The Winter of Someone Else’s Discontent

John M. Ford, The Dragon Waiting

Four fugitives gather in a snowbound inn on the fringes of northern Italy. All live in constant fear of the encroaching Empire. Though they share a goal, they have their own motivations, their own closely guarded secrets and unhealed wounds. With little else in common, they agree to work toward their one ultimate desire, to stop Byzantium from gaining any more ground in Western Europe. To do that, they look to their one hope, the beleaguered English king, Richard III.

John M. Ford, “Mike” to his friends, had little patience for the commercial niceties of genre writing. His novels broke new ground in space opera, cyberpunk, and literary fantasy, and fellow authors adored him; he was a celebrity on the convention circuit. But other than two successful Star Trek tie-in novels, Ford found little recognition in his lifetime. Then he abruptly died, aged only 49, without a will. Nobody knew who owned his novels, which disappeared from print.

This 1983 fantasy, Ford’s first novel pushed back into print after his passing, bridges the gaps between Tolkein’s heroic fable-making, and George RR Martin’s cynical political chronicles. Like Tolkein, it features a fellowship of sworn brethren (though one’s a woman) seeking to restore justice to a wounded world. Like Martin, Ford’s disenchanted antiheroes prefer to work behind the scenes. The hybrid result will undoubtedly excite and confound dedicated genre fans.

Ford’s circle of bloody-minded revengers includes a Welsh wizard whose exceedingly long life has rendered him distrustful of his own power, and an Italian doctor, who counters her Welsh counterpart in youth and veracity. A Greek-speaking mercenary, a descendant of Emperors, who fled his Empire when court intrigue became more highly valued than honor. And an exiled Bavarian artillery commander who fears himself, and his unnatural thirst for human blood.

Even beyond Ford’s characters, though, his world-building will excite and challenge his readers. Ford postulates an alternate history where Emperor Julian, “the Apostate,” survived his battle at Ctesiphon and reigned long enough to prevent Christianity from becoming Rome’s state religion. This results in a world where tolerance and religious pluralism reign supreme. Equally important, the Byzantine Empire didn’t dwindle to insignificance; its intrigues continue growing as it reconquers long-lost territory.

John M. Ford

Therefore Ford’s world contains chilling contradictions. Though its civilization seems welcoming and broad-minded, it also keeps the Imperial government alive and growing. At a moment when the Italian Renaissance should begin blossoming, the greedy, undead corpse of Late Antiquity is instead spreading its intrigues throughout Europe. Julian’s rejection of parochialism, instead creates a perfect climate for ancient fears and paranoias to flourish in the shadow of modernity.

Our quartet of anti-Byzantine protagonists thus wades into a world where dynastic struggles and royal governments are merely proxies for ancient resentments and worship of the state. (Maybe not so fanciful, sometimes.) Our protagonists’ unique skills let them attempt to pull the levers of complex political machinations, though they often can’t see the outcomes of their actions. Nor do we; once laid, our protagonists’ plots may not see fruition for over 100 pages.

Ford has essentially crafted the John le Carré novel of epic fantasy. His characters maintain the public face of piety (without the bonds of shared religion), but their actions amorally aim toward desired outcomes. They consider these moral compromises acceptable, however, because the alternative is Byzantine reconquest, with its pitiless armies and its wizard enforcers. As someone, I’ve forgotten who, wrote of le Carré, this story features the pretty bad standing up against the truly awful.

And just as le Carré’s espionage classics featured generous doses of real-world politics, Ford salts his story with just enough familiarity to keep us hooked, even if we don’t always agree with his postulations. Ford presents Richard III and Lorenzo de Medici as flawed but remarkably sympathetic rulers, paternalistic despots who must govern harshly to control the wild, unlettered masses. In Ford’s world, religion is vast and all-enveloping, but somehow never controlling.

This novel was immensely popular with writers and critics upon release; it won the 1984 World Fantasy Award, and acquired the loyalty of several marquee authors, particularly Neil Gaiman. But it never found a mass-market audience, and twice fell out of print for nearly twenty years. Gaiman has suggested that it could’ve become a success if Ford had spun it into a series. But that was just one of many aspects of genre publishing that Ford regarded with distaste.

It may disappear again; don’t neglect this opportunity to grab an influential but seldom-read classic.