Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing

Towards the back end of last year, I wolfed down a couple of Gaie Sebold's extremely enjoyable swords and sorcery novels, starting with Babylon Steel. Set in the city of Scalentine, a sort of inter-dimensional nexus, it follows titular heroine, mercenary proprietrix of the Red Lantern brothel, as she takes on a side job to make ends meet only to find herself dodging things from her past.

The story opens with Babylon realising that they may well not have enough to pay the Red Lantern's tax bill. So when the mysterious Darask Fain shows up offering a substantial sum to rescue a young woman with striking eyes who may just be the link between the Gudain and the Ikinchli, she jumps at the chance. Looking into the matter Babylon learns that a particularly brutal murderer, who might just be tied up with the Vessels purity cult, is preying on vulnerable women and she starts to worry that her target may have been killed rather than simply abducted.

All of this plays against the vivid backdrop of the city, virtually a character in itself, just a grand celestial conjunction — a syzygy of syzygies! — promises to bring its weirdness and that of its inhabitants to their apogee. The cast, especially the crew of the Red Lantern, are well developed and much of the story is drive by Babylon's desire to do right by her friends: Flower, her trollish cook; Laney, the flakey fairy princess; Previous, her bouncer; Kittack an Ikinchli bar owner, friend and sometime customer; and even Mokraine, a powerful magician turned derelict emotional vampire by a spell gone horribly wrong. It's clear from the outset that Babylon is more than a bit in love with Chief Bitternut, the werewolf militia captain, and that he's in love with her but doesn't seem to have got round to doing anything about it.

Unfolding in parallel with the main action, each of the chapters begins with a section telling the story of Ebi, an orphan child living on desolate world dominated by a group of demigods. It's immediately obvious that Ebi is Babylon, that she is somehow tied to the Babaska, the goddess of love and world, and that she is on the run from her previous self. So when the demigods appear in Scalentine ahead of the syzygy and start making enquiries, Babylon has to decide whether to run or whether to confront her past whilst also trying to reconcile herself to the impact of her eventual decision on her friends.

The backstory puts Babylon Steel's character into perspective, not least explaining her twin roles of brothel keeper and mercenary, whilst also widening the scope of the story to encompass the multiverse beyond Scalentine. Ebi's home plane of Tiresana may have many gods, all represented by actual living avatars, but the world beyond the temples has a moribund atmosphere expressed through the population's nostalgia for the better days of previous generations. Having seen the desolation at first hand, it's only too easy to understand why a naive child like Ebi feels honoured to be chosen to serve the avatars and why she makes the decisions she does.

As might be expected, the past and present begin to collide with each other just as the grand conjunction is about to cause all sorts of trouble to breakout across the planes. But when the crunch finally comes, Babylon finally comes to understand just how good her friends are and why she has a duty to finally confront the problems of her past-self.

Definitely recommended.