Great start for the Spellsong Cycle

L.E. Modesitt Jr. is mostly known by his renowned Recluce-series which is still ongoing., Somehow I only read the first book of that series. However Modesitt wrote a lot of other series. 'The Spellsong Cycle' from which 'The Soprano Sorceress' is the first installment, is one of those other series. In this series we follow Anna Marshall. Anna recently lost a daughter. She is a singer and music teacher on a university. She is trying to get by after the divorce she just went through and picked up a side job to sing in the opera house. She wants to be somewhere else, but accepts what needs to be done at the moment.

The story line deducted from the first few chapters:
With the help of some musicians, Lord Brill raises a new fort on Erde. Because one of the violinists is humming along the port is partly askew and a repair song needs to be sung. The violinist pays the ultimate price: Lord Brill turns him to red ash, which is scattered by the wind.

Anna Marshal - as singer and music teacher - is trying to get by after her divorce. She is worried about her children, because her husband only seems to care about her daughter. She wants to be somewhere else than where she is, but accepts this situation she is in.

Daffyd, the son of the murdered violinist, asks for help from Jenny, a traveler-singer. He persuades her to summon a mighty sorceress from the mist worlds, strong enough to murder Lord Brill for him.

Lord Brill, and the Dark Monks, have noticed that a port to the mist worlds was opened an are trying to locate the port. They want to know what happened. Lord Brill is the first to arrive. Anna, being summoned by Jenny, doesn't know what to do or where she is, but is not of a mind to kill Lord Brill, as Daffyd wants. She is invited by Lord Brill to stay at his fort, so he can explain things to her ...

The Magic System:
The magic system employed on Erde is songmagic. There are two kinds of songmagic: Clearsong en Darksong. Darksong binds the living or once-living. Darksong is dangerous to use, but the why/how is not further explained. Clearsong binds the nonliving.
People can use magic by singing, but it has to be clear singing, which means without dissonance. The song can be enhanced by using musical instruments, but these then needs to be in harmony with the singing, which is somehow a bit lacking on Erde. Next to that the singer/sorcerer needs to visualize in his mind what is to happen. So any distraction might be hazardous. There do not seem to be a lot of sorceresses, and the reason for that might be that females become infertile when they use songmagic. Using songmagic also takes something from the one employing it. All sorcerers seem to have an insatiable hunger and need to eat almost continuously. On top of that Anna has an incredible thirst.

As soon as Anna arrives on Erde, she becomes a target from the powers that live on Erde. Because of her background in music, she is a very strong magic user, although in the beginning she doesn't really know how to use her magic. She becomes a target from almost every ruler on Erde, because they don't know where Anna's loyalties lie and that makes her dangerous to their power.
They start scheming to either control or kill her. In the beginning Anna has only one clear enemy: the Dark Monks. They want to conquer Erde and enforce their rule on anybody. They start on the country called Defalk, which is exactly the place Anna was summoned to. The Dark Monks use Darksong to fight, and also control the weather. For them Anna is too powerful to leave alive anyway, so she becomes a target as soon as she arrives on Erde.

Although there are some fights in this book, the emphasis lies at the political intrigue going on in Erde. The scheming and plotting against Anna and how she reacts to that is the main story line of the book. This makes for gripping story telling, because this means character development is key to this series.

The average chapter length is about five pages (A5), but some are as short as one page. This might make it difficult to decide wether you want to read another chapter or do something else (like sleeping), as it is unknown what the length of the next chapter will be. In the later part of the book the chapter length seems to be mostly short. All in all, this might be a turn off for some people.

Modesitt built a believable world with Erde. And you are spoon-fed the things you need to know about it. This pace is just a bit more than Anna needs to learn how this world works, because we also visit the other parties present on Erde, from which we can deduce more about how the magic works for instance. But even then it is apparent that there is more to learn Modesitt doesn't show you.

Modesitt portrays a strong character with Anna Marshall. But Anna is not without flaws. She starts not knowing how to use her magic and at some points in the story she does things with magic she doesn't like doing. But above all she misses her children, who have to cope with the loss of their sister without her being there. Through the writing of Modesitt scenes and characters come to life. That makes it easy to feel for Anna, as she struggles in a world not her own, where sometimes everyone seems to either want to kill or control her.