Lord of Misrule by Kannan Feng

[reviews_and_ramblings]

This was quite an interesting fantasy novel mixing pain with pleasure but above all giving to a Dom/sub relationship is true and original meaning, that is no only that of being a sex game.

Verity Lysimachus Severi Sephandus Fen of the House of Fen has probably a name longer than his age; even if for the current standard he is not so young (around 25 years old), he is still what you can identify to a post-graduate student in a fantasy Veiled University. As one of the older students he has some rights, like they were not enough those his spoiled self already were claiming, and so he is assigned a servant, Iskander. Even if younger than Verity, Iskander has a dignity, and a self-consciousness, that make him appear older and for sure savvier. Iskander has that dignity that sometime you see in Asian people, even when they are forced by economic conditions to accept job under their status, nevertheless they perform the task with accuracy and perfection. Iskander is so perfect that Verity almost forgets he is around and so Verity goes back to his bratty attitude, hopping up and down the bed of almost strangers, all linked together by the characteristic of being young and pretty, and so easily conditioned by Verity who leads them around like lap-pet.

One night Iskander, who has never questioned his Master’s behaviour, decides to teach him a lesson: in a way, Iskander is doing his job again at perfection, his duty is to take care of Verity and to make him perfect as well, and teaching Verity a lesson is the best way to straighten up the romp student. Iskander was taught since he was young how to deal with servants and similar and so he mixes this skill with sex: bondage, flogging, gagging are all good methods, and by the way, it’s not that Verity is complaining so much.

But one thing is to enjoy the sex in the privacy of their bedroom and another thing is to admit to strangers that he is having sex with a servant; and so Verity gets distracted, or maybe search distraction in the arms of Liulfr. In Verity’s eyes this is not a betrayal since, first he is not yet arrived to admit that he has a relationship with Iskander, and second, he is still convinced that he is the Master, and since he cannot perform his masterly duty on Iskander, then he has to find another willing recipient.

I like that, even with being an heavily fantasy setting, the story was not too much out of the ordinary to not allow the reader to identify with the world setting. Sometime, especially in the first part of the story, I was so focused on the blossoming relationship between Iskander and Verity that I almost forgot this was a fantasy, it could have been well a college romance set in a maybe ’40 or ’50 of the XX century European University. Then the second part of the story out-tracks a bit, or better the fantasy side comes out strongly than before; again nothing too much, but definitely clearly fantasy.

http://www.circlet.com/?p=1597

Amazon Kindle: The Lord of Misrule
Publisher: Circlet Press, Inc. (September 14, 2010)

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Comments

[harbor4t.livejournal.com]

This was excellent! Thank you!!!!

[elisa-rolle.livejournal.com]

glad you enjoyed it ;-)