The Hugo finalist sequel to the Hugo winning The Tainted Cup.
If you are reading this review, and haven’t read The Tainted Cup, you might be ready to tackle this book with that precis but you will miss a lot of the nuance of the Empire and what it does, and not be quite ready for the further conversation here. There are many lines in this book, and one of them is one that should not be overlooked: a critique of the Empire and the Imperial Project.
That critique is a nuanced and interesting one that goes beyond the usual binaries of Chaos vs Absolute Law and Ana and Din, as representatives of the Empire in a important but still independent border Kingdom, do navigate. We saw in The Tainted Cup about the importance of the Empire and also the costs of that Empire as well. We still don’t quite know what the Leviathans really are. Here, in this book, we are in a place where the reagents and the remnants of defeated Leviathans are processed. Yarrow is an important kingdom because of what it can do for the Empire, but it is not yet within the orbit of the Empire. But it seems like it is a matter of time before it is.
And that is interesting because there are conversations about the idea of Imperial Expansion and the uses of Empire and the health of the Empire. Since I think about the Roman Empire everyday, there are two time frames here I am thinking of. First is the 2nd century AD, in the time of Trajan and Hadrian. Trajan conquers a bunch of Mesopotamia from the Persians, in what is now Iraq. However, upon his death, Hadrian begins a campaign of consolidation, giving up the new gains and fortifying the Empire as it is. This is of course where we get Hadrian’s Wall.¹ The point is that the Empire is at a limit...and that is a dangerous place for Empire to be. It’s dangerous for an Empire to further expand, something Ana talks to Din about as Din considers his own problems within the Empire. And it is dangerous for an Empire to remain in this position. That mirrors Din’s all problems again--as Ana’s hands, he is trapped in an old crushing debt, but getting out of that position is difficult. But remaining in that position is taxing. It’s a nice balance of the internal problems of the main character with the geopolitical position of the Empire he works for. What good is an Empire and is it all worth it?
The even stronger second Roman Empire parallel is the 130’s BC and the kingdom of Pergamon. Pergamon was a Greek Kingdom in what we now call Turkey. Attalus III, last king of the kingdom, had no direct heirs, and so bequeathed the kingdom to the then Roman Republic. This was something that seems to have been in the wind for years (much like in this book how the people of Yarrow know that the Empire is slowly closing its jaws around them to absorb them completely). The actual attempted transfer mirrors events in the book here, as a supposed brother challenges the transfer and violence erupts. Here, events diverge from the history, but the upset is that the transfer is much messier and more fraught than it might otherwise be, both for Yarrow and the Empire, and Pergamon and the Roman Republic.
Beyond all of this fascinating and crunchy worldbuilding, supported by the previous novel, there is of course a murder plot, and schemes and wheels within wheels. Now that we have the Ana and Din pattern established, the book can unleash us upon it. Din finds himself in some precarious positions and situations gathering data from Ana, ranging from a perilous trip up a canal in boats that reminded me personally of a visit to the Mekong Delta, to schemes and conflicts involving the Empire’s own bank, the workshop/magical foundry that Yarrow is famous for, and an opponent possessed of prescience. Said opponent has some of the classic uses of the form--false identities, faked deaths, body doubles and more. And the actual inciting incident is that classic trope--a locked room mystery.
Ana does find herself, as the jacket cover suggests, with an opponent that can predict her every move. How does one beat someone who can see so many moves ahead? Therein lies the story. It’s a fair bit of puzzling and it is our slow understanding (as it is for Ana and Din) of the culture and society of Yarrow that keeps our investigators on their toes.
The question of award eligibility comes to a head here. Should a book be award worthy if it does not stand on its own? A Drop of Corruption most definitely extends the world, builds out Ana and Din more, and provides a whole new set of secondary characters who are fascinating and interesting (and not just our antagonist, once revealed). Ana as always remains a strange and sometimes alien person, it is Din who goes out into the world and has to be, for lack of a better word, a people person. Not that, especially when it comes to sexual relations, that Din is at all a wilting flower in this regard. But for all of that, does this book stand on its own?
No. I don’t think its reasonable for a reader to pick up this book, without having picked up The Tainted Cup, and get the full experience of what Bennett is doing. If your standards for award nomination is “the book stands on its own”, then A Drop of Corruption, as strong as it is, and as vibrant the characters are, the worldbuilding and the writing, does not pass that test. There are some hints here and there of the past, but this book assumes the reader knows about Din’s secrets, his debt, and already know that Ana is more than she appears (something reinforced here, but you are clearly meant to continue in a vein already known).
As a book, however, if you do not want to follow the rule of a book standing on this own, I think myself that A Drop of Corruption is among the strongest of the finalists. It does what The Tainted Cup does, but without having to set up the story and the problem, can really focus on a problem, an area, and a situation and really go into deep depth in it. Bennett is one of the more interesting fantasy authors out there today, and A Drop of Corruption proves just why.
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Highlights:
- Second Ana and Din mystery - does not stand on its own
- Interesting puzzles and an intriguing, frustrating antagonist.
- Deep worldbuilding, including crunchy thoughts on Empire
¹ A successor to Hadrian, Antonius Pius, tried to build a wall further north, in the area that is now Glasgow and Edinburgh. There are some remnants but that project was abandoned two decades after it was finished, and Hadrian’s Wall remained the furthest permanent projection of Roman power until the 5th century. There are some artifacts from the Antonine Wall fortlets in a museum in Glasgow.
POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I'm just this guy, you know? @princejvstin.
