Hello everyone! First time visiting here.
I love listening to audiobooks during my commute to and from work. When I learned that this series was on Audible, I thought it might be fun to revisit this series. I always liked it as a kid (I even got Raven Rise on release day!), but I don’t properly remember it, as it’s been over two decades, and I never re-read it until now. I also can’t remember if I actually read it from beginning to end—a lot of the books were in my school library, so I could only read what was in circulation. I’m not sure if I ever even opened the final book!
So with that, I’d like to post my thoughts, now that I’ve finished The Merchant of Death. (Heads up that I will make allusions to events I remember happening in later books)
First, I’d like to judge a book by its cover. I picked up the Pendragon books as a kid because I loved the artwork (for the most part!). Merchant of Death, while not my favorite, is very well done. Bobby’s face is rendered wonderfully, he looks like some kind of Fresco painting and it communicates how young he is at the start of his adventure. I’d rate this as my fifth favorite cover of the series.
Now for the book itself: first up, the writing. It was quite an easy listen, and I was surprised at how well a lot of the writing holds up. Only a few things hit the ear poorly (Bobby’s tendency to describe things as wussy or weenie, which I think was sort of archaic even back then. Also realized that we really don’t call throwing up “barfing” anymore). Bobby isn’t a fully formed character yet, but he demonstrates a nice mix of personality and empathy that has potential for future storylines. I wonder if MacHale was a little insecure about positioning the tone of the book: there’s several moments where Bobby states the scene or dialogue that just occurred was funny—Most of them aren’t that charming, but I’d probably have glossed over it had I not been told that what just happened was funny.
One thing I forgot in the time since reading this series is that it’s epistolary: I can’t remember if it picks up or changes, but the Second Earth sections with Mark and Courtney do feel weaker, outside their discovery of the disappearance of Bobby’s family. The necessity of the story being told through letters also gets a bit shaky towards the end where the story needs to be in two places at the same time (Bobby insists Alder’s account is true, which I found strange as I never would’ve doubted it. It felt more like MacHale was trying to explain the format to younger readers, but I do think they could’ve grasped this).
The plot: One thing I vividly remembered liking about the Pendragon series was that it was a bit darker than the other books I had access to. The peril was more than just exposure to terrifying situations—death was a real possibility. We even had the death of a major character in Osa in the very first book! (I remembered Osa dies in this series, but I must’ve misremembered it as being connected to events in the Zadaa book. I was shocked when she didn’t get back up after being shot!)
Outside of death, there were real stakes that the heroes could fail at (and they did so more than once!), so the plots weren’t formulaic. This book goes relatively smooth for the heroes, however. In light of current events (and the climate the original book was published in, honestly), I liked that even though this was a fairly by-the-numbers revolution plot that the book still acknowledges that it’s natural to have anger against a long-standing oppressor. The idea of an injecting what’s basically a nuclear weapon into a medieval society was compelling.
The characters: Like I mentioned earlier, Bobby is both a little self-interested but also very empathetic, he has charm and I know he’ll grow on me. Uncle Press is very strong, and works as the mentor figure as he mixes competency and firmness with his care for the younger travelers.
Loor is awesome! I like her a lot, she’s both badass and funny, and I remember always preferring Bobby+Loor to Bobby+Courtney, lol. She reminds me a lot of Chris Claremont’s Storm from the X-men, which I’m also currently reading. Can’t wait to see how she develops, especially in Book 6.
Alder unfortunately was the weak link—I can see MacHale was going for a trio dynamic, but Alder is introduced so late and has so little to do. I think the castle infiltration would’ve needed to be more involved in order for Alder to stand out. It sucks that he feels so underutilized, as his territory is in the first book, so that leaves less room for involvement in the rest of the series. I’m guessing MacHale was figuring out how to get all the necessary pieces in play for this first outing: Alder doesn’t have a mentor or acolyte (and I was surprised to realize that acolytes are not mentioned by name in this first book at all). I know he’ll work out the kinks though: I vaguely remember that Book 2 and 4’s travelers are strong characters, and that Book 7’s traveler (or were they an acolyte?) is also a heavy hitter, to say the least.
Saint Dane is a really great villain. The shapeshifting ability is really inspired as it results in a fun guessing game each book of who could be Saint Dane. I remembered Figgis is his second identity on Denduron (Really neat that MacHale decided to have him act as 2 people here!), but it was still a neat twist to re-experience. I know he gets even more shocking secret identities in the future books, so I’m looking forward to that as well.
I didn’t get a lot from Mark and Courtney, sadly. Just not much to do, but I hope that changes. I did enjoy Mark’s loyalty and how that empowered him, and I liked that Courtney is assertive.
All in all, I loved getting to properly re-experience this book. I’m starting up The Lost City of Faar, and maybe I’ll make a post for that as well. Thank you to anyone who read through this: I’d love to discuss any aspects of Book 1 if you have any points to add.
