Perhaps I can give a short synopsis of TTotN, just enough to get one into LofSK. But I echo Michael--it's worth pushing through the book, for the pay-off in LofSK. WARNING SPOILERS WARNING LofSK focuses chiefly on Piper Hecht, head of the armies of the Pope (well, he's called Patriarch, situated in Brothe, Firaldia--but it means the Pope, located in Rome, Italy). Hecht is not, as nearly everyone supposes, a mercenary from a European backwater, but a spy sent from Derangea, one of the Arab states. This is possible because Derangea steals infants as slaves from all over Europe and raises them to be fanatical soldiers (the Sha-Lug), so it's plausible for Hecht to have been Eureopean in extraction. Along the way from his insertion into Europe to working his way up to his august position, Hecht was the target of several assassination attempts from sorcerors. He managed to escape, in part because of his brilliant discovery, back when he was a normal solider for Derangea: If you mix silver and iron into the charge of a cannon (newly invented by Deves), the result is fatal to magical creatures and very disabling to sorcerors. The Deves are the best cannon engineers (as well as good sources of information on the European power centers), so he's made common cause with them in spite of their pariah status. People who know Hecht's true identity (Else Tage): his mistress Anna in Brothe, his friend and chief contact among the Deves (i.e., Jews)Titus, and, possibly, the mysterious diplomat/spy Renfrow. Hecht's actual motives have undergone a shift. He started out intending to spy upon the motives and intentions of the Pope and do his best to frustate the Pope's building of a new crusade in the Holy Land, but he's found that none of his messages have got back home, and it seems he's been abandoned. Worse, he's found that the court wizard back home, er-Rashal--who fitted him with an anti-magic amulet of some potency, the better to survive his spy mission--appears to have joined the forces arrayed against him. Hecht might still be loyal to the power-holder back at home (Gordimer), but he's been operating totally on his own for some time now. He went along on a mini-crusade which didn't get a whole lot further than Sicily (at any rate, it didn't get to the Holy Land); his chief effect there was to wipe out some magical creatures. Hecht's still committed to frustrating any invasion of the Holy Land, but mostly he works just at being an honorable leader of armies (something of an anomaly). A secondary story is that of a wandering monk in the End of Connec--think Switzerland. This "Perfect" is trying to preserve Connecen independence from the Pope by organizing moral strength of character and sensible resistance. There is a host of tertiary stories, such as the Emperor Johan (think Holy Roman Emperor), vying for political influence with the Pope; Johan's daughter (one of whom has a crush on Hecht) and sickly son; innumerable swirlings of political alliances and betrayals among the European states (including a rival Pope); and double dealings, ancient feuds, and shifting alliances among the Brothen aristocratic families, who control the Collegium (combination College of Cardinals and official sorcerors). Not to mention an entirely different scale of story having to do with the Norse gods and a pair of Vikings they send out to kill Hecht, for having the temerity to have invented a god-killer. Well, it is a 400-page book... Steve/Stacey