Summary
We learn right away that our narrator is a 21-centuries-old druid, who looks like a 21-year-old Irish kid. He’s been running an occult bookshop in Tempe, Arizona for over a decade (since the late nineties). He likes the New World and Arizona in particular because no only aren’t there a lot of gods around, but there aren’t any faeries either. He isn’t worried about the “Disney” type of fairies, but the Fae, descendants of the Tuatha Dé Danann. Unfortunately, while he goes by the Greek name Atticus, his use of O’Sullivan, an Anglicized version of his real surname, in combination with supposedly being too young to have his knowledge of rare books, is enough information for the Fae to find him. Fortunately, he’s paranoid and has some protections.
Five faeries attack him near his store. He deals with three relatively quickly through an elbow to the face, a crushed windpipe and death by iron (his bookshop has iron bars lining the walls). However, his arm is cut down to the bone while fending fending off a sword blow. The remaining two faeries are less eager to attack him after seeing his fighting prowess and the advantages of his cold iron amulet, which is bound to his aura and is magically poisonous to them. This allows Atticus to stall.
He calls on an iron elemental and draws from the earth’s power to heal himself. While in conversation with these last two, he learns they are looking for the sword Fragarach and were sent by Aneghus Og, who has been after him for two millennia. Then the bars of the iron along the wall of his shop morph into the iron elemental who delightedly eats his final two assailants.
Commentary
As I said in my introduction, most of the information we learn about Atticus is in the form of an info-dump, one of those long passages that exists mainly to impart information to the reader. In this case, we are privy to this information through Atticus’ thoughts. In fact, as it is all in present tense, he might as well be talking directly to the reader a la Jane Eyre, “dear reader.” But it never seems old fashioned. We get information about his current situation, his past and the magic of this world he inhabits, which includes gods (Thor is an asshat, but Coyote is okay); vampires (sparring buddies); grimoires (part of his job); and the Fae (“as likely to gut you as hug you”). One of the reasons it works is his voice. Atticus is brimming with attitude (henceforth, Atticus will be known as having badassitude rather than badassery) and it comes through clearly in Hearne’s writing. From the very first paragraph, the reader knows the narrator has personality and whatever the book is about it should be fun to read. Expounding on the subject of the first line, a genius:
ignores the baleful stares of authority, and does something his countrymen think to be completely batshit insane. Of those, Galileo was my personal favorite. Van Gogh comes in second, but he really was batshit insane.
So the reader is willing to forgive the fact that nothing is happening, while Atticus muses from one subject to another. But right away the reader is also made aware that not everything is hunky-dory in Atticus land (not that we know his name yet, except from the back cover copy). Atticus is a druid, but he doesn’t want anyone to know. In fact, he is in hiding and he is serious about it. As he goes on about the New World being great because of the lack of gods and the Fae, his relief is palpable and we the reader are again willing to read through the three-page exposition because the pages are brimming with conflict.
I don’t want to neglect the humor that permeates Hearne’s writing. Not only is it an essential part of Atticus’ badassitude, it also helps make his descriptions more effective and vivid. For example:
They were lean, ropy types who had chosen to disguise themselves as cross-country runners, bare-chested and wearing nothing but maroon shorts and expensive running shoes. To any passerby it would look as if they were trying to beat me up with brooms, but that was just a glamour they had cast on their weapons.
So Hearne’s use of voice and conflict pulls us through to the fight where Atticus really gets to show off his badassitude (he’s clearly a ruthless and creative fighter) and to the end of the chapter when we learn someone Atticus has been running and hiding from has finally tracked him down.
A couple of notes on character development. I’m pretty sure I didn’t notice these things the first time I read this, but two aspects of Atticus’ personality that become pretty important later on, especially in his relationship with and/or in comparison to Granuaile, are brought right in to the first chapter:
- Paranoia: Atticus is paranoid for a reason, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t and can’t become an issue. He’s been running and hiding for hundreds and hundreds of years, so it’s naturally become engrained in his personality. He even comments about it:
Thanks the Gods Below for paranoia. I classified it as a survival skill rather than a neurotic condition; it was a keen knife’s edge, sharpened for centuries against the grindstone of People Who Want to Kill Me.
- Perspective: Living for 21 centuries as he has, Atticus has a unique perspective on life. He does not care about some things the way other people might. In fact, he could be considered callous or flippant about the current suffering and trials of the world:
There is still a downside to being different today, of course, which is why I put so much effort into blending in, but the downside is usually just harassment and discrimination, and that is a vast improvement over dying for the common man’s entertainment.
So there we go. Chapter 1 analysis complete. I look forward to diving into Chapter 2—a quick peek shows me we get our first introduction to . . .
(dum dum dum)
. . . the Morrigan.