Just Finished Reading Daniel Abraham's The Dragon's Path

Daniel Abraham is a prolific author of science fiction and fantasy stories who often collaborates with others...and likes to use pseudonyms.  Although his ongoing fantasy series The Dagger and the Coin is a solo project published under his own name, Abraham has nonetheless  been receiving much encouragement with it from his friend, George R.R. Martin, of A Song of Ice and Fire (Game of Thrones) fame.  And as I have earlier written in another article, Abraham's series bears a remarkable resemblance to Martin's.  For one, the characters all have within their personalities...even those being presented as "heroic" protagonists...a rather objectionable brutality.  Also, there is a conflict going on in the central kingdom (with a weak king and serious questions about succession) between the protagonists, who want to suppress the common people and maintain strict authoritarian rule under the nobility, and the antagonists, who have allied themselves with the farmers and other commoners to push for more reforms.  So as a reader I feel that the author is persuading me to take the "good guy" Dawson's side and oppose "bad guy" Issandrian...but I prefer the latter.  Another "hero", Geder, is also extremely brutal and selfish...but he likes to read books, so I guess I'm supposed to like him, too!

In The Dragon's Path, the character Dawson reminds me of Martin's Ned Stark, Geder reminds me a bit of his Tyrion, and there is a subplot across the continent that features the characters Cithrin and Marcus.  Cithrin is like a cross between Martin's Daenerys and Arya, and Marcus resembles Jorah Mormont in that both men are feeling a growing love toward a young woman they are protecting who has a sense of destiny (with Marcus it's Cithrin and with Lord Mormont it's Daenerys).  There is also an extensive historical past with dragons ruling in both series, as well as an aggressive, strange religion that carries sinister foreboding as it spreads.  In a departure from Martin, though, Abraham's human population is divided into several extremely distinct "races", some with scales, some with heavy fur, some with tusks, etc,. and an ongoing mystery as to why it is so divided...

The series name The Dagger and the Coin refers to the great dynamic conquering forces in this fantasy world (and our own, for that matter): war and finance...and seems to be engaged in the question of which of the two truly reigns supreme.  In spite of the relative lack of innovation in The Dragon's Path, I like Daniel Abraham's writing and appreciate how he presents his characters, who already are memorable to me.  I want to know what happens next after this book, and the author has obliged with three more installments in the series, with more to come...