Review:
Although Cliopher Mdang, the Secretary in Chief of the Offices of the Lords of State, knows it's close to blasphemy for him to do this, he decides one day to suggest that his Radiancy, the Sun-on-Earth, take a vacation. His Radiancy agrees, and it sets in motion changes and shifts in attitude that Cliopher never dared to expect.
I can't remember how this made it onto my radar. The sheer size of it (an 899-page hardcover) was daunting, but eventually I decided I was in the mood to tackle it.
Despite reassurances on the author's own website, I was initially worried that this wasn't a good starting point for a newbie to the series like me. There were a lot of characters I didn't know, and lots of references to events I knew nothing about. I couldn't seem to get a handle on anything - it took me longer than it maybe should have to realize that his Radiancy was literally viewed as a god on Earth, and that the rules governing how he could interact with others and vice versa existed because touching him or even looking into his eyes too long could do actual harm to the mere mortals around him.
Luckily, I liked the characters and enjoyed reading about them and their world, or this would have been a chore to get through. The first part describes his Radiancy's vacation, while the next part deals with Cliopher's promotion, the multi-year work required to prepare for his Radiancy's eventual quest for his successor (and Cliopher's plans for his own retirement), and Cliopher's efforts to grapple with the feeling that his life's work has resulted in him not quite belonging anywhere.
Cliopher comes from a region that is seen, by those in the capital, as a backwater place filled with barbarians. Various nobles may be willing to admit that he isn't a barbarian, but to them he's the exception that proves the rule, an example of someone who successfully assimilated into proper society. Meanwhile, back at home none of his many relatives seem to recognize or care about his various accomplishments. Even though they still clearly care about him as a person and member of the family, they don't understand him. Cliopher's story will likely resonate most with First Gen and/or immigrant readers (First Generation college student here, with an immigrant parent - certain scenes gave me flashbacks to moments in my own past, even though my overall background is very different from Cliopher's).
There are many, many scenes, both in the capital and on his home island, in which people make assumptions about Cliopher and how he'll behave and are shocked to find themselves thoroughly corrected. Islanders who don't know him look at his clothing and assume he's a foreigner, only to find out he's related to a horde of well-connected Mdangs. Nobles talk about barbaric islanders, assuming he'll agree with them, only to learn that he's related to the "barbarians" they're talking about (I was honestly surprised that this wasn't common knowledge, considering his position in the government).
As much as I generally enjoyed spending time with Cliopher and his various friends, coworkers, and family members, I don't disagree with reviewers who've said that a good chunk of this book could've been edited out. For sure, I'd have appreciated if certain scenes had been dropped. There were times when Goddard seemed to think that readers would be amused by scenes in which Cliopher or his Radiancy put pompous people in their place. Instead, some instances horrified me. In one example, his Radiancy turned a noble who'd insulted Cliopher into a table. There was no mention, that I could recall, of the person ever being turned back into a human.
It bothered me that everything Cliopher and his Radiancy said and did were presented as automatically good and correct. Cliopher was the genius who pretty much single-handedly overhauled the previously corrupt government, using his own people's teachings and way of life as his guiding principles. He instituted universal basic income and somehow thought of all possible things that could go wrong and had preparations in place for all those possibilities. He was incorruptible and the perfect government official (and yet also extremely humble). None of which stopped me from worrying about the immense amount of power both he and his Radiancy wielded, and how easily they'd be able to steamroll over any opposition. Again, his Radiancy casually turned a man into a table and left him there with no apparent fallout I could see.
Overall, I enjoyed this despite my issues with it, and I at least plan to read several of the short prequels. I'd like to read the next book, At the Feet of the Sun, but it's just as long as this one, and the author's website recommends reading yet another work, The Return of Fitzroy Angursell (which is only 370 pages), beforehand. I don't want to devote a good chunk of my year to one series, so it may be a while before I find out how his Radiancy's quest went and whether Cliopher manages to gather all of his friends together upon his retirement.
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