With Arm of the Sphinx, the ‘Books of Babel’ Is Quickly Becoming a New Favorite Series

I think we’re reaching Green Bone or Deavabad levels of excitement with this Books of Babel series.

Back in February, I was pretty much gushing about Bancroft’s character work in Senlin Ascends. For Arm of the Sphinx, its the twists. Of course its hard to write about this without giving the game away (which I won’t do), but let’s just say that this book is easily living up to my favorite mantra in Brandon Sanderson’s Cosmere novels:

“There’s always another secret.”

It seems like even small things are not what they seem, and Bancroft really leverages dramatic irony — when the audience knows more than the character — to great effect. I’m also quite astounded by the thought and planning it must have taken to weave these threads together. Things in Arm of the Sphinx are often unexpected, but never outright contradictory to what we know from book 1 and so it seems he must have had many of these ideas at least in mind if not fully fleshed out when writing that first book.

It has me wondering, and somewhat nervous (in a good way), what groundwork has been laid (that I missed), which will take me by surprise in book 3.

I don’t think it’s too much of a spoiler to say that we finally meet the enigmatic Sphinx in this book (they’re right there in the title lol). What a bizarre, eccentric and weirdly sinister character. Despite Senlin and friends flying around in an airship for about the first half of the story (I was actually a little worried this book would just be pirating and we wouldn’t explore any more of the tower at all), I felt that it was the time we spent with the Sphinx in which the book fully embraced its potential as a piece of Steampunk fantasy.

What strange and evocative technological marvels we get to experience, many of which should feel like old news in our modern times, but Bancroft really manages to inject a new sense of awe into them.

During the first levels of our ascent through the ringdoms of the tower (meaning while I was reading Senlin Ascends) I felt the only major weakness of the story was the book’s depiction of women. Senlin’s wife Marya is basically a MacGuffin, and Iren and Edith read a bit like male heroes in dresses (although I guess Iren doesn’t actually ever wear a dress). I finished book one hoping for a Marya POV chapter somewhere in the future, which I felt would give the story some complexity if not some much needed diversity.

In Arm of the Sphinx I’m slightly disappointed we still never got to see the tower through Marya’s eyes, but I’m happy to report that our other leading women take on more nuance and complexity through the course of this second book. In fact, Senlin isn’t even around in one chunk of the book, which just gives Edith and Iren more time to shine.

We also have Voleta taking on a more prominent roll. In my humble opinion, results here are mixed. I think she’s supposed to be around eighteen but read much younger to me. On the surface, this may not have been a problem if there was some backstory reason for her stunted maturity, which given the general anything-can-and-does-happen vibe of The Tower could have probably been pretty easy to explain away.

However, the Voleta we see in book one was essentially a prisoner in a brothel. Though her brother Adam tries to shield her as much as possible, I felt a large part of the dynamic there is that he’s mostly absent and ineffectual. As such, I would have expected Voleta to be more mature/jaded, and less childlike. Her devil-may-care disposition towards authority and personal safety (she should really be more freaked out by spiders) would still fit, but perhaps fit just a little better.

Despite the complaints above, I still managed to love and enjoy so many, many parts of this book. I’ll begin winding this love letter down with a passage which stuck out to me towards the end of the book. It reads:

“The tradition among libraries of boasting about the number of volumes in their collection is well established, but surely, it is not aggregation that makes a library; it is dissemination. Perhaps libraries should bang on about how many volumes are on loan, are presently off crowding nightstands, and circulating through piles on the mantel, and weighing down purses. Yes, it is somewhat vexing to thread through the stacks of a library, only to discover an absence rather than the sought after volume, but once the ire subsides, doesn’t one feel a sense of community? The gaps in a library are like footprints in the sand: They show where others have gone before; they assure us we are not alone.“

I think we just need to hire Bancroft for the Library’s marketing team. Which library? All of them. Just in general.

Obviously given my background, this insight was much enjoyed and highly relevant to me personally, but I bring it up in this post to do more than just prattle on and feel seen. I included it as an example of the level of quality and care that Bancroft brings to every scene within Arm of the Sphinx. I’m sure there are a hundred other pieces of wisdom hidden within its pages which I do not have time to hunt down and record, but it feels like enough to know they are there.

Give This One A Read?

Please yes. The Books of Babbel is quickly joining the ranks of stories like the Greenbone Saga, Deavabad books, and Cosmere novels as all-time favorites. And Arm of the Sphinx only strengthens that positioning. With twist after twist (on things large and small), Bancroft continues to ratchet up my excitement about these novels.

Though we still never saw a point of view from Marya, I felt like we made great strides in fixing some of my issues with Senlin Ascends in regards to “writing women”, and while Voleta’s character seemed a bit off to me, it was not enough to detract from the things I enjoyed about the story, which were its sense of awe and (particularly Steampunk) brand of wonder, as well as Bancroft’s unique insight into a plethora of topics like art and libraries.

That’s all I have for this week. Has anyone been climbing this tower along side me? What are your thoughts so far? How stoked are you for The Hod King? And what has been your favorite part of this series to date?

Leave your answers in the comments. I’m excited to talk about this one!

Senlin Ascends: A Monument to Great Character Writing

I really loved this book.

There is so much within its pages that shines so brightly that it’s actually a bit hard to know where to begin.

In most books, the intricacy of the setting is what really draws me in. I love being immersed in a new world, and appreciating the time and effort an author has taken to get every little detail just right.

Of course Josiah Bancroft has displayed a phenomenal level of skill in building his ‘Tower of Babel’ but I found that it was not really the part of the book which kept me turning the pages.

What kept me coming back night after night, and what had me checking the clock at the end of each chapter to see if I had time to squeeze in just one more before I absolutely had to go to bed — what has me refreshing my amazon tracker to see how soon the sequel will arrive — is by far Bancroft’s characters.

Everyone in The Tower has an agenda. EVERYONE. Even the most inconsequential throw-away-I-just-need-a-body-here character is up to something, even if the reader doesn’t know what it is, which just makes everything feel more alive. There is a way in which I feel like this could easily sour, with loads of exposition being dumped here an there to set up the most trivial of encounters. Somehow this book avoids that.

I’m sure it will be worth my time as a writer to go back and study this further, but as a reader — and without a quote handy — my impression is that Bancroft is just super economical with his prose, able to paint whole lives in just a sentence or maybe two.

Of course Senlin’s ascension up the ‘Ringdoms’ of The Tower is somewhat episodic, with each new setting revealing an entire new world to explore. However, there are several recurring characters which tie what could be very disparate adventures back together.

What was most impressive to me about the inclusion of these recurring characters was just how much each had changed since their last appearance and what we could learn about them — what we could glean of their essence — from the differences between then an now.

Each of them has lived multitudes since their last appearance. In one way or another, each has lost innocence in some way, and each is holding a hope and a mystery close to their heart. I just wanted to spend a little more time with all of them.

Finally there is Senlin himself. A quote on the back cover of my copy from Fantasy Faction, reads: “The most unlikely yet likeable hero since a certain hobbit rushed out of Bag End leaving his second breakfast half-finished.”

There’s really not much more to say.

Senlin is an amazing protagonist because in most ways, he’s hardly amazing at all. He has no superpower other than and unending supply of hope, determination, and forgiveness. He simply refuses to see the world in the grim light which The Tower tries to cast it, mostly to his detriment, but ultimately to his triumph.

As Bancroft states in an interview published as an extra at the end of the book:

“Senlin is not a hero. He’s a human. Which means he’s a bit of an idiot. And he doesn’t really know himself, which is the cause of so much misfortune. He is slow to let go of his illusions because they’re so essential to him. When he encounters a problem, he proudly learns a lesson, but it’s often the wrong lesson. He rushes when he should linger, and he is patient when he should insist. He does learn, but slowly; he grows, but not in a straight line. Senlin’s strength, ultimately, is his adaptability. His education and his determination make him a capable chameleon. But otherwise, he’s a small man on a big adventure, which means he makes a lot of mistakes.”

Another quote from this interview which I love:

“When I’ve experienced setbacks, I don’t rise from the ashes with all the answers. I flail about. I fall over. I take a step back and fall over again. I think that developing strength and wisdom takes time and practice.”

These could be words to live by even outside the context of this novel, but I think they also really encapsulate what makes Senlin’s character so relatable and so compelling. He’s just a dude looking for his wife . . . and the dude don’t quit.

If there is one complaint I have about the book it’s that we never get any POVs of Marya. Not only do I think a few chapters from her perspective would have added to the complexity and richness of the story, but I think it would have helped steer the book away from its biggest pitfall which is its treatment of women.

Though its presumed that Marya is still alive throughout the story, ultimately, she’s a ‘refrigerator woman’ as much as any superheroes’ girlfriend, or 007 love interest.

We are teased with her memory here and there, but unfortunately she mostly reads like an object. Something for Senlin to chase after. And as the novel progresses, an ideal. Senlin does seem to struggle with this fact at several points in the novel which makes the book somewhat self-aware, but if the book is able to acknowledge this pitfall, why continue with it?

And if you’re not Marya, and are a woman in the tower, it seems that all that is left for you is prostitution. The two main arguments against this are Edith and Iren, who are both simply amazing, but in an action hero kind of way we typically associate with male heroes.

I’m sure we’ll be seeing more of these two characters in Arm of the Sphinx (the cover of which seems particularly symbolic of Edith), so I hope we get a little more nuance in their characters, and in general some female characters who are badass for other reasons then their skill with a weapon.

Give This One A Read

Wholeheartedly yes. Even with the complaints I had above, I still feel there is a great deal here to enjoy.

That’s all I have for this week! Let me know your thoughts? Has anyone read this one yet? Which Ringdom did you enjoy the most? Would you want to visit any?

Let me know in the comments. See you next time!