'Zarsthor's Bane' (204 pp) was published by Ace Books in November 1978; this third printing was issued in July 1983. The cover art is by John Pound.
'Bane' is a 'Witchworld' novel. The heroine, a young woman named Brixia, is an outcast from a noble family, roaming the wastes of High Halleck as an outcast in the aftermath of the ruinous wars that have collapsed human society. She is accompanied by a cat named Uta.
Brixia meets up with a boy named Dwed, who is a squire to a warrior named Marbon. Marbon has suffered a serious head injury, and, in his few moments of coherence, is prone to spouting poetry about a long-ago Bane that brought ruin to a vast tract of Witchworld.
Despite her misgivings, Brixia decides to accompany Dew and Marbon in their quest into the depths of the wasteland. This entails confrontations with the remnants of Evil Powers still at loose in the High Halleck. Will the foursome - squire, warrior, cat, and wanderer - be able to overcome the malevolent forces gathering around them ? Or will the Bane triumph and leave the foursome prisoners in the Hell of the Bane's making ?
I picked up 'Zarasthor's Bane' expecting a 'typical' Witchworld novel; that is, one tailored for a Young Adult readership; bloodless; long on phantasmagorical sequences; overly reliant on stilted dialogue; a denouement that involves a young woman's realization that, despite the seeming humbleness of her existence, she is in fact the holder of awesome psychic abilities upon which the resolution of an age-old conflict depends.
'Bane' is certainly these things, but it also seems tired and meandering, much more so than other volumes in the Witchworld series. This may reflect the fact that at the time she wrote it, Andre Norton (i.e., Alice Mary Norton) was in declining health.
Whatever the faults are inherent in the book's prose, this illustrated edition benefits from the line artwork of Evan Ten-Broeck Steadman. These plentiful illustrations strike a skillful balance of abstract and decorative styles appropriate for presentation within the pages of a mass-market paperback book (never an easy assignment). Indeed, Steadman's art kept me turning the pages even when the narrative became too plodding to hold my interest.
The verdict ? Unless you are a fervent Witchworld fan, 'Zarasthor's Bane' will not be a rewarding read. In my opinion, the earlier novels in the series are better investments.
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