There’s always so much to admire in Moon’s work that, even when she’s not fully engaged, readers will be gratified.
In this sequel to Cold Welcome (2017), itself part of a long-standing military science-fiction series, ex-Adm. Ky Vatta must confront a murderous conspiracy against her family and the government of her home planet, Slotter Key.
In the previous adventure, Ky overcame sabotage, treachery, and abandonment to bring her inexperienced troops safely home and reveal the outlines of a simmering plot against the Vatta clan and business empire. This time out, Moon emphasizes cloak-and-dagger intrigue rather than her heroine’s specialty, space combat. Ky learns that her troops have been seized, drugged, and held incommunicado, while all the evidence of the conspiracy that she so carefully collected has disappeared. And, along with her love interest, Rafe, CEO of a corporation that manufactures instantaneous communicators, she finds herself tied up in legal knots, cut off from her finances, and threatened with arrest and imprisonment. Clearly the conspirators reach to the highest levels of Slotter Key’s government—but who bears Vatta such vicious, long-standing ill will? Ky must discover the whereabouts of her troops before their jailers can permanently dispose of them, while other family members—Grace, the planet’s Rector of Defense, and CEO Stella, whose relationship with Ky has often been prickly—lead the resistance. Once again Moon’s adherence to the military honor code drives and binds the plot’s mechanics while providing a mute and perhaps ironic commentary on modern public affairs. Sadly, we get only a few glimpses of the opposition, one of whom, rather feebly, is motivated solely by old familial grudges and rivalry while another—quite implausibly—disagrees and prepares to betray his own family. And, somewhat deflatingly, it proves to be a yarn that, rather than working up to the conclusion, winds down.
There’s always so much to admire in Moon’s work that, even when she’s not fully engaged, readers will be gratified.Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-101-88734-9
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2018
At Buckkeep in the Six Duchies, young Fitz, the bastard son of Prince Chivalry, is raised as a stablehand by old warrior Burrich. But when Chivalry dies without legitimate issue—murdered, it's rumored—Fitz, at the orders of King Shrewd, is brought into the palace and trained in the knightly and courtly arts. Meanwhile, secretly at night, he receives instruction from another bastard, Chade, in the assassin's craft. Now, King Shrewd's subjects are imperiled by the visits of the Red-Ship Raiders—formidable warriors who pillage the seacoasts and turn their human victims into vicious, destructive zombies. Since rehabilitating the zombies proves impossible, it's Fitz's task to go abroad covertly and kill them as quickly and humanely as possible. Shrewd orders that Fitz be taught the Skill—mental powers of telepathy and coercion possessed by all those of the royal line; his teacher is Galen, a sadistic ally of the popinjay Prince Regal, who hates Fitz all the more for his loyalty to Shrewd's other son, the stalwart soldier Verity. Galen brutalizes Fitz and, unknown to anyone, implants a mental block that prevents Fitz from using the Skill. Later, Shrewd decrees that, to cement an alliance, Verity shall wed the Princess Kettricken, heir to a remote yet rich mountain kingdom. Verity, occupied with Skillfully keeping the Red-Ship Raiders at bay, can't go to collect his bride, so Regal and Fitz are sent. Finally, Fitz must discover the depths of Regal's perfidy, recapture his true Skill, win Kettricken's heart for Verity, and help Verity defeat the Raiders. An intriguing, controlled, and remarkably assured debut, at once satisfyingly self-contained yet leaving plenty of scope for future extensions and embellishments.
Pub Date: April 17, 1995
ISBN: 0-553-37445-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Spectra/Bantam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1995
A charming and persuasive entry that will leave readers impatiently awaiting the concluding volume.
Book 2 of Hearne's latest fantasy trilogy, The Seven Kennings (A Plague of Giants, 2017), set in a multiracial world thrust into turmoil by an invasion of peculiar giants.
In this world, most races have their own particular magical endowment, or “kenning,” though there are downsides to trying to gain the magic (an excellent chance of being killed instead) and using it (rapid aging and death). Most recently discovered is the sixth kenning, whose beneficiaries can talk to and command animals. The story canters along, although with multiple first-person narrators, it's confusing at times. Some characters are familiar, others are new, most of them with their own problems to solve, all somehow caught up in the grand design. To escape her overbearing father and the unreasoning violence his kind represents, fire-giant Olet Kanek leads her followers into the far north, hoping to found a new city where the races and kennings can peacefully coexist. Joining Olet are young Abhinava Khose, discoverer of the sixth kenning, and, later, Koesha Gansu (kenning: air), captain of an all-female crew shipwrecked by deep-sea monsters. Elsewhere, Hanima, who commands hive insects, struggles to free her city from the iron grip of wealthy, callous merchant monarchists. Other threads focus on the Bone Giants, relentless invaders seeking the still-unknown seventh kenning, whose confidence that this can defeat the other six is deeply disturbing. Under Hearne's light touch, these elements mesh perfectly, presenting an inventive, eye-filling panorama; satisfying (and, where appropriate, well-resolved) plotlines; and tensions between the races and their kennings to supply much of the drama.
A charming and persuasive entry that will leave readers impatiently awaiting the concluding volume.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-345-54857-3
Page Count: 592
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
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