In this book, Cho is both providing that diversity and directly responding to those who prefer a more traditional (read: white male) approach to fantasy. Many voices in the sci-fi community have spoken of the need for diversity in authors, characters, and subject matter and have faced some unpleasant public blowback for that view. He's distracted in his quest by assassination attempts, the conflict between the sultan of Janda Baik and that nation’s witches, and the presence of Prunella Gentleman, a young woman of uncertain but presumably half-Indian parentage, who is possessed of powerful magical gifts that ladies are firmly encouraged to suppress. Nevertheless, Zacharias strives to serve his fellow magicians by determining why the magic level in England has diminished recently. Zacharias’ skin color bars him from social acceptance moreover, he’s commonly assumed to have wrested the late Sir Stephen’s staff from him by nefarious means. Born a slave of African parents, he was set free by his predecessor, Sir Stephen Wythe, who raised him and trained him in the magical arts as a kind of experiment. Most thaumaturges agree that Zacharias Wythe is a most unsuitable Sorcerer Royal. Set in an alternate, magical England during the Napoleonic Wars, Cho’s debut novel is at once a comedy of manners and a sharp metacomment concerning racism and misogyny in the fantasy genre.
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