Priestess of the White by Trudi Canavan

The Gods are fairly silent in the reality to most of us but in this book, the religious representatives of the people, The White, see their five Gods on a periodic basis. This is a world where Dreamweavers are being persecuted and feared by the Hanian people that they offer their healing services to. It has everything from a community of flying people and underwater dwellers created and favored by one of the gods, forbidden love, a mysterious cult from the south with sorcerous leaders clad in black that, according to hearsay, recruits followers by conducting religious orgies among other sacrilegious activities, and mysterious, powerful sorcerors on the run from the persecution of the White. It makes you wonder, whose side these people are on. And why do these five supposedly benevolent Gods instruct the White to destroy a people at one point or stay their hand at the next? And are they truly the only survivors of the great war between the Gods that happened once upon a time?

The great thing about this book is the way she wrote about the numerous and complex main characters that make this fantastic world go round. She introduced them all fairly early in the story. I normally go ballistic when authors keep you on tenterhooks about one character for the first third of the tale and then suddenly decide to switch to a completely new one during the second third. It throws me off but I have to admit, it makes the book all the more difficult to put down. I enjoyed how everything connected and lent itself to the mystery surrounding some of the more enigmatic characters. All in all a good read. This book is the first in Canavan's second trilogy, Age of the Five. For those who are just starting off in the fantasy genre, you might no want to try out this book just yet as it's a little heavy.