Master and Fool
core novel 1996 The Book of Words
Record
| First published | 1996 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 3.93 (5,575 ratings, collected 2026-08-21) |
| First-edition ISBN | 9781857234718 |
| Internal chronology | 3 |
Synopsis
As the concluding volume of the Book of Words trilogy, Master and Fool opens with the Known Lands sliding toward all-out war. Jack must finally come to terms with the full scope of his extraordinary abilities as the destiny built up across the earlier books closes in on him, while the disgraced knight Tawl works desperately to protect Melliandra and the unborn child she carries from the machinations of Prince Kylock and the dark sorcerer Baralis, who continues pursuing forbidden magic in service of his own ambitions. Rather than painting its antagonists as purely evil, the novel treats even its darkest figures as flawed, self-interested people whose choices, alongside Jack's, Tawl's, and Melliandra's, build toward a final, desperate confrontation that threatens to unmake the fragile order of the Known Lands entirely.
Where it sits
- Universe: The Book of Words
- Series: The Book of Words Trilogy core; position 3 of 3 in the series' recorded order
- Author: J. V. Jones
Notes
- From the series record (The Book of Words Trilogy): J. V. Jones's debut epic-fantasy trilogy.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings and are never conflated: a book's place in one says nothing about its place in the other.
- Publication order, within the series The Book of Words Trilogy: position 3 of 3: previous A Man Betrayed (1996)
- Internal chronology, within The Book of Words: position 5 of 7: previous A Fortress of Grey Ice (2002) · next A Sword from Red Ice (2007)
Sources
- The Book of Words - bibliography listing
- The Book of Words - Sword of Shadows Wiki
- https://jvj.com/master2026.html
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