Publisher: HarperAudio (Audiobook – 3 August 2021)
Series: The Way of the Drow – Book One
Length: 14 hours and 49 minutes
My Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
The icon of the fantasy world, R. A. Salvatore, returns with a new adventure set in the world of his acclaimed Drizzt Do’Urden novels, with Starlight Enclave, the first book in The Way of the Drow trilogy.
Salvatore is an absolute legend amongst fantasy writers, having been an impressive leading figure for over 30 years with a massive catalogue of more than 60 novels. I have long been a fan of Salvatore, who has written some of my absolute favourite fantasy novels over the years. While he has written several great series, the author is still best known for his iconic, long-running Drizzt Do’Urden novels, which are set within the shared Forgotten Realms universe. Salvatore has had a particularly busy couple of years, simultaneously writing two separate series, including The Coven trilogy (Child of a Mad God, Reckoning of a Fallen God and Song of a Risen God), as well as the three books in the Drizzt focused Generations series (Timeless, Boundless and Relentless). All six of these recent novels have been pretty incredible, with Song of a Risen God and Boundless being amongst some of my favourite audiobooks of 2019 and 2020 respectfully. As a result, I was pretty excited when I saw that Salvatore had another Drizzt Do’Urden novel coming out and I made sure to grab a copy of Starlight Enclave as soon as I could.
Two years after the miraculous end to the Drow siege of Gauntlgrym, peace reigns throughout the Forgotten Realms. However, while some revel in the hard-won tranquillity, others worry about the future. Despite having cemented his rule over the pirate city of Luskan, the Drow rogue Jarlaxle is deeply troubled by the difficulties plaguing his people. Despite the apparent magical miracle that showed her as a false gold, the demonic Spider Queen Loth is still worshiped in the dark Drow city of Menzoberranzan, and civil war appears likely as the powerful Drow houses battle for the city’s soul.
Determined that Loth be thrown down once and for all, Jarlaxle looks for every advantage and weapon he can get his hands on. One of his more ambitious plans leads him to arm his closest friend, the recently resurrected Zaknafein Do’Urden, with two mighty swords of power, including the notorious blade Khazid’hea, better known as Cutter. With a sly and dark intelligence of its own, Khazid’hea has corrupted many wielders over the years, and its last master, the half-Drow Doum’wielle, may prove to be the missing piece in Jarlaxle’s latest master plan. Unfortunately, Doum’wielle was lost years before, thrown through a magical portal to the far north, and to find her Jarlaxle will need to embark on another dangerous quest.
Gathering three mighty companions in Zaknafein, the human priestess Cattie-brie and the former assassin Artemis Entreri, Jarlaxle leads them to the extreme far north, a place few have travelled. However, they are unprepared for just how dangerous this northern land can be, with new foes and mysterious phenomenon they have no idea about. But there are far great surprises waiting in store for them, ones that could change the very fabric of the world and alter the course of the upcoming Drow civil war.
Starlight Enclave is another compelling and fun fantasy novel from Salvatore who continues to expand and polish his iconic characters and settings with another great adventure narrative. This latest book contains a fantastic story that not only takes the series back to its bold adventurous roots, but which also sets up a great new trilogy that will no doubt be some of my favourite books of the next couple of years.
This new book contains a distinctive and powerful narrative that starts off a couple of years after the events of the previous novel, Relentless. The story starts off by setting the scene for a substantial amount of the plot while also recapping some key events of the previous novels in this very long-running series. It took me a little while to initially get into this book, but once the story got to a fantastic and intense sea battle around 50 pages in, I was pretty hooked. From there, the story diverts into two distinctive paths, the first following Jarlaxle and his companions as they venture out into the north, while a second following main series protagonist Drizzt Do’Urden, as he takes his daughter Brie to meet his martial arts master, Grand Master Kane. While initially pretty evenly split, the Jarlaxle adventure storyline quickly becomes the dominant narrative thread, with Drizzt’s storyline stopping about halfway through. I personally was fine with this; by this point, I was really enjoying the unique and cool tale being told around the four adventurers as they discover new lands and great dangers in the far north. This second half of the novel is very intriguing, and Salvatore ensures that there is a great blend of action, character development and world building. Just like with most of Salvatore’s novels, the fight scenes within Starlight Enclave are a thing of beauty and the author does an amazing job bringing the various fantasy battles to life, so much so the reader feels like they are in the room with them. The narrative eventually ends a bit of a cliffhanger that places most of the characters in mortal peril and which serves as a pretty cool conclusion to this great tale. I had a wonderful time getting through this story, and I am very intrigued to see how the narrative continues in the rest of the trilogy.
Due to Starlight Enclave being part of the long running Drizzt Do’Urden series, there is a bit of a question about how easy it is for new readers to enjoy this latest book. I will admit that there might be some difficulties for those unfamiliar with the series. Salvatore has built up quite a lot of background lore in the last 30+ years, and large amount of this comes into play throughout the book as there are a substantial number of references to previous adventures and characters. In addition, new readers might not be familiar with Salvatore’s writing style, which is very similar to how he wrote the original novels back in the 1980s, and as a result, they have a more classic fantasy adventure feel to them. As someone familiar with the previous adventures (although I could use a refresher) and the author’s style, I managed to get into this novel quite well, although I could potentially see new readers having a bit of a harder time breaking into them. Salvatore does take the time to explain the relevant bits of lore, and readers that pay attention should be able to follow the story without any substantial problems. I do think that, at this point, most of Salvatore’s novels are probably best read by his long-term fans, but newer readers will probably find something that they enjoy within them.
Unlike the previous trilogy of novels, which was set in more established settings, Starlight Enclave takes the reader on a big adventure into some brand-new areas of this massive fantasy world. Most of the story takes place in the far, far in the north of the planet, where very few southerners have ventured. This is a pretty unforgiving land of ice and snow, which proves a real challenge to survive in. Salvatore does a really good job bringing this snowy landscape to life, and it proves to be an excellent and treacherous setting for the story, especially as the protagonists soon discover that their magic does not work the same way as it does in the south, severely weakening them. Salvatore also does some major world-building in this book, as he introduces some big new civilisations and opponents. While I won’t go into too much detail about them here, I will say that it is a pretty major new inclusion, and it is clearly one that is going to have some significant impacts on the Drizzt Do’Urden series going forward. Some of the new major locations and races are extremely cool and Salvatore has successfully introduced some great and intriguing new entries into this wider world. I look forward to seeing how these elements are expanded in the future novels, and I have a feeling they are going to produce a few great surprises down the line.
You can’t talk about one of Salvatore’s novels without mentioning the fun and compelling characters. Starlight Enclave is a great example of this, as it includes a fantastic range of characters, with both intriguing new characters to beloved long-running figures from the overarching series. Over the last couple of Drizzt Do’Urden novels, Salvatore has noticeably moved away from some of his classic protagonists and has started to focus on the unique combination of the Drow characters of Jarlaxle and Zaknafein. I quite like these two great characters, especially the constantly manipulative and canny Jarlaxle, and together they form a fantastic pairing who play off each other’s personalities perfectly. The inclusion of other main characters, Cattie-brie and Artemis Entreri rounds out the main quartet nicely and presents a great group of veteran adventurers who are each looking for something very different, whether it be hope, redemption or the long-lost joy of adventure. Long-term fans of Salvatore’s books may be a little disappointed that some major characters, such as Regis and Wulfgar, are overlooked in this novel, but I was personally more than happy with the four main characters Starlight Enclave ended up focusing on.
The other character who got a bit of attention in Starlight Enclave is the overarching series’ main protagonist, Drizzt Do’Urden, who is the focus of the book’s secondary storyline. Like some of the other major characters, Drizzt has not been as heavily featured in the last few books as Salvatore experiments with different protagonists. This is still true in Starlight Enclave, with less than a quarter of the book given over to Drizzt’s adventure. Drizzt still shines as a character, especially as he is going through quite a lot. Drizzt is facing a bit of a crisis of faith and self-identity, brought on by his unique experiences in the previous trilogy when he ascended to a higher plain of existence to escape a deadly foe. Brought back by the love of his family, Drizzt still isn’t all there, and it is quite fascinating to see the more distracted and spiritual version of the character. Due to this development, Drizzt’s scenes tend to be quite philosophical in nature rather than action orientated, and there are several detailed discussions and debates about religion and the morality of the Drow. While not as exciting, Drizzt’s scenes are pretty interesting and form a great counterpoint to the other storyline. Salavatore is clearly building to something big here surrounding Drizzt, and I feel like there are going to be some other major changes around him in the coming novels. Still, it was nice to see a somewhat more peaceful Drizzt in this book, and after all these years, I had a smile to see him as a father rather than a warrior.
To enjoy this cool novel, I ended up grabbing the audiobook version of Starlight Enclave, which was narrated by Victor Bevine. This audiobook has a pretty decent runtime of just under 15 hours, which I was able to get through in around a week. I really enjoyed this version of the book, and I felt that it helped me get more entrenched in the landscapes and detailed fantasy world that Salvatore produced. Bevine, who has narrated a substantial number of Salvatore’s previous novels, does another great job here, and it was great to once again here his take on the various characters, especially as there is a bit of continuity from the previous audiobooks I have enjoyed. Bevine does a good job portraying each of the characters contained within Starlight Enclave, and I like the fun accents he does for the various races, especially the dwarves, who get some fun Scottish tones. Bevine ensures that this audiobook moves along at a fast and exciting pace, and I always enjoy hearing his narration of these exciting and compelling adventures.
In the amazing Starlight Enclave, the iconic R. A. Salvatore continues to expand his impressive and long-running Drizzt Do’Urden series with another bold adventure novel. This great novel does an awesome job setting up the cool new The Way of the Drow trilogy with a unique and exciting story and some compelling world-building. I had a wonderful time getting through Starlight Enclave and it is an excellent read, especially for those established fans of the author who will no doubt love to see another classic fantasy tale. An overall outstanding book, I am extremely excited to see how the rest of this new series unfolds.
The Unseen Library 