Science Fiction and Fantasy Association of New Zealand

The Great Bazaar The Great Bazaar / Brayan's Gold
by Peter V. Brett
Harper Voyager

Supplied for review by Harper Collins New Zealand

Reviewed By: Simon Litten

The Great Bazaar/Brayan’s Gold is an elegant volume containing two novellas by Peter V. Brett in his world of The Painted Man. The novellas were previously published in 2010 and 2011 but this is the first time they have been available as a collected joint set.

The first novella is Brayan’s Gold (although this was written second) and concerns apprentice messenger Arlen Bales’, the central character of the series, first mission. Here he shows his steadfastness of purpose as a messenger and his integrity of character.

The second novella The Great Bazaar also features Arlen Bates and is set in the southern lands of The Desert Spear, the second book of the series. Here Arlen displays greater knowledge of the night demons and has the beginnings of an idea of how to effectively destroy them.

These two stories were not only complete in and of themselves (both could stand alone if need be), but were very good tasters to Mr Brett’s Painted Man trilogy, and were also useful backgrounders to the tales told in that series. They left me wanting more, which isn’t always the case with fantasy. I will also note that the volume is very nicely packaged in faux leather binding with gold script and cover art. As I noted above: a very elegant volume.

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