Shadow in the Empire of Light by Jane Routley

Publisher - Solaris

Published - Out Now (eBook) 21/1 paperback

Price - £4.31 Kindle eBook

"MAGIC. MURDER. MAYHEM. But keep it in the family.

Shine’s life is usually dull: an orphan without magic in a family of powerful mages, she’s left to run the family estate with only an eccentric aunt and telepathic cat for company.

But when the family descend on the house for the annual Fertility Festival, Shine is plunged into dark intrigue; stolen letters, a fugitive spy, and family drama mix with murder, sex and secrets, and Shine is forced to decide both her loyalties and future...

Fantasy can be a tad po-faced although there is often scheming and treachery, it is all done in a medieval-style court; so, it has manners and curiously staid as the knife enters the back. When I was reading Shadow in the Empire of the Light by Jane Routley, I found myself sent to a very different type of world one that is bawdy, light and yet just as flawed as our own.

The story is told by Shine who is an impoverished hard-working member on her family’s estate trying to turn it into profit. The Empire of Light is divided between Mages with magical powers and mundane who are not. Shine’s family is mainly Mage-based (unlike Shine)and is distantly related to its emperor so her family is noble…at least in theory…in reality as they prepare to descend for a religious ceremony they are often under the influence of drugs, rowing with each other, scheming for power and seeking sexual adventures. All of this Shine sees with some annoyance but its an annual tradition she has to be a part of. But this year she will have her exiled relative return in secret; a traveller from a neighbouring country to hide; a family member’s secret to uncover and a murder to help unravel. This year Shine’s life will begin to change a lot.

The key world I think of when reading this story is bustle everything is moving and swirling around. As the story is told by Shine in first-person, we don’t have an omnipotent narrator explaining the world we have to slowly uncover it. Routley throws the reader in the deep end as we try to make sense what is a very different culture and way of living. We get thrown these various events and the way the family celebrate and have to try and work out what is going on. Those who enjoy precise storytelling may not enjoy this, but I enjoyed what at times felt more a slice of life tale than typical tale of warring families.

The life element is for me the main attraction. The Empire of Light is a study in contradictions. Religiously devoted nobles yet the working class worship different Gods; those who practise the ceremony are well respected yet the ones we meet are often drug-addled and everyone seems very sexually liberated to a point taking lovers just for fun…to a point. This is where I enjoyed having the story narrated by Shine who sort of accepts this world is how it is and yet she here has a couple of interesting realisations that her society is flawed beyond how appalling her relatives treat her.

Very early on we meet her favourite cousin Bright who we find was exiled from the family; because they are gay which in this world of sexual appetites, is still a social barrier; it is also quite racist as we find when she encounters Bright’s secret - a traveller from the Outlands Shadow who is investigating some strange events on the border of the two countries. We find The Empire is very scared of outsiders and Shine herself is of mixed race (her missing mother was in a relationship with someone from the Outlands). Add in an Empire where indentured servitude is often common practise then Routley gives us a world that could be a lot of fun but is also underneath with some serious social flaws that Shine is only just realising are all around her.

I also liked Shine a lot as our lead she is smart and young but not yet worked out where she fits in the world. Its quite unusual to have a female lead very aware of her own sexuality and desires but mixed with a desire to be doing something else than manage a farm. She is engaging as a character and a narrator as we get her various personal views on her relatives. One of the bigger themes is her realising the secrets of the family are a lot nastier than she realised and towards the send of the book we get some frank looks at issues of sexual abuse being uncovered. In some ways a big tonal shift but also it’s a logical step that a society that is so focused on pleasure and power for the nobles is perhaps a little too eager to turn a blind eye to those it hurts the most. These shadings in the world I think raise from just a slice of life to perhaps allowing us to explore a different type of world which still hides a lot of dangers within it.

The plot does take its time to move on but in this world, we will meet physic cats, smugglers and killers with racing or even flying through the forest. It’s a tale with a lot of energy and something is always going on whether small or large in terms of narrative. Some things didn’t quite work for me it only becomes clear in the final act we are heading towards a sequel yet a lot of plot points don’t feel very sewn up yet and there is a slight concern I have over showing a racist society where the Empire is definitely non-white and also one where the Outlands is shown to be more democratic and technically advanced rather than the magical empire. Overall, I felt the story was being fair and I think until I’ve read the other parts of it, I’m ambivalent if that is a failing or a deliberate device for another reason.

Overall though this was a story that strangely reminded me of Emma Newman’s Split World series where we also had a society blind to its own flaws which ended up undoing itself. This was a lot of fun and I’ve always enjoyed stories where I’m trying to work the world out plus it has magical cats so what where you expecting me to say? If you enjoy bawdy energetic stories that still take their time to unfold then this is one you should have a look at.