The Long Price Quartet: Difference between revisions

This four-book series by author Daniel Abraham (an alum of the same New Mexico writer's workshop as Gardener Dozois, Melinda M. Snodgrass and George R. R. Martin) focuses on the lives and relationship of two men, Otah Machi, an [[Exiled Prince]] and Maati Vaupathi, with an array of secondary characters who come and go as the series progresses. Long Price takes place primarily in a collapsed [[Empire]] known as the Khaiate where poets bind ideas to human form and wield unimaginable power through their slaves, the Andat. The series follows Otah and Maati from their childhoods to their old age, chronicling their friendship, antagonism and the decline of the fortunes of the Khaiate as they come into conflict with their trading partners, the Galts.

 

The Quartet deals heavily with issues of racism, progress, sustainability, aging and love. The unusually large timeframe (the series spans nearly sixty years from the first chapter of [[A Shadow In Summer]] to the epilogue of [[The Price Of Spring]]) allows a very real look at how flawed people deal with family, responsibility and guilt. The issue of abuse of power is also prominent due to the world-spanning power of the Andat and, by association, the poets who wield them.

 

* [[Applied Phlebotinum]]: The binding of new Andat becomes progressively more important to the plot as the series progresses.

* [[Batman Gambit]]: {{spoiler|The Andat Seedless arranges for Heshai to perform an abortion on a young girl (who doesn't know what's happening thanks to a helpful language barrier) in hope of [[Driven to Suicide|driving Heshai to suicide]], thus releasing Seedless from his binding.}}

* [[Beautiful All Along]]: Subverted with Idaan, who is described as unremarkable but skilled with cosmetics.

* [[Bookworm]]: Maati, Cehmai and all the poets to one degree or another.

* [[Break the Cutie]]: Liat Chokavi in [[A Shadow In Summer]]. And how.

* [[Cruel and Unusual Death]]: Failure to bind an Andat properly results in "the paying of the price," which can be anything from having one's organs filled slowly with crushed glass to growing hundreds of mouths that vomit up all of your blood. Right.

* [[Dark and Troubled Past]]: Vanjit's need for vengeance against the Galts in [[The Price Of Spring]] is {{spoiler|motivated by her family's death during Balasar Gice's invasion of the Khaiate.}}

* [[The Emperor]]: {{spoiler|Otah, from the end of [[An Autumn War]] onward.}}

* [[Dynamic Character]]: Otah, surprisingly. {{spoiler|He even manages to avoid becoming a [[Standardized Leader]] while working his way from dockfront laborer to messenger, Khai Machi and finally Emperor.}}

* [[Fantasy Counterpart Culture]]: The Khaiate is strongly reminiscent of feudal Japan.

* [[Fantastic Honorifics]]: Faux-Japanese style.

* [[Holding Back the Phlebotinum]]: The Andat, despite being able to literally level continents are rarely, if ever, employed in war. Conflicts between poets are implied to have rendered huge swaths of the Khaiate states uninhabitable. {{spoiler|Two Andat, Corrupting-the-Generative and Clarity-of-Vision, are wielded in the series. Corrupting-the-Generative is unleashed without a true binding and sterilizes all Galtic men and all Khaiate women. Clarity-of-Vision is used by the insane Vanjit to blind EVERYTHING IN THE ENTIRE WORLD.}}

* [[Jerkass]]: Tahi-kvo, a teacher at the poets' school.

* [[Marriage of Alliance]]: Between {{spoiler|Ana Dasin of Galt and Danat, Otah's son and heir.}}

* [[Medieval Stasis]]: Averted with Galt, a nation which employs "steam wagons" and invents the train. Played straight with the Khaiate which is socially, economically and technologically stagnant due to their reliance on the andat.

* [[Took a Level In Badass]]: Eiah in [[The Price Of Spring]].

* [[Villainous Breakdown]]: Idaan.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Fantasy Literature]]

[[Category:The Long Price Quartet]]