Better late than never, I finally finished the other Dragon Age tie-in novel by David Gaider last night, The Calling.
The story takes place about ten to fifteen years after the events of the previous book. King Maric gets approached by a strange group of Grey Wardens from Orlais, who have an outrageous request to make: they need to go into the Deep Roads to prevent a Blight, and he is the only one who can guide them...
If that sounds like a strange setup, that's because it is, and pretty much all the characters in the story acknowledge it as such. I found it a little hard to suspend my disbelief at first because it seemed a little too far-fetched to me, but more than anything else I was simply intrigued, and in the end I felt that most of my doubts got cleared up in a satisfactory fashion.
Compared to Stolen Throne, The Calling feels like a much tighter novel. It doesn't take as long to get going, and the story it tells is also limited to a much smaller scope. Where Stolen Throne follows the rebellion across all of Ferelden over the course of several years, The Calling only covers a period of a few weeks and the action is mostly limited to the Deep Roads. Its outcome is still supposed to affect all of Ferelden, but since the book is so focused on its small group of adventurers in dark and narrow tunnels, the reader soon feels just as cut off from the outside world as the story's protagonists, and character interactions seem to matter much more than whether their mission will actually succeed or not. This is not a bad thing however, as characterisation is something the author does quite well, and it's fascinating to watch the characters' relationships develop.
Also, where Stolen Throne's ties to the game are fairly loose and it serves more as an introduction to the world of Thedas in general, The Calling draws much more tangible connections to the game. For one thing one of the Orlesian Grey Wardens is a young Duncan, who is unsurprisingly quite different from the wise leader that recruits you in the game. I've heard that the "big bad" of the book shows up in Awakening, though I haven't played that expansion myself yet. And finally, the ending can be interpreted in a very intriguing way in regards to one of your companions in the game - it doesn't entirely match up with information you're given in the game's codex, but that could simply be chucked up to an unreliable narrator. If you read the book without having played the game, none of these tidbits will stand out as confusing or strange, but as a fan you'll likely find them very valuable and interesting.
Just like it's precedessor, I think that The Calling has the potential to appeal to both Dragon Age players and fantasy fans in general. The main difference between the two is that the first book is more of a grand fantasy story, following the journey of a few major characters over the years and across all of Ferelden, while The Calling has a slightly larger ensemble and is much more focused on the characters and their particular problems, largely leaving the world of Thedas outside.
