A Knight in the Silk Purse: Ghosts of Taux

Tales of the Emerald Serpent #2

by Scott Taylor (editor), Julie E. Czerneda, Dan Wells

In Taux, the city of cursed stone, a new dark power stalks the dreams of the population with bloody footprints. Even among the celebrations of the Festival of a Thousand Blossoms, the hardy folk of the Black Gate must find a way to defeat this lurking menace before it consumes them all. A Knight in the Silk Purse blends the shared tales of twelve of fantasy's greatest modern storytellers into an epic weave of intrigue, murder, sorcery, death, and retribution like nothing else found on the shelves today.

Genres: Fantasy, Anthologies

320 pages, Paperback

First published July 4, 2014

Reviews

[Melony Breeze · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was in love with the first book, Tales of the Emerald Serpant, after I bought it to read the story by Lynn Flewelling,so I contributed to the Kickstarter campaign for a second book. And I must say, despite a very long delay, it was definitely worth the money, and the wait.

You don't have to read Tales to understand what's going on in this second book, as the world building in this book is even richer than the first, however I would recommend it, and it helps to be more familiar with the characters.

Everything I loved about the first book was improved in this second installment--rich characters, strong and vivid world building, and a story that comes to life as events from one story tie into another. This time, the stories are woven even tighter together, and you can read how much hard work must've gone into this volume to have good continuity and characters that smoothly stride from one author's tale to another. This time, their actions more directly affect each other than in the first book, leading the reader along a mystery that the knight, Lady Evynhoe, is investigating. Characters such as the wizard known as the Weaver, have greater influence on the world around them, and events from the first book are readily referenced, in particular the final events from the last book have a key role.

One of the chapters had me laughing as an intelligent sword clearly brought to mind old RPG campaigns, as did certain cursed objects, which likely will play an important role if we get another book--which I would definitely support!

Lovely illustrations enrich the volume even more. Also, unlike the first book, this one includes a detailed appendix, giving background on the city, and character and race descriptions and illustrations. It was very helpful to be able reference these.

I would definitely recommend this book, and look forward to another volume of this shared world anthology!

[Rebecca A. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Writing fantasy is one of the most difficult jobs. When you start with an entirely blank slate, as the fantasy genre allows, you may be seduced by your own freedom in world-building, and come up with parameters that bend too far. Then you end up with a slushy story, and characters that can get themselves out of impossible straits with the snap of a finger.

If anything can happen in your world, the author has allowed themselves too much power. One must be strict, even confining, to create a world and characters that are real. Real enough for readers to forget all those constrictions and become enchanted by the people, places, and problems in the story.

Editor Scott Taylor has orchestrated the short stories of a dozen masters of fantasy, writing facets of a single event in the life of the city called Taux. Prepare to be intrigued, puzzled, inspired, and confounded.