A Super-Thrilling Historical Fantasy Novel. Review on Across The Nightingale Floor - Lian Hearn

'Across the Nightingale Floor' is the first book of the'Tales of the Otori' trilogy written by author Lian Hearn. Lian's actual name is Gillian Rubinstein.

The Backdrop of the Story-

The Otori are a high ranking warrior- clan in the quasi-Japanese land of the Three Countries and they are the rulers of the Middle Country that lies in the middle of two other countries, the East and the West.

Lord Otori Shigeru, the eldest son of Lord Otori Shigemori, is a noble, just, and compassionate person and loved by his people. His uncles, Shoichi and Masahiro are the current rulers of the Otori clan, after Shigemori's demise. The Otori capital is the castle town of Hagi. The symbol or the sigil of the clan is the crest of a heron.

The East is under the control of the Tohan, bitter and traditional enemies of the Otori. Their ruler is Lord Iida Sadamu, son of Iida Sadayoshi, an ambitious and cruel man who lusts for power. Their capital is the castle town of Inuyama. The symbol of the clan is the triple oak leaf. But this is the present setting of the novel. What happened in the past?

In the Battle of Yaegahara, when Lord Otori Shigemori used to be the Otori head, the two clans engaged in a bloody battle in which the Otori were decisively defeated by the Tohan, thanks to the betrayal of the Noguchi clan. The Noguchi betrayed the Otori and went over to the Tohan. The Tohan clan took most of the Middle Country under its possession after the defeat of the Otori in the Battle of Yaegahara. Otori Shigeru was distraught and broken after the battle as he lost his father and his younger brother Takeshi after Yaegahara.

The Plot-

The main story of the book begins after the Battle of Yaegahara. Tomasu is a young boy who lives with his parents and sisters in the village of Mino in the East where the Hidden live. The Hidden is a religious sect whose followers worship a secret God and believe in the equality of men. An unbreakable oath rules their life- that they would never take the life of others or of themselves. Iida Sadamu, the Tohan warlord, wants to eradicate the Hidden because he thinks they insult the gods and the Enlightened One(The Buddha) and are a threat to the society ruled by warlords of the different clans. In his boiling hatred for the Hidden, he orders his troops to seek out the Hidden, torture, and kill them. One day, he arrives himself with his soldiers at Mino. Tomasu is luckily not in the village at that time. The village is attacked, burned, and the villagers are killed mercilessly by Tohan troops. Tomasu returns only to see the total destruction of his village, his stepfather dead, his mother and sisters missing. The leader of the Hidden, Isao, lies dead too with everyone else in the village, after being brutally tortured and'torn apart' by Iida's soldiers.

Then Iida, clad in his fearsome black armour and antler-helmet and astride his horse, sees him.

Tomasu flees and is rescued mysteriously by Lord Otori Shigeru, who appears just out of nowhere near Mino. He takes Tomasu with him to Hagi and gives him a new name- Takeo. But what Shigeru and Takeo himself don't know is that Takeo is not just some ordinary boy. Takeo has got some strange skills. He has a super acute sense of hearing, so sharp that if he is in a castle with fifty to sixty people, he can hear them all! But this is just one of many!

Meanwhile, Iida Sadamu has got built in his black-walled fortress at Inuyama a'nightingale floor'- a floor that sings at the sound of the lightest tread. He's built it so that no assassin could kill him while he is in his fortress. Shigeru finds out about the talents of the boy and discovers that he has got skills of the Tribe, a group of highly skilled paid assassins. He gets a nightingale floor built in his own house in Hagi, fully aware of Sadamu's floor at Inuyama. And then asks Takeo if he could go across it silently!

If this plot doesn't grip you, then you are missing out on a great story. The book is extremely well written, with Takeo's chapters in the first-person narrative, and is highly readable. It is fast paced, graphic, and the Oriental setting makes it all the more exciting. The lucid language will make you progress from chapter to chapter speedily. And let me remind you, this is only the first volume of the Tales of the Otori, and the epic storyline is just beginning.

Go and grab that copy of Across The Nightingale Floor. You'll be wanting the next part soon after you are done with it.