People of the City - Marshall Ryan Maresca

 

People of the City is the conclusion of a chapter in Marshall Ryan Maresca’s Maradaine saga. I've been talking about it for five years, and the series has always been a mosaic. Different characters have trilogies or sequences of their own, and those stories have interwoven to produce a narrative with a genuinely epic scope. We’ve seen crossovers between them, but here all of our heroes finally meet. The crime fighting superhero Thorn, the hard-working investigators Minox and Rainey, the Rynax brothers, and the Tarians Dayne and Jerinne - they’re all going to be drawn into a plot which has the potential to shake the literal foundations of the city of Maradaine. 

This is, above all, a fun book. It’s probably also one you’d want to be familiar with the rest of the series in order to truly enjoy. All of the central cast are established characters, and knowing their issues, what drives them, the costs which they’ve already borne, their quirks and in-jokes, will make the experience far richer. You can still read this as a standalone, I suspect, but it works better as a culmination of threads from all of the other works, being tied together into something larger.

With that in mind, there’s always a lot going on. The story starts off quickly, and ramps up the tension and pressure as it goes, pulling you along with it. There’s plots and counterplots here, new mysteries and the settling of old scores. If you’ve got a favourite character, worry not, they’ll have their moment in the sun. This is a song for the people of Maradaine. A paean for civic co-operation, and for the way that groups of ordinary people, standing as one, can be stronger together, can defeat any evil they put their mind and arm to. It’s also a story about evildoers trying to take over a city, using a wonderfully diabolical plan, and about a band of heroes coming together to kick arse and keep evil off the streets.

Is it good though? Yes. Yes it is. 

It has everything I’ve enjoyed in previous Maradaine novels. There’s the complex, compelling world building, which constructs a city with a real sense of itself, one which feels alive, one where the different neighbourhoods feel different. Where the politics has the glitz and glamour and hard graft and seams of corruption we all know from our own lives. Where people make excellent pastries, and I surface from the page feeling hungry. Where magic and science collide, and construct wonders and horrors in equal measure. There’s the characterisation - here informed by books worth of back-adventures for each of the main characters, all of whom seem to be acting in line with their own needs. Some of the villainy is a little over the top, though in fairness, that felt like it added to the fun, but in general, the people on the page are as real as we are. Working hard jobs, going for a pint, looking for love - and, occasionally, trying to overthrow the government, or saving people from assassination attempts. 

The story rattles along wonderfully. I always wanted to know what the next page brought, and the conclusion left enough unanswered threads that I came away from the book wanting more. It has revelations, sudden reversals, some genuinely impressive magic, some moments of appalling villainy, and some of genuinely hopeful heroism.

This is a story which will take you into the world of Maradaine, and when you come out on he last page, leave you wanting more, wanting to know what happens next. So go now, and pick a copy up - it’s a genuine delight.