A little history but worked to follow.

The city of Windwir just been annihilated. Pole namely Named Lands, source of political and religious balance remains of the Grande Bibliothèque where lay the memory of the world and the leader of the Pope supposed to preserve order Andofrancien know. All this, destroyed by a disaster to the unknown source. So begins "Lamentation"
That the leaders of nations on the alert, the people in shock and the few survivors who were out of town at this time, devastated.

A range of different characters tell us following the events after the destruction. Either company Petronus, old sailor who seems to have a long history linked to the town of Windwir; Jin Li Tam, forty-second girl and spy the house Li Tam who are the great bankers of this world; Next Rudolfo, Gypsy leader of the Nine Houses Sylvestres who wants to preserve what can be saved from the lost knowledge; Neb alongside young teenager of fifteen years who is traumatized after witnessing the destruction of his city and the death of his relatives or finally, with Sethbert obese leader of Cities states boasting of having destroyed this city in his court.

And amidst all these characters conspiring, there Isaak.
One of the robots Library Windwir having escaped destruction and is accused of being responsible for this disaster.

It is difficult to tell the story of this book without revealing the plot because it advances at a fairly steady pace. It was soon immersed in it, plots and events are linked together quickly and no time to get bored. This is the strong point of the novel.

What is a little disappointing to me is that all these characters are too caricatured. Between the charismatic leader, the gruff and nasty and stupid young beautiful spy and the orphan boy abandoned by all, there is hardly an original and endearing character. The only perhaps of interest and emotion robot is the Isaak.

As the world where the story evolves, it could, in my view, be a little more worked. There are dark areas and bright areas appear overly simplistic or worse, unrealistic. But the next tome we may learn more about it as several issues are left unresolved. Therefore, I do not consider this lack of information as specially negative but I expect to learn more in the volumes that follow.

Still, history remains appreciable simply because of his pace, to the sequence of events sometimes surprising and sometimes predictable. A book that reads quickly and entertains well but more importantly, it sets up a story that, if properly crafted and detailed in the following volumes, can give birth to a very interesting cycle. Especially since the book ends with another plot underlying the first, and we expect to learn more about the hand that directs this immense chessboard.

An author to follow and which, I hope, will surprise us more later.