Book Review: The Sword of the Dawn by Michael Moorcock

Book Review: The Sword of the Dawn by Michael Moorcock
Published in 1977 by Daw Books
Cover Art by Richard Clifton-Dey

Book Review: The Sword of The Dawn by Michael Moorcock

Published in 1967, 1977 The edition owned is the 1977 Edition Daw SF


Cover art by Richard Clifton-Dey


Cover image courtesy T Kelson, a photograph of his copy of the novel


From the book

“Then the Earth grew old, its landscapes mellowing and showing signs of age, its ways becoming whimsical and strange in the manner of a man in his last years…
-The high History of The Runestaff



Duke Dorian Hawkmoon, Duke of Koln, Sometimes willing servant of The Runestaff, his adventures continue in the third volume in The HIstory of The Runestaff which is titled, The Sword oF THe Dawn.

The novel opens with the warlords of Granbretan surveying the destruction they had wrought on a city, the last in Europe they claim, to fall to their forces. The might of the Dark Empire of Granbretan has swept the lands of Europe and most of the Middle East as well at this point. Their forces are seemingly unstoppable in their relentless pursuit of decadent destruction and devastation.

Meanwhile in the alternate Kamarg where the machine of the Crystal Folk of Soryandum had sent the heros and their land too, boredom has set in for the warriors there. Dorian, Count Brass, Oladahn and Huilliam are all growing tired of the peace and worry about what is happening back in their home dimension mounts. When a poet from Granbretan is captured, fears rise that if he could make it there, then military forcer from Granbretan could also. From there Dorian and Hulliam travel back to the Dark Empire to seek out a mystic and to ascertain what the Scientists of Granbretan do or do not know.

The rest of the novel consists of their adventures in Granbretan, further ruminations and machinations of the nobles of that island as well as the tasking from the Runestaff as transmitted through The Warrior in Jet and Gold. Along the way more of the island is explored, Baron Meliadus is encountered and foiled and travel is found to the fabled land of Amarehk, where a civilization is destroyed, river pirates foiled, loyal friends perish and the next item Dorian needs to defeat the Dark Empire, the Sword of The Dawn, is wrested from the group that had possession of it, and into the hands of the Duke, where the power to summon the Legion of The Dawn is revealed in a most fortuitous time.

The battles are non-stop, the complaining of Hawkmoon continues, and the real hero of Hulliam carries the day once again. Once the quest is complete, Dorian and Huilliam seek to return to Europe in order to return to The Kamarg and to see once again their friends and loved ones.


This third novel is only slightly longer than the previous two, coming in at 173 pages in the edition I own. It has the same pacing and narrative feel as the other novels, slightly more compressed and short in depth in comparison to the novels dealing with Elric or Corum in comparison.

Hawkmoon as a character is not my favorite Eternal Champion Manifestation. He seems the least powerful of them all (With the most items to help him against mortal foes of all the champions as well as a plethora of companions). Still his is one of the more interesting settings, and if you have Granbretan as a power but not a superpower it is probably the most interesting of the core settings to this reader and reviewer. The technology as magic works wonderful here vice in the first three Corum novels. The mood is strong and evocative and, since it is an alternate future, seems much more plausible to me. This is what makes the world of Hawkmoon the most accessible to Roleplaying Games as well, compared to either the Elric or Corum novels (which are the only other ones that have been ported to RPGs).


RPG Note:
If someone is interested Mongoose Publishing has created the Hawkmoon Roleplaying Game. It is no longer in production per Sales at Mongoose Publishing. The author has not had a chance to pick up a copy so no impressions are available. There was another one based on the Runequest game system, which I had seen once many years ago. There are no RPGs currently in production covering this manifestation of The Eternal Champion.




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