A god will return
When the earth and sky converge
Under the black sun
Rebecca Roanhorse’s previous Hugo-nominated novel (and debut book) was set in a dystopian future of climate disaster and Navajo legends come to life. Her latest book has also been nominated for Best Novel, and this one is set in the distant past…sort of. The world of Meridian is a fantasy creation heavily inspired by pre-Contact Americas, with elements of Aztec and Mayan culture mixed in with gods and magic and a decades-long plan to create an omnipotent weapon of revenge in the body of a scared 12-year old boy.
Today he would become a god. His mother had told him so…
We first meet Serapio ten years before Convergence, on the day his mother ends his old life and starts his new one using a bone needle, gut thread, and knives.
We first meet Naranpa on the day of Convergence as she’s being dragged from the river, frozen and paralyzed while a witch and her apprentices cover her with blood, trying to understand how she could rise all the way to become the Sun Priest, only to end up here.
The rest of the book is the story of everything that happens in between.
Roanhorse talks in her afterword about how hard it is to find epic fantasy stories set in the pre-Columbian Americas. Part of the problem seems to be that so many people assume everything outside of Europe was a primitive civilization before Columbus showed up. Black Sun takes many elements that show the Americas were anything but primitive – a civilization with metropolises and intercontinental trade and science and artwork – and combines the clothes and architecture and food and music with a gorgeously-described fantasy setting that has magic and gods and crows that are big enough to ride.
Just about every scene is sumptuous, from the grand halls of The Celestial Tower, to the impromptu firelit sailor picnic on a sandbar far from the coast, to the bustling crowds of The Coyote’s Maw, the cityscape that’s built vertically along the sides of a narrow canyon so deep that the bottom is perpetually in twilight.
People filled the streets, some finishing their evening shopping under the glow of torchlight but most already out carousing for the evening’s entertainment. Women in bright one-shouldered dresses that bared skin, despite the cold, and men in leggings and hip skirts adorned with colorful string and embroidery. Music poured from doorways, flute and drum and trumpet, accompanied by singing and the slap of dancing feet.
The cast of characters in the front of the book looks a little intimidating, but Roanhorse unspools the history and politics so gradually that I found it was easier to just soak it in rather than trying to memorize names from the list. To summarize (very) briefly, the city of Tova is the crowning jewel of the crescent-shaped continent of Meridian. In Tova there are the Watchers (the religious ruling body), and the Sky Made (the four clans that make up the nobility of Tova). Years ago during the infamous Night of Knives, most of the clan of Carrion Crow was wiped out by the Watchers for being, well, mostly for being religious, but not being the right kind of religious. For being a threat to the Watchers.
And there are quite a few people who have shaped their whole lives around finding a way to bring down the Watchers in revenge.
It is said that crows can remember the faces of men who hurt them and do not forgive. They will carry a grudge against their tormentor until their deaths and pass on their resentment to their children. It is how they survive.
The book is divided between four main characters, shuttling back and forth in time. Serapio’s mother was part of Carrion Crow, and what she does to Serapio’s body and eyes is just the start of how he’ll be transformed over the next ten years.
Meanwhile Naranpa grew up in the slums of The Maw, and climbed up from being a servant of the Sun Priest to being appointed his successor. Naranpa is ambitious, naturally, but her real ambition is to raise the Watchers back to the level of power they used to have, while avoiding any more atrocities like the Night of Knives. Unfortunately she’s finding out that there are people in the Celestial Tower with their own ambitions, and many of them are never going to let her forget that she was born a Dry Earther instead of one of the real citizens of Tova.
They were never going to accept me, were they?” she asked quietly.
“No,” xe said. “The gap between Sky Made and Dry Earth is too vast.”
Possibly the character who gets the smallest amount of space in the book is Okoa, son of the current matron of Carrion Crow, and student in the war college in Hokaia. (Remember those huge crows I mentioned? Okoa is one of the crow-riders, and it’s always awesome.) Okoa has to divide his time in between trying to discover the identity of a murderer (and how exactly the murder happened in the first place) and being drawn into a secret sect of Carrion Crow who keep talking about a prophecy, and the arrival of a god, and a possible rebellion against the Watchers that Okoa is pretty sure will get the entire clan wiped out. Again.
And then there’s my favorite character, the Teek sailor Xiala. Her first chapter starts with her waking up in a Kuharan jail with a hangover and very little memory of the previous evening, something about drinking too much and going home with a beautiful woman (not allowed in Kuharan) and taking a swing at the woman’s wealthy husband (really not allowed). Xiala is one of a long line of my favorite zero-fucks-to-give female characters that are always a hell of a lot of fun to read. (Xiala’s way more damaged than Kiva though. And also Xiala is from a seafaring race that is sometimes hunted for their eyes and their bones, and she also has to deal with sailors who’s opinion about whether Teeks are good luck or cursed can turn on a frigging dime, so she swears exactly as much as Kiva.)
Xiala’s story really gets going when she’s bailed out of jail and hired to transport to Tova a blind monk, Serapio, who is sheltered and shy, and who just happens to be the long-awaited instrument of revenge and destruction.
The four viewpoints interweave and echo each other, all of them at one point absolutely sure that what they’re doing is what’s best for them/their clan/their city. And at the same time they’re all just human beings with petty sibling arguments and trust issues and not always healthy relationships and sometimes a desire to be someone else, anyone else, because there’s always that doubt that maybe they’re wrong.
It’s a novel of political intrigue and a murder mystery, and also justice-by-sorcery and scenes of magic and transformation that are just stunning. Serapio is quiet and reserved and also shockingly ruthless (pretty high body count here), but his unlikely relationship with Xiala is surprisingly tender and sweet, and even hilarious at times. The way his power manifests can be terrifying, or incredibly satisfying, or absolutely wondrous. There’s a moment when Serapio sees himself through the eyes of a giant crow, and I’m not sure how Roanhorse did it but the entire scene literally took my breath away.
The ending is one of those that hits you like running into a brick wall, and it happens in a way that makes you realize the entire book was the prelude for the main story that’s starting now. Book 2 comes out next April, and I’m looking forward to it for many reasons. We’ve already seen the crow-riders from the Carrion Crow clan, and I can’t wait to see what Roanhorse does with clan Winged Serpent.