Magician’s Gambit

Magician’s Gambit (1983) David Eddings

The third book of the Belgariad opens with one of my favorite “outside the story” bits, which is how the Ulgos came to worship UL.

The story feels as if it could have come out of the Torah.

Then Gorim brought the creatures before UL. The creatures prostrated themselves before the God and moaned to beseech his blessing. UL marveled that he had not seen the beauty of each creature before. He raised up his hands and blessed them, saying: “I am UL and I find beauty and worthiness in each of you. I will be your God, and you shall prosper, and peace shall be among you.”

It’s beautiful and moving, how the Gorim came to convince UL to become the god of the Ulgos.

There’s lots of theology throughout the story, and although some of it is horrible (see: Torak) much is beautiful.

“You see, Garion,” Wolf explained, “the ultimate purpose of the universe is to create things. It will not permit you to come along behind it uncreating all the things it went to so much trouble to create in the first place.

It’s a very elegant explanation of why magic works in certain ways, and I quite like it.

We also meet Relg, who is a very problematic character.

As Garion had feared, Relg’s favorite topic was sin. Garion was amazed at the simple things that Relg considered sinful. Forgetting to pray before a meal, for example, was a major transgression. As the fanatic’s gloomy catalogue of his faults expanded, Garion began to perceive that most of his sins were sins of thought rather than of action.

Relg is a zealot, and his obsession with religion is somewhat horrifying, but it’s also very well done. We see why Relg is the way he is, what caused him to become so, and we slowly see his transformation.

It’s quite fascinating, and also very slow: you won’t see much change in this book, which is one of the reasons I like his transformation. It’s realistic. (The same is also done with Garion’s slow acceptance of who and what Belgarath is.)

The book also has the fight between Silk and Brill, which is something that has been a long time coming. Again, the story allows ideas to be introduced and slowly build, never feeling forced.

I also found it fascinating that this huge event–one that has been coming from the first book–wasn’t the end of the series, but instead just past the halfway point.
Rating: 9/10

Published by Harper Voyager

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