Twilight Falling by Paul S. Kemp is the first book of the Erevis Cale Trilogy, named for the central character. Cale is a character I've met before in the novel Shadow's Witness which I reviewed recently. As with that book, this one is a Forgotten Realms novel and it begins several months after the events of that novel.
Erevis Cale is a tall bald man with a dark past. A former assassin, he has for the last decade or so been the loyal butler to the wealthy Uskevren family in the city of Selgaunt. During his time in their service, he had come to regard the lord of the family Thamalon Uskevren as a surrogate father. All that ended when Thamalon died a few months prior to the start of this book, which has Cale evaluating his life. The new lord of the family Tamlin has little need for Cale's service it seems, and Cale for his part has no love for the spoilt young lord. As he debates what to do now, he is surprised to realise that he has already decided to leave the familys home of Stormweather Towers.
On the day he is to leave, he receives a note from an old rival by the name of Drasek Riven. Riven is an ex-member of the Zhentarim, an organisation of ruthless wizards, priests and assassins bent on controlling the Realms through trade. He left the organisation not because he developed a conscience about killing, but because he got tired of the constant in-fighting. Riven is everything Cale used to be before he came to work for Thamalon. Not knowing why Riven wants to see him, but needing something to do once he leaves the Uskevren home behind, Cale meets him at a tavern.
And thus begins one of the best written books I've ever had the plesaure of reading. From that simple start, Cale and Riven are drawn into the start of plot by a villainous shadow wizard by the name of Vraggen, and his murderous and seemingly unkillable accomplices: Azriim (a half-drow with a penchant for high fashion), Dolgan (a big brute with an addiction to pain both caused and felt), Serrin (an oriental with a perpetual sneer and little to say) and Elura (a seductive woman who loves men to death). Vraggen is seeking the Fane of Shadows, a temple to the powers of night that travels between worlds and in which he believes he can become immortal.
To this end he needs a curious item Thamalon purchased a few years before as an art object, and thus wants Cale out of the way. As Vraggen is also a worshipper of Cyric the God of Chaos and a former member of the Zhentarim himself, he has a personal score to settle with Riven too. The last major character is Cale's longtime friend and sometime partner Jak Fleet, a halfling priest of Bandobaris the God of Trickery and an accomplished thief himself. Three against five would hardly be fair odds, but Cale and Riven are both servants of Mask the God of Shadows and he has plans for his First and Second.
This book also has one of the coolest characters I've ever read about, Sephris a Chosen of Oghma the God of Knowledge, who sees the world in terms of mathematical equations. To him everything is solvable if you know the correct maths. The trouble is that this "gift" from his God has rendered him a trifle mad, or at least that's how he appears to be to most people.
This book is a great start to a trilogy and I'm already well into book 2 of the saga and loving that just as much as I liked this one. Top marks for this book 5/5, and I am glad to know that after I've finished this trilogy, Mr. Kemp has another coming out starting later this year featuring many of the characters that I'm enjoying reading about now.
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