Historical fiction can be so much fun because I want to know how much the author stuck to history and how much they diverted. In A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians, H.G. Parry stuck pretty close to history (at least as far as my knowledge goes) while giving everything a supernatural twist. Parry fills historical events with magic while maintaining a focus on the political machinations. A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians made me go out and seek the real life figures to learn more about them.
Disclaimer: This review is based on the published book. I purchased the trade paperback; so, this book is in my personal library. Any and all opinions that follow are mine alone.
© PrimmLife.com 2021
TL;DR
H.G. Parry created an entertaining book about the politics of abolition in England and France prior to the French Revolution. A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians was a fantastic, fun, and fast read. Highly recommended.
From the Publisher
A sweeping tale of revolution and wonder in a world not quite like our own, A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians is a genre-defying story of magic, war, and the struggle for freedom in the early modern world.
Review: A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry
From the opening chapter, Parry introduces readers to the horrors of the slave trade. A young African girl is kidnapped by slave traders and fed a magical potion that traps her mind within her own body yet unable to control it. She is branded, given a new name, and sold to work on the island of Jamaica. The next chapter jumps to a young Camille Desmoulins practicing his shadow magic despite it being illegal for commoners to practice magic in France. The bracelet around his wrist, put there to discourage magic, burns and shrieks as Camille calls forth a shadow, but Camille lets his magic flow. Once the shadow is dispatched, he’s taken to the Knights Templar to be imprisoned for illegal use of magic. Because Camille’s father is high ranking in the town, he’s freed but viewed with suspicion.
The third chapter takes the reader to England where William Pitt the Younger prepares to defend a commoner magician who illegally used magic as self-defense. His success launches his career in politics and makes him a friend of William Wilberforce. Pitt goes on to be the youngest prime minister in the history of Great Britain, and Wilberforce becomes prominent in the abolition movement. From the very beginning, A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians is concerned with the morality of government sanctioned control of humans. Whether magical or of a different race, Parry has her characters reflect on the barbarity of what can be legal and the institutional inertia holding back change.
The book soon introduces the reader to Maximilien François Marie Isidore de Robespierre, who is his sleep is given an offer to have his dormant mesmerism magic awakened. As anyone who has studied history knows, Robespierre take whatever action he deems necessary for what he believes is the good of France. Robespierre doesn’t concern himself with his benefactor or his motives. He seizes on the opportunity, and it will lead him down one of the darkest paths in French history.
A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians puts a supernatural twist on the historical events surrounding the English abolition movement and the French Revolution. Parry uses the political figures of these times to explore their personal histories and to speculate on how they sought to increase equality in their own ways. The book spends a lot of time on the politics of abolition. Here abolition seeks to end the slave trade but also to end the prohibition of commoners from using magic. It is legal for the nobility to practice magic, but commoners are prohibited even in self-defense. And the punishments for illegal magic use are horrific as well. In England, the guilty are locked in the Tower of London, which is slightly better than being locked in the Bastille in France.
The Horrors of Slavery
A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians does an amazing job at portraying the horrors of the slave trade. Parry made the slaves lack of bodily control concrete here through the use of alchemical potion. This potion makes the slaves do whatever the master says. It’s disgusting, and Parry puts the reader in the mind of a slave so that we experience her horror with her. Fina, the Jamaican slave, observes how the slaveholders treat the kidnapped Africans as commodities and not people, how families were broken up. But she also lets the Africans rebel in little ways, talking at night as the potion wears off, forming found families with those around them. Parry does an excellent job at keeping the Africans human despite the horrors of their circumstances.
A Friendship Beyond Politics
Much of the book rides on the friendship of Pitt and Wilberforce, and it succeeds. Their relationship makes their political maneuvering more interesting because Parry imbues their maneuvering with more than just politics and morality. Pitt entrusts Wilberforce with a secret that could land Pitt in prison if not find him executed outright. The reader also gets to see the duo fight shadows a few times, which I loved. But don’t be mistaken, they don’t become Slayers in this book. The two showdowns they have profoundly affect Wilberforce.
I liked these two. Pitt rises to the task of leadership, and he doesn’t forget his friends. Wilberforce becomes a man of deep faith and self-reflection over his decisions. Abolition is a moral must for Wilberforce, and he devotes much of his life’s work to achieving it. Based on quick Wikipedia perusals, Parry portrayed both of them accurately, and I enjoyed this polite, political friendship.
Robespierre
Prior to this book, I knew very little of Robespierre beyond his involvement in the Terror. I don’t know how accurate a portrayal Parry made of him, but his journey in this book was well done. Knowing where he would end up, it would have been easy to portray him as a villain, but in this book, he embodies the saying that villains are the heroes of the stories they tell themselves. It’s interesting to watch Robespierre start out with the best of intentions and then find himself crossing lines he swore never to cross. His descent from country solicitor to revolutionary to tyrant is fascinating and without self-reflection.
Robespierre will forever serve as a warning to revolutionaries because for him, even upon winning control of the nation, the revolution never stopped. He claimed to want what was best for France, but like all dictators, the best for France only meant what he thought. Parry does an excellent job inside Robespierre’s head, rationalizing his actions. It was sad, and Parry gave him so many exits from his horrific future. But he just wanted the best for France.
Saint Domingue/Haiti
Eventually the slave revolt in Saint Domingue plays into the novel. If you know history, this isn’t a spoiler. Again, Parry did an excellent job displaying the horrors of violent conflict. François-Dominique Toussaint Louverture and his fighters enact violence in a righteous cause, but violence is still awful. I would have liked more time with Louverture and the rebels. I didn’t get much of a feel for Louverture’s character; though, this might be because he’s not a point of view character.
I would have liked to see more of the freed slaves’ struggles and learn what their larger plans were. We get a bit of it, but I wanted more.
Conclusion
H.G. Parry’s A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians puts a twist on major historical events while focusing on the actors driving those events. I loved this book and the political machinations involved. Highly recommended.
A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians by H.G. Parry is available from Redhook now.
© PrimmLife.com 2021