A popular fantasy novel. Not a literary novel but "good read". These are some of the descriptions I've heard or would make about this book. But I'd also state that The Magic of Recluce contains some very deep elements, even raises philosophical issues which leave you with the sense that this is a book, and possibly series, that offers more than just entertainment value.
The story is told mainly in the first person: the viewpoint of Lerris, a youth in the land of Recluce. The situation unfolds that Recluce is an isolated land which embodies the force of Order (as opposed to Chaos). Magic is alive and well in his world but rarely seen. Any semblance of chaos in Recluce is forced out of the land or dealt with by the mysterious Brotherhood, a collection of order-masters or magicians who have special sensitivities. High technology is generally not used widely, as apparently the more complex machinery in an object, the more easily it can be manipulated by a chaos-wizard.
Lerris has the personal fault of being easily bored, a possible threat to this orderly state of things, and is sent to live with his Uncle Sardit, a woodcrafter. This training does not straighten him out, however, and Lerris is made to go on "Dangergeld", a journey outside Recluce to discover himself and whether he can return to find a place in the unremitting order of Recluce. After this slow-moving exposition (18 chapters) which sets up the situation of the fantasy world, he leaves by ship on his journey of exile. Lerris is wary of those around him, including the Brotherhood; there is a tone established of secrets being held, truths kept hidden, the additional scruples of the Brotherhood behind the reason he is forced to go. All this ties in with several other fantasy series written in the 1990s, which warn of covert conspiracies and those in power withholding real information (for example, The Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan). This often pervading tone of pre-millenium paranoia does, however, turn out to be justified later on. The idea of hidden secrets is rather effective in making the reader want to keep reading in order to find what the secrets are, if Lerris can find them.
Lerris's adventures in Candar, a mainland in which the force of Chaos exists freely, form the basis of the novel. He arrives in Freetown, where he learns that exiles from Recluce are feared and hunted. He escapes, all the time careful of the black staff he carries, a symbol of Recluce. He is pursued through a series of small towns and narrowly escapes the diabolical chaos-wizards Antonin and Sephya, who turn out to be his nemeses later on. He meets with a grey wizard, Justen, who tutors him and gives him instruction in an important book, "The Basis of Order". Eventually Lerris arrives at the town of Fenard, where he works as a woodcrafter and begins a process of understanding this book, which usually bewilders Lerris and is only revealed to us in tantalising hints. Throughout all this, we meet a series of interesting characters and have the unusual novelty of an immature main character telling story, who peevishly describes a lot of the scenery he encounters as "boring". He also becomes closer to his small horse, Gairloch, an unusually sensitive animal who also possesses his own secret. Lerris primarily learns the art of independent survival, as he escapes possible dangers by disguise, fleeing or fighting.
The characterisation in the book is definitely a strong point. Lerris finds out a number of things about himself. Throughout the whole story, he must face the conflict between order and chaos in himself, for example witholding his desires for Deidre. He learns to resist the illusions of chaos and the conspiracy of silence of Recluce. By doing things in a way that might be bumbling and cynical, he still usually finds a successful path forward, such as when he attacks the white wizard on horseback. He becomes closer to his horse, developing a special relationship while journeying in a mode for survival. In Fenar he discovers a responsibility to Bostric, Destin, Deidre and Brettel, and at the same time a mundane talent for woodcraft (this ordinary talent also hones his special powers further). He saves his friends and the kingdom of Kyphros. Finally, he comes to the end of a dilemma of choosing between Tamra and Krystal. And perhaps most importantly, he grows in power and understanding of the philosophy behind "The Basis of Order".
The language and style of the novel is also bound up in the characterisation. Lerris (and the author behind him) uses flat descriptions: they are lucid, and certainly not difficult to read. For example:
"The hills were not wild again, nor were they tame, but somewhere inbetween. Abandoned apple trees still ran in orchard rows with gaps showing..."
However, Lerris's words are lacking the lyricism of Tolkien and a bit more of a poetical sense would've better created a "sense of wonder". That said, one could also ask whether Lerris is even intended to be a poetical man by the author. Lerris describes things quite unsentimentally, which is one of his character's positive features in the novel.
The characters of the Order masters, Sardit, Talryn, Dorthae and Isolde, all have an indirectness of speech. They are inexpressive, elusive, cryptic and formiddable, speaking in veiled allusions and the reader has to fill in the gaps. This is in contrast to the most likeable character in the whole book, Justen the grey wizard. Justen is cynical, taciturn and self-interested, but he tries to aid Lerris in his journey of self-discovery and protect him initially. He also has a wry humour, describing a place that will give visitors "a unique perspective" when later we find it was utterly obliterated by magic in a catastrophe. Justen is a healer and a teacher, and teaches Lerris by actually letting him teach himself. Then there is the false and slippery obsequiousness of Antonin and Sephya, always with a hidden objective. After a violent display of chaos-magic, Antonin demands of Justen "Tell me that it is wrong to feed the hungry", while at the same time malevolently using the demonstration to magnify Justen's opposition against him and planning to increase his own powers.
The language of the non-wizards in the book is also varied. We meet the earthy woodcrafters in a smoky tavern in Fenar, and various innkeepers in one form or another. There is the obnoxiously talkative travelling companion, Shervan. Krystal the blade-master becomes as calm in her manner as her name implies and all the more dangerous for it, e.g. "I am. I always have been". The autarch of Kyphros is similarly serene but totally in command. Tamra is stingingly mocking and provocative to the extreme, probably the most genuinely frightening character of the novel. One noticeable thing is the increase in the number of humorous interchanges between characters later on, for example Lerris's meeting with the autarch and her ministers (his behaviour is that of such a modest hero that he defeats their aristocratic expectations).
Lerris finds himself in a number of different settings in the course of his travels. Recluce begins as a home base for him, and he is left very much a fish out of water in the unruly continent of Candar. This is most noticeable in Freetown, where even city streets do not show the traceable patters of order he is used to, and order-masters are hated as "witches". In Candar, the are little pockets of Order, such as the Traveler's Rest inn or Brettel's mill. The wilderness between the towns is empty and repetitive in its sameness. Fenar is a city of intrigue, and there Lerris works to solve the mystery of the hidden source of chaos while also worrying about threats from a number of possibilities.
We see the devastating effects of unbridled chaos when Lerris visits Fairhaven, a place that also reveals a link betwen his father and his own expulsion from Recluce. There is the ancient, magical, hidden wizard-road that Antonin needs to use in order to give an impression of being present everywhere at once (something that in the book Chaos cannot actually achieve). Chaos primarily works by illusion and hiding of the truth: the fact that it causes decay, even of a wizard's body so that he/she has to possess a new "host" body. Many of the settings in the book also work to highlight the difference between order and chaos, for example the minutely orderly arrangements at the dinner table in Nylan compared with the shambolic construction of Antonin's castle. If the fountain of chaos in Fenar represents a wish to diffuse Chaos and spread its power, Lerris's black staff is a symbol of concentrated Order.
Lerris also learns the ability to create a "light shield" that renders him invisible in his environment. This could have been a plot device that was problematic (as an invisible character can almost do anything without being seen), but there are interesting limitations put on his ability. While he operates the shield, he cannot see clearly himself. He is also invisible (to non-wizards) but not undetectable, something that at times actually increases apprehension that he may be discovered.
One immediate thing one notices about the novel and its ideas are the colour associations with Order and Chaos. Black, the colour that (in Western literature) we usually associate with evil, is the colour of the staves of the Brotherhood of Recluce. We immediately might start to question the fact that Order is indeed the side of good. It emerges that Recluce is actually allowing Antonin and the chaos-wizards almost free reign in Candar, since when the power of Chaos increases, so does the power of Order to counter-balance it and so the Brotherhood's own power. Never mind the innocents, like the sheep at the inn where Antonin makes his unpleasant demonstration of the force of Chaos. Black is also a colour that may not be written on, symbolising a state of narrow-mindedness that won't accept different ideas imposed on it. And black is also the colour of night, of secrecy, of being kept literally "in the dark". White, on the other hand, which we normally associate with goodness, is associated in the novel with destruction, bones and ashes, as in the scene of the wizard path that Lerris follows in the Westhorns. White is also unique in that it holds all colours of a spectrum in itself, a chaotic blending of them in one.
Ultimately, Lerris learns that there is a need for balance in his world. There is also a need to stop a lust for all-consuming power, as the Brotherhood/Antonin and Sephya display. His finding a way to act to bring about this balance also shows us the importance of individual discovery of truth in the world about us.
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