THE BELLY OF THE BOW is the richly imaginative, masterfully written second volume in the FENCER trilogy
The city of Perimadeia has fallen. Bardas Loredan, the man who was supposed to save it, is now living on the Island - a recluce, living apart from his family in the mountains, with only a young apprentice for company. His life as a fencer-at-law is over. Instead, Loredon spends his days perfecting the art of bow-making.
But his isolation will not last forever; and when the Island comes under attack, his skills as a soldier and general are once again called upon.
COLOURS IN THE STEEL, Volume One of the Fencer Trilogy, introduced a remarkable new voice in fantasy fiction. THE BELLY OF THE BOW confirms that rich promise and establishes K. J. Parker in the top rank of writers.
The great city of Perimadeia has fallen to its barbarian enemies, and its last commander, Bardas Loredan, is one of the few survivors, saved by the brother who betrayed the city. The Loredan family are a strange bunch, doomed by the consequences of past actions to endless attempts at reconciliation, or actions so appalling that no reconciliation will be possible. And they are also crucial to the financial manoeuvrings of this well-imagined world, where hostile take-overs are conducted at swords point ... K J Parker's The Belly of the Bow, second of the Fencer trilogy, is intelligent about perverse behaviour, about the logistics of conquest and resistance and about the way that power follows both finance and military might. He is also intelligent about the details of weapon making--in his first book Colours in the Steel, it was siege engines and here it is longbows--and about the working and consequences of magic--a pair of wizards who meddled in things they did not understand find themselves tinkering endlessly to make events less devastating, and running out of that luck which makes meddling possible. With two books, Parker has become a name to be reckoned with; his gloomy fantasies of fate and misadventure are not like anything else in the field. - Roz Kaveney, AMAZON.CO.UK REVIEW
K. J. Parker is a pseudonym for Tom Holt. He was born in London in 1961. At Oxford he studied bar billiards, ancient Greek agriculture and the care and feeding of small, temperamental Japanese motorcycle engines. These interests led him, perhaps inevitably, to qualify as a solicitor and emigrate to Somerset, where he specialised in death and taxes for seven years before going straight in 1995. He lives in Chard, Somerset, with his wife and daughter.