I just finished the fantasy trilogy The Quest of the Riddle-Master, written by Patricia McKillip. The three books are The Riddle-Master of Hed (1976), Heir of Sea and Fire (1977), and Harpist in the Wind (1979). The trilogy is a beautifully written story with many twists and turns. I won’t spoil any specific plot points but I’m going to discuss the story generally in this review.

Cover art by Darrell K Sweet. I’m not really a fan of Sweet’s Wheel of Time covers but I dig this one. From my personal collection.

Before I opened the first book I expected the riddles referenced in the title to be like the riddle game in The Hobbit, but they are more like bits of lore that offer life lessons. Refreshingly, this fantasy series takes place in a world with no Orcs, Elves, Dwarves, or their analogues. There are two schools, one of wizardry and one of riddlery, but we spent no time with our characters in classrooms. There is the end of an age but no epic battle between good and evil. There are plenty of wizards, shapeshifting, ancient powers, spirits, hidden destinies, and graceful descriptions. I was surprised by how different from Tolkein this epic fantasy series is. A lot of genre in the 70’s couldn’t get out from under the master’s shadow.

My drawing of Morgon the Star-Bearer.

Also unlike Tolkein, this novel has very slight amounts of worldbuilding and; especially in the first book, few descriptive passages. In fact I was a little disappointed in how vague everything is in The Riddle-Master of Hed, but the second and third books are much more substantial without being much longer. Or maybe I was just getting used to McKillip’s writing style. Contemporary fantasy novels love to build scenes word-brick by word-brick until there is a sturdy image in the reader’s mind. These books leave a lot more to the imagination. This is especially true in the wizard battles. Every action is very ethereal and evocative. The rules are never well defined.

My drawing of Raederle, the third-person limited point-of-view character of the second book, Heir of Sea and Fire.

I’ve read a lot of books by authors like Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson who prefer to treat magic like science. Magical systems like the One Power or Allomancy have very well-defined limits, uses, and sources. In The Quest of the Riddle-Master, however, the magic and conflict is very mystical. In a lot of fantasy novels something that should be spiritual, an epic battle between good and evil, seems so determined and mechanical. The beautiful but sparse language that McKillip uses to describe the magical events imbues everything with mystery. I felt as if there’s a whole other hidden world that I glimpsed. Also, so much of the books are also about connecting to land, nature, and history, which are sources of spirituality to me.