Book Review
Peridot (Episode 4: Balance of Power) by Tyree Campbell (Hiraeth Press)
This novel is the fourth installment in the “Peridot” adventure novel series authored by Tyree Campbell. The series is up to four books or “episodes” so far as published by Hiraeth Books.
The main character in the series is Patricia “Ricia” Ryder, a young American expatriate living off-the-grid in France. Ricia had previously crossed paths with the ancient Celtic Goddess Sequana, who endowed Ricia as Peridot, a superheroine with powers received in exchange for doing the Goddess’s bidding. Additional key characters introduced in the previous three novel installments include among others Ricia’s close friends the Togolese immigrant Nathalie, the journalist Stephanie, French underworld figure Mad Paul Spiridot and Sequana’s archrival the ancient Olympian God of War himself, Mars.
The previous third installment in the series advanced two new subplots. The first elevated Sequana’s role in the series, as “the three Musketeers” of Peridot, Nathalie and Stephanie interacted with a small village in restoring an ancient shrine to Sequana. Secondly, romance is introduced into the storyline, as Peridot revealed her secret identity to Georges Follette, the Mayor of Grenoble, thereby embarking upon a relationship. And of course, the adventuring and conflict continues around the various parties seeking to obtain and control The Caesar Talisman.
This fourth installment both advances the ongoing multi-novel storyline and adds an interesting new sub-plot to the unfolding adventure. Without giving away any spoiler points, the power struggle between the forces of good and evil continue, as “the usual suspects” of both superhuman and merely human players vie for power and control of events (and humankind!) by struggling for control of The Caesar Talisman, which Peridot has up until this point managed to both control and successfully hide away.
The new sub-plot adds an intriguing French urban planning element to this unfolding story universe. Peridot makes a new friend in this book in the guise of Niger immigrant Binyelum, a woman struggling to counter sexism, racism and general oppression in her newly-adopted France. Peridot and Binyelum construct a strategy of approaching Grenoble Mayor Georges Follette with a detailed and very logical proposal to implement urban revitalization in Grenoble and giving Binyelum and her fellow struggling immigrants the opportunity to drive and benefit from the economic engine of this community revitalization program. Finally, as with the previous installments in this adventure series, the book ends in an exciting cliffhanger as Peridot races to prevent all-out war between France and Italy.
Once again, I truly enjoyed the latest book in this ongoing adventure series. Author Campbell does a strong and skillful job of both advancing the long-range supernatural power struggle with The Caesar Talisman at it’s center and interweaving into the storyline the new sub-plot centering upon Binyelum and her fellow struggling immigrants. I was particularly impressed with the urban revitalization elements of the storyline. As a practicing and teaching urban planner, I found the details very real-world logical and realistic. It’s clear that Campbell did his “urban planning homework” in figuring-out a real-world urban revitalization blueprint that the city of Grenoble may wish to actually consider!
In sum, Tyree Campbell has once again crafted a winning installment in the ongoing Peridot fantasy adventure series. The fantasy elements, human nature details of the relationships between and among the main characters as well as Campbell’s mastery of French geography, culture, language and society all blend together into the perfect mix of a very highly entertaining novel. So by all means, read this novel series from the very beginning at Book One or if you’re curious, feel free to start with this current Book Four and then read the previous three books as a prequel to Peridot Episode Four: Balance of Power!
-Alan Ira Gordon