Recently, I have had a problem where the book I’ve bought and the book I read are completely different. This is not an issue of thievery but rather an intriguing description of overpromising and underdelivering consistently. Fantasy is one of my long-time favorite genres of fiction to read and incredibly popular to boot. But what is consistently popular is romance. And as anyone alive and literate in the 2010s can tell you, when dystopian fiction became popular, there were so many hot male love interests caught in love triangles they could’ve formed a small nation. But to summarize, the main plot was disregarded for the will-they-won’t-they subplot, and the world was left essentially abandoned. This same curse has infiltrated the world of fantasy fiction en masse, creating the Romantasy that appears to be in every new book.
So it has been refreshing to read a book with an intriguing premise, and not once has it taken over by the B-plot. So I was delighted when I read my most recent book, The Second Sight of Zachary Cloudesley by Sean Lusk, and it delivered everything I could have hoped for and more. The plot follows the aforementioned Zachary and his father Abel Cloudesley in the late 1700s in England and follows them as father and then son, venture into Constantinople for the sake of each other. What is particularly interesting about this book is the sheer amount of world building despite it being a play on real historical events. Abel originally goes to Constantinople as a spy hidden inside a mechanical chess-playing robot, known as The Turk, as its hidden operator. Though never used as a spying device, The Turk was a real thing that existed, and there were people inside of it who secretly played chess for the robot. Magic and engineering combine into one constant thing rather than being separate. Zachary is able to see the future through the use of his glass blue eye, and the theme of magic and science being the same thing is very present throughout the story. It’s cohesive and captures the reader’s attention to the world and how magical it is by being exceedingly normal. There are no cheap tricks or twists; it is simply a good story that is unique in its concept and sets up the world in that upon reading it, you believe that magic is real and you are living in it.
If it has not been clear, I absolutely adore this book and highly recommend others read it. But, what is more important is what this book shows for the fantasy genre as a whole. It is not stuck with romance as the real driver of the plot. Nor does it need to hide behind flashy displays of magic or a plot that focuses on the end of the world to be high stakes. The best stories, regardless of genre, have an emotional heart that beats through them. Some of the more recent Fantasy novels I have read have reflected this. Diverse backgrounds and unique stories focus on normal people and what they go through in these worlds. That is what I love about fantasy, not the chosen one or someone special, but normal people stepping up to face problems and persevering.
