Legends of Perilisc is a collection of short stories created by Jesse Teller.  This collection has eight different stories that all tie together along a timeline. While each story can stand alone there is a sense that it’s building up to something that we don’t get to in this book. Each title is subtitled with a phrase like “120,000 Years Before The Escape” (Teller p.7) and “Three Years Before The Escape” (Teller p. 197). While the preface lists the date as being after the Escape it offers no clue to who is escaping what. This leaves the author open to create many more books in this series. There is one character that reoccurs in most of the stories, Simon the Bard.

At first the beginning story sounds like a twist on the Greek Mythology stories from when the Gods battled for control of the world. While some of the names mentioned do link back to mythology, most of the characters are original to Jesse Teller. Their personalities and names differ from one story to the next. I think this lack of continuity is intentional and well done showing the different times and places in Perilisc. These stories are dark; they are not happy endings with moral lessons. It is a work of fantasy unlike anything I have come across. Each individual story tells of a quest, usually the quest is to find someone and kill them. Through these short stories you get so much detail though. The author does not waste words. Every line is important to character development, the action or setting.

Piecing together information from the different stories we learn more about Simon the Bard. He is the constant so far in the world created by Teller. He travels the word claiming to be a simple story teller, but is always in the right place at the right time to offer important information. He is immortal, and has magical powers but the reader does not discover just how deep those powers go.

As with any collection of short stories it can be frustrating to get small pieces of a story line and not see where they end up. Knowing that all these story lines interact building up to “the escape” is even more frustrating given the huge jumps in time. Chances are we may never know more about the characters we read about. One example is Konnon. His story is brief, we find out about his devastating childhood, his enslavement to an enchanted beast, and his revenge. His story takes place in one night, but we don’t know how this fits into the overall story line. It is just a good snap shot into the world and how it is developing through time.

Legends of Perilisc is a great collection for the reader looking for a fresh take on fantasy novels. It is not for the reader looking for a happy ending and a magical quest with elves and good wizards. This collection is dark, full of death and evil. Topics of patricide, cannibalism, adultery, rape and many more dark topics fill these stories. A good read with an open ending leaving the author free to continue this world and create many more stories to entertain and shock his readers.

Pages: 141 | ASIN: B01I7KD9O8