Everyone step out of the Twilight…

This text is acceptable to the forces of Light.
                                        The Night Watch

This text is acceptable to the forces of Darkness.
                                        The Day Watch

I think I am a Procrastinator Beyond Classification. “Zach Wolfe, Procrastinator, Higher”. I may even be a zero-point procrastinator. That may be a little presumptuous, since I can’t see my own aura, but I’m willing to assume that it’s true. And why would I assume something like this? Why, because just little over twenty-four hours ago, I was giving you the rundown on the latest book I had read and here I am again, wishing to do the same once more. That’s right, folks, I’ve already polished off another one. This time, if you haven’t guessed, the book was Last Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko.

The Night Watch series has held a special place in my heart since I first learned of its existence a few years ago. For one, it’s on a very short list of books that I’ve read that weren’t originally written in this country. For another – or perhaps directly linked to the first – the story is highly unique. I mean, sure, there’s magic and whatnot but it just doesn’t have the same feel as it does in other fantasy novels. It’s also urban fantasy, which is a genre that I don’t have a lot of experience in (baring The Dresden Files, anyway). One way or another, I have greatly enjoyed this series and am sad to see it conclude with this novel.

As this is, indeed, the last book in the series, I don’t really feel like I should go into details about the plot and whatnot. If you haven’t read it, my words won’t make a lick of sense. And for those of you that have read up to this point… well, you’re aware of the writing style; it probably still wouldn’t make any sense. That’s something I do want to comment on, however briefly, if you’ll humor me. The style of these books is noticeably different from that of Western novels, and fantasy in particular. Now this shouldn’t be such a great shock, as the book was written in Russia. I’ve only recently read one other contemporary fantasy book written across the pond – that being The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski from Poland – and I noticed a similar sort of what that stories are framed. It’s a more… direct, abrupt way of going about things. It’s rather hard to describe, though I’m sure there are those who have tried. But simply, even basic sentences aren’t structured in the same way and it makes the reading experience completely different from that of your typical Western novel.

Neglecting sentence structure and the like, though, the simple presentation of events is handled in a different fashion. Often, characters have revelations that aren’t revealed to the reader for possibly hundreds of pages (those familiar with the books will recall that Anton does this near the end in every book). Secondly, though the books play out as a sort of horror mystery with a fantasy element, the reader is never really permitted to guess at things; Lukyanenko typically just slaps you in the face with a plot twist in the last couple of pages that came from the bleachers somewhere off behind left field and expects that to be a logical solution. Often, however, these left me perplexed as to what was even going on. The first book was the worst, if I recall, though it progressively got better in this regard as the series progressed. Sure, Anton has a habit of wasting obscene amounts of power. At least the explanations for why he did it got better as they went along.

In this sense, I was rather pleased with the ending. For one, this story follows the “mystery procedural” a little closer than others, with a few clues here and there. Now, maybe reading the thing in one sitting allowed to me pick up on foreshadowing that you wouldn’t immediately recall when reading the book over a period of a week – much like when you watch an entire television show’s season in one sitting; the foreshadowing has to be heavy-handed for you to remember it ‘til next week – but I was actually able to figure things out long before Anton did. I’m not trying to prop myself up as some mystery-solving expert, though. What I’m getting at is that the machinations in the book simply aren’t overwhelmingly ludicrous like they were in the other books. For instance, the true nature of the Twilight it pretty easy to figure out once they find Merlin’s little poem near the end of Story One (This isn’t a spoiler, even if it may seem like one; they just sort of… find it all of a sudden. “Hey, look down here.” Not kidding.). Though I will give myself a little bit of credit here; after three of his books, I’ve started to see how Lukyanenko thinks. It’s the same trick every time, just used in different ways, so it was a little easier to figure stuff out this time around. I want to go into more detail, but I know some of you haven’t read this book yet so I won’t spoil it for you. But let me just say that the end of the book doesn’t read like this: “Suddenly, a character that you’ve never heard of before this moment appeared and took the Crown, a smile upon her face, before disappearing once more. With a knowing grin, [Gesar/Zabulon] patted Anton on the shoulder. ‘It had been his plan all along,’ Anton thought, looking at the leader of the [Night Watch/Day Watch]. ‘I understand what I have to do now…’ [Obscene misuse of power here].” In all fairness, it’s actually a decent ending.

[Spoiler Alert! If you haven’t read up through Twilight Watch, the following is going to be a mild surprise.]

One bone to pick, however, is the fact that, even though Anton is now a Grand Light Magician, he hardly does anything more powerful than you’ve seen him do a hundred times before. The only real difference is his ability to go deeper into the Twilight. Now, of course, his enemies have basically scaled in power as well, but it’s still not a proper excuse. “Beyond Classification” means – and this is stated in the first couple pages of the book by Anton – that all Higher Magicians are so close in power, it’s hard to tell which one is more powerful at any given time. Otherwise, the numbering system would go higher and they’d get themselves some numbers, too. However, there isn’t even the slightest hint that Anton could stand for more than a second against an attack from Gesar, Zabulon, his wife Svetlana, Thomas (he’s new), Olga, etc. Sure, most of this could be attributed to inexperience (though Svetlana is an outlier) and you do see him go toe-to-toe with another Higher Magician… but even in that fight, he was aided by another Magician with some fancy toys and he was still worried that he would lose – and probably would’ve had the bad guy not fled the scene. Maybe I just want to see Anton finally flex his muscles a bit and actually have the upper hand on occasion, but it just seems like Lukyanenko missed an opportunity here for some really nifty storytelling. A person that magically (heh, get it?) comes into a large amount of power, struggling with learning how to control it and use it for the Light, etc. Oh well, I guess.

I would recommend these books simply because they’re from Russia, have a style unlike our own, and I feel that anyone who enjoys reading should expose themselves to different techniques. The fact that they have a really interesting story and world is a definite bonus. Lukyanenko is one of Russia’s most popular authors and it’s easy to see why. So by the Light and by the Darkness – whichever tickles your fancy – read these books. You won’t regret it.