The Daemon Prism

November 21, 2011
This rousing and complex good-against-evil battle, which concludes Berg’s voluminous quasi-Renaissance epic fantasy trilogy (after The Spirit Lens and The Soul Mirror), centers on Dante, a blind and irascible practitioner of soul-shaking magic now feared by almost all of his splendidly detailed world. In the aether, the medium of souls, he met courageous noblewoman Anne de Vernase, who saved him from madness and evil. Now they join familiar companions in a quest to defend the world against a new supernatural threat, which strikes before they can recover from the previous battle. Though Berg’s enormously complex plot demands acquaintance with the previous installments, her insight into the nature of human good and evil, the constantly ebbing and flowing relationships among lovers and friends, and the interplay of the mythic with the world of the senses consistently raises this novel above sword-and-sorcery routine. Agent: The Knight Agency.

December 1, 2011
Final installment of Berg's character-driven sword-and-sorcery trilogy (The Soul Mirror, 2011, etc.), again with all of the main characters reappearing--even the dead ones. This time the main narrator is reviled, blinded sorcerer Dante, whose task is to teach practical, intelligent and skeptical Anne de Vernase how to wield her powerful magic. At length wearying of Dante's dogged insistence on discipline and control, Anne departs to visit her family. Dante, meanwhile, learns of a ghostly, pleading young woman apparently with the ability to project magic through dreams using a mysterious green crystal. The magic bound up in the crystal is utterly different than anything in Dante's experience. So Dante, despite knowing that the lure of the crystal is a trap, cannot resist seeking it out. At least he'll be accompanied by his old comrade, clownish chevalier Ilario de Sylvae. Another compelling reason driving Dante to seek the crystal is the puzzle of missing royal librarian Portier de Savin-Duplais. Dante's friend Portier may be immortal--and their mutual enemy, the malevolent wizard Jacard, aims to bury Portier alive to power the recovery of Jacard's uncle Kajetan (slain by Anne and Dante in the previous book) from a ghastly realm beyond death. Co-narrator Anne finally grasps the situation and sets out in pursuit. All these adventures are somewhat marred by an obvious spy to whom everybody remains stoically oblivious. The downside is the ending: The abrupt switch from two narrators to four serves only to obfuscate, delay and dilute the force of what should have been a shattering conclusion. Nonetheless, enthralling and not to be missed.

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

January 1, 2012

Condemned by Temple, King, and the Camarilla Magica for crimes committed through necromancy, the mage Dante, now blind after being maimed by his enemies, attempts redemption by instructing noble-born Anne de Vernase in the ways of magic. Through her power, Dante hopes to heal the rip in the fabric that separates the world of life from the land of death, an opening caused by his own actions. When an imprisoned sorceress compels him through dreams to rescue her, however, Dante falls into a life-threatening trap and must find the way to destroy three ancient artifacts. Berg's final volume in her Renaissance-flavored trilogy (The Spirit Lens; The Soul Mirror) is a compelling tale of a man reviled by all but his true friends and the woman whose devotion may prove his salvation or his undoing. VERDICT Top-notch storytelling and in-depth characterizations make this series a must for lovers of period fantasy.

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2011
Within the aether, a universe bound together by magical energies, threads of power, and keirna Dante, a powerful sorcerer, meets Anne, a young woman with a fearful power in her blood, and takes her on as his student. Anne and Dante believe their acts at the end of The Soul Mirror (2011) closed the portal between the living and the dead. Those acts left Master Dante a broken, blind mage. Dante's belief in securing a division between the living and the dead is shattered when an old soldier comes to him with a dream. Dante enters the dream to find an astonishing, incomprehensible magic, so dangerous that those who wield it threaten to start the last battle of the War for Heaven and the guardianship of the Living Realm. An amazingly complex and rewarding story, The Daemon Prism is certain to reward the devoted students of the Collegia Magica trilogy.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)