The Witness for the Dead
Series: The Goblin Emperor Series (but can be read as standalone)
Published: June 2021
Book Themes / Tropes: I can speak to the Dead, Judicial power politics, Court intrigue, A Good Person
Recommended if you like: Hundred Thousand Kingdoms by N.K. Jemisin, Chalion series by Lois McMaster Bujold, or generally any mythological fantasy work
Rating: 9 of 10
How many times do we come across truly good, kind people in fiction? People who do the right thing even if that doesn’t help them much politically, simply because it is the right thing to do? In Witness for the Dead, Addison has created a good person in the form of Celehar who works as a witness for the dead.
And what does a witness for the dead do? He prays for the dead. If the death is recent, he can also ask them about their last wishes or most closely held secrets. In return, he doesn’t get much thanks or much money. Celahar lives almost penniless in the city of Amalo, but speaking to the dead is his calling.
You’d think at least speaking to the dead would be left alone by power mongers. No such thing. Celahar gets caught up in angry struggles over social ranking — merit, wealth, seniority, political backing (as in, who appoints whom). Addison has very cleverly mirrored similar complexities of modern-day judiciary and bureaucracy.
This novella has (at least) 4 different mysteries that Celahar needs to solve by listening to the dead. First, an ambitious opera woman who has drowned to death. Second, a pregant woman slowly poisoned by her serial killer husband. Third, a dispute over a rich man’s succession. And fourth, a ghoul borne of neglected cemeteries. Celahar has his hands full, and till the very end, I was half afraid that we’d end up with cliffhangers.
But Addison resolves all 4 mysteries beautifully. More importantly, Celahar, who is clearly suffering due to old sorrows, survives and finds some reason to hope and move on. Witness is about the underdog rediscovering his self-respect, and winning everyone’s respect in return. A recipe for feel good. It’s impossible not to like Celahar — as I said, a Good Person.
Fair warning: Addison displays the same knack for choosing rather difficult words and tongue-twisting names that I remember from Goblin Emperor. It made the reading speed very slow, and so I am docking a point for that here. Otherwise, this is a wonderful book.
Have you read Witness for the Dead? Did you like it too? And if you’ve read The Goblin Emperor, how did the two books compare?
15 replies on “The Witness for the Dead by Katherine Addison”
What an interesting job he has! 🙂
Well, you’ve hit the nail on the head!
Prayers for the dead is an important element of both Eastern and Western Christianity, but I have rarely if ever seen it in novels. Intriguing
Wow, I completely missed that angle. And you’re absolutely right, it ties-in to the book so well.
I love a story with a great character you root for and Celahar sounds like a wonderful protagonist!
He is, he is. Even if you don’t typically read SFF, this one works well as a mystery novella across genres.
I’ve been thinking about prayers for the dead lately, granted inn a more real life/ theological way, because of some things I’ve been reading… it’s a topic I had never given much thought to before. Interesting to see it handled in fiction.
Emma’s comment caught my eye also because same.
Yes, and you’re both right! It never crossed my mind till you mentioned it, but now I’m wondering if Addison based the book on that too.
Since this one can be read as a standalone, I might pick it up. I’m not interested in The Goblin Emperor for some reason, so I wasn’t initially looking at this one at all, either. Your review sounds really interesting, though.
I‘ve had Goblin Emperor on my want-to-read shelf for a while now. This review reminded me of that. Apparently the audiobook narration is excellent. I‘ll see! I just started something else on audio…
The audiobook for The Goblin Emperor was pretty good. If it’s the same narrator, I think Witness will be wonderful in audio too.
Goblin Emperor is a great book, but a bit of heavy reading and even drags on in parts. I definitely liked Witness way better. It’s a novella, so perfect for Novellas in November challenge if you’re participating in that!
This is one of the characters from The Goblin Emperor that I wanted to know more about and so this book was very welcome and I really enjoyed it. On balance I preferred the style of TGE but this was still a really good read.
Lynn 😀
Hmm. I think I’d choose Witness over Goblin Emperor, because I felt TGE dragged on a bit in some places. But that feel-good factor was so strong in both books. I’m looking forward to the sequels!
Pleased to see you enjoyed this instalment from Addison as much as I did. And interesting that you found the naming conventions somewhat of a barrier to enjoyment—ordinarily I would too, as some authors seem to relish coming up with outlandish or arbitrary names, but oddly I enjoyed the consistent way she approached the naming of names and titles and found, after a little bit of work, that it was relatively easy to remember who was who.
Anyway, I’m glad to have come across another reader who appreciates what Addison has achieved here!