A skillfully spun yarn of murder and mayhem, if one that sometimes plods.
George delivers a fresh installment in her Lynley/Havers procedural series, this one more politically charged than most.
“Dominique’s white and she thinks white, which is to say most of the time she doesn’t think at all because she doesn’t have to think. She never thought we might be better off if we hired someone without marshmallow skin, no offence.” So says an embittered mixed-race filmmaker who’s been paired, much to her disgust, with a White photographer to document life in the Black African and Black British neighborhoods of London. There’s a hidden undercurrent to the story, which speaks to George’s title: Especially among the Nigerian community, female genital mutilation is widely practiced in order to transform young girls “into vessels of chastity and purity for men.” A young Nigerian Briton named Tanimola Bankole is being packed off by his bigamous, bullying father to marry such a “suitable” bride in the homeland; other characters have undergone or are slated to undergo the procedure, carried out in illegal butcher shops in the mews and back alleys of Peckham, Lewisham, and thereabouts. DS Havers is on the case, following the trail of victims with the help of a White reconstructive surgeon and advocate. So is DCS Lynley, flummoxed by the fact that one of his detectives has been murdered after she set to work on the FGM beat—and that a senior officer in the Metropolitan Police seems somehow to be involved in her killing. George’s story is too long by a couple of hundred pages, with strands that go pretty much nowhere (that of the photographer being one). Still, for all the cultural sensitivities involved in the premise, she handles the details thoughtfully. Was it a basement butcher who killed the inspector? A senior officer? A disgruntled sibling? Mystery buffs will be pleased that, having followed a winding path strewn with red herrings, they won’t be likely to guess at the murderer’s identity until the very last pages.
A skillfully spun yarn of murder and mayhem, if one that sometimes plods.Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-59-329684-4
Page Count: 704
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Nov. 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
Unrelenting, and not in a good way.
A young Navarrian woman faces even greater challenges in her second year at dragon-riding school.
Violet Sorrengail did all the normal things one would do as a first-year student at Basgiath War College: made new friends, fell in love, and survived multiple assassination attempts. She was also the first rider to ever bond with two dragons: Tairn, a powerful black dragon with a distinguished battle history, and Andarna, a baby dragon too young to carry a rider. At the end of Fourth Wing (2023), Violet and her lover, Xaden Riorson, discovered that Navarre is under attack from wyvern, evil two-legged dragons, and venin, soulless monsters that harvest energy from the ground. Navarrians had always been told that these were monsters of legend and myth, not real creatures dangerously close to breaking through Navarre’s wards and attacking civilian populations. In this overly long sequel, Violet, Xaden, and their dragons are determined to find a way to protect Navarre, despite the fact that the army and government hid the truth about these creatures. Due to the machinations of several traitorous instructors at Basgiath, Xaden and Violet are separated for most of the book—he’s stationed at a distant outpost, leaving her to handle the treacherous, cutthroat world of the war college on her own. Violet is repeatedly threatened by her new vice commandant, a brutal man who wants to silence her. Although Violet and her dragons continue to model extreme bravery, the novel feels repetitive and more than a little sloppy, leaving obvious questions about the world unanswered. The book is full of action and just as full of plot holes, including scenes that are illogical or disconnected from the main narrative. Secondary characters are ignored until a scene requires them to assist Violet or to be killed in the endless violence that plagues their school.
Unrelenting, and not in a good way.Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374172
Page Count: 640
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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