“About a mile from the vessel, the dragons roiled in the Black Silk Sea, trying to constrict each other. Their snaking bodies–azure against ruby–twisted together like braided rope.”

L. N. Holmes’s The Floating Castle is an epic fantasy with big ambitions. In its marketing the novel is compared to Game of Thrones, The Witcher, Priory of the Orange Tree, and Dragon Age–all big shoes to fill! I could see the influence of each of these as I read, though ultimately Floating Castle is its own beast with its own style. Out of its comparatives, I’d probably liken it most to Priory, though it’s much faster paced and here the dragons are largely a backdrop for most of the novel (something I don’t consider to be a negative). Although I read Floating Castle to its conclusion and had quite a lot of fun with it, it does also have some significant issues. That said, Holmes demonstrates a keen sense of pacing and plotting, and I’m excited to see what she does next.

The Floating Castle itself is a multi-POV, secondary world fantasy whose key geographic players range from the Asian-inspired Toguan, to the nation of Gledann (home to the titular floating castle). Although our characters hale from many nations, action primarily takes place in Gledann, which feels like a combination of various British nations (along with France and perhaps Central and Eastern Europe). It’s main POVs are Prince Elias, the heir to Gledann (think Joffrey Baratheon if her were a brunette); Princess Liling, a Toguanese princess sent to marry Elias, but who proves anything but an empty-headed, wilting flower; Emmeline, a former peasant turned bodyguard to Liling; and Valena, a woods witch from an all-female society that worships a bloodthirsty goddess. When Liling arrives in Gledann and is unceremoniously rebuffed by Elias in a refusal reminiscent of Henry VIII’s rejection of Anne of Cleves, Liling must rely on her wits and her friendships around the castle to survive. Elias, meanwhile, is focused on his own family struggles, chiefly the fact that his brother Wallon is much nicer and better-liked than he is. Emmeline and Valena’s stories interweave with the other POVs as well, with Emmeline being assigned to protect Liling from would-be assassins, and Valena drawn into Elias’s plot to acquire powerful witches and wizards.

Set out like that, it may sound a bit much, but one of Floating Castle‘s strengths is how deftly all its disparate narratives come together. While many fantasies keep their POVs at arms length from one another for multiple tomes, Holmes very satisfyingly draws the net tighter quite quickly, creating dynamic tension as the reader worries for Liling’s life and the safety of the other characters. Despite the fast pace, the story never feels rushed, but pitch perfect in terms of when and how it introduces the different storylines and their characters. Valena’s is the last to really intertwine with the others, but when it does it’s incredibly satisfying and feels as though it’s falling into its natural place.

That said, there are some major stumbles throughout Floating Castle. For much of the book, I struggled to nail down the period and place Holmes was drawing from. While it was awesome to see names from a variety of cultures (along with the diversity that implies), certain choices also felt chaotic and incoherent at a worldbuilding level, as though the implications of having characters from such varied backgrounds hadn’t been fully thought through. It’s certainly not a requirement that every epic fantasy author have a degree in linguistics, but from page one I was wondering how the characters’ names all fit into one cultural environment. Certainly, we do get a sense of a wider world beyond Gledann and Toguan, and it’s very possible that some solid worldbuilding undergirds the reason for Gledann’s naming conventions, but there wasn’t anything on page to indicate that potential richness. Early in the story, there were also some dramatic tonal and genre shifts that initially confused me. Elias’s first chapter read like a fairly standard, medievalesque fantasy opening (albeit one that relies a lot on A Song and Ice and Fire for its set pieces), while Emmeline’s first chapter was a bit like suddenly tumbling into the world of a popular wizard school series. The initial whiplash does ease off, however, especially as the storylines converge, but it was unclear to me why Emmeline’s story didn’t start with her as a bodyguard or castle trainee, as opposed to a pupil just out of school.

At the line level, Floating Castle is a little uneven. There are some genuinely beautiful passages like the one quoted above, but a failure to use the past perfect often makes narration and exposition clunky to read, and despite fairly straightforward and bare bones prose, sometimes the word choice is jarringly esoteric. As an author, I sympathize a lot with the frustration of having to come up with novel ways to describe someone’s hair standing on end, but sometimes a thesaurus can steer you wrong, with words like horripilated, borborygmic, and pusillanimity pulling me out of the story and often at odds with the voice of the character(s) and their world. Dialogue is also occasionally a little unnatural, with much of it used to convey backstory through “as you know, Bobbing.” In contrast, sometimes narratively juicy events occur off page, to be related in narration at the start of chapters, while otherwise tense scenes might come to a sudden halt in order for the POV character to describe someone’s clothing, eye colour, and hairstyle.

There’s a lot that Floating Castle also gets right. It’s a very quick read and never feels poorly paced, and as tensions rise between Liling, Wallon, and Elias, it’s hard not to become invested in their rapidly unraveling world. The political machinations of the characters, while occasionally over-the-top, were never dull, and I appreciated that Holmes allowed moments of insights into even Floating Castle‘s nastiest of schemers. About three quarters into The Floating Castle, many of the issues with dialogue and exposition fall away, as the action becomes truly explosive, and Holmes hit me with some powerful emotional moments that had me worried for the characters and excited over the story’s twists. Of the POVs, Valena and Liling are the two I personally found the most compelling, and their stories are particularly urgent (Valena’s story also includes a talking cat named Spider, who’s a delight). Other standouts from the supporting cast include Bai, Liling’s translator, two older guards at the palace, a sex worker named Griselda, and Prince Wallon.

It’s clear from The Floating Castle that the world Holmes has constructed hasn’t yet revealed all its mysteries. There are a lot of key worldbuilding and magical elements that are satisfyingly teased and that I’m sure will be explored in later volumes. If you enjoy plot-focused political fantasy, The Floating Castle is certainly worth a look.

Quick Pitch:

A power hungry prince and a daughter of the empire on her way to the arranged marriage of that determined Prince.
His family relationships are complicated and strained, so no wonder he doesn’t want to get married. He can achieve his dreams of power other ways, tyvm. Now add in two new female knights (dames) hired to protect the both his sister and bride-to-be. Oh, don’t forget to weave in a witch– finally getting her powers in the most tragic and unexpected way. Ones that power hungry prince would want to utilize in his master plan. Cue the political intrigue, wedding drama and… dragons?

Overall Thoughts:

Things I loved:

• If you like multi-POV’s with surprising magical layers this is pretty fun. Though darker, it reads maybe upper YA, imho.

• I thought I would be overwhelmed with all the POV’s jumping around or daunted by the world building- but I was surprised how fast the pages turned.

Tough Love:

• I felt like sometimes the prose was lacking. It was easy for me to find parts I liked*, but not quotes.
  *Like the part when Emmeline needs to stand out amid two hundred women. Determined FMC’s, ayyyyyyeeee!

• The parent story lines in all of felt unbelievably tragic. And I understand gentle parenting wasn’t prevalent in these times, but sometimes this theme hindered the pacing progression.