irethorn's title character begins her life as an orphaned drudge, a nameless vassal of a ruling class whose members call themselves the Blood while referring to those who serve them as mudpeople. Marked by a head of fiery red hair (a sign widely believed to represent good fortune), the young girl is named Luck and taken under the wing of a well-born herbalist. Quick and eager to learn, she proves a willing student in the arts of healing.
When her elderly tutor dies, though, Luck is suddenly at the mercy of a new and rapacious landholder. Rather than become his unwilling concubine, she flees to the forbidden Kingswood. There she passes an entire year, nearly starving in the harshness of winter. Hunger drives her to eat some dangerously toxic berries, and the experience alters her forever, marking her as a plaything of the gods. When the runaway returns to her home village in the spring, it is with a new name: Firethorn, after the plant whose berries she devoured at such great risk.
Soon after her homecoming, Firethorn embarks on a passionate affair with a knight who is on the way to a war brewing with a faraway kingdom. She accompanies Sire Galan on his journey, discovering the harsh realities of life as a camp follower. Galan offers Firethorn as much protection as any woman, mud or Blood, might expect in such a situation: far less than she needs, in other words. Despite the hazards and the inequalities in her relationship with Galan, she finds sources of satisfaction in camp living—tending to the health needs of other women and making friends.
Unfortunately, Firethorn is a lightning rod for trouble, and even Sire Galan's power to shield her has its limits.
Love in a harsh, realistic world
Firethorn is Sarah Micklem's first novel, the opening installment of a trilogy that promises to be an epic feminist fantasy. The harshness of camp life and the cruelty of the oft-romanticized medieval era are brought into sharp focus in this tale. Firethorn is constantly endangered merely because she is without family, lowborn and most of all female. To complicate matters, her hair, skills and stubborn pride make her conspicuous.
To call this a character-driven novel is to understate the case. The relationship between Firethorn and Galan is volatile and passionate. It is also forbidden—the Blood may, of course, dally with their vassals, but they must never fall in love with them—and touches off disasters that engulf the King's army. The troublesome lovers are both depicted with a sure hand and satisfying depth. Readers see Galan's single-minded affection for Firethorn, and yet are never surprised by her inability to have faith in his devotion. Every insecurity and quirk is utterly believable. The price the two of them must pay for this affection is steep, and every time they seem to have redeemed themselves another mishap sends them tumbling into danger again.
Like most high fantasy novels, Firethorn's language is formal and even occasionally ornate, but fortunately Micklem does not carry this style so far that the book ever becomes wearing to read. Engrossing, suspenseful and uncompromising, this is a novel that sets a great story into motion, leaving readers eager for the next chapter.
