Book Review: To Kill a Unicorn
When I first saw the title, To Kill a Unicorn: Lovecraftian Mythical Urban Fantasy Thriller, I must confess that I went through an internal tug-of-war between two different reactions. Should I dive right in or run away screaming? The title hinted at sprawling, wild imagination, but it also seemed a little…overstuffed. I enjoy novels that touch a lot of different bases—but I don’t necessarily want all of them to be including in the title.
Being the adventurous type, I dived in—and I’m glad I did.
Even the name of the main character, Cain Sthyldor, is interesting. Some of you may remember Cain, the first murderer from the Book of Genesis. I don’t know if the first syllable of Sthyldor is supposed to be vaguely reminiscent of the Sith from Star Wars—as you’ll see, Cain is both an assassin and, from the point of view of other humans, a traitor. Or perhaps the last syllable is intended to echo LOTR placenames like Gondor or even remind us of Dumbledore. With regard to the latter, Cain does train someone to use magic. I wouldn’t completely rule anything out.
Cain is a human—or so we think, anyway—who enraged his fellow humans by siding with the fae in an earlier war. But he split with the fae also, returned to the human world, and semi-retired as an assassin, though he does do tracking for other assassins.
That’s where the book starts, but it doesn’t take long for things to get messy. Cain discovers one of his marks is a high school girl and tries to save her instead of letting an assassin end her life.
The thing about this book is that nothing is ever as simple as it seems. The girl, Hannah, is no ordinary girl. The assassin is no ordinary assassin, and this pattern continues throughout the book. Cain’s handler turns out to be someone else he knows. The old gods are supposed to be dead—killed by the fae—but they may not be dead at all. An assassin with a ten million dollar contract on Cain might just be his best ally. His trusty octopus, Fred (yes, you’re reading that right) may be a spy for an ancient power.
As if navigating all these complications is not enough, Cain is dying from “magic cancer” as a result of using an ancient artifact without realizing what it was. The only cure is to eat the still-beating heart of a unicorn. Aside from the ethical implications, the only problem with that remedy is that unicorns are extinct. Except that maybe they aren’t—if Cain is willing to return to his role as an assassin and kill one of the best protected people on the planet.
It takes a lot of effort to work all of these elements—and many others—into the story, but the author manages this juggling act and makes it look easy. He also has no trouble making a retired assassin a sympathetic figure. True, that’s been done before, but it isn’t easy to make it seem as plausible as it is here.
Needless to say, putting this book down is not an option, except maybe in case of medical emergency or the house catching fire. I first discovered John Corwin through this book. It turns out he’s written many books. Something tells me that I will read them all.