The River Wall

This seventh book finally wraps up everything, mysteries are revealed, the earth moves, the real Ra'ira is found, the last known baddies are defeated, and there's at least a chance that all will live happily ever after.

It's a more exciting book than its predecessors. Up to now we've been stepping through the long and complicated plot, not slowly but at a measured pace, and now things really start to happen.

This has to be the best of the series since the first one, which was good in a different way: it had the novelty of Ricardo's arrival in a new and surprising world, and I suppose that Randall Garrett made a more substantial contribution to it before he was incapacitated. Whereas I guess that books 2 to 7 were largely written by Vicki Ann Heydron, with Randall Garrett contributing mainly to the initial outline.

The weakness of this book is that, all along, people (and even sha'um) are too easily persuaded by Rikardon and Tarani. It's pleasant, in a way, that goodness prevails in this world, but it seems too easy: it's unconvincing.

The baddies are not usually persuaded; they have to be defeated. However, in the real world, well-meaning goodies have to struggle with the great mass of people who are not particularly bad nor particularly good, but uncommitted, unpersuaded, and uncooperative. And it's these in-between people who aren't properly represented in this book.

The series as a whole is well conceived. The scenario was a good idea and the details of the environment feel right. The plot was carefully planned. It could have been a classic series, but some magic ingredient in the writing is missing, and so Garrett's Lord Darcy stories remain more enjoyable and therefore better known than this very different exercise in fiction.

I find the central character of Ricardo/Rikardon rather annoying. He's mostly presented as wise, good, and able. His tendency to self-doubt should be endearing. But it's coupled with intermittent attacks of bad behaviour, stupidity, and foot-in-mouth disease. Perhaps Randall Garrett had this kind of dual personality himself, but it's not easy to live with, even in fiction.

Although some explanation and justification is attempted, it remains hard to believe that some sha'um (great cats) of this world are willing to place themselves in the service of men for very intangible rewards, and to tolerate considerable hardships, when they could easily live free (as most of them continue to do).