book that held her heart

The third and final book of the Library Trilogy by Mark Lawrence is called The Book that Held her Heart. I was hopeful, as I mentioned in my review of book 2, that Lawrence would fill in some more details about the mechanics of the library, and put a little more flesh on the bones of the title book, and why it poses such a threat, and more importantly, hope it actually does that.

I didn't get that.

What I did get, didn't, in some cases, make sense to me. Are they plot holes, or is the author taking an easy way out. I'm not sure, but it can't just be me. This book was shorter than the others, and included a whole subplot that I'm not sure was originally even intended to be part of the story. Maybe I'm wrong, but it this was a television series, some of that stuff was filler episodes. Did it ask important questions? Sure. Did it help tie the fantasy of the first two books more firmly to our own shared reality? You betcha. Did it need to do those things, especially if they were done in lieu of resolving some other things that seem to have slipped by? Nope.

The ending of this one, reminded my of the end of The Firm, by John Grisham. Link has spoilers, but you know... it was written in the 90s. Not my favorite, and a little bit of a disappointment given the time Lawrence and his readers put into this. I would go as far as putting on my 'myeh' list, but it could have been better.

 

book that broke the world

The Book that Broke the World is book 2 in the Library Trilogy by Mark Lawrence. I mentioned that I was reading this in my review of the first book, but then forgot to write about it. That was a month or so ago,* but I actually purchased this book at a used book sale so I have it, and could give it a flip through to remind myself about it.

This books helps to explain what exactly is up with this book that is so dangerous has done, and how its doing it. Maybe I read over that part too quickly, but I'm not sure I got the explanation in the kind of detail I was looking for. I understand that this universe Lawrence has created is different, and has different rules, but as a reader, I don't understand those rules unless you explain them to me, and I'm not sure I left this one completely satisfied. 

I also think (if I remember correctly) that I was hopeful that the third installment would provide that clarification I was looking for. Now that I've read book 3 as well, I can confirm that this book was Lawrence's opportunity to explain it to me, and I don't think I got it.

This was a fin book in any case, and I certainly didn't give up on the series because of my confusion. Would I have if I'd known that the third book wouldn't provide the full answer to my niggling question? I don't think so. Maybe I'm not the only one?

 

* Okay, its more than a month ago now, I just found this when I opened this to get caught up. I've also finished the 3rd book in this series, as well. 

 

 

dark mirror

I may have cried about this before, but I normally like to wait until all the books are out in a series before digging into it. I've been burned a few times yeah, George R. R. Martin, I'm looking at you When I started to read the Bone Season, I was under the impression it was a 3 book series. It wasn't until a few books in did I realize there were 7, and then only recently, did I learn that the other two books out there in this series were NOT part of the series, but addenda, and short stories--outtakes that were cut from the main books is my guess--and that I need to wait for tow more to come! Yeah, that's right, altho started back in 2013 or something, the sixth book is due out next year and then the seventh... at some point after that. Assuming there isn't an eighth, or whatever.

She even took a break to crack out another series, which was pretty good!

Book 5 is called The Dark Mirror, and in the preface, Shannon points out that after working on this series for close on 15 years, starting when she was pretty young, she's found that some of the earlier things she wrote either don't hold up or have become problematic as the story arc, the characters, or maybe both, have evolved, so she has released revised, and updated versions. The preface includes a link to her site where you can go read a summary of the changes, or find links to the updated texts.*

This was an interesting installment, and includes both new things, as well as the return to some older things. Fans of the series will likely enjoy this book, is my prediction, and I thought that it was pretty well put together. When it started up, I wasn't sure where we were going, but Shannon has crafted a way to maintain the tension and the action, and keep it interesting enough to make us look forward to the next volume. Do I think it would have been possible to tell this story in less than 7 volumes? Sure, but Shannon has created some likeable characters and an interesting alternate universe for them to inhabit so I can see hardcore fans looking forward to as many volumes as they can get. I recall hearing that Tolkien said that his only regret about The Lord of the Rings, was that it was too short. I also think that if he had lived longer, we probably would have seen more from him. So on a related note, lets hope George of the familiar R.R. moniker, doesn't kick it before he gets done what he'd like to.

This was a fun one. 

 

* If you haven't read the books, the Revision Guide Shannon has put together, linked above, may have spoilers. 

 

 

first commandment

The First Commandment by Brad Thor is apparently book 6 in the Scot Harvath series. I've read a few of these now, and I had a feeling this was an earlier adventure, just because there were some things that didn't seem to sync up with some of the other stories I've read, but because I've only ever read these with passing interest; my wife typically will read them, and I will go through and try to grab something I haven't read before, so I haven't paid much attention to publishing order. I suppose that would help keep track of the overall story arc that follow through on most character based series.

Scot Harvath is a lot like some other characters that series are built around in similar spy thriller books. Some similarities or characteristics that I don't think will surprise anyone may include something like: ex-military, special forces, apex predator with a heart of gold and plenty of righteous patriotism, who has had some personal loss or trauma that keeps them centered, and has later made his or her way through the CIA, the FBI, or the Secret Service, or maybe all three before being recruited to some super-secret, off book or even private espionage entity, that may or may not have direct oversight from the president, a prime minister, the director of the CIA, or some similar big wig who needs to get things done with credible deniability, for the good of the citizens and a free world. There are a bunch of them, and they are typically all fun to read. Brad Thor and Scot Harvath are not my favorite team, but they aren't the worst and I typically enjoy a read through one of their adventures. I just don't ever feel the need to run out and buy the next one (or even read the teaser chapter at the end of most paperbacks like this).

Looks like I've read book 11, 14, and 19. And I may have read book 1, The Lions of Lucerne * just recently, but didn't write here about it. Its possible I read some of the others as well, it looks like there are 25 books in the series so far.

 

* Yeah, I definitely read Lions a little while ago, but didn't write about it on the blog. 

 

 

 

a certain justice

Commander Adam Dalgliesh and his team have been called upon to solve another murder, in this later book in P.D. James' series of mysteries featuring the detective. A Certain Justice was first published in 1997, a few years after James was created Baroness James of Holland Park. She died just about 10 years ago, well into her 90s.

The format follows that of some of her other Adam Dalgliesh mysteries, that is the story focuses on the people surrounding, involved in, or otherwise impacted by the murder. This sets the stage, allows us to get to know the people involved, and typically the murder victim, prior to the deed. The deed itself is not shown to us, so we must work alongside Dalgliesh and his team while they try and sort it out.

James does a good job, and its clear why she's so popular. Lots of her books have been made into movies and television shows, including one of this book, in the UK. There are a fair number of English terms that may hang up American English readers, but that's pretty typical I think and context clues certainly help in most cases, but there are some things that just don't come across; Is that a clue or lunch they're taking about?

Some of the more complicated words have to do with the law and the courts. We're all familiar with what a barrister is, and that they wear wigs in court, and what robes? A gown? Not sure what those terms are. That doesn't prevent a good read however. 

book that wouldn't burn

Yes, I've changed gears. After learning that Samantha Shannon has book 6 of her Bone Season series due out next year, and who knows when book 7 will be out (or if there will be more!) I decided to swap over to Mark Lawrence's Library Trilogy. I bought book 2 at some point at a used book sale, and didn't realize it was the second in a trilogy until I got home and cracked it open to read. So I borrowed book 1 from the library; The Book that Wouldn't Burn. I haven't read any of Mark Lawrence's stuff before and this was pretty good. The story arc is built around a library, that in the point of this story, seems to have been developed thousands of years ago, but a much more advanced society than the current one, but the reasons for that may be that the culture the present story takes place in is either new to the library or is possibly a newer culture that is developing after some post-apocalyptic event, or something. Its a little vague, but I wouldn't tell you what it was here in any case as I try to avoid spoilers.

The library itself reminds me a little of the library in Asimov's Foundation Series, but only in its abstract, font of all knowledge, people in service of the library vibe that story gave me, at least as far as I can recall. its been a while!

I actually finished this a few days ago, and I've been working on book 2. Its a smaller volume, so I don't think it will take me too long before I go grab book 3 from the library. I guess this probably fits into the fantasy genre, but there are also SciFi aspects to it as well, and it also reads a little like historical fiction, but that may be because the culture in which this takes place is slowly transitioning from edged weapons to firearms, and the customs, dress, architecture, societal norms, nobility etc. seem to reflect a historical era.

The writing is pretty tight, and there are some interesting twists and loops that creep in that I wasn't expecting, and some others I could see coming, but I think I could see them because Lawrence wanted me to. 

mask falling

Paige Mahoney is at it again. The Mask Falling is the 4th book in the 7-book Bone Season series by Samantha Shannon. In the dedication, Shannon notes that this is the middle book. I guess I didn't realize how many there were when I started, as I've probably mentioned in the past. The 6th book has been announced, and just recently revealed it's cover art on Shannon's website. That book is due out early next year. The 7th book? Who knows. And will Shannon decide that she needs an 8th to really wrap things up? I know, sorry, but... maybe. it's like, art, and stuff

Paige Mahoney is, of course, the main protagonist in this series, and you just can't keep a good woman down. After making serious and significant inroads on the UK battlefront, Mahoney has decamped to Paris for the majority of this installment. Many of the same characters we met in the first 3 books still appear, but many for only short periods, or mentions, as they are still in England. This book does take the overall story arc onto a more global stage, with implications mentioned for Portugal and Spain as well, altho we don't visit those places. Perhaps a foreshadowing of some future book's setting?

The series framework is a kind of sawtooth shaped story arc or increasing tragedy, conflict, or obstacle,  which ratchets up the tension, and when resolved drops the anxiety back down again for a beat, before the next thing comes along that needs to be overcome. The seem to come pretty regularly (hence the sawtooth analogy) in large part because the Mahoney character runs toward trouble rather than away. Its in her DNA to fight injustice and oppression and putting herself in harms way not only comes naturally, but appears to be her preferred modus operandi. i'll just let it eat me, and cut my way out from the inside *

So would I recommend that you read this series? Its not really SciFi, and its not Swords & Sorcery. Magical Realism? Is that even a thing? Maybe just call it Speculative Fiction. If you like that kind of thing, with some clairvoyance and some rebels-against-the-evil-empire action then you'll probably enjoy this series. You could wait until she's done, so you don't have to hang around waiting for the next installment, but some folks like that, so, you do you!

 

* That's not an actual quote from this book, but a trope we've all seen a number of times. I just read the exact thing in the book I'm reading right now. Which is NOT, by the way, the next book in this series.

 

 

 

song rising

The Song Rising is the third book in the Bone Season series by Samantha Shannon, which I am currently cracking through. However, as I said in my last post--written when I was about halfway thru this book--it looks like there is another volume coming next year. Maybe that's it, or...

I read the American hardcover, from my local library, and it appears that the English versions may have different cover art. Who knows why that happens, but I assume its because the American affiliate of the British publisher thinks that a different cover may do better in the US? Not sure, but I don't think this cover is it, chief. If you click on the image you can get a better look at it. or click on the annotated detail below for even more complainin' It looks to me like they've either assumed that because this series sells so well that they don't need to try all that hard--and if that was the case, why not just go with the UK cover art? Okay maybe there is a rights thing or agreement that obligates the cover art to be different. Or, maybe because sales are good, whoever was in charge gave it to their teen (tween?) who is really, like, talented in art class? I mean, look at the flames... yeah, click right in there and take a look.  They just wiggled the stylus around on their iPad. And the reflections on the crown? A crown that doesn't look anything like any crown described in the books, by the way. What? Is that the only reflective spot on this shinny metal object, and are those little bits of flame skipping across the front of the image too, or are those rust stains on a domed glass cover over the center part? What's that for? Jacket Design David Mann, images from Shutterstock, by the way. yes, i'm looking at you And why, you may ask, have I written an entire, long and rambling paragraph about the cover art? Simple: because it stinks. Its embarrassing. Do better Bloomsbury USA.

This book is shorter than the first two at 363 pages (including the backmatter*) so I worked through it pretty quickly, and just before I sat down to write this review, I checked at the library to see if they had the next volume, The Mask Falling, on the shelf, and they do, so I'll probably pick that up today. The Song Rising was pretty good, but perhaps not as good as the first two. It definitely moved the story forward, and there are a few good moments, but it did feel a bit like a connection between the beginning of the story and the end, if you know what I mean.

It didn't suck, or I wouldn't be going to get get book 4 later today**, but not great either. What did suck?The cover. Did I mention that? Look at it!

 

Maybe its fan art of the One Ring put together with clip art of a crown. Jacket designer is listed, but no artist is named, hmm. Is this an AI image? I can't get over it. They used Shutterstock; just do a search on Shutterstock for 'flaming ring' and you get a hundred images*** that look better than this.

 

* Backmatter includes a glossary and acknowledgments.  The frontmatter includes some maps, a listing of the Mime Order, and a prelude.

** Update: I started this yesterday, on Saturday, and didn't make it to the library. Today is Sunday and by the time I finished what I was doing, the library is closed again, so maybe tomorrow. 

*** My search turned up 47,000+ images, and most of the images on the first page were better that what they did here. 

**** Yes, I know that a double asterisk is as far as you're supposed to go when using typographic symbols for footnotes. Depending on who you ask, you could go to a double asterisk before changing symbols.† Here is the list of what seems like the commonly accepted order:

Asterisk (*) - Shift-8 

Double asterisk (**) - Shift-88 

Dagger (†) - Option-T on Mac

Double dagger (‡) - Option-Shift-7 on Mac

Section mark (§) - Option-6 on Mac

Parallels (||) - Shift-Backslash-Backslash

Octothorpe (#) - Shift-3

Pilcrow (¶) - Option-7 on Mac

 

† The UN actually allows up to fours asterisks, and then they follow with dagger (or Obelisk), double dagger (or Diesis) and Section mark (or Silcrow). That's it. Their standard is no more than seven footnotes using symbols, if you have more than seven footnotes, you should be using numbers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

mime order

The Mime Order is the second book in what Samantha Shannon refers to as a 7-book series known as the Bone Season series, after the first book. Two of the installments are novellas, which sound like they may or may not be critical to the overall story arc. My guess, based on nothing other than what I know--and that is limited to their titles and the fact that they’re novellas--is that they are based on background material Shannon prepared in the writing of the main books in the series.* Here’s my thought process: The Bone Season is Shannon’s first book, and it sounds like she is self-taught, and has been writing since adolescence. So, her editor gets ahold of The Bone Season draft and says, hey (I speculate, wildly) what’s all this exposé about the main character? Let's cut all this out. Then, said editor runs across all this background material that Shannon has stuffed in between the chapters which is presumably a pamphlet written by a supporting character, and says, hey (again) let's cut all this out.

Those cuttings are the raw material spun up into the two novellas. How’d I do? Maybe Samantha Shannon will read this and respond… that was me waiting.

Book two picks up after the events of the first book, but the end of the first one wasn’t so much of a cliffhanger, as the end of this one is. When I got to end of this one, I logged on to my local library and put a hold on the third book. I mean, come on, it was like, her hair was on fire and 14 people in the room had just pulled knives and started to run and then…

Tune in next week for another excited episode of…

Shannon’s work is fun to read. After reading The Bone Season a while ago, I also read some of her other stuff, so I had a pretty good feeling that going back to this series was going to work out okay. So far so good. As I write this, I’m almost halfway through book three; The Song Rising. Shannon has created an interesting alternate universe in a future London, which connects to another dimension (?) called the aether which is also where spirits of the dead go, and the folks that can connect to the aether are, as you might expect, called clairvoyants. But the aether has inhabitants of its own, and what are they exactly?

Love, anger, oppression, rebellion, friendship, justice, solitary, prejudice, class warfare, and communing with spirits (and other things) is all mixed up in this fast moving, and action-forward series. I get the feeling that when I’m getting close on the one I'm reading now, I’ll be reserving the next one at the library too. If and when I do, I’ll let all six of you know.

 

* So if you looked up the link above on the Main Series of books on Shannon's website, you may find that there is a placeholder for another book called The Moth Reborn, which is due next year. So I guess that makes it 8-books... Nope, wait, there is another novella on her website called The Dawn Chorus, so 9? But wait, the other book** I talked about coming from background material isn't listed on her site, so maybe we're back down to 7, or I guess 8 with the upcoming book? yeah, I'm confused too

** The other 'novella' from background material isn't a novella, its a 50 page pamphlet called On the Merits of Unnaturalness. My thoughts about its origins hold however, and I guess I'll add The Dawn Chorus novella mentioned immediately above to that group of edited out material, altho that novella fits between The Song Rising (reading now) and the next book, The Mask Falling.

 

 

spellbook of katrina van tassel

The Spellbook of Katrina Van Tassel: A Story of Sleepy Hollow may be the first book by Alyssa Palombo, but I guess I can check that. nope, she wrote a few other things before this  Maybe she’s too young to remember the Tim Burton movie "Sleepy Hollow" from 1999 with Johnny Depp as Ichabod Crane and Christina Ricci as Katrina Van Tassel but she is certainly aware of Washington Irving's short story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" from 1820, and she's a big fan. I don't recall the Tim Burton movie that well, but it came out in 1999, and I'm guessing she was a kid then. "Sleepy Hollow" was more of a murder mystery with spooky ghost tie-ins, a la Scooby Doo.

The spellbook in the title is just about the only place you'll find a spellbook in this novel. I get the creeping suspicion that someone (editor, publisher ?) suggested the title, or at least that part of it. Van Tassel does keep a diary, and I guess she may have scribbled the ingredients for an herbal tincture that her friend, the healer, gave her, but I'm not sure that makes it a spellbook. Certainly not enough of a spellbook to name a novel after. oooo, maybe this is the spellbook? nope

Otherwise, this book was okay. I thought Palombo may have been a little more detailed during the sex scenes--which showed up a little more frequently--than she needed to, which gives the whole story an little bit an Historical Romance* vibe. Van Tassel is a strong female lead, and does what she needs to do to stick up for herself in a time and place where women aren't typically given the opportunity to stand up for themselves. Palombo set this book in Sleepy Hollow, of course, but at an earlier time period that other interpretations. Washington refuses to run for a second term, and John Adams takes over as the second president during this story arc of this novel.

 

* See my note about 'bodice ripper' romance novels and the associated footnotes and links on this recent post.

 

 

lying game

 

The Lying Game is by Ruth Ware, and English author who brought us The Woman in Cabin 10. I saw this book at my library's book sale and because I thought the Cabin book was good I picked this one up.

The book cover, which is similar to the illustration shown here,* also notes that this book was featured in a book club with Reese Witherspoon's name on it. I'm not sure what that means, I didn't know she had one, and this book is from 2017, although the paperback was probably printed a year or so later, and I'm not sure if Witherspoon still has a book club or not. Looks like she does and it looks like the club features books by women authors, so good on you Reece.

Not only is this book written by a woman, it focuses on the story of four women, that have know each other since their high school days at a boarding school near the coast, not too far from London. The story is about friendship, secrets, and lies, and how they shapes the young women in the story into the adults they become, and what it means when part of their youth, that they may have been hoping would stay in their past, catches up with them.

Its tightly written, with tension, mystery, and an interesting look at the things we share, and the things we don't. Ware did a pretty good job with this one too.

 

* Mine looks like this; the badging is different. 

 

 

eye of the needle

Eye of the Needle is a Ken Follett World War II novel from 1978. I picked this up from the book sale at the Bigelow Free Public Library in Clinton, MA. The Bigelow is a pretty little library built with Guastavino vaults about 100 years ago. It was built with funding from the Andrew Carnegie Foundation, and opened in 1902. The library director gave me the thumbs up on this book, and altho I've read Follett's cathedral stories, I haven't read any of his spy thriller work (or maybe anything else he's written?)

Anyhoo, this is a well paced, inspired by reality kind of thriller, and it certainly checked off all the boxes for me. It was exciting, believable, seemingly well researched, tense, and in some cases brutal, and in other cases sad, and still others, sweet. The story is set mainly in the UK, toward the end of WWII, with glimpses of what was happening in Germany at the time, or at least what Follett speculated could have happened based on the information we do have, both about the events in the UK and Germany. He comes right out and says up front that we all know the results, but it was close there for a while, and while we don't know all the details something like this could have happened. I'm paraphrasing. because I didn't want to get up and get the book

 Its crazy to imagine that in 1978, the world was much closer to the end of WWII, than we are now to 1978. Follet wrote this just 30 or so years after the end of the war, and its getting close to 50 years since he wrote it. The story holds up however, probably because its set in an earlier period and it seems that Follet was careful to avoid modern terms and lingo in his writing (at lest to my eye.) This is James Bond without the tuxedos. Its gritty, and the story is wrapped up in everyday life, and the struggles of people living through a war, and doing the best they can in crummy circumstances.

dombey and son

Dombey and Son is not a book I’d heard of before. It was written by Charles Dickens beginning in 1846, and published as a serial, with pamphlet size installments issued once per month for 19 months between 1846 and 1848 by Bradbury & Evans, with illustrations Henry Clarence Pitz. Shortly after the last (double-issue) pamphlet was released, the entire book was published in hardback. Serialized books read differently than other books, in my mind anyway, as they can be had in one go without having to wait. And because one had to wait, there could be cliffhangers at the end of a monthly installment; but there also needs to be a way to make sure your readers will remember where they are in the story, and who the characters are. This is why, I believe, the characters are almost caricatures, or archetypes, which makes their personalities so striking, especially when contrasted to other characters in the story. The character names are also a clue, and consequently can be very amusing. One can imagine that a gruff imposing landlady named Mrs. MacStinger, should not be crossed without some consequence.

Reading a serialized novel is similar to spamming a television series that was designed to be broadcast once per week. The regular pacing of a weekly TV show, its alignment with holidays, and the passing of seasons, felt in many ways that you were following these characters along in their lives at the same pace you were living along with them. While Dombey and Son takes place over a longer story arc than the 19 months in which it was originally published, I’m sure that span of time helped with the pacing as the story stretched through the years. Reading it all in one volume is the 1840s equivalent of the spamming.

I picked up this volume at the book sale in my local library. It had no book jacket, although I assume it probably did,* and there was a small leaflet tucked inside the front cover which I thought was a found bookmark. Because I didn’t know about it, and had no book jacket to consult, I read the first line and I was sold. Between that first line, and the handsome binding, it was clearly worth the $2.00 I paid for it. After getting it home, I found that it is a Heritage Club edition. The Heritage Club published books with quality bindings, using their own editing staff, illustrators, and bindery, and made them available at an affordable price to their members. The leaflet tucked into the front is a small newsletter to the club members called  "Sandglass" that discusses the book, the printing, and Dickens himself.

The original title was Dealings with the Firm of Dombey and Son: Wholesale, Retail and for Exportation. yeah, glad they shortened that up It’s a big book but I really enjoyed it. I can’t say that I couldn’t put it down but I did find myself picking it up more often that my usual reading times at breakfast and before bed. Not only that, Dickens had me emotionally tied up with these characters. It may be because of the serial format, or it may just be a literary tool, but the characters had such clear personalities that you could almost guess what they might do, and when wrong, it was either much worse or much better, depending on the character, than you may have guessed.

There are some familiar themes here that Dickens is examining. Themes that we’ve seen him mull over before in books like A Christmas Carol, and David Copperfield. Paul Dombey could be compared to Ebenezer Scrooge, and James Carker would give Uriah Heep a run for his money. What I especially liked is how Dickens examined insidiousness in his evil characters. They aren’t as smarmy or blatantly vile as they are in more modern stories; Dickens’ baddies use the very etiquette of a polite and civil society, especially the higher class norms, as the pool in which he has these creatures wriggle about like eels or prowl like sharks, outwardly smiling and nodding as they watch their prey twist in agony. By contrast, Dickens’ good characters are personifications of the divine upon the earthly plane. It doesn’t matter what happens to them, how terrible their misfortunes, how bleak their outlook may be, they smile or simply tighten their belts, and push on, with endless reservoirs of love, kindness, understanding, and forgiveness. Maybe that’s putting too fine a point on it, and perhaps it’s a bit of a spoiler, but if you’ve read Dickens, I don’t think this will come as a surprise.

I really enjoyed this one, and I can imagine reading it again at some point to see if it still holds up, like I’ve done with similar books, like The Count of Monte Cristo. After a quick look online, it seems as though Dombey and Son is not unknown in the UK; I found many different adaptations of the novel in British movies and television programs. 

Read this book. Maybe twice!

 

 

 

* After writing this, I discovered the Heritage Club edition came in a red slipcase as shown in the photo. This wasn't there at the library box sale, where I got mine.

 

 

 

 

 

murder room

The Murder Room is an Adam Dalgliesh mystery novel by P. D. James. This isn't the first of her mysteries I've read, and they've all been headed by Commander Adam Dalgliesh. This popular figure has apparently inspired a British TV series called "Dalgliesh", which appears to have begun at some point between the time of my last read of one of his stories, and the time previous. clear as mud

The Murder Room sounds like an archetype murder mystery where everyone is locked in a room, and someone gets killed, but that is not the case here. James takes her time with the first few chapters introducing the cast of characters, which gets a little dry, frankly. while I'm waiting to get to the fun, frigging, part of the game Once we got into the thick of it, the story moved right along for me. 

Altho the characters were saying to one another that it was all pretty clear to them, I only had some suspicions, but not enough for it to be clear to me, but then I'm not a big mystery reader, or a detective, so it was interesting to read the whodunit part.

This was another great installment in the Dalgliesh series and you can see why they've done a TV show, which may still be running in the UK. If you're a mystery fan, especially a British mystery fan--yep, they read differently--then look up P.D. James.

 

 

empire of gold

The last book of the Daevabad Trilogy is The Empire of Gold. I can always tell when a book, or in this case a trilogy, has me; I spend extra time reading. S.A. Chakraborty did a great job with this as a first time author. Since this trilogy was released, she's done some newer things--under her full name Shannon Chakraborty--and it was one of those newer books that turned me on to her writing.

Empire was a little longer (784 pages) than the first two books, and if I have any notes on this book its that it could have probably been edited down a little. Perhaps we could have had a little less of the travelogue. One of the things I liked about this book was the restraint in the romantic engagements. If you're looking for the bodice riper version of the Arabian Nights, you're in the wrong place.* The romance is more demure in this trilogy; think Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy. There is fair amount of wrist touching and shivers.**

I was impressed with Chakraborty's world building, and she has the politics and history nailed down, as well as how the existence of the djinn is folded into our own world in ways that you and i just can't see, which gives the existence of the djinn their mythical quality. Chakraborty has taken a cue from Tolkien's writing when writing about the djinn. Instead of them being the wispy figments we see in other tales, the djinn of Daevabad are real, like the elves of Middle Earth.

If you're a fan of fantasy, swords and sorcery, and similar types of speculative fiction, you'll really enjoy this one. 

Read this book. Read all three! 

 

* If you're a fan of Shahrazad, however, you won't be disappointed about the heroine in this story. 

** If, on the other hand, you ARE interested in bodice ripping,*** rumor has it that Netflix has acquired the rights to do a series, and I'm assuming it will be a little sexier, if that series actually happens.

*** For those of you offended by the use of the term bodice ripper, I'm using it here to refer to that more modern, scandalous type of romance novel where (consensual) sexy time takes center stage, and can get pretty graphic. The term does have some harder meanings when referring to older stories which seemed to celebrate more violent scenes, ravishment, or other code words for taking advantage of women. No means no. See what I'm talking about in this one minute read here.

 

 

 

kingdom of copper

This is book 2 of the Daevabad Trilogy by S. A. Chakraborty. I had taken this book out a few weeks ago by mistake, not knowing it was book 2, so I returned it and got the first one. By the time I read that one and returned it, this book was lent out, but through the magic of the inter-library loan program, I got an email a day later that this book had arrived from one of the other libraries in the North of Boston Library Exchange (NOBLE) network. if you haven't been to the library, then go--a few times--and see what they can do

Sometimes the second book in a trilogy feels like filler, or just a bridge between the intro in book 1 and the climax in book 3, but this one didn't feel like that, and I think that is especially nice given that this is the first work of this author, who now goes by her given name Shannon Chakraborty. 

Any great adventure story has something difficult for the protagonist(s) to overcome; the big baddie, the evil plot, the end of the world, and this one is no different. The Kingdom of Copper fleshes out the personalities of the main characters, tests their resolve, and uncovers parts of their personalities that didn't come to light, or at least not so clearly, in the first book. This volume also introduces the big problem. And its much bigger than we were lead to believe in the first book. 

This one ends in an almost literal cliffhanger, so while the idea is that each book in a trilogy can or could be read independent of the others, this one does leave you hanging. But I was also left looking forward to the last book in the trilogy (which I took out from the library at the same time, and I am currently reading!) 

city of brass

About a week and a half ago, I took an S. A. Chakraborty book out of the library, it ended up being book 2 of the Daevabad Trilogy, The Kingdom of Copper. I shouldn't take out books when I'm in a hurry I guess. So I returned it and took out this book, book 1: The City of Brass. I'll be going back to get book 2 again.

Once I started reading, the story and especially the characters, seemed familiar, but I haven't been diligent in keeping up this blog so I could only find one of  Chakraborty's more current books on the list here on the blog.* But after I finished this one, I think I did read something else a while ago, and after looking on Chakraborty's website, I think it must have been The River of Silver, which are "Tales from the Daevabad Trilogy," a book outside the trilogy, but including stories from that universe. If I remember correctly it included some stories that may contain spoilers for the trilogy, but it also contains stories that could have been, but weren't, part of the trilogy; alternative plot lines that may have originally been pursued while writing the trilogy and then abandoned or edited out.

Chakraborty says that she is a speculative fiction author, and who am I to disagree, but I'd say that this book falls into the fantasy group as well, and maybe more specifically the sword and sorcery sub-genre. The City of Brass exists in a concealed place where humans can't see or go, hidden in a world parallel to our own; similar to our culture of four or five hundred years ago, across lands that span from the northern and eastern coasts of Africa, across he Middle East to the Indian Subcontinent.** She's woven a pretty complex tale of the secret lives, cultures, and politics of the djinn culture. A people with races, homelands, languages, and abilities that may have all originated as one people, but have diverged over the centuries. Now these people are similar to men--who they do interact with--and have their own politics, religions, prejudices and wars.

Into this, drop our heroine, Nahri, who lives an orphaned, hand-to-mouth existence of cons and hustle on the streets of Cairo, and hopes for a better life, when she inadvertently becomes caught up in the djinn world. This was a fun one, and I found myself spending extra time reading it, and as I said, I'm looking forward to the next one.

 

* I speculated that The Adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi would have a follow-up, and it apparently does now--or will shortly. The Tapestry of Fate comes out in May.

** There is a map in the frontmatter of this book, and it wasn't until I finished that I discovered a glossary in the back, which would have been good to know as I was reading.

dark sacred night

I’m pretty sure this is a re-read... It’s possible I recognize the storyline from the TV show, but I’m not sure.* I haven’t been keeping up with my reviews or even recording which books I’ve read here on the blog, and preventing accidental purchases and re-reads is one of the main reasons I started keeping this blog.

Dark Sacred Night is a Harry Bosch novel is from 2018, and I may have read it in 2020 or '21, when I had some spotty record keeping on my reading, or even last year, when my record keeping bordered on nonexistent.

Michael Connelly has the Harry Bosch nailed down at this point, and this book may be our first introduction to Detective Renée Ballard, who teams up with Bosch to look at a cold case. There is a fair amount of Ballard own casework as well; a number of smaller cases that she works through at the same time the larger cold case arc is going on. This seems to me to help establish Ballard as a character readers (and Bosch) can relate to so that when she appears in future stories, we have a sense for who she is a little more quickly. Solving 2 or 3 other smaller cases builds her character’s résumé pretty quickly.**

Fans of Bosch books will probably like this one, although his overall personality story arc seems to be showing signs of stress in the form of a loosening of his moral code.

Because I’ve haven’t read the Bosch books in chronological order, it is harder to comment intelligently on the development of the Bosch character, but there it is!

 

* After some looking, this site says that Bosch season 6, is based on this book. Who would have thought that a site called Comic Book Resources, would be the site that has this info, altho I will say you need to dig for that name, as they seem to just go by CBR, and maybe that's why.

** Fans of Ballard may be pleased to hear that she has her own TV show, presumably a spinoff of the Bosch franchise.