K.J. Parker's World of Deadpan Fantasy

The man, the myth, the legend; his unique style and unchanging formula

Who is K.J. Parker?

I only picked up Parker's novels and stories a few years ago, so I missed the era from 1998-2015 when this question was a mystery in the community of speculative fiction fandom.

Generally accepted as genderless, Parker was noted for the bleak and wryly humourous tone of their fantasy stories, which frequently explored the intersection of flawed morality and opportunistic hunger for power. Most of Parker's stories are also notable for being entirely absent of magic, though these are still labeled fantasy since they take place in invented settings. Those stories that do feature magic lose none of the usual cynicism, however, and simply find new ways to poke holes in our perception of the world.

Prosper's Demon and Inside Man, cover art by Sam Weber

When the subject of gender did come up, consensus lent toward Parker being female, remarkable to me given that I've yet to encounter a single one of their stories that features a female lead. Truly refreshing to see that gender could be separated from an author's writing and even traditionally male interests in such a way.

Of course, 2015 saw K.J. Parker finally unveiled as British novelist Tom Holt. This change doesn't seem to have had much impact on the author though, as he has continued putting out some of his best and most popular work in the past decade.

A Fractious World

An aspect of K.J. Parker's work I find absolutely fascinating – and half wonder whether he does in part to toy with loyal readers – is that all of his stories seem to inhabit the same world, but it remains nearly impossible to view them with any kind of cohesion. (Notably, this includes both the magical and non-magical stories, putting understanding that much further out of reach.)

Fan-made map of K.J. Parker's fictional world, by Simon Regan

This is a fan's best attempt at assembling Parker's world, and as far as I can tell it is one-of-a-kind; Parker certainly hasn't provided any maps to go off, despite how heavily the geography of trade, war and politics features in his stories.

I think Parker simply enjoys reusing names of places and people between stories, and has perhaps chosen to lean into it more over time. He also loves playing with the fog of time in his books, so is probably aiming on some level to confuse readers in the same way that mismatched details of real history have confounded scholars for decades.

After all, the wear and tear of history are fundamental to so much of Parker's writing. It's hard to find one of his stories that doesn't play with ideas of perception and reality; the "Great Men" of these stories are all con men of one stripe or another, even if they are also as intelligent, charismatic or courageous as history remembers them.

Saloninus, great philosopher and alchemist? Generated with AI

This world is also defined by bloodshed. The Robur, Sashan and Echmen Empires are all built on conquest, and most of Parker's stories tell of both recent and ancient catastrophic battles – to the point that multiple stories feature a competitive industry built on looting battlefields. (Granted, so much of Parker's work is based on aspects of real history that this might be too.) Despite this violent history, Parker is surprisingly sparing in utilizing revenge as character motivation. Far more often, personal revenge is an opportunistic grab on behalf of characters failing to keep hold of their slippery morals.

Weaknesses

Parker certainly has a successful formula for his stories, but sticking to this style for so long makes its weak points more and more evident the more you read. For me this mostly just has to do with the representation of women and the issues with inconsistent worldbuilding.

I said earlier that I had yet to read a Parker story with a female lead, and I'll expand on that now to say that half of the stories don't feature women at all. That sucks, especially since I think Parker's formula of men bluffing their way into authority could be extraordinarily well suited to stories about women and trans people doing the same.

Parker's male narrators are often exasperated with women in a way that makes it clear he is mocking their sexism; this is reinforced by the fact that all of the women who do appear on the page have their own wits and motivations. Yet there is never really any growth or explicit backlash to the sexism in a way that could be seen as normalizing these attitudes, which makes me wish even more for a little more diversity in these perspectives.

The inconsistent worldbuilding is mostly frustrating as someone who wants to imagine all of these stories happening in the same world – the exorcisms of Prosper's Demon and Inside Man occurring just a few miles and decades away from the fabrication of The Invincible Sun in The Sun and I – but I think it also has broader consequences. Between the first and second books of Parker's The Siege trilogy, the author misplaces two important female characters and seems to turn his only gay character straight.

The Siege

But I'll go far more in-depth with all of these points – morality, Great Men, race, gender and more – as they relate to that incredible trilogy next week. Depending on how that goes, I'd love to eventually look at a few of these other stories and their pithy commentary on our silly planet and its institutions.

Until next week, thanks for reading!