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Once there were three worlds, each with their own people. Then, fleeing out of the void, on the edge of extinction, came the Charon. And the balance changed for ever.
With A SHADOW ON THE GLASS, Book One of A View from the Mirror, a major new fantasy epic begins. Karan, a sensitive with a troubled past, is forced to steal an ancient relic in payment for a debt. But she is not told that the relic is, in fact, the Mirror of Aachan, a twisted, deceitful thing that remembers everything it has seen. Llian, meanwhile, a brilliant chronicler, is expelled from his college for uncovering a perilous mystery.Thrown together by fate, Karan and Llian are hunted across a world at war, for the Mirror contains a secret of incredible power.
More information on this book and others can be found on the Orbit website at http://www.orbitbooks.co.uk
With A SHADOW ON THE GLASS, Book One of A View from the Mirror, a major new fantasy epic begins. Karan, a sensitive with a troubled past, is forced to steal an ancient relic in payment for a debt. But she is not told that the relic is, in fact, the Mirror of Aachan, a twisted, deceitful thing that remembers everything it has seen. Llian, meanwhile, a brilliant chronicler, is expelled from his college for uncovering a perilous mystery.Thrown together by fate, Karan and Llian are hunted across a world at war, for the Mirror contains a secret of incredible power.
More information on this book and others can be found on the Orbit website at http://www.orbitbooks.co.uk
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Reviews
Irvine has built a history and wonderful culture for his vivid world. His first novel vibrates with originality
Magic pathways from world to world were a curse, making possible invasion and enslavement, and long ago those paths were closed leaving three worlds and the void between them a hopeless jumble of what had been and what is now. Ian Irvine's A Shadow on the Glass, first volume of his fantasy quartet "The View from the Mirror", takes us to one of those worlds and to two adventurers, a scholar and a psychic, who find themselves dragged into the conflicts of the mighty and the ambitious. Karan is blackmailed into helping steal a magic mirror, and finds herself on the run from warlords and warlocks; all that Llian wanted to do was find a great story to tell, and clarify some minor ambiguities in the archives of the college of storytellers--but he finds himself expelled and ostracised, and accompanying Karan on her breakneck journeys on high barrens and treacherous rivers. What Irvine brings to the mix is a sense of irony and some intelligent observation of character: Llian and Karan are not your average squeaky clean hero and heroine, and their opponents are hardly villainous, just people acting out the planned treacheries that seemed like a good idea.
The complex cultures, detailed geography, and the palpable weight of history provide a solid background to an intense story that ... becomes increasingly compelling. This stands out as a worldbuilding labour of love with some truly original touches
