Perfect Shadow (The Night Angel Trilogy)

• A beautifully written, engaging novella about some of history in the twisting, frenetic, and dangerous life of the author’s famous character Durzo Blint, first introduced in “The Way of Shadows”. I loved the brief glimpses of this fascinating assassin, an immortal soul that has held many guises over his 700 years of life, starting with his first Acaelus Thorne. I particularly liked how some of the other characters (I’ll not mention here to keep spoilers out of my review) from that novel were worked into this story. • Reading this novella might be a bit of a challenge at first because, as the author mentions in his own Acknowledgments, writing it gave him the chance to “experiment with a staccato, time-skipping, kinetic style that I [the author] hoped would be fitting for these characters.” Indeed, the style chosen for the novella does fit the telling of the history of these characters, but it is jarring for the reader. • The best advice I can give is to remember the main character here is Gaelan Starfire, and he’s giving an interview to a guy by the name of Yvor Vas. The threads then weave in and out and between the interview, and many other characters are mentioned, considerably more than for your typical novella. It will help the reader keep things straight in his mind to know that Brent Weeks wrote the interview portion of the story in PRESENT tense, while all the memories of the stories are written in PAST tense. • The second piece of advice is to know that italics are used for internal monologue (of course), but those italicized lines enclosed by tilde (“~”) characters are thoughts given off by the secret entity that lives inside the main character. Their silent dialogue exchanges can be insightful and funny, but confusing if you don’t realize this little detail. • Others have remarked you need to read the entire Night Angel trilogy before reading this novella. Not so! I’ve only read the first book in the trilogy, and I enjoyed this novella very much. Perhaps some of it went over my head? Possibly. But that’s why this wonderful work deserves a second (or even third) reading to capture all the nuances that author Weeks imbued this great tale. It is a must-read for any fan of “The Way of Shadows”.

I will start by saying that Brent Weeks is one of my all time favorite authors. I hold the Night Angel trilogy in very high regard for the character depth especially. In this world the characters are very believable and stay true throughout the series. However, in my opinion, none of the other characters are as deep and enriching to the story as Durzo Blint. I was extremely excited to learn that Brent took time off from writing the sequel to The Black Prism to work on this novella. Despite a glaring contradiction from the original story regarding the use of a certain artifact by a certain legendary character (see pages 414 and 535 of Beyond the Shadows, then examine Perfect Shadow), this was still a very fun read and I greatly enjoyed getting to see more of Durzo before the beginning of the trilogy. I really look forward to Brent's next series set in this world after he finishes the Lightbringer trilogy.

I don't get the negative reviews of this novella, especially from readers claiming to be a big fans of the trilogy. Yes it's short - it's a novella - you knew that when you bought it. I for one am very grateful to have this additional taste of Night Angel story and history. It's as well-written as the Night Angel trilogy, and for as short as it is, it contains a lot of history. There are several time frames but it's not jumpy. There are a few short-story type segments, going forward in time with each clip, and then the majority of the novella is done in the same time frame, which is the most interesting part. There is more history here than just Durzo's too - Gwinvere (Momma K) is a young working woman during the last segment, and we're treated to their first meeting. We're given some insight into what has made Durzo Blint the man he is, and a little more personality of the black ka'kari itself. There are several conversational bits between man and ka'kari. We also see another ka'kari in action, and see its fate. This novella probably started out as some research-type writing on the author's part. Then at some point he realized hey, the fans might like to read this stuff. So here we have it, and I'm glad this didn't just end up sitting dormant in a hard drive or the editor's archive files. I too am anxiously awaiting the next Lightbringer novel, but this was great. And as far as the price - yes it costs more per page than a novel. But come on - how much do you think the author would make if this were $0.99? Almost nothing. He deserves our support for his fine work. $2.99 is less than the cost of a beer at a bar, it's not unreasonable. If you're a new reader to the Night Angel trilogy, I would definitely say DO NOT read this before reading the trilogy. It won't ruin it or anything, but I think discovering things as they are laid out in the trilogy is best, and this additional history afterward is great backstory. Backstory is always best once we know and care about a character. If you're a Night Angel fan, don't hesitate to read this, you'll enjoy it!

This series is fabulous, epic scale, great characters, super cool realm, and a great story! You can’t go wrong if you’re looking for lots of action and intrigue!

Esse é um dos livros da minha série favorita!!! Recomendo

Charmante nouvelle qui raconte les premiers pas de Durzo Blint en tant que wetboy. L'histoire se situe donc quelques années avant sa rencontre avec Kylar, mais je conseille de la lire après la trilogie, pour être familiarisé avec les notions de Sa'kagé, ka'kari, etc. Le récit n'est aucunement indispensable, mais c'est un plaisir de retrouver Durzo et de découvrir des facettes de sa longue vie. Et on croise des personnages qui auront leur importance par la suite. L'écriture est maîtrisée, le style tonique. J'ai trouvé cette longue nouvelle particulièrement plaisante.

Zunächst war ich verwirrt, doch ich hatte bis dahin noch nichts von diesem Autor gelesen und kannte das Universum nicht. Trotzdem war ich sofort begeistert von dem Schreibstil - kurz, knapp, aber dennoch sehr aussagekräftig und bildgewaltig. Sofort bekommt man ein Gefühl für die Stimmung dieser fremden Welt und für den Protagonisten, der die Geschichte erzählt. Außerdem wartet die Story mit tollen Dialogen und spannenden Actionszenen auf, auch wird es heiß und sexy. Damit hat sie alles, was sie für eine abgerundete, unterhaltsame Geschichte braucht.

I have loved the whole series, this gives a great insight into the world of Durzo, thoroughly recommend this book.

Mi è piaciuto molto. L'ho letto tra il secondo e terzo libro della trilogia. Lo consiglio per approfondire i personaggi di questa bella storia di Brent Weeks.