Notorious Sorcerer (Part 2)

STATS

Title: Notorious Sorcerer

Series: The Burnished City (Book 1)

Author(s): Davinia Evans

Genre: Fantasy fiction

First Printing: September 2022

Publisher: Orbit

Rating: 3/10

SPOILER WARNING

Mild spoilers will be necessary to properly break down this story.  I will include “Heavy Spoilers” in the heading for any section where further detail is required.  I will keep the first paragraph of section as spoiler-free as possible in case you want to skim and then read the book for yourself before coming back for the full analysis.

CHARACTERS

The characters of Notorious Sorcerer are not terrible.  They aren’t great (with one exception), but they are not so bad that they’d have ruined this book if the plot and worldbuilding were solid.  The best of them are likeable and engaging.  The worst serve a functional purpose, and while their execution may not always be on-point, they are as successful as they can be within the framework provided.

Siyon Velo

Siyon is not the only POV character of Notorious Sorcerer, but he is undeniably the protagonist.  A member of a bravi tribe (a gang of flashy swordsmen, whom I’ll get into more in the Worldbuilding section), he both earns a living and supports his tribe by opening portals to other planes and harvesting extraplanar ingredients, which he then sells to alchemists.  His life is changed when, one day, an instinctive act of magic earns him the attention of influential persons across the city.  Notorious Sorcerer then follows the adventures – and fallout – that ensue.

Right off the bat, Siyon is established as a likeable protagonist.  He’s witty, cunning, observant, and ambitious, yet he also understands his limits.  Though he is effectively broke and living on his own, he’s working hard to get an education and improve his situation.  It’s very easy to empathize with him.  That empathy does not diminish as he is tossed through the tumultuous events of the book, thinking on his feet and trying to help those around him.  He’s the type of character who makes friends with others quite easily, but this never feels forced.  Given the type of person he is, it’s believable that he could win people over quickly.

Siyon does, however, have three problems that are worth commenting upon.  They might not have been noteworthy in isolation, but taken together, they expose the pattern of superficiality in the writing.

The first issue is that Siyon’s observant nature and quick thinking are used as a crutch.  He’d used to provide blunt exposition to the audience about the rules of the magic system … in the same scenes when those observations become relevant, often at the very moment that they become relevant.  The timing of this information makes the magic feel less like something that is bound by the rules of cause and effect and more like something Evans is making up as she goes along, with her throwing in Siyon’s observations on a redraft to bandage the situation.  The same issue can be seen when Siyon uses magic to solve problems.

Compounding this is that Siyon is often figuring out things that magic users with a lot more experience couldn’t.  I don’t think it’s so bad that he becomes a Mary Sue, but it really does deflate the tension.  We know that, even if Siyon fails in a given scene, he’ll instantly figure out how to get it right next time with little or no help.  He is a key contributor to why the magic system feels like it has no depth and can do whatever is needed to drive the plot forward.

The second issue with Siyon is his backstory.  He is the son of a fisher clan from the poorest part of the city, and he had to leave that family behind after a traumatic altercation.  This is decent as a backstory.  However, the book insists on squeezing in an anticlimactic confrontation with said family near the end of the second act of the story.  It feels very rushed, and a lot of exposition gets dumped on us after the fact.  Ultimately, it’s something that we didn’t need, and it toys with depth rather than providing it.

The third issue pertains to his involvement in the yaoi romance.  Put simply, the text fails to convince me that Siyon is attracted to other men.  Evans goes out of her way to point out women he had sex with and to tell us how he enjoys looking at scantily clad women, yet he never shows any physical interest in other men until Izmirlian, nor is any mention made to prior sexual relations with other men.  This might work if Izmirlian were the first man he was attracted to, but the way it is presented within the novel, Siyon was already aware of this aspect of himself.  (I also don’t think that this is a society where homosexuality is so commonplace that a person wouldn’t need a moment to process such a revelation, due to the way another character’s supposed homosexuality is handled.) I have a hunch that, in the source material that Notorious Sorcerer is fanfiction for, the character on whom Siyon is based on is heterosexual, and Evans merely layered on an attraction to men for the sake of the erotica.  The reason he’s so easily distracted by women is that Evans reverts to his original characterization whenever she’s not pushing him towards sex with Izmirlian.

Izmirlian Hisarani

Izmirlian is the second son of an incredibly wealthy noble house.  He is the type of idle rich man who indulges in travel and the arts.  Having grown bored of the Mundane world, he seeks magic that will allow him to travel beyond the bounds of reality and into whatever existence is beyond the planes.  Siyon’s incredible magic catches his eye, so he commissions Siyon to make his desire a reality.

I have no complaints about Izmirlian.  His characterization is close to perfect.  He is an intellectual match for Siyon, and his more subdued nature and ability to conduct himself among the upper crust of society makes for a good dynamic between the characters.  While he’s not as sociable as Siyon, it’s not hard to understand why other characters like him.

For all the criticisms I’ve leveled thus far, and all those yet to come, the fact remains that Evans can write very well if she is passionate about something.  I think it’s safe to say that she was more invested in Izmirlian than any other element in this book.  All that hard work paid off.  (It might have worked too well.  He’s a more interesting character than Siyon.)

Zagiri

A noble girl who slums as a member of Siyon’s bravi tribe, Zagiri shares his quick thinking, desire to help others, and ease at winning people over.  She has no interest in alchemy herself, but that doesn’t stop her from helping Siyon in various alchemical endeavors.  After Siyon saves her life (in the aforementioned act of instinctive magic), she offers him shelter in her sister’s household, thereby facilitating the progression of the other subplots.

Zagiri was the character who first made me aware of the superficiality problem that this book suffers from, long before I realized why the book is that way.  She has a subplot about helping alchemists, all poor people or foreigners, escape the clutches of the city’s inquisitors.  She laments the fact that the rich are protected while the poor suffer.  In fairness to her, it makes sense that she would have this conflict: she is a member of the noble class who has made friends among the lowest classes of the city, and thus she is directly confronted by the unequal treatment.

The problem with Zagiri’s subplot is that it’s very shallow.  It’s doesn’t have anything new, interesting, or challenging to say.  As for Zagiri’s involvement in said subplot, her motivation doesn’t run any deeper than helping the poor because That’s Good and lamenting the unequal treatment because That’s Wrong.  She’s also not challenged over the fact that she is actively benefitting from being a noble, including going home to a safe, comfortable house each night and participating in lavish social events (she shows up to at least two scenes wearing a nice dress from one of those events).

The only aspect of her that sort of has depth is the fact that she gets a suggestion of a character arc.  At the start of the book, she is a spoiled elite who rails against the system and refuses to honor her responsibilities while living parasitically off the wealth of her family; at the end of the book, after helping the downtrodden because That’s Good, she’s still most of those things, but she’s indicated a willingness to start taking up her responsibilities.

On an unrelated note, I suspect Evans used Zagiri as a self-insert.  Aside from her inherent goodness, she is constantly helping to drive the plot along by delivering timely messages or having good ideas.  More importantly, there are two conversations she has about relationships, one with Siyon and one with her older sister, that sound just a little bit off to me.  She sounds less like a product of her environment and more like a young woman of our own era.  It feels like Evans was using her as a mouthpiece to address other characters directly.

Anahid

As Zagiri’s older sister and the wife of a powerful alchemist named Nihath Joddani, Anahid plays a key supporting role in the story.  She shelters Siyon from the inquisitors for several weeks and aids him in his adventures when she can.  Anahid also gets a subplot about her dissatisfaction with her marriage, her frustrations with how social expectations bind her to that marriage, and how she tries to find self-actualization through a card game called carrick.

Anahid is my second-favorite character after Izmirlian.  While she is not part of the erotica subplot, she is on the checklist of things Evans was passionate about, so her characterization is fairly solid.  My biggest gripe with her is, again, with her subplot.  Anahid does not actually address or even confront her problems.  She instead distracts herself from them by becoming a gambling addict.

Maybe that’s a bit of a spicy take.  Maybe I’m jaded by my own experiences with psychological addiction.  Maybe Evans wanted to tell us a sort of sports story, showing how Anahid becomes a professional gambler, finding joy in the game and the struggle without being mastered by it.  Even if I’m right, a character falling into vice as an alternative to resolving her problems could make for a great story.  Evans could be going for some long-term arc about Anahid hiding from her problems in the momentary pleasure of gambling.

Looking at Evans’s interview, I doubt any of those positive spins apply.

Evans wanted to self-indulge in “various flavours of badass women” and “terribly complicated card games”.  She succeeded in both.  What she failed to consider was how she was combining the two elements.  To be clear, Anahid’s enjoyment of this card game is explicitly linked to winning money in it.  She is triggering the neurochemical signals in her brain that make gambling so addictive.  At the same time, we never see Anahid confront her problems. She doesn’t even try.  We the audience are simply told to expect that these problems cannot be salvaged.

Oh, and did I mention that this is after only a few months of marriage, to a husband whose only crime is that he is married to his work (and maybe has an in-house lover, though we’ll get into that below), something that a member of the upper classes who is marrying for social position should have been mentally prepared for?

Evans had two superficial objectives with Anahid.  While she successfully hit both targets, she failed to provide the necessary structural support within the narrative for Anahid’s story to hold together for more than a few seconds of analysis.  It’s clear that Evans was not truly interested in telling Anahid’s story.  The self-indulgence was what mattered here.

Nihath Joddani

One of the most powerful and influential alchemists in Bezim, Nihath’s mind is consumed with one problem: the planes of reality are out of alignment, distorting how magic works in Bezim.  To restore balance, he seeks to make himself the Power of the Mundane (a godlike figure who can act as a counterweight to balance the Powers on the other planes).  He works alongside Siyon to unravel the mystery of restoring alignment and becoming said Power.

Nihath’s position in the story is complicated.  Functionally, he is one of Siyon’s two mentors in magic, embodying alchemy (which represents empiricism, reason, and the scientific method).  His character development throughout the book is not change so much as an evolving perspective of who he is.  He starts as an elite figure whom Siyon must extort into granting access to his library; when Siyon is first sheltered under his and Anahid’s roof, he reprimands Siyon for being a dangerous amateur.  As the story progresses, he becomes more benign and helpful, trusting more and more in Siyon’s judgement as he sees the effectiveness of Siyon’s methods.  He also indirectly supports the erotica subplot by providing Siyon access to texts and ingredients needed to facilitate said plot.

I don’t have issues with Nihath as a character.  He is functional in his role.  The thematic conflict that he services has issues of his own, but we’ll get into that in Part 5.

Auntie Geryss

Geryss is Siyon’s original teacher in alchemy.  She is a foreigner who, while an accomplished alchemist, advocates a return to sorcery (a more fundamental approach to magic that represents mysticism, emotion, connections, and abstract ideas).  There is a side quest in the story where she goes missing for an extended period, and Siyon endangers himself to try and find her.  When she resurfaces, it is to provide wisdom to help Siyon accomplish his goals.

As you might have guessed, Geryss is the mentor embodying the opposite side of the thematic conflict of alchemy versus sorcery.  Unlike Nihath, she doesn’t have depth outside of that.  She’s also less effective in her role than Nihath.  The story treats her ideas as if they are something revolutionary to Siyon, but if she was his original teacher, it doesn’t make a lot of sense that she didn’t impart this perspective on him previously.  (I’m sure there is some way to rationalize this, but the audience should not need to repair the story for the writer.)

Tehroun (Heavy Spoilers)

Tehroun is Nihath’s … apprentice?  In-house lover?

The book tells us that he’s Nihath’s lover, citing this was the reason why Anahid is so unhappy in her marriage.  (This is the bit about cultural views of homosexuality that I mentioned while criticizing Siyon’s writing.  It’s not clear what Nihath would bother marrying someone of lower social position if he were free to have a male lover.)  Having read the book, I have my doubts as to whether Nihath and Tehroun really have that sort of relationship.  Nihath’s characterization and behavior towards Tehroun makes it seem like Tehroun is just an assistant whom Nihath values for his magical skills.

Regardless, Tehroun is around.  He is frequently in Nihath’s orbit, and he is often lurking in the house when Siyon is around.  He has a mysterious affinity for Aethereal magic, and Siyon feels a connection with him that can’t be fully explained.  His guidance is instrumental to helping Siyon unravel the magic ritual for the erotica subplot.

Early on, the idea is floated that Tehroun is a fallen djinn, a spirit of the Aethereal plane who has become trapped in a mortal shape.  Nihath is dismissive of this idea, thinking that Tehroun’s affinity for the Aethereal is nothing but a talent, but it is confirmed later in the book that Tehroun is indeed a djinn.  In fact, Siyon summoned him years ago, a forgotten act of magic that saved Siyon from drowning.  This should have been a compelling twist … except that, as mentioned above in Siyon’s breakdown, the whole backstory about him being the son of a fisherman was just dumped on the audience, without any emotional weight behind it. Learning that Tehroun was summoned to the Mundane by Siyon as part of that backstory earned nothing but a bland, “Oh, okay,” from me.

I think it’s commendable that Evans tried to use secondary characters for multiple purposes.  That’s both an efficient strategy and one that makes the story feel more realistic.  In this case, though, the parts of Tehroun’s character that worked and the parts that didn’t really showcase where her priorities were.

Vartan Xhanari

The inquisitors serve as the chief antagonists of Notorious Sorcerer, and Xhanari is the face of the inquisitors (at least, as far as Siyon is concerned).  He targets Siyon personally, seeing our protagonist as a weak link who can be used to bring down all other alchemists in Bezim.  As the stakes escalates, he reveals that he’s willing to go farther than any other inquisitor to crush the alchemists.

Xhanari is effective as a villain.  He’s not interesting, and his most extreme behavior is being slightly more willing to use lawful levels of physical violence than his compatriots, but he has an easily understood motivation.  What’s more, Siyon sees him as a credible threat. That goes a long way to sell Xhanari as an antagonist.  While I have issues with the inquisitors in general (more on that in Part 4), I don’t have issues with Xhanari specifically.

Also, Xhanari is one half of the reason I think that Notorious Sorcerer began as a fanfiction of Fullmetal Alchemist.  He has Roy Mustang’s drive and devotion to working within the system to achieve his goals, and the narrative explicitly states that inquisitors have an affinity for the Empyreal plane (which serves as the plane of fire in this setting).

Olenka (Heavy Spoilers)

The Riza Hawkeye to Xhanari’s Mustang, Olenka is always close whenever Xhanari appears.  She’s a Valkyrie of a woman whose physical presence leaves no doubt that she could overpower any other character in a physical altercation.  Siyon may fear Xhanari’s relentlessness, but he is fully aware that Olenka will be the one who pounds him into submission.

Olenka is another fallen planar being: an angel of the Empyreal.  While this works well enough at first glance, Evans takes it too far.  Olenka is heavily implied to be the same angel that tries to kill Siyon in the opening of the book.  It’s also implied that the act of magic that makes Siyon a public sensation was him summoning her to the Mundane (much like he did with Tehroun).  The problem with this is the timeline.  If Olenka is that same angel, then she entered the Mundane the same day that she meets Siyon in human form.  By that point, she is already Xhanari’s lieutenant.  How did she accomplish this in mere hours?  (Then again, the text leaves some ambiguity as to whether she is indeed that same angel, so this could just be Siyon misreading who she is).

Enkin Danelani (Heavy Spoilers)

The son of Bezim’s prefect (the official who is the highest executive authority in the city), Danelani corners Siyon to buy a powerful alchemical ingredient … which he promptly uses to teleport to the Abyss (the plane of water).  His disappearance causes massive upheaval in the city.  His mother unleashes the inquisitors upon all magic users in the city, desperate to either force Danelani’s return or to punish those responsible for this disappearance.  This purge serves as the main source of tension throughout the book.

Danelani is another functional character.  He triggers conflict, then he sits out of the story until Siyon and Izmirlian rescue him. (This rescue services the erotica subplot, as the influence of the Abyss nearly spurs Siyon and Izmirlian into having sex before they can find him.)  He then triggers more conflict by falling ill after the rescue, triggering another purge.

While Danelani serves his role perfectly well, Evans’s attempt to give him depth just raises more questions.  He teleported to the Abyss so that he could be with a harpy (the one mentioned in the blurb).  How, exactly, did he meet this harpy in the first place?  When did they fall in love, and when did she convince him to join her in the Abyss?  For that matter, with the way the rules of portals work in this world, he shouldn’t have needed Siyon’s help in the first place.  He should have vanished before this story even started.

I don’t think Evans thought Danelani all the way through.  This might have been a situation where it would have been better if we never learned Danelani’s reason for going to the Abyss, leaving it all as a mystery that could be resolved later.  As it was, Evans used him to try to set up some lore that factors into the resolution of the A plot, and that stretch doesn’t mesh well with other aspects of the worldbuilding.

Other

There’s a healthy ensemble of site characters in this story, like Daruj, a fellow bravi from Siyon and Zagiri’s tribe.  None of the others have a significant contribution of the plot.  They’re written well enough for their roles, and they’ve not unlikeable, but no one else is remarkable enough to warrant analysis.

Lessons Learned

On the whole, Evans wrote a good cast.  Here, the superficiality problem isn’t so much about flat characters so much as transparent ones.  We can clearly see which characters (and which aspects of those characters) were the ones she was truly willing to put in effort for.  There are also too many cases where narrative purpose of the characters is plain to see.

There’s nothing wrong with a writer having a favorite among their characters.  Having characters serve a meaningful function that moves your story along is a good thing.  However, neither fact should be obvious on a first reading.  An important aspect of telling an immersive story is making each character feel like their own person.  Give more attention to your favorites, sure, but at least make sure that everyone else has depth in their characterization, and make sure you think through how that characterization meshes with the other elements of the story.

A WHOLE NEW WORLD

Character is the core of storytelling.  This is not a bad core.  Given this setup, you might be thinking that I exaggerated the problems with this book.

Unfortunately, these characters are not great enough to single-handed carry a narrative, and their stories are intertwined with things that really don’t work.  What’s worse, there is a massive hole in the worldbuilding that I had to ignore for the sake of this character analysis.  If I had to take it into account, half of these characters would have been so horribly assassinated that they’d seem almost as bad as Daylen Namaran.

We won’t quite get into this issue next week.  I had so much to say on the worldbuilding that I had to split it into two parts.  Next week, we’ll focus on the more glamorous aspects that drew me into the story, and how they inadvertently destroy the most important subplots of the book.  After that, we’ll explore the scene of the character assassinations.

I hope you’ll join me for it next week.  See you all then.