Paladin of Souls - Lois McMaster Bujold

Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Updated Review Sept 12, 2015:

I always find it really difficult to review those books that I experience at a gut level and love completely irrationally. This was one of those. I simply enjoyed reading every moment of it, and don't know how to explain why. Now I've put it off for too long, and I'm going to try anyway.

First of all, if you've read The Curse of Chalion, you need to know that the pacing and focus of this book is completely different. That one was epic, full of political intrigue and kingdom-wide conflicts. This is not. It mostly takes place in a remote fortress and focuses on characters more than kingdom. So the pace is much different, and may seem slow if you're expecting action-driven plot. Now that that's out of the way...

I really loved that the main character is a middle-aged woman. It's not often that you get someone with more experience as a main character in Fantasy. In this case, Ista has already lived a life. She was married to the (now dead) king, and has grown children who are out of the picture. But although everyone around her believes that's all she's allotted to get out of life, she is not by any means old and is completely stifled. She still needs to find out who she can be, just as much as any young protagonist out there. So we get a mature woman who escapes from home and her caretakers to find adventure and a new life for herself. Hurray!

Maybe it's the fact that I am no longer a fledgling myself, but her story really resonated with me. Her observations about life and people were so spot on for someone who has lived more than 30 years. Plus, I really liked her. I wanted to be her. Since this is a character-driven story, that's kind of important.

Aside from Ista, there's a full cast of characters to complement her, and I enjoyed all of them (except the ones I wasn't supposed to). It's been a couple months since I read this, and I still remember at least six of the characters even if I've forgotten their names. There's the monk, two soldier brothers who actually have their own personalities, a female messenger turned lady's maid, and a dynamic lord of the fortress whose brother is mysteriously ill. The mystery of the brother's illness is where the story really gets going, in case you haven't been hooked yet by that point.

What drives the plot are the mystery behind the brother's illness, and problems of god-possession and demon-possession. Ista has been touched by a god before, and was considered insane for years. Now she wants to avoid anything to do with gods because they can't be trusted. Yeah, that doesn't work out so well for her. Once a god notices you, it's impossible to ignore them.

Maybe it built a little slowly, but it captivated me, really from the start. I loved the development of the characters through it all, and the complexity that was revealed over time. How it turned out left me breathless. I was enjoying it so much that I was afraid the ending would disappoint, so I was almost giddy with relief that it didn't. I really loved it. And I know I haven't explained why well enough at all, and used too many words to do it.


Initial Review June 27, 2015:

I loved pretty much every minute of this. Why did I wait so long to read it?? I'll try to write a proper review later.