Harper Voyager 2009: ISBN 978 0 7322 8929 4
Two years have crawled by since fans last had the pleasure of clutching a new Glenda Larke opus to their bosoms, and the wait has been painful. In fact it was Swancon 2003 when Larke first shared her initial ideas for this series (known as the Watergivers Trilogy). Those of us who heard her read from an early draft were impressed then. We are even more impressed now.

A whole nother trilogy has interposed twixt her first, The Isles of Glory, and this one. The one in the middle was, of course, The Mirage Makers, and like the rest of this author’s oeuvre it was imaginative and highly original. The Watergivers is even more so. Larke confesses to a gift for taking a snippet or vignette from this world and combining it with two or three others to provide setting and ideas for her stories. She always comes up with something so breathtakingly different from anything we’ve seen that we can only feast our imaginations in awe and gratitude.

In The Last Stormlord, Larke has once again given us a richly imagined world, peopled with well-defined, fascinating characters. Imagine a world where rain fell on command and the waters were guided to where they were needed most. That's how it is in the world of the Watergivers, but only a hierarchy of Rainlords, Stormlords and Cloudmasters carries the talent to bring down the rains and direct the waters to the right place at the right time. If this kind of magical talent did not exist, there would be no precipitation at all.

And the last Cloudmaster is dying.

The two principals, Terelle and Shale, both discover hidden, but very different, abilities in regard to water. Terelle learns how to manipulate the future by painting on water, while Shale struggles to bring his erratic Stormlord gifts under control. Meantime, the charismatic but evil Taquar is marshalling the desert tribes to destroy the Stormlords and bring back the Time of Random Rain.

This is, I think, the best work Larke has essayed to date. It is cleverer and more subtle than her first seven books, several of which were a little inclined to bash the reader over the head with ideas to do with Good Causes such as environmental protection and racial or gender equality. Larke, a conservationist (and one suspects, an idealist) has learnt, after much practice, how to channel her ideas into more understated forms of allegory. The result is the start of a trilogy that looks set to drive its lessons home without alienating, embarrassing or boring the reader who is just looking for a good yarn. There is something here for everyone who loves a good story and is interested in human nature with all its contradictions and ambitions, both admirable and misplaced.

The Last Stormlord is definitely Aurealis material, but whether or not it tops the prize list it will be a winner in the hearts and minds of readers. It is sure to add to Glenda Larke’s already large body of fans.

You can read Glenda Larke’s blog at http://glendalarke.blogspot.com/