The Noble Warriors

William Nicholson has said that his Noble Warriors trilogy is about the search for God. As a result, the trilogy has parallels with Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials which could be said to be about the death of God.

Unlike the world Pullman creates - which is governed by The Magisterium, a maelevolent version of the Church - the major power in Nicholson's world in beneficent. The Noble Warriors or Nomana are a relatively small band of handpicked women and men who eschew violence in the service of the All and Only. From their base, the Nom, the Nomana spread throughout the world using mind control to force those using physical violence to lay down their weapons and kneel in surrender.

If you think that there is something contradictory containec within that last description, you would be right, and the trilogy explores issues of the exercise of power through the journeys and experiences of its three central characters, Seeker, Star and Wildman. The central narrative line is of a life lived as an experiment in seeking truth.

The peace created by the Nomana comes under threat from forces seeking temporal power through physical force manipulated by spirits seeking eternal life. The journeys of Seeker, Star and Wildman begin as they seek to counter these forces but the journey of Seeker goes further and deeper into the nature of power, peace and, ultimately, of God.

Through its many twists and turns, Nicholson's plotline opens out into a pantheistic resolution. The All and Only is not where he is thought to be - a parallel experience to the death of God in His Dark Materials - and is not constrained but is all around, in all and with all, if only all could see and understand that all are gods ourselves.

Unlike Pullman's world where the Magisterium is clearly evil and God is to be killed, Nicholson does not set up a simple good versus evil paradigm. Here, Seeker needs to understand the limitations of the Nomana, whom he loves, in order to reach the story's resolution. How he will do so keeps the reader turning the pages as Nicholson's plotline (as one would expect from a someone with his screenwriter's experience) is the strongest element in the style and structure of the trilogy.

The Noble Warriors is a trilogy that stands alongside His Dark Materials, in the shadow of The Lord of the Rings, as a well constructed, page turning exploration of issues of power, love and the search for God.

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Percy Sledge - Bring It On Home To Me.