The Moonlight Blade
The Moonlight Blade
I jerk Ingo’s shoulders harder, but he does not twitch or groan. His chest rises so little that I bend close to his nose, and a faint exhalation tickles the hairs near my ears. His breath smells of molding oranges, just like Alen’s. I move the back of my hand close to his forehead but don’t dare touch his skin. He feels too hot. Gingerly, I pull up his sleeves and see the rash has already spread upward. Whatever this malady is, it works quickly, and I’m trapped in here with it. Heavens help me, I hope it isn’t in the air, or I’m doomed.
I lay Ingo flat on the floor and open his lungs, and I start banging at the wall. “Is anyone out there? Ingo’s sick! I need help!” I might not care for him, but I cannot let him die.
But the door doesn’t open. Maybe it’s not supposed to. Maybe we’re being disappeared, like the other candidates and the missing Archivists. And that means no one’s coming to help. I can’t afford to fail this test. Panic rises up from my gut. Payan warned I had to do well or I may not score high enough to continue. I rub my eyes in frustration. My mother is so close. I just need a little longer.
The Moonlight Blade is an atmospheric fantasy novel set in a highly original world, one full of danger and suspense. Narra has lived her life under the curse of a stigmatizing birthmark, forced to hide and avoid strangers. When her mother is arrested in the city and imprisoned in the fortress, Narra feels obligated to enter the unfamiliar city and find and rescue her. To get into the fortress, Narra fraudulently enters a ritual competition to choose the next leader of the country, joining hundreds of other young adults all vying for the position. By day, Narra competes in the dangerous trials of the competition, and, by night, she searches for her mother. Soon she learns that all is not going right with the competition. While the competition is supposed to be dangerous and difficult, it is not normal for so many competitors to disappear and die, and many of the tasks they are set go wrong. Something is deeply amiss, and Narra soon discovers that it is connected to her own past and her mother's crime and a sinister conspiracy to remake the world, a conspiracy that only Narra has the power to stop.
In The Moonlight Blade, Tessa Barbosa has crafted a unique world with a complex history, adding richness and a sense of originality to the novel. Narra is a complex character with a sense of loyalty to her mother and sister that leads her to rash decisions. The history of Narra’s people is provided to the reader in small details that come out naturally through the telling of the story. It is an effective way to convey the complexity of the world without long paragraphs of explanatory information. At the beginning, it can make the story difficult to follow, but the reader soon has enough context to understand what is going on. The Moonlight Blade is full of action and suspense but also contains considerable violence. Not all readers will be comfortable with the level of death and violence experienced by Narra and the other characters.
The Moonlight Blade will appeal to fans of fantasy that enjoy original world building and complex characters.
Tara Stieglitz is a librarian at MacEwan University in Edmonton, Alberta.