Spoilers!
Imagine seeing human faces around you, but not knowing who is a different kind of human. That’s what our protagonist faces in Terry Goodkind’s 2009 book, The Law of Nines. First off, heck of a last name. Secondly, this book seems to technically be part of his long-running The Sword of Truth series, referred to as 15.5 in the series (there’s 26 other books!). Fortunately for me, however, it’s treated as a standalone, but for series fans, it has enough breadcrumbs that they’ll notice. In any event, Goodkind’s book was so addictively propulsive, with hardly any downtime between breathless and bloody action, making for a rip-roaring good fantasy story.
Alex Rahl, 27, is a rather ho-hum individual living in Nebraska. He paints, although those paintings are considered lacking pizzazz by the gallery owner who features them (and correspondingly, they don’t tend to sell), and he’s not interested in the voluptuous Bethany, who is coming on strong for him. Honestly, my initial impression of Alex, especially when he was talking with his grandfather, Ben, was that he almost seemed child-like. Only later do we learn that he apparently has the skills to defend himself with his hands, including with knife-wielding and gunplay. His ho-humness is disrupted when he gallantly saves a mysterious woman’s life. Additionally, Alex learns from Ben that upon him turning 27, he now has the option of owning 65,000 acres of land in Maine, or turning it over to the Daggett Trust in exchange for fair market price. For a frame of reference, all of Manhattan is 14,600 acres! Alex isn’t sure what he will do; in fact, he mostly think it sounds lovely to go live on the land and paint.
He soon learns that the woman, Jax, is a different kind of human from a world with magic. She’s a sorceress. This world of magic was separated by Lord Rahl of the House of Rahl, who was on this world of magic. He then sent those who didn’t wish to be magical anymore to Earth. This “gateway” has been closed ever since and only someone from the House of Rahl can open it again. Even so, Jax and her people are able to use a “lifeline” to travel to our world, sans the ability to use magic. Meanwhile, back in her world, a populist demagogue, Radell Cain, has managed to gain power by convincing scores of people that their world would be better without magic. Indeed, he’s convinced the magical to give up their magic. He then wants to use the technology of our world, including guns, to control the nonmagical world he’s envisioning. While Jax, Cain, and his people can come to our world and return to theirs with the lifeline, they can’t bring anything back yet. That’s why they need the gateway, and that’s why they’re hunting down Alex. That’s also why they killed Alex’s father, likely turned his mother insane and institutionalized her, and then burned Ben alive in a housefire.
Of course, Alex doesn’t believe any of this, skeptical of every bit of it, especially the idea of magic. Funny enough, though, for Jax, our technology appears like magic to her, even down to how to use a teabag (seriously), which is one of the ways she tries to convince Alex about the veracity of her claims. I don’t understand why they don’t have teabags in this magical world of hers?! Perhaps they steep their tea with magic. Nonetheless, Jax explains the “law of nines” to Alex. Nines are triggers. Two and seven (in his age of 27) make nine, and it’s the third iteration of that being the case with his age. That’s what triggered the land trust issue in Maine, and what’s triggered Cain and his minions to make a full-throttle effort at capturing Alex to learn how to open the gateway.
After mostly dismissing Jax, if still being rather entranced by her, Alex returns home to paint. His doorbell rings, whereupon Bethany, with two henchman, uses a Taser to subdue him. Bethany is a different kind of human. Even during this melee, Alex is able to kill one of the henchman, which at this point in the story, came out of nowhere to me that he had such prowess! The other henchman is able to tie Alex to the bed; Bethany intends to make an heir of Lord Rahl. She’s operating separately from Cain, and as a Queen in the world of magic, she thinks having the son of a Rahl will make her even more important. That’s when Jax returns, with a poof into the bedroom, and brutally kills Bethany. This poofing into locations is very theatrical and would make for a heart-stopping moments in a film adaptation, like when one of the henchman does it to Alex and Jax in their vehicle. Jax is then able to use a spell, where she essentially etches symbols of some sort into the person’s forehead, to send Bethany back to their world via the lifeline. It erases all evidence of the body and the blood. That ultimately is what convinces Alex that everything is true. In her haste to rescue Alex, as Jax sees her duty, which in turn will mean saving her world since Alex is the “defender of man,” Jax didn’t have time to establish a lifeline. She’s stuck on Earth.
Since they’re a tandem now, with Alex fully buying in, Alex thinks the next stop to uncover what is going on is his mother and the mental hospital she’s housed at (appropriately on the ninth floor!), Mother of Roses. After all, his mother is one who warned Alex about mirrors: that’s how the different humans from the world of magic can track Alex or other people. However, in a shocking twist, just as Alex’s mom mentions the word gateway, triggering Jax, they are assaulted by a nurse and an orderly. They are hit with a sedative, knocking them out. That was another propulsive jaw-dropping moment! It turns out, the Mother of Roses has these different kind of humans working there, both to keep an eye on Alex’s mother, and as a trap for Alex. They’re working with an Earth doctor of the hospital to facilitate it all. With Alex and Jax drugged up, I couldn’t imagine how they were going to find their way out of this predicament, which is exactly the feeling an author wants to engender in the reader. Fortunately, through Alex’s wits and cunning, he’s able to trick Cain’s minions into giving him more time, not assaulting Jax, and he also ceases taking the drugs to ween himself off of their sedative powers. Moreover, because he’s a painter and an artist with a mind for composition, he’s brilliantly able to duplicate Jax’s symbols and send one of the bad nurses back to her world after killing her. Alex and Jax ultimately escape Mother of Roses, although not before one of the henchman kills Alex’s mother, and the Earth doctor sets the hospital on fire.
The next leg of the journey is to head to Maine to finalize putting the 65,000 acres in Alex’s name. They surmise that the land must be where the gateway is located. But in order to finalize the title, they have to meet with the Daggett Trust. That’s where Alex learns the Daggett Trust has been in operation for thousands of years for this exact eventuality. Even the Daggett Trust has been infiltrated with a different kind of human, though, who tries to kill Jax; he’s quickly killed and sent back to his world. Alex and Jax journey on to Castle Mountain, a spot on the 65,000 acres they think must be where the gateway is located. On the way, though, they learn that Cain and his people have begun a series of terrorist attacks throughout the world, including middle school stabbings and setting fires at hospitals. All of which is to force Alex’s hand.
Upon getting to the location, Jax thinks she ought to give herself up to Cain to save Alex’s world. Alex, again using his ingenuity, realizes how to open the gateway, though, and tricks Cain and his minions. Then after a knife fight and gunplay (what a word for shooting people!), Alex and Jax vanquish all the bad guys, including Cain. With the gateway operational, Jax can return to her world, and she must to ensure its survival after all that Caine had done. However, she will return to Earth to live with Alex because they are getting married. Naturally, through all this, they had fallen madly in love. Because of course.
One hanging thread that went unresolved is that Cain sent scores of individuals out in the world to do more harm; what becomes of them? How do we root out all the different kinds of humans? Also, why is it that in Jax’s world, Cain has managed to gain some modicum of populist power over the entire world? Is he analogous to a Hitler or a Stalin? Perhaps! Certainly, Goodkind seemed to insinuate as much. Jax previously explained to Alex that Cain “blamed everything on those who were still productive and prosperous, saying that they were uncaring and insensitive.” His bid to turn the magical nonmagical meant taking away their individuality, their uniqueness, their magic! “He made taking what others had worked to earn sound like justice.” It’s not difficult to see where Goodkind is coming from with this good vs. evil, world vs. world story.
Overall, I enjoyed The Law of Nines because of that propulsive factor. For 566 pages (mass market paperback), Goodkind hardly let up on the gas, so, while the Alex characterization, love story, and dialogue weren’t always the best, it was in service of keeping the story moving with intense action sequences that kept me second-guessing. I can appreciate that! The book also achieved what surely is the endeavor of any author as well: to make me curious to read more of their work, as I am now with Goodkind.
Milam's Musings 