Valdemar saga (in chronological order of the world, not order of publication):
The Valdemar saga by Mercedes seems vaguely never ending. It's been since March 2025 since I visited Valdemar, so it seems like it's time for me to get back at it. The Arrows Trilogy begins with Arrows of the Queen.
Talia is an abused daughter of the Holderkin, a patriarchal Borderland sect that allows girls only two choices: get married around thirteen, often as a third or fourth wife, or go to a religious sect. Talia dreamed of bigger things and was always hiding books she was reading about Heralds and magic. One day, after she ran away with a blowup with her family, a white horse she recognizes as a Companion, noses her and she finds herself leading it back to the Collegium. She is Chosen by Rolan and has become one of the highest ranked leaders in Valdemar.
(This is basically the same book as Foundation. However, this was one of the first Valdemar books published in 1987 and Foundation wasn't published until 2008, so Foundation is really the book with the repeated plot. There really is a difference in reading these in publishing versus chronological order.)
Once Talia gets to the Collegium, she is nervous and shy and nearly gets killed because she's too afraid to make connections. Her Gift is Empathy and THAT IS A WEIRD GIFT (but it's absolutely not if you've read it in chronological order *sigh*). Talia gets the Heir Apparent Elspeth to stop being a brat. Oh, and she has a strange attraction to that Herald Dirk. That's the book. 3/5 stars
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All pages come from The Complete Arrows Trilogy omnibus (published 2015)
Line of note:
"I feel like somebody's been using me for pells!" (page 140)
Hat mentions: None
Something I continue to be uncomfortable with, but don't know what to do about: The introduction to the omnibus contains the line "I made my first professional sale in 1985, to Marion Zimmer Bradley..." Lackey's continued mentions of Bradley as a professional mentor make me feel sort of gross. Bradley's involvement in child abuse makes some of the storylines in her books a bit too real and I can never tell if my writing about these books somehow makes me complicit in her legacy. *gnashes teeth*
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Up next we have Arrow's Flight. Talia's Heraldic training cannot be complete until she rides circuit with an experienced Herald. She and Herald Kris go off to the Borderlands to administer justice. Kris is Dirk's best friend and that's awkward. They get snowed in and it becomes clear that Talia has not been properly trained and she has no control over her gift and she can start projecting emotions like crazy and that's no good. This would ruin the reputation of the Collegium if it got out that they were sending untrained Heralds out in the world, so Talia and Kris set out to fix it.
Meanwhile, they help a village with a plague, another with bandits, and stop a raping rapist from raping. By the time they return to the Collegium, no one needs to know how badly off Talia had been.
The pacing was off in this book. It's definitely a second book in a series and Kris and Talia wandering around the Borderlands lasted way too long. And they were snowed in for a MONTH. Crazy. 3.5/5 stars
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Hat mentions:
...someone beckoned them on by a smile or a wave of a hat. (page 466)
Thing I looked up:
ustil greens (page 474) - I think this is a fictional vegetable.
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Last, but certainly not least, we have Arrow's Fall. The queen's heir is near marriageable age and the king of nearby land has asked if she will consider his son. Talia and Kris are sent to figure out if this would be a good match. Once they get there, intrigue happens.
THIS BOOK IS SO GOOD. I've read (counts) a couple dozen of these Valdemar books and this is the one I could not stop reading (but I had to because LIFE GETS IN THE WAY OF MY READING AND THAT IS SO RUDE).
Ahem.
Solid plot that pulls together threads from the last two books. Makes proper reference to other longstanding issues in the kingdom. The pacing is solid. Every chapter break made me want to keep reading.
There is a lot of violence, physical, sexual, and emotional, so that's something to know, especially if you're reading this thinking that the YAness means it's pretty clean. I mean, there's no swearing, but it specifically talks about rape and the aftermath.
5/5 stars
Is the reading rut over?
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One of the prompts for the Pop Sugar Reading Challenge this year is "a book about a horse or with a horse on the cover." Companions aren't really horses. Do you think I can still use these as books for that prompt?
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