Upland Outlaws by Dave Duncan

Synopsis:
A despotic sorcerer has torn the Impire apart through a ruthless program of magical slavery, and imperor Shandie’s small cadre of loyal supporters are forced to travel to the farthest corners of Pandemia in order to save the world.

Review:
Upland Outlaws is Part Two of the Handful of Men series, and I’m sort of running out of superlatives. I’m beyond grateful to Shari for introducing me to this fine author, who is helping me bide my time until A Dance of Dragons comes out.

I’m tempted just to tell you to check out a truly genius list of fantasy cliches (HT Jeffrey Overstreet) and say “Dave Duncan does none of this,” but that would be lazy of me.

Things get super, super bleak in Upland Outlaws, yet there’s so much joy in this story. It’s utterly alive, every part of it. Duncan introduces us to the world of the pixies, a race of people thought to be extinct. It turns out they’ve been living happy little lives in a corner of the world that nobody can pay attention to, thanks to their powerful inattention spell. I think he’s gearing up to show us that there are some pixies who’ve got quite ambitious plans for profiting off of the current upheaval.

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