I liked it enough, the story, but it was quite boring at times because the main character was a little boring… the fact is, Ben is described as a level-headed man, a lawyer, with a strong sense of justice and a big desire to change his life. Which is good, but he keeps thinking and rethinking the same things over and over, wondering, doubting, hoping, and therefore we read basically the same thing over and over with him.
Other than that, the story was nice and interesting, and the other characters were okay, although it would have been nicer to have a bit more about them, but we only have a sort of Ben-point-of-view, so we see and hear them only when Ben does.
The story in details:
Ben is sad. He lost his wife Annie to a car accident two years ago and he never got over it. He only has one friend left, his partner Miles at the law firm, but even with him he speaks mostly of work, he doesn’t do anything else but working.
At the beginning of the book, a Christmas catalog is delivered to him, addressed to his wife who loved it, and he reads it thinking of her, when he sees the strangest thing: a magical kingdom for sale at one million dollars. He laughs about it, doesn’t believe it, even talks about it with Miles, but nonetheless he keeps thinking about it. It’s a Rosen’s catalog, they have a good reputation to uphold, only stuff for the rich, only unique pieces, they wouldn’t trick their customers out of their money like that… so he goes to New York to talk to the man, Mr Meeks, that should decide if he is an acceptable buyer. He doesn’t really believe, still, but he hopes, because his life is no more worth living here in Chicago. He is heartbroken and frustrated at his job and the law system.
Meeks deems him acceptable so he buys Landover. Instructions arrive at his home, and he follows them to the letter. He boards a plane, then drives the car assigned to him, wears the medallion that he was instructed never to take off, and walks in the direction written on the instructions.
Suddenly there’s a strange mist, he sees a dragon and a demon and a knight that saves him from it, and arrives in a new realm. He meets Questor Thews, a wizard who is not really good at magic and very often messes it up. Then he meets Abernathy, the scribe, who looks like a dog on two legs, because Questor Thews tried to disguise him with magic and never got him back the same.
The only other two in his court are two kobolds, Bunion and Parsnip.
He learns that the magic is dying since Landover has been twenty years without a proper king, and as he goes on he learns that he’s on another world, no more on Earth, but connected to it by the fairy mist. It has been sold many times over the years, but since nobody managed to stay for long, Meeks was always able to sell it again, making lots and lots of money.
Meeks was once the court wizard, but when the king died his young son didn’t want the responsibility so he went to Earth with Meeks and they started selling the place.
Without a proper king, Landover is losing its magic, everywhere there are signs of it, and his castle is gloomy and rusted too. He has no money, no army, there are no more laws and no more taxes, and very few people come to his coronation because nobody believes in the latest king farce anymore.
Ben is determined to stay, though, he hates giving up and doesn’t want to fail and go back to his miserable life.
He decides to start working to become a real king, and first he thinks he needs his subjects to pledge loyalty to him. He goes to the Lords of the Greensward first, where he is challenged by the local Lord Kallendbor. Luckily Abernathy is smart enough to suggests the ‘weapons’, knowing that Ben used to practice box back home, so he can at least hold his own until the ghost of the Paladin comes to his aid. They say now that they’ll be on his side only if he frees them of the dragon killing their animals and their people.
Ben goes to the River Master next, and even though the welcome is much nicer, he finds the same distrust and disbelief. He’s told that if he convinces the Lords to stop polluting the waters and the land he’ll pledge to him.
Ben meets a beautiful sylph here, Willow. She tells him that the encounter was foretold, and that she now belongs to him. Ben doesn’t believe it, and does not ask the Master to let her go with him. As beautiful as she is, Willow is also totally different, a creature who must turn into a tree to get nourishment. Also, he feels guilty over the memory of his beloved wife.
Back at the castle, two small creatures, Fillip and Sot, ask for his help. They are G’Home Gnomes, called like that because nobody wants them around, they are little thieves and they eat dogs and other pet creatures (pets are easier to hunt…). They tell him that the Orcs (or Trolls?) have enslaved their people (because they stole and ate their pets…) and swear loyalty to him if he helps. Ben doesn’t like them, like nobody likes them, they are little thieves and extremely dirty, but they are the only ones on his side at the moment, and the first to make a request to him as the King, and they are still part of the world, so he accepts. They are all captured and only manage to escape (also freeing the Gnomes people) because Willow followed him of her own accord, insisting she belongs with him and he will learn to love her in time, and she frees them.
Fillip and Sot now are loyal to him and follow him, and help him any way they can.
Ben thinks that the only thing to do at this point is to go to the witch Nightshade, a witch with a strong magic still, hoping she might help him. Everyone is terrorised of her and nobody wants him to go but he is determined (and as always listens to nobody; he has quite a King-attitude: I say we go, we go!!!).
The two Gnomes know the way and he speaks to the witch (who followed him all the way since he entered the Deep Fell in the form of a crow). She appears to be evil, does not care for him or any other king or creature or person other than herself. He insists and she makes a deal, if he is as strong as he says he will go through the Fairy mists and bring her something she says she will use to help him control the dragon (everything is so obvious at this point, that it is a powder to take control over another being and since she’s so evil it’s not very likely that she’ll let him have it…)
Willow is terrified for him, says nobody can enter the mists and come back, that he’ll not be able to make it, reality is different there and everything is sort of controlled by the mind, or rather influenced by the person’s mind, but of course he doesn’t listen, asks no further questions about what he will be faced with, and simply goes.
He sees things that destroy him: Miles saying he was gone ten years, believed dead and has nothing anymore; Annie and their daughter’s ghosts saying they were waiting for him but he never came, instead sold her house and left their world; Landover a dead place, with everyone dead because he failed. He manages to find his balance again and think, and knows that it wasn’t real and it was just his fears. At this point the Fairy people speak to him, saying he conquered his fears and deserves the powder… (well, every time he was saved from perdition by a weird wind that sort of knocked him back, and stopped the vision… it’s not said what that wind was, but he didn’t seem to me so special in this particular mission… )
Realising now that it is too dangerous to simply go back and give it to the witch, he plans to trick her and he has her inhale the powder so she has to obey him… honestly, he only asks her a few questions before becoming too enraged to reason and sending her away through the Fairy Mists, where she would probably die or have a very unpleasant stay since she was forbidden back there.
Learning that Willow and all the others have been captured by the witch and sent to the demon world, he gets angry and plans to rescue them.
He goes to Strabo, who is a quite cultured dragon, but quite used to stop bothering and simply eat the nuisance, so after a few words Strabo wants to eat him but he has it enhale a lot of powder so the dragon has to obey him. Riding Strabo, Ben goes to the Abaddon realm and saves all his friends (Questor Thews manages to do something right with his magic, when he was about to die), and then go back to the Rivers where Willow has to transform or she will die.
Afterwards, he frees the dragon with the promise that he won’t hunt at the Lords’ lands anymore.
The biggest, scariest demon comes to challenge him for the throne (because nobody can take the medallion off him), and Ben accepts.
He still has no idea of what he will do to save himself, but is determined to try.
In front of the Lords and the River people, he summons the Paladin, and everybody watches as the king stands still while the Paladin fights and beats the demon away.
Ben finds out why the role of the king is so important, the medallion gives him the power to call the Paladin, but it is his own consciousness that enters the Paladin and has him fight as a real knight and not a ghost, the Paladin is the King himself!
After winning the battle, he has the Lords keep their promise, and they swear to him since he got the dragon to stay away. Then the River Master as well, since Ben tells the Lords to stop polluting the waters.
They have a big feast at the castle, and already the castle feels better (it is sort of alive, magical).
Now Ben plans many ways in which he will bring Landover towards a brighter future, but for the moment he has to go and find the two Gnomes, because the Lords had a dog that now can’t be found…
ITA il magico regno di Landover
(also: Gnomi Va’ via, Strega del Crepuscolo, silfide, i Signori delle Pianure, il Signore del Fiume, il Marchio di Ferro…)
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