The sequel to The Price of the Stars continues the pulpy thrills of a galaxy one stop removed from Star Wars. Decades after being broken and humiliated, the Mageworlds are planning a conquering comeback -- but they reckoned without the Rosselin-Metadi clan. Adept Owen discovers the reawakening remnants of Mage power; Medic Ari stumbles into mutiny and betrayal within the Space Force; Captain Beka goes undercover to find evidence of the Mages' new military power. Yet all that information may come to nothing if the three siblings -- obstructed by friends, foes, and fate -- are unable to alert the rest of the universe. ( )

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Title: Starpilot's Grave
Series: Mageworlds #2
Authors: Debra Doyle & James Macdonald
Rating: 3.5 of 5 Stars
Genre: SFF
Pages: 357
Words: 124.5K

Synopsis:

From Isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pe.cgi?3526 & Me

Beka Rosselin-Metadi and her crew get involved in the beginning of the Second Magewar. privateer and a planetary ruler must join forces to defeat the Mages.

From the back cover of the Tor Books first edition) Blockaded, restricted, and forgotten - the Mageworlds would never threaten the Republic again.

A broken and drifting ship, its long-dead captain still strapped in the command seat: that's what free-spacers call a starpilot's grave. When one of these derelict craft appears in the Net, the artificial barrier zone separating the Republic from the Mageworlds, the discovery is no accident. It's a sign, a warning that the Mageworlds have not forgotten the Republic - and the Mageworlds make long plans.

But the Mageworlds weren't planning on Beka Rosselin-Metadi.

Beka has unfinished business to take care of, and his name is Ebenra D'Caer: the man who arranged her mother's murder. D'Caer is safe, - he thinks - hidden among the Mages on the far side of the Net. Flying under a false name and false colors, Beka penetrates the Magezone and finds more than anyone expected: the Magelords have discovered a fatal weakness in the Republic's defenses, and are poised to wreak their vengeance on the hated enemy. The Mages are too strong. They must prevail. Unless one woman in one ship can do the impossible.

In the end, Beka accepts the crown of Entibor-in-Exile to rally the republic forces, which are divided by a traitor admiral, who brokered a deal with the magelords.

My Thoughts:

Beka remains the Main main character but this time her other brother Owen gets the majority of the main main character time whereas it was her brother Ari who got the spotlight last time. Considering this novel is about the mageworlds breaking the blockade and taking over the republic, and Owen is the main Adept, it's only right we should get a good chunk from his view.

One thing about Owen, it's obvious he has a lot of growing to do and we'll see that in these stories. He's spent so much time completely dedicated to the Adepts that he's pretty much forgone growth as a human being. Thank goodness he hooked up with a whore who has magical potential. That should educate him quite quickly. The biggest issue with Owen was that he didn't trust the head of his Order because that guy (who is the equivalent of Luke in Star Wars) didn't do things how Owen thought he should when the Mage's attacked. Goes to show his trust was pretty thin and brittle.

As for Beka, holy smokes, that girl continues to kick some serious butt! She's racing around killing people who were involved in her mother's death, dealing with the mageworlds, dealing with corrupt Republic forces and then has to deal with her father disappearing and no one listening to her because she supposedly died in the previous book. Her taking the crown of Entibor-in-Exile shows that she's willing to do whatever it takes even though she knows that action will most likely kill her as it did her mother.

Since this series revolves around the Adepts and the Mages, Llannat Hyfid is necessary, almost more so than Owen. She's learning from both sides and it wouldn't surprise me if by the end of the series either the Adepts and Mages become one, or, more likely in my opinion, there starts up a third branch of magic users. What is really interesting to me is how Doyle and MacDonald have reversed how the two sides operate. The Adepts have a Master/Apprentice setup and then each apprentic goes off on his own and the cycle repeats. The Mages use groups to form circles, almost exactly like what Jordan uses for the Aes Sedai in the Wheel of Time series. The Leader of the Adepts is actually known as Circle Breaker, for his habit of destroying entire circles of Mages during the first Mage War.

Anyway, the main reason this was downgraded a halfstar from the previous book was the slight increase in points of view. I am NOT a fan of a huge cast of characters and unless handled with absolutely perfect writing, it gets more confusing than is worth it. I am hoping the next book cuts back on the cast of characters or at least brings several together.

★★★✬☆ ( )

http://bactra.org/weblog/algae-2015-03.html ( )

I don't, as a rule, care for the kind of epic series that bounces around among thirty-seven main characters and fifteen intertwining plot threads, but Mageworlds has proven to be the exception. The writing is good, I care about enough of the characters that I can remember (for the most part) who's who and doing what where, and the books are long enough to be satisfying but not so long that they are unwieldy to carry around or take forever and a day to read.

Also, there is a decent proportion and variety of female characters, which is especially noteworthy after complete lack of women beyond two main characters in the first book. ( )

This is the second book of the Magewar trilogy. They are just about my favorite space opera, hence the reread. They're essentially a different take on the Star Wars trilogy. Instead of a princess, a dashing starpilot and his alien sidekick, and a mystical young hero with android sidekicks, we get the Rosselin-Metadi siblings (from youngest to oldest): Beka (princess and swashbucklinging starpilot rolled into one), Owen (unassuming mystical apprentice Adept who fights with two-handed staff), and Ari (the giant but peaceful medic in the Space Force). They've got the political, religious, and military angles all covered amongst themselves.

Like the original Star Wars trilogy, these books represent the second generation. Their parents are the famous Domina Perada Rosselin and General Jos Metadi, who were instrumental in stopping the Mages from taking over the "civilized galaxy." Their story is told in the prequel, which I always find interesting for the "continuity errors" between its narrative and the legends/history as portrayed in the main trilogy.

Anyway, Beka is the main plot driver, and most (but certainly not all) of the action revolves around her, but the story jumps around among the three siblings and their important supporting characters. It's a fast-paced action story with some very amusing dialogue.

Beside the main character differences from Star Wars, these books also differ on the story angle. Rather than being a battle between good and evil (or the Dark Side of the Force), it's really about two different cultures and philosophies/religions: the Adepts believe in a kind of metaphysical noninterference policy and are essentially individualists, while the Mages (who fight with one-handed staffs) believe in manipulating space-time/reality for higher purposes and work in groups ("Circles"). The battles with staffs involve just as much light show as lightsabers, but it's generated by each individual's own power rather than a little gizmo. So the Mages aren't evil, per se, just different, and from a different part of the galaxy.

Those are the reasons why I like the stories.

Problems: well, once again, an entire galaxy of white people, even from two apparently completely distinct civilizations. Only one person in the entire series is described as being brown, and with all of the extras involved in such an epic tale, there's plenty of room for more. And of course, as far as we know, everyone is straight.

However, I must say that a definite strength is that there is about a 50:50 gender ratio in terms of characters. If anything, when two secondary characters are presented, the woman is more likely to be in the leadership position. So lots of strong women characters as both protagonists and window dressing. Definitely passes the Bechdel/Wallace test.

Nonhumans get pretty short shrift too; I mean, really, an entire galaxy full of two human civilizations? The Selvaurs are the only ones that get any playtime in the story, since one of them is Jos Metadi's engineer during his privateer days during the Magewar (pilot with alien sidekick, check) in the prequel. It was this relationship that allowed Jos and Perada to begin to form an allied space fleet to kick Mage ass, so the Selvaurs played a pretty pivotal role in the historical context.

And since Ari, the oldest sibling, was fostered on the Selvaur homeworld to cement that alliance, the Selvaurs do turn up as relatively minor characters throughout the trilogy. The only other aliens who make a very brief appearance are the Rotis, who show up in By Honor Betray'd during a key plot moment. That's it? C'mon. What's the use of space opera with some aliens if you don't have fun with it?

And what's with this "civilized" space thing? The Mages are barbarians? They clearly have better technology in a few different fields. They're a unified culture, as opposed to the hodgepodge of independent planets of the Adept territories. And if they were so hurting for goods in their home territory that they needed to start raiding "civilized" space (Vikings, anyone?), how the hell did they get the advanced technology in the first place? So some flaws to basic underlying premises and the way the story is framed.

But hey, if you ignore subtext (subtext, what's that?) and lack of representation and the general shallowness of the story, characters, etc., it is entertaining. And like I said, an interesting spin on Star Wars, defects aside. ( )