The Iron Grail (Book 2 of The Merlin Codex) by Robert Holdstock
01/10/2002 . Source: Joules Taylor 

Pub: Earthlight. 299 page hardback. Price: £17.99 (UK). ISBN: 0-7432-2077-3.

Check out website: www.earthlight.co.uk

The legacy of Medea's hatred of Jason's betrayal lives on, seven hundred years after she pulled her sons through time with her.

In Greece, Jason's elder son (now calling himself Orgetorix, 'King of killers') tried to kill his father. He failed, though Jason was badly injured.

Now, in the second book, Jason and his companions return to Albion to seek his younger son...

Slower paced than the first book in the series, 'The Iron Grail' explores more deeply into a mythic world where the barriers between the worlds of the living and the dead - and the yet Unborn - are tenuous, the worlds themselves interlinked and accessible, if you know the entrances and paths.

There are two intermeshed quests running through this series: Jason's search for his sons and Merlin's quest for himself. Both of them helped (and hindered) along the way by a variety of memorable characters: Niiv, the northern sorceress, Urtha the chief, massive Rubobostes and his wondrous horse...

There's something extremely appealing about a story in which a god's sons can lend their help to mortals just for the fun of it. The living can offer their lives to help a colleague in the far future. The living ship Argo can carry her crew from the human world to Ghostland and an ocean which 'is a true part of the world within the world' (p 238).

It's on several of the islands dotting this 'inner ocean' that Jason will find his younger son.

'The Merlin Codex' is a fascinating mix of European myth, history and ancient magic. This second book is less relentless than the first but no less gripping.

A fine read. When's book three out?

Joules Taylor