Tome of the Undergates [Hardcover]

Lenk is a man who commands a company of adventurers. Well, 'commands' is perhaps the wrong word. His company consists of Gariath, a dragonman who has vowed to die in glorious battle and regards human as vermin; Katiara, a shictish archer who regards human as vermin; Denaos, a thief who regards himself as vermin and is quite happy about it; Dreadaeleon, a mage with an impressive ego; and Asper, a priestess and healer with confidence issues. They spend all of their time insulting and threatening to kill one another.

Lenk's team-management skills are put to their test when his band is hired to escort an important churchman on a long ocean voyager. Attacks by pirates and strange sea creatures lead to the revelation that their mission could determine the fate of the world, and when a powerful magical artefact is stolen and taken to a remote island, Lenk's team reluctantly (less reluctantly when the fee is mentioned) sets out to recover it.

Tome of the Undergates (not Tomb of the Undergarments as I initially misread the title) is the debut novel by American author Sam Sykes, and is one of Gollancz's big fantasy debuts for 2010. Having hit big previously with Scott Lynch and Joe Abercrombie, Gollancz have great form for their debut fantasy authors and if their more recent debuts (Stephen Deas and Robert Redick) have not been quite in the same league, they have remained highly readable and enjoyable.

Unfortunately, I don't think Tome will be generating the hoped-for reception either. This is a troubled novel with a number of big problems that made getting through it quite difficult. That said, it also has some excellent points that ultimately made the journey worthwhile.

The first problem is that whilst the individual characterisation is fine - these are memorable and vivid characters - their interrelationships are mind-bogglingly tedious. These guys hate one another. I don't mean in the "Not liking one another to start with but learning to get along and ultimately respecting each other," way of say Belgarion's companions in The Belgariad or Legolas and Gimli in Lord of the Rings, I mean that they want to kill one another and threaten to do so one every fricking page, at least through the first half or so of the book. Why these characters haven't all killed one another by the halfway point of the book is a total mystery, and the revelation that this band has been hanging out and working together for a year is totally implausible, especially since two of them are non-human creatures who hold that humans are all vermin and all of them deserve to die in agony. They threaten one another with physical violence and death on every single page they appear for over 300 pages (this is not even remotely an exaggeration), even whilst in mid-battle fending off hordes of enemies. It's quite funny, yes, but only because it's so silly. It reminded me of being a DM trying heard the campaign along whilst all the players want to do is sit around and make insinuations about one another's sexuality and their relationships with their mothers. It's funny for a bit but the joke wears thin after the first ten minutes or so.

Another major problem is the book's pacing, which is problematic. The book opens with a sequence at sea where there is a big fight and our 'heroes' learn about the plot from the Expositionary High Priest and are given their mission to go and retrieve the missing magical item. This sequence, mostly consisting of a shipboard battle, takes up a mind-boggling two hundred pages. I am honestly impressed at this, as not even R.A. Salvatore or Steven Erikson can keep up one single battle sequence going for two hundred pages, especially one where all of the 'good guys' spend every page threatening to kill one another in graphic detail whilst fending off the enemy hordes. The amount of carnage is genuinely impressive, but it has to be said gets rather old quite quickly.

Once this sequences is concluded, the book picks up. Things move somewhat more quickly as our team of protagonists have to explore an island and then a large temple for signs of the bad guys, and there is an impressive left-field curveball about three quarters of the way through the book when a hitherto unknown faction reveals itself. The characters start to gel and work together better, and drop off from threatening to kill one another every page to merely once every three or four pages. There's some much more impressive combat sequences (thankfully merely in a single-figure count of pages) and the backstory and worldbuilding elements start being built upon in a more intriguing manner. There's also some bigger character revelations in the second half that makes the protagonists more layered and interesting.

The book ends with more of a pause than a cliffhanger, and by this point I was rather surprised to learn that I was reluctant to see the back of our band of mentally unstable psychopaths with the story still incomplete, so it's fair to say that the book eventually overcomes it's huge character and pacing issues with aplomb and ends up being skirting against being compelling.

Although I am still trying to work out what Geralt, Andrzej Sapkowski's Witcher of Rivia, is doing taking a doggy-paddle on the front cover.

Tome of the Undergates (***½) is, eventually, an interesting story with a lot of mysterious elements that leave the reader wanting some answers. Getting to that point is an exercise in pure frustration, however, and less patient readers may not last the course.

Gollancz has a good solid reputation for introducing new authors to the fantasy reader that seem to hit the spot, so usually it's a fairly good sign if they're backing someone new for the reader. Whilst a number of people are going to love their latest protégé I have to admit that I'm not that enamoured of this first novel.

I'm not being down on the guy but to be honest my biggest gripe was with the characters. As individuals they're interesting but as a group they not only annoy but I wanted to bludgeon them personally with something big and heavy. Why? Well a group of misfits that fight together is one thing but when their own personal hatred has them threatening to kill each other for a huge chunk of the book then you really need to go back and do some editing as whilst it's a bit of fun for a few pages, you can imagine the tedium after 150. Yet this seems to be the core of the tale which is backed up with a 200 page battle that feels like it lasts forever. Having said that the body count and gore is sufficiently high to give Conan or Kull pause and he does do it well but keeping an even pace so that the reader has the lulls to let the adrenaline down is something that the author has yet to master. Its almost as if this title is based upon a roleplay scenario and each character is played by individuals that are seeking ways to massacre the others so that they're the king of the levels.

I'm not saying that you won't get fun out of this and there will be a huge number of people who disagree with my view but personally, if I can't get a handle on the characters and get to like them, then I find it almost impossible to love a tale. With luck future offerings will temper down the problems and mix it with a wiser head. We can but wait to see.

When I started reading "Tome of the Undergates", I got the impression that I was reading the antidote to everything I used to find insipid about fantasy - there are no perfect souls, immaculate heroic warriors or particularly fair maidens in this novel. It promised some great things.

The opening excerpt from Lenk's journal is an amusing comparison and examination of the differences between the respectable soldier, less-respected yet still somewhat-honourable mercenary, and the bottom-feeding untrustworthy adventurer. It belongs in a fantasy manual, and was a great introduction to the world Lenk and company inhabit. (Each Act is introduced with a passage from Lenk's journal, each entertaining and well used to move the story along.)

Sam Sykes has a somewhat scary imagination. His creatures are horrifying, `gribbly', and especially so when considered alongside his considerable gift for description, simile and metaphor (which he sometimes indulges in just a touch too much). The main characters are brilliantly drawn, all highly flawed, sociopathic, or deranged. And they claim to not like each other at all (it's more complicated than that, as becomes clear over the course of the novel). One (the female shict - seems to be the `elf' in this reality) doesn't like humans, and keeps a tally of how many she's killed, while at the same time being fascinated (perhaps infatuated) by Lenk; one seems perfectly comfortable eating humans, and is disappointed when battles are too easy; the wizard is confounded by women and what impresses them, not to mention incredibly young; another is a rogue good with the sneaking and knifing, and a more complicated psyche and past than his companions believe. And Lenk, the leader of this merry band of total misfits, is starting to hear voices (which reply and sometimes can wrest control of his limbs), as well as being rather short and prone to getting a beating.

Sykes is good at translating his brand of humour into his novel, but he doesn't seem to have exercised much self-control, which is perhaps also a fault of his editors. He doesn't quite have the depth of Abercrombie, or the stylish flair of Lynch, but Tome of the Undergates does show clear evidence of Sykes getting there - he shows a great and substantial appreciation for the darker side of human nature, and is unafraid in showing it in his characters (one might say he revels in it).

While there is plenty to be happy about with the novel, it is not without its flaws. The opening battle(s) takes a little too long (it consumes the whole of Act I, which is approximately 25% of the novel), and it is also a little strange. This was a pity, as the diary-introduction and the first chapter were extremely strong - I had a number of people asking me what I was reading to make me chuckle out loud so often. But then, after setting the scene, it just seemed to keep going... If it was meant to get us familiar with the characters, Sykes managed that far quicker than I think he realised. The aftermath of the battle, likewise, offered more than the battle itself.

Sometimes the novel and Sykes's prose are a little weird, as the author indulges an apparent desire to weird the reader out. For example, the strange exchange between Asper and Denaos about the toilet habits of their companions, and another, metaphor-filled scene describing Lenk vomiting. I don't really understand what purpose it served, other than appealing to the author's fondness for peculiarity. That being said, there are also scenes in which his characters intelligently argue for and against religion and the nature of gods and belief.

The banter between the disparate companions, while for the main amusing, sometimes is rather repetitive - at one point I found myself muttering, "Ok, they don't like each other, we get it!" It's a minor concern, as Sykes has been able to make us familiar with his characters quicker than one might expect in a fantasy series (while still retaining a certain amount of mystery and ambiguity over some things about their pasts and abilities). As a character-driven fantasy, it is also unfair to complain about this, I suppose.

"Tome of the Undergates" shows a lot of promise for future instalments of the series, and I will certainly buy book two, as soon as it's available. In this debut, the balance between plot and characterisation skews far more towards the latter than the former, which sometimes made it feel as though the plot was a device purely with which to bring this disparate band of misfits together. There is nothing wrong with this per se, but given the author's vivid imagination, not to mention the length of the novel, I had hoped more would actually happen.

Grimly characterised, and highly imaginative, if somewhat self-indulgent, "Tome of the Undergates" is an intriguing, original take on the classic fantasy band-of-adventurers tale. Sykes takes gleeful aim at the tired tropes of fantasy and turns them on their head, warping them to suit his sense of humour and dark mind. My impression of the novel is mixed, as flashes of genius are sometimes subsumed by self-indulgence and a less-than-strict focus on the plot. I hope the second book in the series, now that he has established the characters so well, offers a little more story, plot and adventure. However, considering this is a debut, I have no problem seeing Sykes becoming and enduring and successful voice in fantasy.

A cautious recommendation, this should appeal to the darker-minded fantasy fan. I can't wait for "Black Halo", which is published later this year.