I haven't had much luck with SFF debuts these last couple of years. For some reason, most of them just can't scratch that itch and make me want to find out what happens next. Even worse, most of them have been veritable chores to finish. Which is why I've been steering clear from debuts for a while.
Still, I have to admit that my curiosity was piqued when the publicist handling Anji Kills a King got in touch with me about getting an early read of this one. I didn't know it at the time, but Evan Leikam is a fellow book reviewer who hosts a podcast. The blurb was intriguing, so I decided to give this new debut a shot.
Alas, Leikam's debut was a disappointment on all fronts. Don't let the cover blurb mislead you. It's got nothing in common with Joe Abercrombie's body of work. I haven't read Christopher Buehlman yet, so I can't comment on any similarities between his novels and Anji Kills a King. I can say that, much like Kuang's The Poppy War, this one features an absurdly annoying young female lead and that's about it.
It's too bad, for this novel did have potential. Yet the utter lack of worldbuilding, the often boring linear plot, the perspective of a single dumb protagonist, the pathetic quality of the antagonists, and the somewhat black and white approach with little or no nuance whatsoever turned what seemed to have true promise into a lackluster dark YA effort that failed to deliver.
Here's the blurb:
An unlikely assassin struggles to escape a legendary bounty hunter in this breakneck fantasy debut that will grab you by the throat—perfect for fans of Joe Abercrombie, R.F. Kuang, and Christopher Buehlman.
She killed for a cause. Will she die for it too?
Anji works as a castle servant, cleaning laundry for a king she hates. So when a rare opportunity presents itself, she seizes the chance to cut his throat. Then she runs for her life. In her wake, the kingdom is thrown into disarray, while a bounty bigger than anyone could imagine lands on her head.
On her heels are the fabled mercenaries of the Menagerie, whose animal-shaped masks are magical relics rumored to give them superhuman powers. It’s the Hawk who finds Anji, a surly, aging swordswoman who has her own reasons for keeping Anji alive and out of the hands of her fellow bounty hunters, if only long enough to collect the reward herself.
With the rest of the Menagerie on their trail, so begins an alliance as tenuous as it is temporary—and a race against death that will decide Anji’s fate, and may change the course of a kingdom.
From the very beginning, the premise doesn't make much sense. How can a lowly laundress find herself alone in the presence of the king, with no guards or other attendants close by, and then kill him and get away without anyone being the wiser? Still, I elected to go with the flow and see how the tale unfolds. Needless to say, Anji Kills a King starts with a bang and is good until the Hawk takes Anji into custody. Their relationship is at first interesting, but things quickly go down the crapper and they never quite recover until just before the end. By then it's too late to save this one.
The worldbuilding leaves a lot to be desired. Evan Leikam introduces what seem to be intriguing concepts, yet he rarely sees fit to elaborate on any of them. Weighing in at barely 350 pages, it's not like the author was forced to cut scenes or get rid of exposition meant to provide depth to his ideas. As a matter of course, not all secrets can be divulged in the first installment of a new series. Then again, with this being a debut, there must be enough meat around the bone to capture my imagination and maintain my interest. Leikam did it with the Rail addiction. It works like cocaine, but it turns users into monsters known as Dredgers once addicted. Drug use and their repercussions are seldom explored in fantasy stories, so this was a different theme which stands out. Trouble is, beyond Rail Leikam only provides bare bone details about everything else. We learn nothing of King Rolandrian and the kingdom of Yem's politics and why things are the way they are. Nothing of the neighboring kingdoms. Very little of the Order of the Inheritance and their fall from grace. Nothing of the Nine Gods. Nothing of the Sun Wardens and the One Path and how it became the state religion. Nothing of the Maxia, the magic system in Leikam's universe. Very little of what made the Menagerie so fearsome and helped them become the kingdom's most notorious bounty hunters. Sadly, there is almost no depth to speak of. I'm at a total loss to explain this, as it's not like fleshing out these ideas would have boosted the page count by a whole lot. And yet, it would have elevated Anji Kills a King to another level.
As subpar as the worldbuilding turned out to be, it's the characterization that really sinks this book. Not because Anji isn't a well drawn character. She is that. Problem is, Anji just might be the most annoying protagonist I've ever encountered. Hotheaded to the point of stupidity, she's a chore to follow. It took her getting maimed so she could finally shut the hell up. Not only did I feel no desire to root for her, I wanted her to die at every turn. Flashback sequences are meant to show how Anji ended up an orphan working at the castle laundry, yet she is so exasperating that the emotional arc such scenes are meant to build completely failed to have an impact on me. The snarky banter between Anji and the Hawk gets old real fast, and their relationship doesn't really get interesting until the very end. The piss-poor quality of the antagonists, whether it's how lame the masked bounty hunters of the Menagerie are, or the Nazi religious fucktardness of the Sun Wardens, didn't help in the least. With Anji being such an irritating main character, the novel would have benefited from a stronger supporting cast. Unfortunately, other than the Hawk, and Leikam kept his cards way too close to his chest for too long as far as she's concerned, Anji needs to carry this entire tale on her shoulders and she can possibly do that.
Based on the blurb, I was expecting a fast-paced novel. And though some portions are indeed breakneck in nature, others are a slog. A good chunk of this tale is little more than a travelogue in which the Hawk attempts to bring Anji back to the capital to face justice in a roundabout way meant to elude pursuit. To be honest, more often than not it's just for random stuff to occur, mostly violent encounters with monsters or enemies. There is no endgame per se and the ending felt extremely YA and a bit nonsensical. You don't see it coming, which is nice. And yet, it doesn't redeem the previous three hundred pages or so that you have to go through to reach it.
To a certain extent, Anji Kills a King feels like something that isn't a final draft. As mentioned, there are some cool ideas, but they are not developed enough and the faulty execution means that this debut can never live up to its potential. It's sad, for with more editing, more worldbuilding, and more work on the characterization, this would have been a much better and more entertaing read.
The final verdict: 5.5/10
For more info about this title, follow this Amazon Associate link.
You can read an excerpt from the book here.
