Crescent Sea Publishing, $1.99, ISBN 978-1393962083
Fantasy, 2019
Oh, so bezique is actually a real card game! I won’t attempt to even explain how it is played, as I can’t fully grasp the intricacies of poker even at this day and age. I know, I’m terrible at card games that aren’t UNO, Happy Family, Snap, or Old Maid but maybe that’s why I’m not loaded.
Anyway, Elle Beaumont’s Baron Weaver’s Game of Bezique is set in an alternate Paris set some time in the past. Our hero, Etienne Jaritae Mercier, makes his living by attracting people to play bezique with him at the market and divesting them of their money.
The “alternate Paris” part stems from the fact that he is fae.
It wasn’t his fault that he couldn’t maintain a job. As soon as an employer discovered that he was fae, they banished him from their establishment. Fae were seen as a blight on the world thanks to the wicked council that ruined everything. It was all fun and games until one diabolical plan hatched, and evil rained down on innocents. Count de Clavière ruined the future for fae-kind, and painted them to be all the same: bloodthirsty, greedy, and willing to enslave humans.
Of course, he soon crosses path with someone that is on to him. Baron Weaver presses him to work in a circus in exchange for not calling the law on him, and no, that is not an euphemism for sweaty fun buggery. Our hero does find romance, but it’s with a female member of the circus, so adjust your expectations, people.
Indeed, the official synopsis of the story can be tad misleading, as it features Baron Weaver quite prominently, but that fellow turns out to be more of a plot device that exists to get Etienne into the Cirque de la Tempete. It also mentions Lili as Etienne’s love interest, but she too plays only a small role in the story. The synopsis also mentions that the two of them taking some kind of grand risk for their future, but again, I hope no one is expecting something like a daring theft or a brave escapade.
What this one focuses on is Etienne’s adjustment to life in the circus, his responsibilities and antics, and late in the story, a romance to round off his story arc.
It’s an alright read, this one—alright in every good and bad sense of that word. It’s a good kind of alright in that there’s nothing off-putting or awful about the story itself; everything is readable and easily digested.
However, it’s a bad kind of alright in that the length of the story prevents it from becoming something more epic, more memorable. The story seems to be building up to something grand, by suggesting that Etienne’s going to be someone or go somewhere in his new role in the circus… and then the story ends before anything of impact gets to take place!
In other words, this is something resembling more of an excerpt from a far longer, grander story than a complete story in itself.
However, I am intrigued by the overall premise of this story—and I hate how A Million Dreams keeps playing in my head as I read this thing—so I’m definitely interested should the author choose to revisit and expand this thing one of these days.
