Warlock by Wilbur Smith

Background

Warlock is one of the books from Wilbur Smith’s ‘Egyptian Series, historical fiction series based in the land of the ancient Pharaohs

Synopsis

After the death of his beloved Queen, Taita performs the rites of burial for her. Then, stricken with grief, he retreats into the desert and becomes a hermit. Over the years he devotes himself to the study of the mysteries of the occult until, armed with these extraordinary powers, he gradually transforms himself into the Warlock.

Now Taita answers the calling from beyond and leaves the desert vastness to returns to the world of men, finding himself plunged into a terrible conflict against the forces of evil which threaten to overwhelm the throne and the realm of Egypt, and to destroy the young prince Nefer, who is the grandson of Queen Lostris.

Review

There is no getting away with the fact that Wilbur Smith is a great wordsmith and story teller, but this book fell short of the mark for me.

The characters are all well formed to a point where you cheer the heroes on and the plot is woven well to maintain pace, in what is a lengthy novel (over 500 pages) and at times the imagery conjured up by smith is second to none, but it still left me feeling underwhelmed. 

For me smith at times seemed to go too far with areas of gratuitous and sexual violence, seaming to dwell too long over the detail of the event and thus distracting from the impact that the event would have had otherwise. Yes there are times when something needs to have more time spent over its telling and there are times when enough is enough and, in my opinion, Smith crossed that line to many times in Warlock

I can see why this book has, generally, such a high rating, but for me – it misses the mark.

Rating

I give this book 5.5 out of 10, a bit over the top at times