A Song for Arbonne by Guy Gavriel Kay

A Song for Arbonne by Guy Gavriel Kay, Fantasy, 509 pages.
I read this one based on Nancy Pearl's review. I do try to follow her blindly when I can, and it is usually worth the effort, since I am seldom disappointed.
I read Kay's Under Heaven from last year and really enjoyed that (it made this year's American Library Association Reading List as best fantasy novel), and I enjoyed this one as well, but for different reasons or at least in a different way. There was a richness of place in Under Heaven, that this book lacks, but I did not mind. I enjoyed this one quite enough to forgive it for not being as good as one of the author's later works. Arbonne, has a great faux medieval feel, with complicated cultures reminiscent of those found in George RR Martin's Song of Ice and Fire series, Martha Well's Wheel of the Infinite (with a thinner religious layer) or Megan Whelan Turner's Atollia books.
Arbonne is a land ruled by women. The goddess Rian shares the stage with the god Corranos, the queen of the court of love has a share of temporal power, and the countess of Arbonne rules in her late husband's stead. Troubadours and courtly love play a great role in society there, as well. All of this leads their neighbors in the more warlike, macho, and Rian-despising Gorhaut to believe that Arbonne land would be easily acquired for expansion. The characters are well drawn and the plot twists are intricate and compelling. A very good read.

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