Arm of the Sphinx Continues a Surreal Climb Up the Tower of Babel
Senlin Ascends (Books of Babel Series #1)
Paperback $19.99
Senlin Ascends (Books of Babel Series #1)
In Stock Online
Paperback $19.99
Senlin Ascends dropped in January, a massive, dizzying, utterly absorbing introduction to Josiah Bancroft’s Books of Babel. Through the eyes of the steadfast and prudish headmaster Thomas Senlin, we embarked on a heady honeymoon journey through the Tower’s chaotic and tumultuous Ringdoms, ready to take in all the spectacle they had to offer.
Senlin Ascends dropped in January, a massive, dizzying, utterly absorbing introduction to Josiah Bancroft’s Books of Babel. Through the eyes of the steadfast and prudish headmaster Thomas Senlin, we embarked on a heady honeymoon journey through the Tower’s chaotic and tumultuous Ringdoms, ready to take in all the spectacle they had to offer.
Then, Senlin lost his new wife Marya at the foot of the tower, and a bunch of things happened:
• He began a quest to climb the Tower and locate Marya, come hell or high water (particularly the treacherous spa waters of The Baths)
• He collected a slew of new friends and enemies, and a few individuals for whom the Venn Diagram overlaps
• He became a pirate
Arm of the Sphinx, the second installment of the Books of Babel, picks up there, with Senlin sailing the winds under the nom de guerre Tom Mudd. He’s still on the hunt for Marya, who has a presence in this book, though not in the way you might expect.
If Senlin showed up on the Tower’s doorstep wide-eyed and slack-jawed at its power, Tom has been transformed into a reluctant player within its grand plot: older and savvier, but still clinging to what scruples he can.
Our protagonist has changed, to be sure, but the bigger departure in Sphinx is the novel’s perspective. In Senlin Ascends, our experience of the Tower (and surely the worst honeymoon in fantasy fiction) was limited to the experiences of the titular hero. We experienced all the ups and the downs of traversing the wonders and horrors of the Tower’s “Ringdoms” alongside him.
Arm of the Sphinx (Books of Babel Series #2)
eBook $9.99
Arm of the Sphinx (Books of Babel Series #2)
In Stock Online
eBook $9.99
In book two, the scope broadens, and the motley crew of supporting characters assembled around Tom now receive their respective moments in the sun, with the narration flowing seamlessly between multiple perspectives.
In book two, the scope broadens, and the motley crew of supporting characters assembled around Tom now receive their respective moments in the sun, with the narration flowing seamlessly between multiple perspectives.
Take Iren, who over the course of the first novel morphed from New Babel’s resident Brienne of Tarth to one of Senlin’s most important allies, and a genuine friend. Now removed from her role as hulking enforcer, she spends a considerable amount of Sphinx quietly wrestling with questions of identity and self-worth. How do you reconcile a past primarily devoted to fright and intimidation with a present concerned with the welfare of a group of relative strangers?
Iren’s inner monologue is poignant and subdued, and it’s only one example of the remarkable character journeys that play out in this second of four planned novels.
Captain Tom Mudd would be nothing without his right-hand woman Edith, whose own super-powered mechanical arm—a “gift” from the enigmatic Sphinx of Tower legend—causes her no small amount of grief. We inhabit Edith’s head perhaps more than any other; the inside perspective sheds light on her own considerable worries and varied motivations, but also her ever-elevating concerns about the captain to whom she’s more devoted than she seems dreamed she could be.
Also along for the ride are siblings Adam and Voleta, night-and-day opposites whose yo-yo relationship never strains the deep bond they share. Their characterization in particular remained largely opaque in Senlin Ascends; they are given more room to run now that the whole gang is, literally, on the run.
On the run from whom? Just about everybody. Tom is still wanted by the powerful don of The Baths for a crime with significance he doesn’t fully comprehend. The crew certainly isn’t welcome in the port of New Babel either, given the explosiveness of their exit. Every character aboard their stolen ship is fleeing the past. Some of them have futures they’d like to run from, too.
As with everything in the Tower, their understanding of personages like the Sphinx, tinkerer extraordinaire and shrouded in mystique; and places like the Golden Zoo, a not-quite-so-abandoned clockwork marvel; are far from thorough or definite. (To that end, Tom’s doubts about whether his wife will even welcome a rescue color the narrative and muddy the waters.)
In layering ambiguity into his phantasmagorical travelogue, Bancroft’s puts his storytelling skill on full display. He reveals the truth of his tale—or at least what we understand the truth to be—only at his own pace, like a master craftsman building a workshop around himself. The plot never rushes. The characters never falter. The mystery deepens even as it’s untangled.
Tom, Edith, Iren, Adam, Voleta—they’re not finished being put through the ringer—book three, The Hod King, arrives in December—but the imagination and the nimbleness of the world they inhabit makes every challenge and every setback an experience to relish.