Oh, hey, look at this!

The Goblin Emperor came out in, looks like 2014. I knew it was some years ago. As you all have probably noticed, I loved this book. I still love it. I’ve read it many times, and these days generally read parts of it rather than the whole thing straight through.

Way back, a year or so after The Goblin Emperor came out, I saw hints that Katherine Addison was writing a sequel. I eventually gave up on ever seeing that actually in print, though, and figured that one thing or another had derailed it. Too bad! But it happens.

Well, the sequel is now up on Amazon, available for preorder. It’s coming out pretty soon — looks like June — so that’s fantastic.

When the young half-goblin emperor Maia sought to learn who had set the bombs that killed his father and half-brothers, he turned to an obscure resident of his father’s Court, a Prelate of Ulis and a Witness for the Dead. Thara Celehar found the truth, though it did him no good to discover it. He lost his place as a retainer of his cousin the former Empress, and made far too many enemies among the many factions vying for power in the new Court. The favor of the Emperor is a dangerous coin.

Now Celehar lives in the city of Amalo, far from the Court though not exactly in exile. He has not escaped from politics, but his position gives him the ability to serve the common people of the city, which is his preference. He lives modestly, but his decency and fundamental honesty will not permit him to live quietly. As a Witness for the Dead, he can, sometimes, speak to the recently dead: see the last thing they saw, know the last thought they had, experience the last thing they felt. It is his duty use that ability to resolve disputes, to ascertain the intent of the dead, to find the killers of the murdered.

Now Celehar’s skills lead him out of the quiet and into a morass of treachery, murder, and injustice. No matter his own background with the imperial house, Celehar will stand with the commoners, and possibly find a light in the darkness.

This is not quite the sequel I most wanted — I would have liked a sequel that focused on the soon-to-be Empress — but I’ll take it. I do hope we actually get to see Maia again.