A Year of Horse Books: The Four Horsemen series by Laura Thalassa - reviewed by Katherine Roberts
This year, I visited Hay-on-Wye for the festival's Romantasy day. Time I found out what this genre is all about, I decided, since I'm a lifelong fantasy fan yet somehow (probably since I got published as a children's author and write mainly for the 9-11 age group) missed out on the Romantasy side of things! The two lovely authors on the panel, Hazel McBride and Imani Erriu, soon filled me in on the secret of its appeal. It turns out that this hot new genre, being basically fantasy written by women with a romantic twist, is essentially what I was writing back in the pre-internet days of small indie zines produced in people's garages with their equally small but faithful readership of genre fans/authors. In those days, most of these little zines were edited by men, and their content reflected this. But there was one called Visionary Tongue, which included female fantasy authors Storm Constantine and Freda Warrington as editorial consultants, that published a couple of short stories of mine that might today fit under the Romantasy banner. I can certainly remember the two ladies in gorgeous gothic velvet gowns at British Fantasy Society conventions.
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| Visionary Tongue (issue 3) |
So on to my book pick for some sexy midsummer reading.. and what, may you ask, has ROMANTASY to do with HORSES??? To be fair, the panel I attended at Hay this year didn't actually mention them. However, personally I find riding a powerful white steed quite romantic, and a popular Romantasy trope is apparently "one horse" (or "one dragon" as mentioned by the panel), this being the moment when the hero and heroine have to share a mount and get up close. So that's my excuse. The books I came back with from Hay prompted me to seek out some suitably horse-themed Romantasy for this month's review, and The Four Horsemen series by Laura Thalassa seemed perfect.
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| The Four Horsemen series by Laura Thalassa |
As you've probably guessed, these are the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse mentioned in the Bible so they make a challenging and interesting subject in themselves, even without the addition of romance. Laura Thalassa chose to write four separate stories in different parts of the world with a different heroine (as well as a different Horseman of the Apocalypse) in each book, so if you're the sort of reader who enjoys long fantasy series following the same characters through a detailed fantasy world, I suppose this might put you off. But these books do link up loosely with the horsemen following their preordained order of appearance, and keeping the four stories independent means more variety in both the setting and the romance elements, with the advantage of being able to read them in any order that takes your fancy.
In Book 1, 'Pestilence' rides the White Horse, bringing plague. Yes, it's a pandemic... but no, it was not published during our recent covid pandemic! In fact, Laura must have been writing this book a couple of years before covid hit, since it was first published by the author in 2018 and only later released by Bloom Books in the covers illustrated. The Apocalypse in the first chapter is brief with very little detail other than the fact the internet has disappeared, electronics don't work any more, and there is a distinct lack of masks and jabs. People are simply getting sick and dying wherever the first horseman rides, which initially is up the East Coast of America, then across Canada, and back down the West Coast, wiping out small towns and large cities alike. Our heroine Sara is a firefighter, who volunteers to stay behind and kill Pestilence, only she's far from the first human to try, and unknown to her (internet down, remember?) Pestilence cannot be killed despite a fairly horrific opening scene where she does her very best to end him. Instead, he heals himself and takes Sara prisoner... so begins a first girl account of what it's like to fall head-over-heels for a horseman of the Apocalypse.
One thing I will say about this series is that the writing is highly addictive and fairly easy to read, if you don't mind young-adult style first person prose with a liberal sprinkling of f-words. To begin with, I felt that Sara sounded more like a college student than an experienced firefighter, however in her defence she's just given up her English course at uni for the greater cause of saving mankind. The horse (not a normal horse, clearly, as it can't be killed either and never seems to sleep or eat) is rather a cardboard character, so I suspect the author wasn't exactly thinking 'horse book' when she wrote this. There are a couple of unbelievable scenes if you're an equestrian, such as where Sara - leashed to Pestilence's saddle - runs as fast as the galloping horse (racehorses can gallop at 30mph+, and this is a horse of the Apocalypse that carries its master around the entire world's human settlements in the space of a few years so presumably not exactly slow?) Also, if I were Sara, I'd probably try stealing the immortal horse, rather than running away on foot to escape her captor and leaving the horse for him to ride in pursuit. But about halfway through the book the horse acquires a name courtesy of Sara (Trixie Skillz, which I suspect has some cultural reference I'm not aware of), and Pestilence begins to feel human emotion, also courtesy of Sara, which provides more opportunity for interaction with the human victims he infects as they ride. As you might expect, the plot follows the two main characters from Sara's first person viewpoint, concentrating on the developing romance between them. However, the apocalypse part of the story picks up as the book progresses, making me wonder how this scenario could possibly end well for either of them. This series is on the darker side of fantasy, so if you're after an enemies-to-lovers romantasy set in a post-apocalyptic world with an immortal hero and a mortal heroine, you'll not be disappointed.
In Book 2, War rides the Red Horse, bringing - you've guessed it! - war to post-apocalyptic Jerusalem and the Middle East a few years after Book 1 ends.
In Book 3, a few more years have passed and Famine rides the Black Horse to South America, bringing starvation.
Finally, in Book 4, Death rides the Pale Horse back through the US, bringing the kiss of death... or does he? Is there yet hope for the human race?
I'd like to say I devoured all four of Laura Thalassa's Horsemen books to review the whole series for this post. However, they didn't arrive until mid-June and I hate rushing books, so you'll have to make do with my review of the first one... nobody ever reads to the end of a long blog post, anyway, do they? So I'm off now to read the other three. :-)
PS> Reading faster than I thought! I'm currently halfway through the longest book, War, and am enjoying the brief references to the first horseman, Pestilence. Equestrians will be pleased to hear that there is a little more horse interest in this one, and War's horse has a name from the start (Deimos). I suspect the four stories will eventually combine to deliver some kind of apocalyptic conclusion, so it's probably best to stick with the order of publication if you want to experience the full series arc.
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Katherine Roberts writes fantasy and historical fiction for young readers, sometimes with a touch of romance too.
Her short tale "Rubies", about a young vampire growing up to have her first taste of man, was one of her fantasy stories for older readers published in Visionary Tongue. The story is available here as a free ebook for the first time.
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| Rubies free ebook (age 13+) |
If you enjoy short fiction by different authors, "Rubies" appeared in this Visionary Tongue anthology, along with another of Katherine's stories published by the magazine: "The Sin Taker". Please note this anthology was originally published for adults and may contain material unsuitable for under 18s.
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| Visionary Tongue |
"Rubies" is also included in Katherine's own fantasy collection Mythic and Magical.
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| Mythic & Magical |
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