First Mage on the Moon

I like when a genre becomes so embedded that as a whole, we can play with it. This has happened for years in comic books, even the films are so prevalent now that you get plenty of leftfield superhero movies. One genre that has been around longer and has even deeper roots is Fantasy, but has it explored the edges that the genre can offer? Only recently have I noticed a true commitment by the collective fantasy world to play more with the genre. It does not all have to be epic journeys of self-discovery; you can have Mages making rocket ships aimed at the moon.

The Department of Research and Design is constantly on a wartime footing as the on/off war between The Unity and Ranneas Empire bubbles along. Fed up with inventing and manufacturing magic of mass destruction, a few rogue Mages are inspired when one experiment is flung so far into the air, that it almost touches the sky. Could they reach the moon with such a device and ask the Gods why the war must rage on?

First Mage on the Moon by Cameron Johnston is the type of fantasy novel that I am thirsty for, a book set in a world of magic, but not about a magic ring, or a journey from getting there and back again. This is a book about a small group of characters set on a task that is adjacent to the battles that are happening elsewhere.

This is one of the most science fiction fantasy novels I have read as the Mages are scientists and academics who apply their engineering skills through the prism of rune stones. A combination of what could happen and the magical. Substantial portions of the book are about the building and failed launches of rockets. It is a more patient read, for fans who have read plenty of normal fantasy and are ready to deep dive into a single aspect of a world and explore it deeply.

This not to say there is no world building. Like with the best genre fiction Johnston explores the world through the actions of the characters. How they would react to being caught, by the bureaucratic powers that control their budgets, by the real war that threatened their doorstep. There is a rich historic background to the story that dictates the fate of the characters.

Whilst there is plenty of Cozy Fantasy that focuses on a small group, Mage is not Cozy. This is a Low Fantasy book, which comes with public hangings, murder and messed up cat creatures being sliced to death with glass. The juxtaposition between the dark violence of Low Fantasy, and the almost naïve beliefs of the Mages is a little jarring. It takes a lot of people looking the other way and buying into the experiment to make it work. A little too much bending was required to make the story exist in this world, but I am glad it did. In reality I imagine that someone would have betrayed the crew early and it would have been hangings all round.

As a longtime fan of Fantasy it is not often that I read a book that feels different in the genre, but with Mage, Johnston achieves this. It is a focussed story, one that uses the fantasy as a background to the characters and their ambitions. It is not as epic in places as the genre can be, but as the book progresses, it gets more epic than most fantasy can even dream of. I would highly recommend this book to fans of the genre looking for those deep cuts and interesting takes on fantasy.