Piers Anthony review

Piers Anthony has reviewed Elf Righteous for his upcoming newsletter. Here is what he has to say:

I read Elf Righteous by Briant Reil. This is the third in a series, following Elf Mastery and Elf Doubt in 2016 and 2018 respectively. Despite the light hearted titles, these are increasingly complicated, serious, and hard hitting books, with sometimes dismayingly thoughtful characterizations. The protagonist is Kyla, a girl elf, for all that elves live several hundred years. She is trying to do what's right, but in the complex social and political setting it can be challenging to know what is right, let alone managing to accomplish it. She has some magic of her own, plus some magic items that others want, notably Empress Aethelwyne, who is unscrupulous about obtaining them. At one point Kyla swallows them, and the Empress, unwilling to wait for them to emerge naturally, starts to have the elf girl cut open for them. No anesthetic, no threatening, just hold her down and slice her gut open. The Empress is straightforward about her designs. Kyla manages to get away, injured, but is pursued, and she barely escapes several times. She learns more about her own powers, such as being able to use her mind to read the minds of others, and edit out key memories or sights, such as herself, so that she in effect disappears. To simply considerably, the essence is that the power Chaos has been awakened, and is destroying whole planets. He can perhaps be stopped by the artifacts Kyla has, if they can figure out how to use them. But just stopping Chaos isn't enough; they need also to prevent the Empress from achieving her ruthless conquest of the several dominions that make up the larger society. There seems to be no perfect answer, and indeed, this fantasy is realistic in its refusal to provide an unrealistic solution. Read this for adventure, not laughs.

Piers Anthony


​Bryant