Review - Across The Nightingale Floor by Lian Hearn

Genre: Historical fantasy, mature themes

Blurb: Takeo is the only survivor when a brutal massacre wipes out his village.  That day he cheats death, but his life will never be his own again.

Rescued, then adopted, by the mysterious Lord Otori Shigeru, Takeo starts a new life as heir to the Otori clan.  But a sinister organisation called The Tribe claims him as their own and has dark plans for his future.  For Takeo has incredible magical powers - he can make himself invisible, he can be in two places at once, he hears what other people cannot.  These skills make him the perfect assassin - a deadly weapon for The Tribe.

But before Takeo will pledge his life to them he must make a dangerous journey of revenge.  There is no place for the passion of first love - but when Takeo meets the beautiful, forbidden Kaede, he know that he can never give her up...

My Review:
I distinctly remember the first time I began reading this book.  I was about thirteen or fourteen years old, it was late at night and as usual I couldn't sleep so I picked up this book and began reading.  Within the first ten pages I knew I wasn't going to sleep well that night.  You are immediately thrown into the violent world of feuding clans with vivid descriptions of the massacre of Takeo's village, followed by Lord Shigeru decapitating one man and cutting the arm off another.  Not exactly the type of reading that will send you to sleep.

But I wouldn't be put off by that.  Although the violence in this book doesn't really fade away after the initial massacre, it becomes a part of the book you accept is there as it isn't unnecessary violence and without it there wouldn't be the same sense of danger that characterises the atmosphere of the period and brings some deep moral questions to light.

Throughout the novel Takeo is fighting with himself to try and decide if he should give into his darker nature that comes with being a member of the Tribe, questioning whether or not he is a killer.  This internal battle shapes Takeo's character and allows the reader to learn what motivates him.

Both of the narrators in this story, Takeo and Kaede, give the reader a perspective of their world through the eyes of two powerless people, being manipulated by those around them but still struggling to find some sort of control.  Takeo is influenced by both Shigeru and Kenji, both of whom are pulling him in different directions.  Kaede gives us the female point of view, showing how women are used as a pawns by men to help them secure their position or better themselves.

When these two characters meet it is inevitable that they should fall in love.  The fact that Kaede is destined to marry Shigeru makes their love for each other forbidden, much like the love shared between Shigeru and Lady Maruyama.  However, although this love is sudden and incredibly powerful, I find it takes a back seat for the majority of the novel, something I would usually find irritating, leaving more room for other parts of the plot.  But with Takeo's struggle with himself and the secret plotting that is constantly going on behind closed doors, I didn't notice that this particular aspect of the story was more of a background to some of the bigger themes of the novel.

In fact, the restricted nature of Kaede and Takeo's relationship in this novel, coupled with other unfinished story lines, gives the next book in this trilogy, Grass For His Pillow, somewhere to go.

However there were some trivial things that distracted me the first time I read this novel.

I struggle with pronunciation at the best of times, but when faced with a whole book full of Japanese names I began to despair slightly.  I found it surprisingly hard to remember all the names of the different characters when they are in a language I am not familiar with.  The main characters, such as Takeo, Kaede, Shigeru and Kenji, all have names that I can remember simply because they are used so often, but with more minor characters like Kikuta Kotaro and Lord Noguchi, it is harder to remember exactly who they are.  However, thanks to the handy 'who's who' guide at the opening of my copy, it's easy to find out who is being referred to.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this book.  The dark secrets and plotting had me turning page after page, right through to its conclusion.  So if you ever have a day or so with nothing to do, I would definitely recommend picking up Across The Nightingale Floor and allowing yourself to become immersed in the world Lian Hearn has created.