As long as were talking about astonishingly brutal fantasy drama, it doesnt get any more gnarled than Bakkers philosophical wasteland of a trilogy. Like a warped Tolkien, bleached and scoured of hope, only bad things happen to good people in these books. Millennia ago, the appalling, alien Inchoroi, the mad Nonmen and the infernal cult of the Consult attempted to summon the No-God into the world to bring about the Apocalypse, and only the combination of the forces of mankind and magic against them stopped them and saved the world. Now the First Apocalypse, the Consult and the horrors that befell the world are mostly legend, thought to be stories told to children. But the Consult are real. They did not die, and still lurk beneath and behind civilisation, seeking to bring about the Second Apocalypse Set in a world reminiscent of Europe/the Middle East around the time of the Dark Ages, Bakkers plot hinges around the scion of a family of ancient royalty turned hermit monks, using terrifying abilities honed over decades of isolationism to control the personalities of kings, priests and emperors as though they were children. Anasûrimbor Kellhus is essentially Aragorn with no soul: a bottomless pit of glittering intellect who has himself declared the second coming of the Warrior-Prophet and co-opts a holy war for his own ends. Initially, Kellhus doesnt believe in the Consult, in the No-God or in the coming horror of the Second Apocalypse: its illogical, the stuff of myth and fable. But as time goes on and the skinspies of the Consult and the obscene horror of the Inchoroi are found within his Holy War, Kellhus comes to realise that its all true and that the end of the world is nigh. Imagine if Derren Brown used his powers for evil, called himself the new Jesus and gathered the political powers of Europe in a Crusade to march on Jerusalem. Oh, and imagine that he had the unstoppable fighting prowess of a magic ninja. The horror, right? The Prince Of Nothing is a sparse, severe nightmare of a story, every good and noble character manipulated and driven by the will of this human monster: a monster who may be the only one capable of preventing this wholly alien monstrosity from rising up and eating the world. It makes Martins stories of dragons, knights, politics, deceit and casual violence look like My Little Pony, and may be too bleak even for cable television.
Professional writer, punk werewolf and nesting place for starfish. Obsessed with squid, spirals and story. I publish short weird fiction online at desincarne.com, and tweet nonsense under the name Jack The Bodiless. You can follow me all you like, just don't touch my stuff.
