Reviewed by Robert Goodman.
By Robert Jordan, Pan Macmillan, $32.99.
Warrior of the Altaii is/was the never published debut novel of blockbuster epic fantasy novelist Robert Jordan. Jordan is best known, well probably only known, for his multi-volume Wheel of Time series that was so big that it kept turning after his death with the help of fellow blockbuster fantasy novelist Brandon Sanderson. The full series (according to Wikipedia) comes to over 4 million words across almost 12,000 pages. The Wheel of Time is now being turned into a peak TV series by Amazon, because it has a built-in fan base, is a fantasy property, and everyone is looking for the next Game of Thrones.
But years before the Wheel of Time, in the mid 1970s Jordan was a wannabe author by the name of James Oliver Rigney Jr., trying to get a sword and sandal epic called Warrior of the Altaii published. The book was well received by publishers but due to a series of circumstances, outlined in the forward to this edition, the book was never published. Instead, this manuscript became a calling card for Rigney who was taken on by Tor to write a series of Conan the Barbarian books in the mid 1980s. From there he moved on to the Wheel of Time, and the rest is history. In fact, one of the most interesting aspects of this edition is the forward by Jordan’s wife (who was also one of his early publishers) about how the book failed to see the light of day despite being well regarded at the time.
Which brings us back to Warrior of the Altaii, finally published over forty years after it was first written. This is a book of its time, based very much in the Conan mould. The main character Wulfgar, is a member of a tribe of “barbarians”, a great warrior and adopted son of the tribe’s “king”. The Altaii are known as barbarians because they are a nomadic people, moving around the Plain, raiding caravans and trading with established city-states. But the world is changing – water sources are drying up and one of the other nomadic tribes has joined up with some local queens to wipe the Altaii out and start a broader war of conquest.
The rest is pretty much what readers in the 1970s might have expected from this type of book. Hyper masculine posturing, plenty of nudity, physical and sexual abuse (of men and women but mainly women), torture, violence and extended battle scenes. The thing to keep in mind, though, is that this is a book of its time. If it had been published in the 1970s the cover would probably have featured a buff man on a horse wielding a bow or sword but instead we get the stylish 21st century cover which will not raise any eyebrows on public transport. There are a couple of strong female characters but not enough to make up for the number of usually naked or semi-naked female slaves.
But Jordan went on to fantasy success for a reason and there is more to Warrior of the Altaii than this. Wulfgar’s world, despite being sketched briefly is an interesting one – one in which the inhabitants seem to have come from different realities and times (including one character who seems to have “wandered” in from our world). The world is also much wider than that corner that is explored in this volume, so that the action feels like one episode in an ongoing tale, leading to the suspicion that Jordan already had a series in mind. Ideas that he would later go on to develop in the Wheel of Time. Fans of that series are likely to find plenty of hints here on the direction that Jordan went when he was given the freedom.
The battle scenes are particularly well handled. Jordan did two tours of Vietnam and his understanding of combat, both strategically and viscerally, comes through strongly. It is particularly interesting that coming out of Vietnam and not long after the that war ending, Jordan would write a book in which a scrappy small guerrilla force takes on and defeats the large established force (and its local allies) using terrain, guile and local knowledge.
For all of this though, Warrior of the Altaii is only a curiosity piece. While it does have some hallmarks of fantasy books that last well beyond their time, if it had actually been published in the 1970s, it is unlikely that it would have been republished now. Warrior of the Altaii is for those who miss the Conan-style sword and sandal epics of the 1970s and early 1980s or for Jordan completists or for those looking for hints of what would later become the Wheel of Time.
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