Banewreaker

Banewreaker

Banewreaker is a fantasy novel by Jacqueline Carey. It is Carey's fourth novel and the first in The Sundering duology. Banewreaker is set in Urulat, a world based on J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, and many of the plot points mirror The Lord of the Rings...

is a fantasy

Fantasy

Fantasy is a genre of fiction that commonly uses magic and other supernatural phenomena as a primary element of plot, theme, or setting. Many works within the genre take place in imaginary worlds where magic is common...

 novel by Jacqueline Carey

Jacqueline Carey

Jacqueline Carey is an author and novelist, primarily of fantasy fiction.-Life:She attended Lake Forest College, receiving B.A.'s in psychology and English literature. During college, she spent 6 months working in a bookstore in London as part of a work exchange program. While there, she decided...

. It is Carey's fourth novel and the first in The Sundering

The Sundering (series)

-The Shapers:Haomane First-Born:The first of the Shapers and has become the leader of the Six in facing the Sunderer. He created the Ellylon, who are immortal except if killed by steel. His Gift is thought, for which he is named Lord-of-Thought. He gave this Gift only to Elyll and Man, making them...

 duology. Banewreaker is set in Urulat, a world based on J. R. R. Tolkien

J. R. R. Tolkien

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, CBE was an English writer, poet, philologist, and university professor, best known as the author of the classic high fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion.Tolkien was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College,...

's Middle-earth

Middle-earth

Middle-earth is the fictional setting of the majority of author J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy writings. The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings take place entirely in Middle-earth, as does much of The Silmarillion and Unfinished Tales....

, and many of the plot points mirror The Lord of the Rings

The Lord of the Rings

The Lord of the Rings is a high fantasy epic written by English philologist and University of Oxford professor J. R. R. Tolkien. The story began as a sequel to Tolkien's earlier, less complex children's fantasy novel The Hobbit , but eventually developed into a much larger work. It was written in...

. The novel received mixed reaction, and has not achieved the popularity of the Kushiel's Legacy

Kushiel's Legacy

Kushiel's Legacy is a series of fantasy novels by Jacqueline Carey, comprising the Phèdre Trilogy and the Imriel Trilogy...

books.

Influences

Carey has acknowledged that the book is based around Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, as well as the classical tragedy

Tragedy

Tragedy is a form of art based on human suffering that offers its audience pleasure. While most cultures have developed forms that provoke this paradoxical response, tragedy refers to a specific tradition of drama that has played a unique and important role historically in the self-definition of...

 form, reversing the good versus evil scheme of Tolkien by telling the story as an "epic tragedy" from the perspective of the characters who are perceived by most of Urulat as "evil". Carey stated that "it departs from convention in one significant way, which is that it's sympathetic to the losing side, and over the course of the two volumes, the story emerges as one long, colossal tragedy." The novel begins with a quote from John Milton

John Milton

John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...

's "Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse...

".