The series goes back in time, resuming the story of Tor and Tristal from the end of the third book when they journeyed north. It has a narrower focus as Tor is attempting to teach Tristal how to tap into the Shumai axeman's prescience (ESP?) so the old ways will not be lost. Their journey takes them through a significant amount of Western Canada. It includes an encounter with a massive ice sheet, the first indication that the Pelbar are experiencing a mini ice age: take that, global warming.

There's an early bit that unfortunately proves even the increasingly open-minded Pelbar don't accept homosexuality. Afterwards the novel spends far too much of its length in an isolated ice valley, and mistakenly focusses on Tor through this section rather than Tristal when it's Tristal's character that undergoes the most change. The excuse they can't get out is thin at best, when we are never told how they descended into the valley in the first place. Tristal's final evolution feels earned towards the end, but Williams seems only to be hastily connecting the dots so he can move ahead to the conclusion. ( )

Unlike the previous books, the focus of this book is not on Stel and his family and the cities of Pelbar. The focus is instead on one of their allies, Tor the Axeman. Civilization is coming to the area around Pelbar, but that doesn't mean there isn't a lot of adventure to be found. ( )

"The Song of the Axe" is book six (of seven) in Paul O. Williams' "The Pelbar Cycle."
Unlike the others in the series, in this volume Stel Westrun is not the main character, but merely a minor one, as this is the story of Tor, one of the last "Axemen" of the Shumai tribe, and his nephew Tristal. Although the position of axeman, leader of one of the hunting bands of the Shumai, is fading as the new peace of the Heart River Federation causes them to move away from hunting and gathering toward a more agricultural lifestyle, Tor hopes to teach Tristal the principles of leadership once essential to the title. In spite of having lost his hand in the opening of the Dome of the ancients (see "The Dome in the Forest," book three in the series), Tor is still a warrior, but he has become both more introspective and more aware of the bigger picture of the land that is once more being reunited after being shattered by the "Time of Fire" a thousand years before. He leads Tristal on a quest toward a seemingly trivial objective, to see the walls of ice to the northwest described by a group of wanderers they had met a few years earlier, but in the process he is hoping to pass on the ability to listen to the subtleties of life around him that makes an axeman a great leader, because he sees in Tristal the potential to bridge the gap between the old ways and the new.
Successfully making their way to the glaciers, and beyond them to the "Shining Sea of the West" (that Stel had set out to see but never reached in book two, "The Ends of the Circle"), Tor and Tristal sometimes find their master/student relationship more troublesome than the hostile peoples they encounter on the way. Indeed, it takes something unexpected in the usual "coming of age" quest before Tristal finds the Axeman in himself.

From the back cover:
"Spring - and Civilization - were bringing new life to the valley of the Heart River. But the Old Ways of Urstadge's nomads were dying.

So Tor, last of the great Shumai Axemen, took his nephew Tristal on a last run to teach the boy the Way of the Axeman.

But TristaI would have to survive deadly encounters, endure a seductive captivity, and even suffer enslavement before he learned that there was more to the Axeman's skill than just a sound arm and a handy opponent." ( )

F/SF