Call of Kerberos by Jonathon Oliver

Book? of the Twilight of Kerberos Set from Abaddon

On the land, the followers of the Final Faith are bent upon dominating the known world and conquering points unknown, both on land and under the sea. Pivotal to aim this was the elf-designed Galleon Llothriall. Right up until the engineer Dunsany and the Mage Kelos decided to steal the ship and use it for pure exploration….

Under the sea, meanwhile, the crab-like Chadassa prepare for the coming of the Land-walkers and the arrival of The Great Flood, marking the beginning of their domination of the universe.
Unbeknownst to him, pivotal to both plans is the fisherman, Silus Morlader and his amazing talents to read the sea. All he wants to do is to support his wife and the child growing in his wife’s belly.

This is the setting for The Call of Kerboros, part of the Twilight of Kerberos Set. As Abaddon don’t seem to want to supply a timeline or frame of reference for the set, I’m not sure if this is the first, last or middle book of the set.* However, this is only a minor grouse and is easily forgotten in what is a very readable and remarkably creative debut book by Jonathon Oliver.
The above does, however, make the description of the world harder as I’m not entirely sure what’s his own, obviously fertile, imagination and what has it’s foundations in the rest of the series. However, what I can say is what a world! Both of the main species have well-developed back-stories and attitudes and the tale takes you through many stunning vistas, from the Chadassa’s undersea hive, to the Final Faith’s fortress to a city riding across the world on the crest of a wave, complete with a harbour accessed up and down a waterfall! The stunning setting provides a backdrop for action that leaps from a harbour raid by marauders from below the sea to a duel and boarding action between living submersibles with star-ship grade weapons. There is also a monster in the book that’s creepy-weird enough to unsettle me, and I’ve read a lot of odd stuff in my time!

The characters are well designed, their motives fitting well with their backgrounds and providing interesting players on the stage. They are also not exactly traditional heroes and certainly aren’t all powerful but in the balance they don’t take the underdog cliché to far.

The tale primarily follows the efforts of the Chadassa as they try to kidnap Sirus to mate with their queen (ICK!) and bring on the arrival of Land-Walkers and their god, the Great Ocean. The book is written from the viewpoint of all three sides and also reveals the Final Faiths endeavours to recapture the Llorathial for their own ends and rebuff the Chadassa incursions on the territory. The Lloratihel crew, meanwhile, just want to stay free!

With a thrilling mix of action and adventure against a well-developed backdrop I can recommend the Call of Kerberos to anyone to whom the above description sounds interesting!

Squidly squidly!

Regards, Kerl

*This also appears to apply to the other series, Pax Brittania and No Mans World. An honourable exception is The Afterblight Chronicles, which has a Set chronology at the back of the book explaining where the book fit’s relating to the others. The Children’s Crusade from that set will be reviewed soon on this site.