Book Review: Doomdark’s Revenge
The second book in the Midnight Chronicles by Drew Wagar, and the official novelisation of the sequel to Mike Singleton’s Tolkeinesque strategy game, The Lords of Midnight.
Similarly to The Lords of Midnight, Doomdark’s Revenge is a videogame I have no personal experience with. At least with the first game, I’d played a little of the Android remake by Chris Wild. Not so with its sequel. Mike Singleton’s Doomdark’s Revenge was originally released the same year as its predecessor, again for the ZX Spectrum system, and significantly expanded the first game’s scope. There were now hundreds of characters, and a brand new realm to explore. The Icemark also had a much larger map than that of the land of Midnight in the previous game, and many more routes to success. Understandably, making such a novelisation sounds like a monumental challenge. It’s absolutely worth reading Drew’s author’s note at the start of the book to get a fascinating glimpse into the undertaking, as well as the reasoning behind certain decisions (which will undoubtedly hold more meaning for fans of the game, than for those of us approaching this for the first time in book form). I continue to hold the utmost respect for Drew Wagar in taking on these kinds of challenges within his work, from Elite: Reclamation’s Kickstarter, through the contentious events surrounding Elite: Premonition, to novelising Mike Singleton’s beloved ZX Spectrum classics. And the result is always a great read.
Blurb
Doomdark, the Witchking, has been defeated by Moonprince Luxor and the valour of the Free and the Fey. The curse of eternal winter has lifted from the land of Midnight. Yet the hard-won peace is short lived; a strange warning is received. Doomdark has a daughter, Shareth the Heartstealer. She sees Midnight as her rightful inheritance and plans to conquer it. Shareth kidnaps Luxor’s son, Morkin, on the eve of his wedding. Tarithel, his betrothed, tortured by dreams of Morkin’s fate, finds her way into the strange realm of the Icemark, a land riven by conflict and warring factions.
Luxor, aided by Rorthron the Wise and a company of Moonguard warriors, must journey across the Frozen Wastes to seek allies in hostile territory, in a desperate bid to stop Shareth.
Doomdark’s Revenge is a novel written under official licence and based in Mike Singleton’s vast world of the best-selling Tolkienesque fantasy game, Doomdark’s Revenge.
Review
Doomdark’s Revenge picks up right where The Lords of Midnight left off, giving our heroes barely any time to celebrate their victory over the Witchking before Shareth the Heartstealer comes onto the scene. Just like the previous book, the style and tone of this sequel leans heavily into its Tolkienesque roots. However, it departs from mirroring the plot of The Lord of the Rings and comes much more into its own. We instead have a rescue plot, with Shareth in the role of the new - and more dangerous - dark lord. The political manoeuvring is not as straightforward for our protagonists as it was in the previous book either, as they contend with more races with their own mutual distrusts and agendas threatening to throw a spanner in the works. I will say there is a fair amount of unnecessary repetition in the book. A lot of characters, separated by leagues and relying on message-runners, have to be brought up to speed on the goings-on in the Icemark. Drew does a great job keeping the characters’ knowledge of events appropriate, even if it is slightly out of date by the time they receive news. However, I don’t think we needed for the message-bearers to recount the status quo in full within the narrative every time. I’d wager the book would have been a fair bit shorter had Drew chosen instead to skip over these explanations. There was repetitiveness in The Lords of Midnight as well, but that took the form of rousing speeches, which aren’t nearly as numerous here. The plot itself is interesting and engaging - particularly Tarithel’s quest. She has a lot of movement, and our tour of the varied locations of the Icemark comes chiefly through her. Luxor’s part in the quest, by contrast, isn’t as dynamic. Compared to Tarithel, he seems to stay in one place for a very long time. But I felt like the different races had much more distinctiveness with their various cultures and worldbuilding than in the previous book.
The worldbuilding itself was well done. I love the sense of mystery that pervades the world, and the two different soft magic systems at play. Even though the different races were nicely distinct from one another, within themselves they were largely monolithic. The Fey continue in their role as an analogue for Tolkienesque high elves; the Barbarians are brutal, stubborn and warlike; the Giants are big, crude and lumbering, preferring to throw rocks and use clubs than weapons of steel; the Iceguard are fantatical in their devotion to Shareth, and presented largely as plain evil. But Drew did add in some nuance. The Dwarves get opposing political factions, and the Iceguard… Well, I won’t spoil that. It’s quite good. But this is all done in keeping with the videogame, and as a novelisation, faithfulness to the source material is a chief concern.
This brings me onto characters. The returning cast remain as great as they were in The Lords of Midnight. However, Tarithel is the real star of the show here. She gets a lot more depth and character development, and we see most of the Icemark through her eyes as she quests to rescue her beloved Morkin, and struggles with her growing powers and call to destiny. I found her struggles and adventures utterly compelling. In terms of the new cast - it is massive, almost to the point of being unwieldy, and I applaud Drew for facing it head-on. He manages to make most of them distinct, despite the source material’s best efforts to make it as difficult as possible to tell between them. The character names remain unchanged from the game, which means they can get very confusing, since they’re all constructed randomly out of a narrow selection of syllables. It leads to names like Carorthand, Carorthay and Carorthane, two of which are Fey, and the other a Dwarf; or Imorthorn, Imgorthand, Imgorarg, Imgenarg, Imgorad, Imgaril and Imgasharg, most of which are from different races entirely. To help with keeping track of all this, Drew has provided a “Dramatis Personae” section at the beginning of the book, which is a fantastic addition and one which I made great use of. As I mentioned before, despite the unfortunate similarity in the names, Drew did a brilliant job of making a lot of these characters distinct from one another in their personalities. Even now, a few weeks on, I can remember without having to look who many of the above-mentioned characters are. Shareth herself absolutely chewed up every scene she was in. She was bombastic, over-the-top and unashamedly villainous, but her reasons for being so were very clear; she wasn’t just evil for the sake of it. Drew does a great job writing compelling female antagonists as well as protagonists.
In terms of pacing and prose, I thought the book kept on at a good pace and it felt easy to read. I didn’t feel like there were any places in particular that got bogged down. I did wish that Luxor had moved around a bit more, though.
Overall, I really enjoyed Doomdark’s Revenge. It’s one of those books that’s not ashamed of what it is, and in fact leans fully into it. It’s a great fun read, and I would definitely recommend it especially to those who hold fond memories the of the strategy games (of course), but also for anyone looking for an old-school quest fantasy. I’m really looking forward to the third installment, The Citadel.
