After several months being mostly dead (Ghost Story, 2011, etc.), Chicago wizard Harry Dresden’s back in his body…and of course, back in trouble in the 14th Dresden Files novel.
Harry’s attempt to have himself killed and thus avoid becoming Queen Mab’s champion/assassin, the Winter Knight, has failed, and his first target is Mab’s daughter, Maeve. That means he must figure out how to kill an immortal faerie while defending himself against the vicious, treacherous nobles of the Winter Court and the suspicions of the Summer Court. Harry also learns the disturbing true nature of Demonreach, the sentient island in Lake Michigan now under threat from the demonic Outsiders. If he is to surmount these multiple crises in the next 24 hours, he’ll have to regain the trust of his old friends and allies and master the skills and unsettling desires associated with the Winter Knight’s mantle. Harry’s struggle to reconnect with his friends, in the wake of their devastation at his death, the progress they’ve made without him, and their fear of what he’s become, are very real and poignant. Butcher also plots a long, long game, beautifully integrating small elements from the very first installment onward and gradually revealing their significance. But given that he tries to be so careful about these details, it is a shame that he isn’t assisted by more rigorous copy editing to clean up the continuity errors which continue to riddle the series. For example, it would be lovely if Butcher would explain how faeries, for whom the merest touch of iron and its alloys causes searing pain, can drive/ride in cars and operate various types of guns.
None of that, however, will stop readers from grabbing ringside seats the next time Harry Dresden goes forth to stop the apocalypse.Pub Date: Nov. 27, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-451-46440-8
Page Count: 496
Publisher: ROC/Penguin
Review Posted Online: Nov. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2012
Categories: FANTASY
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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. 25, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
Categories: GENERAL SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY | FANTASY | PARANORMAL FICTION | EPIC FANTASY | PARANORMAL FANTASY
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This debut novel, the first of a projected trilogy, blends science fiction, fantasy, gothic chiller, and classic house-party mystery.
Gideon Nav, a foundling of mysterious antecedents, was not so much adopted as indentured by the Ninth House, a nearly extinct noble necromantic house. Trained to fight, she wants nothing more than to leave the place where everyone despises her and join the Cohort, the imperial military. But after her most recent escape attempt fails, she finally gets the opportunity to depart the planet. The heir and secret ruler of the Ninth House, the ruthless and prodigiously talented bone adept Harrowhark Nonagesimus, chooses Gideon to serve her as cavalier primary, a sworn bodyguard and aide de camp, when the undying Emperor summons Harrow to compete for a position as a Lyctor, an elite, near-immortal adviser. The decaying Canaan House on the planet of the absent Emperor holds dark secrets and deadly puzzles as well as a cheerfully enigmatic priest who provides only scant details about the nature of the competition...and at least one person dedicated to brutally slaughtering the competitors. Unsure of how to mix with the necromancers and cavaliers from the other Houses, Gideon must decide whom among them she can trust—and her doubts include her own necromancer, Harrow, whom she’s loathed since childhood. This intriguing genre stew works surprisingly well. The limited locations and narrow focus mean that the author doesn’t really have to explain how people not directly attached to a necromantic House or the military actually conduct daily life in the Empire; hopefully future installments will open up the author’s creative universe a bit more. The most interesting aspect of the novel turns out to be the prickly but intimate relationship between Gideon and Harrow, bound together by what appears at first to be simple hatred. But the challenges of Canaan House expose other layers, beginning with a peculiar but compelling mutual loyalty and continuing on to other, more complex feelings, ties, and shared fraught experiences.
Suspenseful and snarky with surprising emotional depths.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-31319-5
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
Categories: GENERAL SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY | FANTASY | SCIENCE FICTION | GENERAL SCIENCE FICTION | SPACE | EPIC FANTASY
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