As is usual for anything by Kay, an extraordinary amount of research has gone into this book and it pays off in the richness of story and detail on every page. Unusually for him, it is not a historical fantasy, set in a land that bears striking resemblance to, without being, a medieval country in our own world.
But as a completely different story, this one works quite well and, though it lacks the breadth of his other masterpieces, makes up for it in it's tight focus on character. A very good read.