A Dribble of Ink

Wowee. Wonderful cover. (Weird, though, that it has the same title as another Tor title, written by mega-personality, China Mieville.) If only I knew who the artist was, so I could slaver over the rest of their art. Looks a little like Justin Sweet, but I’m not convinced.

Continuing their newfound tradition of mining Eastern Europe/Russia for popular, untranslated works (like Alexei Pehov’s Shadow Prowler), The Scar is coming over to North American shores after finding much critical success in its homeland.

Reaching far beyond sword and sorcery, The Scar is a story of two people torn by disaster, their descent into despair, and their reemergence through love and courage. Sergey and Marina Dyachenko mix dramatic scenes with romance, action and wit, in a style both direct and lyrical. Written with a sure artistic hand, The Scar is the story of a man driven by his own feverish demons to find redemption and the woman who just might save him.

Egert is a brash, confident member of the elite guards and an egotistical philanderer. But after he kills an innocent student in a duel, a mysterious man known as “The Wanderer” challenges Egert and slashes his face with his sword, leaving Egert with a scar that comes to symbolize his cowardice. Unable to end his suffering by his own hand, Egert embarks on an odyssey to undo the curse and the horrible damage he has caused, which can only be repaired by a painful journey down a long and harrowing path. Toria, the woman whose fiancé Egert killed, hates Egert, and is saddened and numb, but comes to forgive the drastically changed Egert.

Plotted with the sureness of Robin Hobb and colored with the haunting and ominous imagination of Michael Moorcock, The Scar tells a story that cannot be forgotten.

It sounds like a tight, personal story, which is something I always appreciate in a novel. There’s also something to be said about Fantasy conventions and settings being approached by people raised in other countries and cultures (Ukraine, in this case). It’s firmly on my rader for that reason alone (and, well, that cover. Yum!)

(The final sentence of that blurb is patently ridiculous, though, no matter how good the book is.)