Requiem (Psalms of Isaak)
This is the fourth installment in a projected five-part series; if you’re coming in cold, you may want to familiarize yourself with the preceding three books first, as the author jumps right in, providing minimal backstory on the myriad characters and plotlines. The series is set in a postapocalyptic future, one in which technology and magic mix (sometimes uneasily). In the beginning (Lamentation, 2009), a terrible weapon destroyed Windwir, the Named Lands’ most important city, and an assortment of characters set out to determine who was responsible. Multiple story lines have taken various characters off in their own directions in subsequent volumes, and, now, in the penultimate book, we begin to see that some of the stories are coming back together. An entertaining mixture of magical fantasy and postapocalyptic SF, which boasts a highly detailed world and finely drawn characters, this latest chapter finds the fate of the Named Lands, now conquered by the mysterious Crimson Empress, and of Isaak, the artificial man at the center of it all, still very much up in the air. Fans will be clamoring for the series finale. --David Pitt