The Sorcerer's Lady

Sorcerer #1

by Paula Volsky

Selected to be the bride of Lord Terrs Fal Grizhni, a mysterious and immortal sorcerer, Lady Verran faces her fate with apprehension

Genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction Fantasy, Romance, Fiction

272 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1986

About the author

Paula Volsky is an American fantasy author. Born in Fanwood, New Jersey, she majored in English literature at liberal arts college Vassar in New York State. At the University of Birmingham, England, she received an M.A. in Shakespearian studies. Before writing fantasy, she sold real estate and also worked for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Illusion, The Wolf of Winter, The Gates of Twilight, The White Tribunal, and The Grand Ellipse all take place within the same fictional world, with fantasy plot-lines inspired by historical events.

Paula Volsky also writes under the pseudonym of Paula Brandon

Reviews

[Belinda Vlasbaard · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars - English Ebook

This is the second book in the series, and it is pretty good with well developed characters and her usual talent for intrigue.

Rhis style is quite different from much of fantasy, both in its darkness of tone and its cynical humor. And while far from the best of her work this is a still a good book. It has considerable psychological depth, some very exciting scenes, and a terrific finish.

The heroine is a slightly less developed version of usual ones in that she is both capable and somewhat passive, but is still deeply drawn and attractive.

The real stars are the other characters who really shine. The Sorcerer of the title is fantastic, the villains particularly well drawn, all in a sardonic style.

The sequel, "The Sorcerer's Heir", is a more satisfying novel, which is reason enough to read this one.

[Jorie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars.

A little over halfway into this book, I realized "Fal Grizhni" sounded like "Walt Disney". That was perhaps the most entertaining thing about this read.

[Natalie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Just like others have previously pointed out, this novel could have been so much better had it placed its focus on something other than the author chose. We have the opportunity to see a blossoming romance in an arranged marriage situation- the growing love between the closed off, quiet, determined sorcerer and his young bride. And instead we get politics, power grabbing between other sorcerers and inane conversations that have no bearing on the plot. The magic system is intriguing but not explained enough. Cognition seems like a pretty cool way to use magic- unfortunately, I couldn’t tell you how it works or why. I don’t know anything about the world except it’s similar to ours and the novel takes place in a Venice-type city. Who is this novel for? The relationship between Verran and Grizni evolves behind closed doors, and we get fade to blacks. Why should I care about this relationship if the author doesn’t? The politics are lame and uninteresting, and situations that are as old as the hills themselves- love triangles, blackmail, power grabs. So, all in all? It was fine. The plot moved forward at a decent pace and I was mostly interested. I really wish we saw more of the relationship happening, but that’s probably why many haven’t read this and it’s been left in the dusty back rooms of book shops. Ok, disappointing, could have been much better.

[Kitty Foil · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a much better read than Illusion, which I think suffered from the fact that it was just too damn long, and wading through the stuff about the French/Russian revolution was like slogging through Tom Hooper's Les Miserables with less singing. Volsky is a good writer, and clearly puts a lot of thought into her world building. Her weakness is storytelling. And I don't mean plotting. The plot is fine, even though it is a weird mish-mash of Julius Caesar and Beauty and the Beast. She is one of those writers that tells you things about the world that she finds interesting, but doesn't make an effort to make it interesting to the reader. That is probably the weakness of both the Sorcerer's Lady and Illusion; the author isn't very interested in interpersonal drama and character development, and struggles to make the reader care about the political strife that she clearly cares so much about. This book starts with Verran who runs away because she has to be married to a sorcerer, Fal Grizhni against her will, in a city that has canals. Lots of canals. What city in Europe has canals?(I know it is Venice).
Running away isn't something Verran does on the regular because she is characterized as being pretty obedient. So she gives in and gets married to this super powerful sorcerer, who she is more than a little afraid of. So, on paper this should be a pretty straight forward beauty and the beast story, where Verran learns more about her husband, becomes less afraid, and they eventually fall in love with each other. But no. That is not what happens.
What we get instead is the author tells us that this happens off screen somewhere. She tells us this when Verran gets into an argument with another character, that their marriage is not loveless, and that she is pregnant.
Like, why couldn't you show that? Why were there no scenes where there is at least an indication that they are trying to understand each other? You have 250 pages in which to do this. Why do we get chapters about what the villains are doing, whose names I can't for the life of me remember, when we know what they are doing because our protagonists are constantly talking/reacting to it.We know that Grizhni is being scapegoated by a corrupt government, but he is not really a character because we don't know his motivations or what he values with the exception of Verran. He is meant to be this larger than life figure in the politics of this world who is super OP and intimidating, but readers and Verran ( because it is her pov) rarely get glimpses of the man. It is like the romantic plot and the political overarching plot can't exist simultaneously in this book, so the subplot is hand waved away even though it is called the Sorcerer's Lady, so we are supposed to care about this relationship. We know Verran is trying to reach out to her husband. She is trying really hard. The most we get from Grizhni to indicate that he cares about her is that he glares less hard. Hell, I was more invested in the relationship she had with the mute servant, Nyd because it was more dynamic. So, when Fal Grizhni dies I kind of shrugged. He is one of the protagonists, there should be more of a reaction than this.

[grosbeak]

Telling a tale of intricate intrigue and weighty conspiracies and arcane magics from the point of view of the Great Man’s naive and sheltered teenaged wife who doesn’t have a clue what’s going on *could* be done in a very interesting and compelling way—this isn’t it, unfortunately. Likewise, the highly admirable character doomed by his own inflexibility and inability to compromise is also a story arc that I love! But it was surprisingly uncompelling in this story, perhaps because our viewpoint character Verran was so in awe of her husband, and the timeline was so compressed that she never learned enough or gained enough experience to have an interesting perspective about anything. That said, there was just enough that caught my interest that I’ll probably read the sequels.

[Marsh "Bad Sci Fi" Bloom · Rating 4 out of 5]

The cover of this book sets one’s expectations up nicely for the book to be a fun read. Tropes were set up and then overturned. The setting makes it feel a bit like fanfiction in some way. I still have not decided if that helped or hindered the story.

It’s dated a bit in language but so am I so that was easy to brush past.

The only thing I’d have preferred was an actual ending instead of a lead in to a series. The book felt like it was designed to be self-contained.

[John Arden · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting look at a noblewoman caught up in a power struggle between nobles and two factions of magicians. Well worth the read.

[Eileen Zhou · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's a very book, but the story broke my heart. I kept hoping for the Hero to appear. It's got ranching story at the end.

[Jen526 · Rating 2 out of 5]

As a huge fan of Paula Volsky's later work just getting around to some of her older oop stuff, I found this an interesting read. It's definitely got an "early work" vibe in the roughness of the writing, but I enjoyed how elements that I would love in later work (the ingenue who grows a spine, the steampunky vibe, etc) show up here in a less polished form. It was cool to see such a clear evolution of a favorite author's themes carrying through from her early work to more recent.

[Donna · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is one of those books that I want to like better than I do. I love the idea of a conflict between the magical and mundane spurred on by ambition and propaganda. The characters are flawed but also static, and everything is filtered through a tepid, oddly dispassionate love story.

And as for that ending, it just emphasizes the muddy overall focus.