The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay
The Lions of Al-Rassan is a 1995 historical fantasy novel by Canadian writer Guy Gavriel Kay. Like many of Kay’s books, Lions takes place in a world that is not dissimilar to our own in terms of history. In this case, the setting of the novel is a peninsula strongly based off of Moorish Iberia on the eve of the Christian Reconquista. The focus of Lions is on the three principal peoples that inhabit the peninsula: the Asharites (Muslims) of Al-Rassan, the Jaddites (Christians) of Esparana, and the Kindath (Jews), the latter of whom wander from nation to nation, and have no land of their own which they can call home. We see the land of Al-Rassan through the lens of three protagonists: Jehane bet Ishak, a Kindath physician; Rodrigo Belmonte, a Jaddite cavalry commander; and Ammar ibn Khairain, a notorious Asharite poet, political advisor, and assassin. All three must navigate a world of religious strife, looming war, political intrigue, and – for those who can find it – immense beauty. We do not just stay with these three throughout the novel, however. We find ourselves zipping across the peninsula, following many different storylines, and are provided with a panoramic view of Kay’s gorgeous world.
The Lions of Al-Rassan opens with an act of mass slaughter. In on afternoon, the ruler of Cartada, the most powerful of the petty kingdoms of Al-Rassan, organises the execution of a large number of his political enemies. Jehane bet Ishak, inadvertently, saves one of her patients from the slaughter and must flee lest the king of Cartada comes after her. Subsequently, the king of Cartada’s principal advisor, Ammar ibn Khairan, finds himself exiled from his homeland through the machinations of court politics. Meanwhile, a family dispute in the Jaddite north sees Captain Rodrigo Belmonte also exiled from his home country of Valedo. Thus, these three take refuge in the Asharite city of Ragosa, and end up in the service of the king. There, they become fast friends and allies, battling assassins, religious zealots, double agents, and the forces – both Jaddite and Asharite – that seek to destroy the fragile realm of tolerance they have cultivated.
This book was absolutely epic. It has almost everything one could want from historical fiction – edge-of-your-seat battle scenes, shadowy political intrigues, an impressive cast of characters, and a wonderful evocation of a time and place. The story of Lions is excellent at both the micro and macro level; the great war for civilisation provided a backdrop for the human drama. Kay’s writing is absolutely phenomenal. It is lyrical, moving, and profound – the very best that the fantasy genre has to offer. His characterisation is also deft, with every character having their own voice and motivations. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that I actually preferred the secondary characters to Kay’s main protagonists. Whilst Jehane, Rodrigo, and Ammar are loveable in their own way, the men and women who surround and oppose them are drawn just as wonderfully. Surprisingly for a book of this size (clocking in at over 600 pages), I was never once bored or mired in a slog. Kay paces his novel so that it is thrilling and brimming with life throughout.
I have only a few slight nitpicks that prevent this book from taking a place in the pantheon of all-time favourites. The first is that the romance element of the novel isn’t particularly strong. Jehane, Ammar, and Rodrigo ostensibly find themselves in a love triangle, and this becomes one of the central conflicts of the novel. This aspect of Lions was never really compelling, and the book could have done without it. The sex scenes present in the novel were also overlong and slightly cringe-inducing. This latter point is supposedly an in-joke amongst long times fans of Kay, and isn’t nearly offensive enough to hamper my enjoyment of the book. My final, ever-so-slight issue with The Lions of Al-Rassan is that the main characters possess relatively modern sensibilities. This is often my pet-hate when it comes to historical novels, but it weirdly did not bother me so much with Lions. Perhaps there is enough to differentiate Ammar, Rodrigo, and Jehane from their 21st century readers so that their enlightened opinions do not grate – but, nevertheless, they don’t read as convincingly Medieval voices. I have yet to come across an author who inhabits a time and a place such as Mary Renault does with her Greek novels, but Kay cannot be faulted too strongly for coming up short against the queen of historical fiction herself.
The Lions of Al-Rassan is the first Guy Gavriel Kay novel that I have read, and it certainly won’t be the last. It is an amazing historical fiction about friendship, tolerance, perseverance, and half a hundred other things that are so difficult to nurture in an age of war and strife. I’m sure that Kay is well on his way to becoming one of my favourite writers of all time, and I hear some of his other novels are even better than this one.
Rating – 9/10
