Witch King
core novel 2023 Witch King
Record
| First published | 2023 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 3.70 (28,329 ratings, collected 2026-08-19) |
| Page count | 432 |
| First-edition ISBN | 9781250826794 |
| Internal chronology | 1 |
Synopsis
Witch King, published by Martha Wells in 2023, opens the Rising World series. Kaiisteron, known as Kai, is a demon prince of the underearth whose family once held a long-standing agreement with the Saredi, a grassland people bound to his kind by old treaties and older debts. The novel opens after Kai has been murdered, his consciousness trapped and left dormant inside a water trap for an unknown length of time, cut off from allies and unaware of how much of the world has changed while he was gone. When he finally wakes, he finds a lesser mage attempting to seize control of the considerable magic still bound to him, a violation that forces Kai to fight his way free and begin piecing together who killed him, why, and what has become of the world and allies he left behind.
Where it sits
- Universe: Witch King
- Series: The Rising World core; position 1 of 2 in the series' recorded order
- Author: Martha Wells
Awards (verified)
- Locus Award (Best Fantasy Novel), 2024: won
- Hugo Award (Best Novel), 2024: finalist
- Nebula Award (Best Novel), 2024: finalist; 59th Annual Nebula Awards (ceremony 2024, for 2023-published work).
- World Fantasy Award (Best Novel), 2024: finalist
Notes
- From the series record (The Rising World): Martha Wells's return to secondary-world fantasy after a decade focused on the science-fiction Murderbot Diaries; unrelated to her earlier Ile-Rien fantasy novels (The Element of Fire, The Death of the Necromancer, the Fall of Ile-Rien trilogy, City of Bones), a separate continuity not researched or admitted. No third book has been announced as of the latest update.
Neighbouring works
Publication order and internal chronology are tracked as two separate orderings, but they resolve to the exact same sequence for this book, so one combined line is shown instead of two identical ones.
- Reading order, within the series The Rising World: position 1 of 2: next Queen Demon (2025)
Sources
- Tordotcom (publisher)
- Wikipedia (English)
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_King_(novel)
- Locus Magazine (locusmag.com)
- The Hugo Awards (official)
- Nebula Awards (SFWA)
- World Fantasy Awards (official)
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