What's on the shelf? All the Seas Of The World

I've been a fan of Guy Gavriel Kay since The Lions of Al-Rassan, which was quite some time ago. I love his world-building of almost-our-Renaissance-but-not-quite, and his delicate handling of magic as something powerful, but not really understandable.

His latest work is All the Seas Of the World, set in the same Renaissance-next-door world as several of his other works. The book is my jam, candy for my sweet tooth, catnip for my inner feline My only complaint is that it ended too soon, although at 528 pages, it's no short story.

The book is almost a sequel to the earlier Children of Earth and Sky, though it stands very well in its own right. The book begins with an assassination gone wrong in a corsair kingdom on the north African coast, and it paints a beautiful, complex picture of how that event shapes lives and triggers a cascade of events that ripple through the world.

Kay's characters are strong, yet vulnerable, easy to like and admire, but not without their flaws. The main protagonist is Lenia Serrana, a trauma survivor with definite anger issues. She has escaped slavery to become a successful merchant, but carries the scars inside her. Her partner Rafel ben Natan is merchant, not a warrior, and while Lenia's thirst for revenge takes them on separate paths, they keep coming back together.

The story is sweeping, taking you from the pirate coast to the pope chambers, from a cobbler's daughter to a mercenary prince to the king of France. To me, every character is pitch perfect, every twist a believable outcome of their motivations, with fate throwing everyone a curveball every so often.

Kay includes mediations on memory, and how our pasts shape our present and future. I feel that Kay is at heart an optimist, who believes we can change out stars. Two thumbs up!