Now I Rise
Kierstin White
Now I Rise is the second novel in Kiersten White's Conqueror's Saga. It is the first that truly lives up to the series name. The novel has a simple overall structure. It is told from the points of view of sister and brother Lada and Radu Dracul, whom we know well from And I Darken. Chapters told from Lada's point of view alterative with chapters from Radu's. Radu's chapters tell the tale of Ottoman Sultan Mehmed's conquest of Constantinople. Mehmed is based on a real historical person, Mehmed II, also known as Mehmed the Conqueror. Lada is also based on a real person, Vlad III of Wallachia, also known as Vlad the Impaler. White has made the male Vlad a woman, Ladislav, our Lada. Radu, too, is based on a real historical person, the brother of Vlad, but since very little is actually known about him, White was free to invent him as she wished.
We know from And I Darken that Mehmed and Lada are both obsessed with dreams of conquest. It was prophesied that Mehmed would conquer Constantinople. Lada, daughter of the Vaivode (Prince) of Wallachia, wants Wallachia back. Although superficially similar, these obsessions are different. Lada wants to go home -- Mehmed wants to make a foreign city his own.
Wallachia is a tiny, dirt-poor little country between what will become the powerful Hungarian and Ottoman Empires. Wallachia is poor because it is ruled by idiots whose best idea for encouraging economic productivity is "beat the peasants." You won't catch Lada discussing the marginal product of labor, but she has a firmer intuitive grasp of economic productivity than any of the nobles of her land, or indeed, than many modern heads of state.
Constantinople, in contrast, is the capital of the Byzantine Empire, which can claim to be the heritor of the Roman Empire. Emperor Constantine is thus, by one reckoning, heir to the Caesars. His city, Constantinople, is a walled city that has withstood multiple previous conquering armies. Mehmed sends Radu to Constantinople. Radu's chapters thus tell the inside story of Mehmed's siege and eventual conquest of Constantinople. Mehmed himself is only a distant presence in Now I Rise.
This contrast of these two historical conquests and conquerors worked well, I thought. Lada is a compelling character -- she is vicious and violent and smart. There's no heart of gold there, but there is a fierce sense of justice. Indeed, even though I know this is fiction and that Vlad III was not a woman, Now I Rise is a believable work of historical fiction. I will certainly read the final novel, Bright We Burn.