When I became an admin on this board a few months ago, one of the things I first thought of doing was to cast some light on non-English-language fantasy and science-fiction, and promote good books written in other languages - a task that in a way I felt was appropriate for me to do, as I am the only one of the admins to not have English as native language. Those noble intentions remained just that - intentions - until last week, when I finally started reading a German fantasy novel I'd seen a few times in the library and in bookshops. I finished it yesterday, and decided to write a review. Those who don't read in German and have no interest in reading a review of a book they can't read, I can reassure: the novel in question, Die Zwerge by Markus Heitz, has been translated into English (as "The Dwarves" ) and is available on the American, British and Canadian Amazons, as is its sequel.

As one might suspect from the title, Heitz' starting concept for the series (there are four books in the series, but the first one at least has a stand-alone story and can be read independently) was to write a story focusing on Dwarves, who appear in many classic fantasy series but rarely get a very big role. Many fantasy authors these days are returning from the Tolkienian humanoid races ("races" is the common term, but I've always thought "species" made more sense, even when interbreeding is possible, as it is here), prefering to either create races of their own or to just stick with humans. Heitz unapologetically chooses to write traditional epic fantasy, not only in terms of the races, but also in terms of clearly drawn lines between good and evil with few exceptions, and oddly-composed fellowships going on world-saving quests. His Dwarves meet nearly all of the stereotypes - the stubbornness, the axes, the mutual wariness between Elves and Dwarves, even the jokes about Dwarven women, it's all there (though unlike Tolkien, Heitz does actually have female Dwarves).

The main point in which Heitz' series distinguishes itself from dozens of other epic fantasy series, then, is the focus on the Dwarves. For thousands of years, Men and Elves have lived in the Protected Land, surrounded by a ring of mountains, which the five Dwarven tribes defend from the evil outside, a religious duty which they take very seriously. But over the years, one Dwarven tribe turned hostile to the others, and one was destroyed when evil - more an entity, known as the Dead Land, than an actual person - broke through and forced the other races to take up arms as well. Things become even worse when it's discovered that those who die on the Dead Land return as zombies - be they Men, Elves or Dwarves. As the novel starts, a power-hungry sorcerer starts uniting the evil races to bring the entirety of the Protected Land under his control, while the Dwarves are distracted by the struggle for the succession of their High King. Tungdil, a young Dwarf brought up by humans, is sent on a seemingly insignificant errand, but quickly becomes a key pawn in both the Dwarven intrigues and the evil sorcerer's plans.

There were two elements in the first part of the novel that were particularly notable. The first is the blistering pace of the plot, which is largely maintained throughout the novel and, one suspects, the rest of the series (that is the impression I got from the teaser for the second novel in the back of this one, at least). Slow and dragging this is not. The chapters are short, and action is plentiful. The other element, somewhat related to the first, is the ruthlessness. Before the novel is halfway, the good guys are reeling on all fronts, several important characters have been killed and the reader has read multiple scenes of slaughter and mayhem, including one particularly memorable one that teeters on the edge between seriously horrifying and so over the top it becomes funny. Heitz' merciless and frightening Dark Elves (or "Albae", as he calls them) are without a doubt his best creation, perhaps because that race is less cliché than the others.

Unfortunately, the fast plot leaves little room for good character development - and the early deaths of various characters don't help. Only in the second half of the novel, when Tungdil embarks on the traditional quest with a number of companions, are the characters fleshed out a bit more, though they remain for the most part fairly flat. One supposes traditional Dwarves just don't have particularly subtle emotions or characters, but that can't be a sufficient excuse for the mediocre characterization of both the Dwarven and non-Dwarven main characters. Heitz does try, in some scenes with more success than in others, but on the whole his efforts to flesh out his protagonists fall short. Tungdil himself certainly evolves, and perhaps thanks to his human upbringing does have emotional depth, but his development seems too limited for the enormity of the things he goes through.

Partially due to this limited character development, the plot was rarely genuinely surprising. I'm not generally a good predictor of storylines, so when I see a number of twists coming within one single book, that is not a good sign. I never found it boring, but certainly it'd have been better if I had been shocked and surprised by twists more often.

On the thematic front, much the same story as with the characterization - there are some attempts, but too little. That hunger for knowledge and power can corrupt, that prejudices and maintaining old grudges are bad, that war is dreadful, these are not exactly deep thoughts or themes. Of course, epic fantasy is rarely very strong thematically, with some exceptions. One point seems potentially interesting in the next novels, though - the notion that perhaps the evil sorcerer's empty talk of doing what he did for the greater good wasn't as empty as it sounded. There is little in this novel that suggests Heitz will deal with that theme of the goal justifying the means in depth, though.

When it comes to elements in the book that display Heitz' cultural background, contrasting with the Anglo-Saxon take on fantasy, I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint Larry. I kept an eye out for them, but found only a few small things, such as the Albae's power of influencing dreams, inspired by the Albs of German lore who are very different from Tolkienesque Elves despite the similarity in their names (the German word for "nightmare" is "Albtraum", i.e. "Alb dream" ). Heitz completes the word game by appropriately calling the Albae's nightmarish steeds "Nachtmahre", a name more inspired by the similarity to the English word than by its actual meaning in German (I could expound on that, but I have a feeling most people wouldn't be too interested, so I guess I won't ). One could theorize on his choice of Dwarves being inspired by a few elements in the stereotypes about Germans, I suppose, but I don't think that'll lead very far. On a few occasions I found traces of what seemed like a more European worldview than one generally finds in American fantasy, but that may just be because I was searching for things of the kind. In short, I doubt whether someone reading the novel in English with no idea about the author's name or origin would be able to tell the novel was not written by an American or other Anglo-Saxon.

I will refrain from commenting on the language, because my knowledge of German is too imperfect for that. I think I understood about 95% of the text on average, sometimes less, sometimes more, but obviously when judging an author's use of language, that's not good enough. As other people who read in languages they understand imperfectly may have noticed, fantasy is actually a rather hard genre to read in foreign languages, what with the difficult war-related and medieval-technology-related vocabulary and sometimes flowery dialogue. When I read Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy in German translation, it went far faster and smoother than this book - though perhaps that's just Larsson's writing being simpler in general.

One thing about the language, though, which I've heard people gripe about when discussing other epic fantasies: Heitz is perhaps a bit too fond of diacritical signs. His names are very well-chosen in general, I thought, and I have no problem with names like Boïndil and Balendilín, on the contrary. But "Nôd'onn" is pushing it, and "Djer?n" really crosses the line. When one doesn't put as much effort into fictional languages and names as Tolkien did, the famous rule of "no more than one kind of diacritical sign (that isn't used in your own language)" is probably a good one. And I just have no idea how to even pronounce that ?.

Die Zwerge is a fast-paced and, in my opinion, entertaining read, but it lacks real depth and I cannot call it a particularly noteworthy novel, even within the epic fantasy genre. The quick pace, entertaining plot and humour were enough to keep me reading, despite the (minor) obstacle of the language, but too much of the plot was predictable, the truly original and good ideas were too few, and the characters lacked real depth. I would enjoy reading the other books in the series, I'm sure, but it'd probably be more interesting - for me and for this board - to read and review other authors. I'd recommend the novel to those looking specifically for epic fantasy and light, entertaining reads, but not to more demanding readers.