From Kirkus Reviews
Second part of Jones's sprawling, hardworking fantasy (The Baker's Boy, 1995). Prince Kylock (nobody knows he's actually the son of chancellor Baralis, a dark sorcerer) murders his ostensible father, King Lesketh, and claims the Four Kingdoms for himself. Melliandra, daughter of the scheming Lord Maybor--she fled rather than marry the horrid Kylock--finds herself in more difficulties, while apprentice baker Jack (having, somehow, frighteningly, acquired the power to work miracles) learns swordplay and deception. Kylock's amorous intentions, meanwhile, focus on the ambitious, and supposedly chaste, sorceress Catherine of Bren. Better than volume one, with some feminist teeth showing; but what a pity that Jones didn't make the effort to render each entry independently intelligible. -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

As the demented Prince Kylock prepares to wed the beautiful, mad Catherine, a war is brewing, fueled by the ambitious prince's newly unleashed Machiavellian power--placing the empire's destiny in danger. Ads in Locus, SF Chronicle, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, and Realms of Fantasy.

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