11 October, 2000
The Dragon Waiting
John M. Ford
1983
383 pp (PB)
So, Kate's been pushing this one for years, but I avoided it for two reasons: 1. It's damn hard to find, and 2. I had previously read only one book by Ford, and I absolutely hated it. (For the curious, that book was a Star Trek novel, How Much for Just the Planet?. Dreadful book, even measured on the scale of Star Trek books.) But, Ford often gets compared to Brust, Gaiman, W.J. Williams, and even Zelazny, and praised by Kate (who generally has very good taste) so often, that when I saw this book in The Stars Our Destination's used section, I decided to give it a try.
The Dragon Waiting (henceforth TDW) is one of those "fantastical history" novels (like alternate history, but with the added feature of magic). It's set during the late 1400s in an alternate Europe where the Byzantine Empire did not wane and fall, but expanded to encompass most of the regions controlled by the Roman Empire at its peak (with some additions and some exceptions). Additionally, the Empire is not Christian; it espouses a philosophy of complete religious inclusion. All gods are considered equal. Also, there's vampires-- the inhabitants of this world consider vampirism to be a disease, but it is also viewed as a way for the rich, powerful, and immoral to extend their lives.
The book centers around the exploits of four characters-- a Welsh wizard, a French-by-way-of-Byzantium mercenary, a female Florentine doctor, and a German vampire-cum-artillary-engineer. Each of them has a reason to oppose the all-mighty Roman Empire, and they band together to help England-- just about the only area of Europe not under Roman control-- maintain its independence.
I better stop before this becomes a full-force review, instead of the review-let I intend.
So, why is this book good? The characters are excellent. Each of the four main characters could have easily filled an entire book on his or her own. The world is well-realized, both in its similarities to and differences from our own. Ford does not play games with style like Brust or Gaiman (at least, he doesn't in this book), but he excels at evoking atmosphere.
If anything, TDW is too short. None of the characters get as much "face time" as they deserve. I'd love to know more about the back-stories of Hywel the Wizard, Dimitrios the soldier, and Gregory the vampire. (Also, Cynthia the doctor, but we see more of her history than we do of the other characters.)
In conclusion, if you can find it, this book is definitely worth reading. It's good enough for me to completely forgive Ford for the 5-6 hours of my life I lost to that wretched Star Trek novel. Hell, I'm even going to try reading his other Star Trek novel, as it seems not to be a "comedy." Pretty impressive, eh?