on bonded with Saravasse, a red female dragon. And that was it. After that one chapter, we know all there is to know about Bisochim to the point where he is now: seeking to release a little bit of darkness from the void into the world. Given that I had just finished reading The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy when I read this book in early 2020, where most of the important characters’ storylines are fully developed from beginning to end from the first to the third books, I felt that this summary about Bisochim’s life was rather inconsistent with the authors’ writing style and did not care for it. Also, I felt that the only reason he existed at all was to get duped and laughed at by Ahairan after he releases her into the world. After that, she forgets all about him. Bisochim, however, realizes he has been manipulated by the Spirit of Darkness and loses his will to live. And the fact that he sacrificed himself in the end, to defeat Ahairan, did not redeem him at all. He was still a sorry excuse for a Wild Mage, one that I never saw use his magic by the way; not even once, and I felt that his ending was rather cowardly.
Now, Ahairan is the Spirit of Darkness that will bring evil back to the world. She has her own problems, but I will only say that she did not live up to my expectations. She has big shoes to fill, the Endarkened being one of my most liked villains in a fantasy series and she does not do them justice. Her most powerful weapon is her ability to raise the dead. Yes, she’s a necromancer and she spent most of the series following Tiercel and Harrier throughout the desert, only to die in the volcano where she was first released in. The entire journey back and forth through the desert seemed rather senseless to me as well. And sometimes, it was exhausting to read about; this, however, is also because personally I am not a big fan of stories set in the desert.
Next, we have the dragons and the elves. In this second trilogy, the elves are secondary characters and do not take a big part in defeating Ahairan and the Dark. They simply ‘guide’ Tiercel and Harrier in to finding out what the next step in their journey is. Frankly, I was a little disappointed by this. I was looking forward to seeing at least some of the characters from the previous trilogy, and I did. But it was also not what I wanted to see. I understand that a thousand years is a long time to live, and that you must eventually die, and Jermayan’s death was one of the saddest parts of the entire series for me. But I still felt a little cheated. Jermayan dies transferring his bond with Ancaladar to Tiercel. Now, I thought Ancaladar was an awesome character in the first trilogy and I was happy to see him again here. I was also intrigued by how the authors were going to explore his relationship with Tiercel, given that the dragon’s new Bonded is a High Mage, not an Elf-Mage like Jermayan. But Ancaladar goes missing at the end of the second book and doesn’t show up in the third at all until the very end when he ‘miraculously’ comes back. And there was just no seeing how Ancaladar learns to love Tiercel as fiercely as he once loved Jermayan. The second dragon, Saravasse, was also a character that I felt wasn’t given a storyline she deserved. By the end of the third book she has lost her Bonded, is mad at the world, and does not have enough time to grieve her loss when she finds herself Bonded to Harrier in the same chapter. I was expecting a better ending for her. And I was upset that the authors had chosen to give her such a sad and bad ending.
Finally, Shaiara and Kareta. Shaiara was an important character in the story but I don’t think she stands out all that much. She is the leader of her people, yes, however I did not feel like she changed much from beginning to end. Her character arc was rather dull. On the other hand, Kareta, the unicorn that delivers Harrier his three books of Wild Magic, though funny and sassy at times, seemed rather annoying and obnoxious at others. And though she plays an important role in taking Tiercel and Harrier to the elves, I was not saddened when she left.
Plot
As in the case of The Outstretched Shadow Trilogy (renamed The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy), the authors chose both the trope of the reluctant hero/the chosen one, or in this case, the reluctant heroes/the chosen ones and the Hero’s Journey trope. Both The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy and The Enduring Flame Trilogy can be summarized as stories where the forces of good fight the forces the evil in a war that threatens the complete annihilation of the side that is defeated. This, of course, is a fantasy plot trope as old as time (e.g., The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien and Memory, Thorn and Sorrow by Tad Williams). What matters is how well the author/authors pull it off, and sad to say, The Enduring Flame Trilogy plot is poorly developed and executed in comparison to that of The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy. I should add, however, that this plot trope is not for everyone and in some cases it can drag to the point where the plot is slower than walking and people just get bored. But in cases where it is very well done, it can be a very rewarding reading experience. I, unfortunately, did not experience that with The Enduring Flame Trilogy, and I was very saddened by this because The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy is one of my favorite series of all time.
I cannot, however, recommend The Enduring Flame Trilogy as I do The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy. Needless to say, Mercedes Lackey is one of the best known fantasy authors today. However, her work with James Mallory might not be as well known. These, however, were the first books I ever read of this author and I hope that I will love The Dragon Prophecy Trilogy as much as I did The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy. Yes, I plan to continue reading the last trilogy set in the Obsidian Universe…but unfortunately I will not be reading The Enduring Flame Trilogy again.
Rating: I Did Not Like It.
