Sailing to Sarantium

Book One of the Sarantine Mosaic

By: Guy Gavriel Kay

Narrated by: Berny Clark

Crispin is a mosaicist, a layer of bright tiles. Still grieving for the family he lost to the plaque, he lives only for his arcane craft. But an imperial summons from Valerius the Trakesian to Sarantium, the most magnificent place in the world, is difficult to resist.

In a world half-wild and tangled with magic, a journey to Sarantium means a walk into destiny. Bearing with him a deadly secret and a Queen's seductive promise, guarded only by his own wits and a talisman from an alchemist's treasury, Crispin sets out for the fabled city. Along the way he will encounter a great beast from the mythic past, and in robbing the zubir of its prize, he wins a woman's devotion and a man's loyalty - and loses a gift he didn't know he had until it was gone.

Once in this city ruled by intrigue and violence, he must find his own source of power. Struggling to deal with the dangers and seductive lures of the men and woman around him, Crispin does discover it, in a most unusual place - high on the scaffolding of the greatest work of art ever imagined....

©1998 Guy Gavriel Kay (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

Mosaic

A mosaicist goes to the big city, the most magnificent city in the world, the capital of the neighboring country which is incidentally intent on invading his war-torn homeland. Here he discovers or should it be rediscovers life, with all its intrigues.
He says all he wants to do is practice his craft, his art, but he is pulled into so much more by the beautiful empress the former dancing girl, her sworn enemy the gorgeous noble woman and of course there is the Queen of his own about-to-be-invaded country. It is not a love triangle by any means, for these are powerful and inhumanly intelligent women, but let???s just say that Guy Gavriel Kay does not by any means shy away from describing them as lovely.
These books are more than the story of one man that goes to the city though, we are introduced and follow other people as well, and unlike many other books where the viewpoints shifts around from person to person we never really lose sight of what it is all about. For like any event in history it is all made out of different bits, many people with many different stories come together in a city in one place in time and together their stories and lives are placed next to each other like pieces of glass or stone a ceiling. It is only when we as the reader see it all from a distance that we see the mosaic it has become. Funny that.

Guy Gavriel Kay never disappoints

Although this isn't one of my favorites, it remains an outstanding work of art. This author's beautiful prose is achieved by few others.

The Kay Series I Mostly Recommend To Newbies

All Kay's works are great. I so often preach his praises to my friends, family, and colleagues, and am confronted with "what should I read first." This Series is almost always my recommendation. Kay teaches world history in fantasy in many of his works to the extent that I know of a homeschooling program where his works are part of the curriculum. The voice actor is very good, but the editing has a major flaw of jumping from one character/setting to the next with ZERO pause in-between. It's is like this in both books, and caused me to have to skip back literally hundreds of times.

Excellent Series

I held off on reviewing this until I had listened to both books in the series. With that being said, I found the series really enjoyable.

The story itself is mainly focused on Crispin, an artist trying to fufill the accomplishment of his life time, the Sarantine Mosaic. The story, much like Crispin's art, is a mosaic of many different characters. Guy will often go off on wild tangents with seemingly random characters in an effort to build the story as a whole. This effect is powerful in the hands of a great story teller, which Guy certainly is.

I've read a few reviews that claim Berny Clark was a bad narrator. I'll admit it caused me to hesitate in purchasing book one. I'm glad I still went through with the purchase because I found no real fault in Clark's performance. If you are unsure I suggest you listen to the sample provided by Audible.

I will also comment that Guy REALLY likes to put these little twists in the last few pages of his books. I take it with a grain of salt and choose to ignore the cases where he demeans the overall story, see Song for Arbonne.

Overall I highly recommend this series if your a fan of Guy Kay, and even if you haven't read any of his works before.

Great Story. Outstanding Narration.

What did you love best about Sailing to Sarantium?

The outstanding narration of a superb story.

Any additional comments?

It seems that other than the Sarantium books, Berny Clark has only narrated one othe book -a pity.

A very good start

I was not expectiong anything special from this book. Well I was wrong, this is a fast moving, well written book. I look foreword's to the rest of the series.

Amazing!

Guy Gavriel Kay does it again delivering a beautiful story filled with nuance, intellect, the historical vibe, etc. the narrator is also excellent with the array of voices and each voice fits the character. Solid 8/10.

Read the Sarantine books, don't listen.

The Sarantine Mosaic is surely worth the read. I so appreciate all of Mr. Kay's books, but this review is about the narration.

I don't read too much anymore, so I revisit books via audio. I suggest you read, rather than listen, because the narrator of these two books is beyond unfortunate. It's an essentially flat monotone, with this strange tailing away at the end of every phrase, resulting in this unending sing-song drone that leeches all color from the words. Sometimes, your heart breaks because what you are hearing doesn't bring tears. I had to shut it down and repeat the words in my head to hear Linon's voice again.

I would recommend Mr. Kay's books to anyone without reservation. So, if you want to listen to them, I suggest any of the others. It's always good, I think, to read books in the order written, certainly so here because there are echoes. Simon Vance reads Tigana, and his slightly cool but flawless narration suits the book. But oh my, Euan Morton's narration of Song for Arbonne is extraordinary, the polar opposite of Clark's, full of overtones, range, music. Mr. Morton also narrates Lions of Al-Rassan. I didn't have to repeat the words in my head to feel them. I so wish he had been the narrator for the Sarantine Mosaic.

Better than i thought it would be

What did you love best about Sailing to Sarantium?

Interesting characters. I did not always know what was going to happen.

Any additional comments?

I like low magic books with deeper plots. This book was worth the credit and I look forward to the next book.

Hard to keep track

I thought it was an interesting story, but it changes time and characters so abruptly that I was constantly having to go back and relisten to parts. Definitely a book you have to pay close attention when listening, not one you can multitask.