Palace of Love, The-Jack Vance novel, book review

Palace of Love, The-Jack Vance novel

AKA: The Demon Princes Book 3

The Palace of Love was first published as a series from October, 1966 through October, 1967 in five digest issues of Galaxy Magazine.  It was released as a complete novel in 1967 by Berkley-Medallion.  It is currently in print in a trade paperback and a hardcover edition by Spatterlight Press. My copy is 154 pages long, making it slightly longer than the first two novels in the series.

The Palace of Love is the third book in Jack Vance's The Demon Princes and remains in print.  The first novel of the series, The Star King, provided essential background material so should be read first.  In The Killing Machine, the second novel, there is further development of the main character, Kirth Gersen, so that ideally should also be read prior to reading The Palace of Love. 

Kirth Gersen continues his obsession with tracking down and killing the five demon princes who killed his parents and destroyed the colony where he lived when he was a child.  So far he has succeeded in doing so with two of them.  This time he is after Viole Falushe.  At one time when still a teenager Falushe kidnapped an entire choir of girls and sold them all into slavery.  Now he is very wealthy slave owner and is the absolute dictator on his own planet where all residents must give him their first born child to enslave or use as he likes.  He spends much of his time on his planet at a place called The Palace of Love where guests are sometimes invited.

Gersen visits the planet Sarkovy with a woman friend named Alusz Ilphigenia Eperje-Tokay in order to track down a lead that might help him find Falushe.  Sarkovy is a planet known for its many natural botanical poisons and its populace of highly skilled poison masters who offer their services for hire and readily sell very lethal poisons at a price set by the poisoners' guild.  One Sarkovy resident is about to be executed by the guild for having sold poison to Falushe at a discount price.  Gersen hopes to interview him for leads to track Falushe down.  Gersen's obsession with tracking down and killing Falushe and his involvement with poisons, death and shady characters creates difficulties with his new romantic relationship with Alusz.

Gersen's pursuit takes him to Old Earth where he meets the mad poet Navarth who use to be Falushe's mentor and a mysterious young woman named Drusilla Wayles or “Zan Zu from Eridu,” who was given to Navarth as a child by Falushe to be cared for.  There is a bizarre wild costume party hosted by Navarth where Gersen finds out what Falushe looks like.  Gersen then decides to purchase a reputable but failing Cosmopolis Magazine so he can hire himself as a writer and then use this as an angle to try to arrange an interview with Falushe.  He offers to write a more complementary and sympathetic article about Falushe than the article that was already submitted to Cosmopolis Magazine which they are about to publish.  Of course Gersen also wrote this initial, highly critical article that he shares with Falushe.  He does not admit to writing the article but says the magazine will refrain from publishing it if he can write a substitute article based on an interview with Falushe.  Will Falushe take the bait and agree to a person to person interview?  If he does agree, how can Gersen work around the extensive security measures that protect Falushe?

Vance's description of Sarkovy and its people is fascinating, but the far future Earth is given very little description despite the time spent there and many activities that happened there.  The most interesting portrait is of Falushes's planet and The Palace of Love which is treated with Vance's usual talent for world building as he describes the architecture, people, customs, laws, and culture.  Although the plot is rather choppy and somewhat thin, we do have some interesting characters and there is plenty of action.  For me it is still the least fascinating of the five book series, but it is still well worth reading As with all of The Demon Prince novels, I found it engaging, entertaining and easy to read even though they are not quite as detailed or thought provoking as some of Vance's other great novels. As with all of Vance's writings I find that repeated readings yield new rewards for the reader.  I've read The Palace of Love three times so far and rate it a 4 “Really liked it.”