Review: Daring by Elliott James

daring by elliott jamesFormat read: ebook purchased from Amazon
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genre: urban fantasy
Series: Pax Arcana #2
Length: 387 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: September 23, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

THE WEREWOLVES HAVE A NEW LEADER…AND HE CANNOT BE STOPPED.

Something is rotten in the state of Wisconsin.

Werewolf packs are being united and absorbed into an army of super soldiers by a mysterious figure who speaks like an angel and fights like a demon. And every Knight Templar—keepers of the magical peace between mankind and magickind—who tries to get close to this big bad wolf winds up dead. No knight can infiltrate a group whose members can smell a human from a mile away…no knight except one.

John Charming. Ex knight. Current werewolf. Hunted by the men who trained him, he now might be their only salvation. But animal instincts are rising up to claim John more powerfully than ever before, and he must decide if this new leader of wolves is a madman…or a messiah.

My Review:

fearless by elliott jamesAlthough I read Daring before Fearless (review here), I’m posting it after. I’ll be packing for WorldCon in Spokane when this posts, and frankly, I needed to have stuff pre-done for as much of this week as possible. Let’s face it, the odds on my managing to write up reviews and prep posts while at Sasquan are virtually nil. And so they should be.

But about this book…Daring is the second book in the Pax Arcana, and it helps to have read the first book, the surprisingly terrific Charming (reviewed here) first. While the author does a pretty good job of summarizing the action so far, and in John Charming’s charmingly snarky voice, you always miss some of the nuance.

And Charming is damn good urban fantasy of the snarky hero/antihero school, so what’s not to love?

The concept of the Pax Arcana still feels like an awesome invention. It’s the concept that magic happens around us all the time, but because of a massive spell that the fae cast just before they left Earth, we can’t see it (unless it’s a question of survival). The fae also created a force of Pax cops – we know them best as the Knights Templar, and pretty much every other order of secret-keeping warriors that has ever been.

John Charming is a big problem for the knights, and it’s one that they created for themselves. John was trained as a knight, just like his father and his father and every other Charming before him. But John’s mother was bitten by a werewolf just before John was born, so John is also a werewolf. The Knights kill werewolves on sight, having decided somewhere in the way back that werewolves are ipso facto violations of the Pax just for existing.

Except that John breaks all the rules, because he is definitely a werewolf, but he is still bound by the geas that binds all knights to protect the Pax. If his existence were an automatic violation, he would have to off himself. But John feels no compulsion towards suicide. The powers-that-be in the Knights don’t want anyone exploring the walking contradiction that is John Charming.

This is also a story where the Knights are not necessarily good, and the monsters are not necessarily bad. They all still have all the messy motivations that regular humans do – so some on both sides are good, and some on both sides are rotten to the core. Except vampires, they’re just rotten, and sometimes rotting.

charming by elliott jamesSo when the Knights blackmail John into helping them with a werewolf problem, they do it in the nastiest way possible – they threaten the lives of all the friends that John made during the story in Charming. So John goes along, but also ties the Knights up in some interesting magical protections of his own, because John knows the Knights are not playing fair with him and his friends.

They never do.

But John’s insertion into the big werewolf clan goes even worse than the Knights’ biggest fears – because there is way more going on than their limited perspective on anyone other than themselves is able to comprehend, and because they screw thing up again while they try to screw John over again. Along with everyone else.

Escape Rating A-: This series gets better and better as it goes along. I say that and I’m in the middle of book 3 as I write this review. The trajectory is definitely upwards.

One of the fun things in this story is just how screwed up the Knights are at this point in their history. They seem to be mostly following their leaders blindly, in a world that keeps changing out from under them. They have historically relied on the Pax and their ability to confuse mundanes through chemicals or spells, but the Earth’s population boom combined with the communication power of the Internet is breaking the Pax faster than they can repair it.

Also they have decided that some creatures are automatically their enemies that aren’t necessarily, but by being targeted they become enemies. That the Knights also don’t give a damn about any normal humans that they murder in their quests does not make them any friends, either. Eventually, people start to suspect. And resent. Definitely resent.

John is a werewolf, but he is also a Knight. However, the Knights murdered his lover to get at him, and are threatening the lives of his new friends. He is not kindly disposed towards them. When the werewolf clan takes him in, he gets involved because they seem to be mostly good people, and mostly just defending themselves, and it feels good to be all of who he really is, instead of having to hide parts of himself.

But while many of the werewolves are just good people, there are some who have a much bigger (and badder) agenda, using the general werewolf population as meat-shields and other, even worse, possibilities.

As the clusterfuck reaches epic proportions, John discovers that the sides he thought he was on are not as clearly defined as he thought – and that his own origin wasn’t the unhappy accident he believed.

There is a lot going on in this installment. John has to embrace both sides of his nature, and he does it by fits and starts. Mostly by fits. He also has to learn to not just be in a group, but also lead one, and it’s a demonstrably hard lesson for a man who has spent decades as a lone wolf.

It’s also a story where all the motives are murky on all sides. John knows that the Knights mostly mean well, for select definitions of the word well, but they often do badly and definitely believe that their supposedly righteous ends justify any means, when all it means is that they lose their humanity in the process of becoming Knights, sometimes even more so than the monsters they hunt.

John’s desire to believe in the werewolf cause constantly conflicts with his cynicism. He knows its too good to be true, even when some parts of it are demonstrably true. His conflict drives him to snark and frustration at every turn.

His story also shows that even for a sometimes monster, it is much easier to get by with a little help from your friends.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Fearless by Elliott James + Giveaway

fearless by elliott jamesFormat read: ebook provided by the publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genre: urban fantasy
Series: Pax Arcana #3
Length: 448 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: August 11, 2015
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

When your last name is Charming, rescuing virgins comes with the territory — even when the virgin in question is a nineteen-year-old college boy.

Someone, somewhere, has declared war on Kevin Kichida, and that someone has a long list of magical predators on their rolodex. The good news is that Kevin lives in a town where Ted Cahill is the new sheriff and old ally of John Charming.

The attacks on Kevin seem to be a pattern, and the more John and his new team follow that thread, the deeper they find themselves in a maze of supernatural threats, family secrets, and age-old betrayals. The more John learns, the more convinced he becomes that Kevin Kichida isn’t just a victim, he’s a sacrifice waiting to happen. And that thread John’s following? It’s really a fuse…

My Review:

daring by elliott jamesI rushed into Fearless immediately after finishing Daring (review next week) and I absolutely couldn’t stop reading it all day. Read at breakfast, read at lunch, read on the stationary bike, read during game saves and cut scenes. Just read.

The Pax Arcana series is gripping and gritty urban fantasy of the “hero is a snarkmaster” school of thought. Start with Charming (reviewed here). John Charming isn’t charming, but he has a cynical way of explaining what’s going on that will keep you turning pages long after you should get some sleep.

So far, at least, John Charming isn’t really very charming, and although he can be daring, at least in the “fools rush in” sense, he isn’t fearless either. It’s just that most of John’s fears are for the people around him and not for himself. He’s having a hard time admitting that he deserves a chance at happiness, or peace of mind, or even a decent night’s sleep.

In Fearless, we have the first story where John rushes in to save someone who is not a member of his merry band of tricksters, and a story where John himself does not start out as the primary bait or target.

Sheriff Ted Cahill, former Clayburg police detective (in Charming) and current Tatum County Sheriff and recently made dhampir, has invited John and his friends to help him with a missing persons cases that smells supernaturally fishy.

So John begins this story as a not-so-innocent bystander, sitting in a diner with his almost-girlfriend Sig and watching as seemingly every creepy and/or inanimate being or thing in Tatum starts zeroing in on college-student Kevin Kichida, who feels (or smells) just a little bit supernatural himself.

The trail leads John and Company to a powerful witch baking bread near Tatum, and a supernaturals-only underground fight-club in New York City. As John and Sig navigate the crowded supernatural community of New York, they try to draw just the right amount of attention from the man who runs the fight club – an old man who has spent centuries using his own descendants in an attempt to make himself a god.

Poor Kevin is his grandson, and he’s scheduled to be granddad’s next human sacrifice – unless John and Sig and their friends can get to granddad first. And end him.

Escape Rating A-: Rules are made to be broken. Or in the case of the Pax Arcana, seriously, seriously bent. One of the continuing threads in this series is the way that the bad guys, or the deluded guys, will use the letter of the Pax to get around the spirit of it.

While I’m specifically thinking of the way that the Knights have indoctrinated all of their generations to believe that werewolves and other supes are a threat to the Pax just be their existence (they actually aren’t), the whole thing gets stretched to its limits by the evil dude in Fearless.

He is always very, very careful to hide what he is doing from the normals, even as he pulls shit that makes everyone want to hurl. He never exposes the supernatural community to outsiders. He just wrecks completely magical murderous crap within it.

Breeding descendants solely for the purpose of taking over their bodies and extending your life is so disgusting that even his own ancestors have rejected him.

charming by elliott jamesThe Knights, and other so-called defenders of the Pax are often evil bystanders, and by that I mean in the sense of “the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” With a lot of truly evil creatures, the Knights and their associated brethren do a whole lot of nothing, while pursuing too many people who are willing to live and let live, but stretch the Knights’ definition of people.

Like John Charming and his friends. They take on Kevin’s grandfather not because no one else can, but because no one else will.

The way that the final pieces of the plot/counterplot come together at the end is awesome, and also awesomely convoluted. One of the conventions of this series, at least so far, is that we don’t see all of the pieces until after the dust has barely settled, and John finally explains what he and his cohorts did. It lets the reader get caught up in the danger zone, without knowing how it will all turn out. I like it.

I also like John Charming and his rather motley group of friends. John is definitely out of the snarky anti-hero as hero school of urban fantasy. His self-talk and overall narrative tone have the kind of gritty cynicism that reminds me of Harry Dresden in the later Dresden Files, or or John Taylor in Simon R. Green’s Nightside. John Charming is never quite sure whether he’s mostly a good guy because he wants to be, or because he’s compelled to be, or because staying with Sig and their friends is way better for his humanity than going back to being a lone wolf.

Fearless also has the feel of a big caper story. There are a lot of moving parts, some of which are moving in realms and phases that we can’t see. In the end, those parts all come together in an explosive climax that will make you groan, and then, finally and in relief, cheer.

After the end of Fearless, the eARC included a sneak preview of the untitled fourth book in this terrific series. While I’m ecstatic to know that there IS a next book, I’m afraid to read the preview. I know it will be just too much of a tease because I already want it NOW!

Fearless Button 300 x 225

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***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Charming by Elliott James

charming by elliott jamesFormat read: ebook provided by the publisher via NetGalley
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genre: urban fantasy
Series: Pax Arcana #1
Length: 366 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: September 24, 2013
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

John Charming isn’t your average Prince…

He comes from a line of Charmings — an illustrious family of dragon slayers, witch-finders and killers dating back to before the fall of Rome. Trained by a modern day version of the Knights Templar, monster hunters who have updated their methods from chainmail and crossbows to kevlar and shotguns, he was one of the best. That is — until he became the abomination the Knights were sworn to hunt.

That was a lifetime ago. Now, he tends bar under an assumed name in rural Virginia and leads a peaceful, quiet life. One that shouldn’t change just because a vampire and a blonde walked into his bar… Right?

My Review:

I’m not sure why, but when I originally picked this up, I thought it was going to be slightly cutesy. I think it might have had something to do with the whole “Charming” name. The mental trail went from Charming to Prince Charming to fairy tales to cutesy.

Having read Charming, I can see just how off-base I was, and in a good way. There is a connection between John Charming and Prince Charming, but not the way I thought. The book Charming is urban fantasy of the kick-ass anti-hero school, where the hero and monster hunter is none too sure whether or not he’s one of the monsters himself.

And the kind of dark and gritty world where bad things happen to good people every bit as often, sometimes moreso, as bad things happen to bad people. Or bad monsters. Or just bad things.

This is also a story where the vampires are very definitely the bad guys, and where the werewolves may or may not be much better.

The setup for this particular urban fantasy world is pretty awesome. It’s the Pax Arcana, and as a founding myth, it’s rather cool. The concept is that there has always been magic in the world. The supernatural has always walked (or slithered, or whatever) among us. But, and it’s a very big but, when the fae folk left our world for wherever, they left behind a powerful spell that prevents any normal human from truly seeing all that magical weirdness that happens all around us.

And being tricksy fae, they also created an all too human group of Pax enforcers and scattered them all over the world, under a magical compulsion that makes them fight the supernatural and protect mankind. It also makes them reproduce so that they make new generations of guardians to protect the world.

The internet is making their lives a bit difficult, something that will probably feature more in later books.

This story, and the series, centers on John Charming. He’s supposed to be one of those Knight-enforcer types, but something went seriously wrong. His mother was bitten by a werewolf just before he was born. He might be a werewolf. He might not, But his former colleagues have decided that whatever he is, he’s an abomination who must be eliminated. They keep trying, often with catastrophic results and collateral damage. Their neverending hunt keeps John alone and on the run.

Until a Valkyrie walks into his bar, hunting a very stupid vampire who has some surprisingly smart friends.

John finds himself in the middle of her vampire hunt, and part of a group of surprising, and surprisingly ept, volunteer monster hunters. John finds himself doing the right and wrong thing simultaneously, as he falls for the Valkyrie and drives her lover to become an even bigger monster than the ones they are hunting.

And all he wanted to do was stay safe, keep his head down, and quietly tend bar. But John Charming’s life is never that quiet.

Escape Rating B+: While the dark and gritty setting and tone of this story will remind a lot of readers of every urban fantasy they’ve ever read and loved, the creation and explanation of the Pax Arcana itself is extremely cool. It’s a combination of self-fulfilling prophecy and vicious cycle all rolled into one. One often very nasty, but still, one.

The story is told in John’s first person perspective. It gives the author an excuse to explain the way the world works, and we see John’s twisted view of his world and everything in it. In some ways, John and his world remind me of the early years of The Dresden Files, without as much descent into the male gaze. Although at least so far, John’s love life is every bit as unlucky as Harry’s.

One of the things I liked about the overall story is that it doesn’t descend into a romance, or even worse, the dreaded love triangle. It’s not that John and Sig the Valkyrie don’t have strong feelings for each other, but there’s no hearts and flowers, and certainly no HEA or even HFN. Instead, they act as catalysts in each other’s lives, making the other realize that there is shit they need to take care of before they might be ready for each other or someone else.

Of course, some of Sig’s shit nearly gets everyone killed.

I hope we see the good parts of this team again. Both Molly and Choo represent different and equally bizarre and believable ways that regular people might find themselves discovering the Pax. Sig’s story about how she enlisted Police Detective Ted Cahill by hanging him over a building and forcing him to see the magic is equally off-base and equally plausible in this world. She needs a cop, so she recruits one by force.

All things considered, Charming is a very interesting introduction to a new-to-me gritty urban fantasy world. I’m looking forward to the rest of the series. And for anyone interested in snagging a copy of Charming for their very own, there is a Goodreads giveaway going on right now.

daring by elliott jamesI’m headed straight to Daring, the second book in the series, to see how John gets himself into even more trouble.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: The Mechanical by Ian Tregillis

mechanical by ian tregillisFormat read: ebook provided by the publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genre: science fiction, alternate history
Series: Alchemy Wars #1
Length: 440 pages
Publisher: Orbit Books
Date Released: March 10, 2015
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

My name is Jax.

That is the name granted to me by my human masters.

I am a clakker: a mechanical man, powered by alchemy. Armies of my kind have conquered the world – and made the Brasswork Throne the sole superpower.

I am a faithful servant. I am the ultimate fighting machine. I am endowed with great strength and boundless stamina.

But I am beholden to the wishes of my human masters.

I am a slave. But I shall be free.

My Review:

There were two things running through my head as I read The Mechanical. The first was that the institution of slavery, any kind of slavery, in its desire to dehumanize the slaves, mostly succeeds in dehumanizing the masters.

This is certainly true in this story, even through the “slaves” in this particular alternate history are clockwork machines. If their owners thought that the assemblages of metal and gears and alchemy were things rather than people, it could almost be excusable. The clakkers really are just animated collections of things. They also happen to be people, as long as your definition of “people” encompasses the possession of free will rather than simply an origin in biological instead of mechanical processes.

Although the question of what is free will definitely comes into play here, with catastrophic results.

But this world that the author has created, an alternate 1926 in which the Dutch rule the world because they possess the alchemical secrets to make and bind clakkers, reminds me also of the future that Captain Picard posited in the Star Trek Next Gen episode The Measure of a Man. For those not familiar, this is the episode where a scientist tries to take possession of Lieutenant Commander Data by asserting that Data is just a machine, and therefore the property of Starfleet to do with as it wills, including disassemble him to see what makes him tick. Picard successfully defends Data’s personhood, in a moving speech where he raises the possibility of an army of slave-Data’s doing all of Starfleet’s dirty work, unwillingly condemned to centuries of servitude.

The Mechanical in effect puts that future in a much earlier time frame, but the arguments are the same. It is the mechanical man, the clakker Jax who demonstrates the full depth of humanity’s inhumanity to this new form of sentient life.

This story is an alternative history, and an action/adventure type quest that starts out in an attempt to save the clakker’s, and to preserve the French government in exile, who are effectively the Rebel Alliance fighting a long defeat.

Not a single one of the obvious to me antecedents kept me from enjoying the book in front of me. Then again, I love the antecedents.

The Mechanical is the first book in the author’s Alchemy Wars, so a chunk of this story is setting up the background for those wars, as seen through the eyes of the clakker Jax, the French intelligence agent Berenice, and the poor, unfortunate former French spy and eventual Dutch assassin, Visser.

We see the world in 1926, more than a century after scientist Christiaan Huygens melded alchemy to clockwork and created the first Clakker. Due to clakker-power, the Dutch control the world.

There is also a strong resemblance between the clakkers and golems, legendary creatures of Jewish folklore who are created out of clay and alchemy.

But the world created by the invention of the clakkers is a very different 1926 than the one we know. In ways that made this reader wonder if a later theme of the series will be that the creation of a permanent underclass to do all the hard work has not been good for the creativity and advancement of humankind. But we’re not there yet.

Instead, we see the setup of a great world-spanning war, as the Dutch are on the brink of expanding their control over the entirety of North America, and the French intelligence service is working in secret to stay alive, even if it means creating or suborning a clakker service of their very own.

And in the middle of it all is Jax, one lone servitor clakker who has accidentally found his free will, and is willing to do anything to keep it, even allying with the French and inserting himself into his very own heart of darkness.

Escape Rating A: This is a big book, and I suspect it is just the opening salvo in what will become a very big series. It takes a lot of set up to get this universe going, but it feels like all the setup is absolutely crucial for understanding how this world came about and the herculean effort it will take to push it into a different track.

One of the fascinating parts of the story is that the clakker Jax is much more human than the human intelligence officer Berenice. In spite of the terrible things that happen to her, Berenice is an unsympathetic character and her people are often disgusting. The only redeeming thing about the French court-in-exile is that it exists in opposition to the Dutch, who are even worse. (Back to my comment at the beginning about slave holding removing the humanity of the masters more than that of the slaves.)

Just as in Star Trek Next Gen, there are times when Jax is the most compassionately and understandably human of all the focus characters. He certainly feels more guilt than they do when he makes a mistake.

While the movement and counter-movement of empires is the force behind the big events in the story, it is Jax’ description of the intense pain of conflicting orders, or geasa, and the ways in which his people have found solidarity amidst their suffering that both warms the soul and chills the heart. It makes them fully “people” in a story where the humans so often are not. We can see that this is exactly what would happen. And we fear that it is all too much like what did happen in our real history.

rising by ian tregillisBook 2 of this series, The Rising, can’t come soon enough for this reader. I await it eagerly with anticipatory chills.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Ancillary Sword by Ann Leckie

ancillary sword by ann leckieFormat read: ebook borrowed from the library
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genre: science fiction
Series: Imperial Radch #2
Length: 359 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: October 7, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

What if you once had thousands of bodies and near god-like technology at your disposal?

And what if all of it were ripped away?

The Lord of the Radch has given Breq command of the ship Mercy of Kalr and sent her to the only place she would have agreed to go — to Athoek Station, where Lieutenant Awn’s sister works in Horticulture.

Athoek was annexed some six hundred years ago, and by now everyone is fully civilized — or should be. But everything is not as tranquil as it appears. Old divisions are still troublesome, Athoek Station’s AI is unhappy with the situation, and it looks like the alien Presger might have taken an interest in what’s going on. With no guarantees that interest is benevolent.

My Review:

ancillary justice by ann leckieIf you love SF and particularly space opera, or even if you just remember it fondly, you absolutely have to read the first book in Ann Leckie’s Imperial Radch series, Ancillary Justice (reviewed pretty damn enthusiastically here). Go forth now and read. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

Ancillary Justice won all the SF awards this year, and there’s a reason – it’s absolutely marvelous. All the great things everyone has said are all true.

Ancillary Sword is the followup, and it was worth the wait. I’m now desperately hoping for a third, because Breq’s journey is clearly not done. The Imperial Radch, and the Leader of the Radch still very much need Breq’s help. Even if, or especially because, Anaander Mianaai’s right hand is plotting a coup against its left hand.

Breq is the only person that the Leader seems to even semi-trust. (When you are literally at war with parts of yourself, full-trust of anyone is out of the question. If you can’t trust yourself, who can you trust?)

Why the trust? Because Anaander Mianaai is a many-cloned being who can be in multiple places at the same time because all the clones carry her consciousness. It’s just that the empire has gotten so huge that instantaneous communication is no longer possible. Lack of coordination breeds confusion and civil war. The clones have different agendas, or at least different visions of the future of the Radch.

Breq knows what it is like to be one among many of yourself; she used to be a ship, Justice of Toren. In the 20 years since one part of the Leader of the Radch ordered her to kill the officer that she cared for, Breq has been concealing her identity and searching for a way to get the Leader’s attention.

Now she’s got it, and not necessarily in a way that she wants. What she can’t get is either her beloved Lieutenant Awn back or her place as one of many ancillaries on a ship. Breq is now singular, alone in her own head, and she has to find a way to be, if not human, at least an independent person with only one body and one perspective.

She is also aware that one of the Anaander factions may have decided that the best way to continue the Radch is to enslave or kill a lot of the people in it. For various definitions of enslave, kill and even people.

Breq has one ship, one crew and one mission; to preserve Athoek Station, its jump gate, and the population that live on the station and the breadbasket planet below.

But Breq’s method of preserving the planet will upset all the powers-that-be not only on Athoek, but all the way back to the heart of the empire. When both sides are serving the empire, how do you decide who the traitors are?

Escape Rating A: One of the fascinating things in Ancillary Justice is Breq’s identity. She doesn’t see herself as having gender (ships, after all, don’t) and the Radch uses a genderless noun, Citizen, for all its people. Breq refers to everyone as “she”. It does rather turn convention on its head.

Breq has a female body, but that isn’t what affects her perspective. She is much more aware of not being an ancillary any more, and not being one of the many limbs of a ship. She misses it, and she misses being part of the whole. But her consciousness of the difference, and her awareness that ancillaries are enslaved people who have been stripped of their identity informs her actions; as does her awareness of the preciousness of life. At the same time, she still has the perspective of the efficiency of the machine; she is always looking for the best way to get the job done, and she doesn’t care who she upsets in the process. She doesn’t care, in the human sense, about very many people. While her ability to empathize is often lacking, she often finds the compassionate solution simply because she doesn’t care what people think.

There is a lot of very human skullduggery in this story that Breq has to figure out and eliminate. The civil war in the Radch is upsetting the status quo, and there are a lot of people on Athoek who are extremely invested in the status quo. Including many officers who believe that their actions serve the Radch, and who may or may not be right.

The overall story is of Breq learning to be human. Or at least to be an individual. She knows all the right things to do, and sometimes she manages to do them. What is interesting is watching her adjust through her pain at being separate, while acknowledging that it is the right thing to do. On the other hand, what she doesn’t see is that the pain and working through it makes her more human.

While the particular problems in Ancillary Sword do get wrapped up, the ending makes it very clear that there will be more to Breq’s story (thank goodness). I’ve seen a reference to the title as AM, so my bets are on Ancillary Mercy, as Mercy of Kalr is Breq’s ship. Or rather, the ship that she is captain of. Her original ship was Justice of Toren (hence Ancillary Justice) and the ship who gives her the most trouble in this book is Sword of Atagaris (therefore Ancillary Sword). Whatever the title of book 3 in the Imperial Radch saga, I can’t wait.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Heaven’s Queen by Rachel Bach

heaven's queen by rachel bachFormat read: ebook (purchased)
Formats available: ebook, paperback
Genre: Science fiction; space opera
Series: Paradox, #3
Length: 388 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: April 22, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

From the moment she took a job on Captain Caldswell’s doomed ship, Devi Morris’ life has been one disaster after another: government conspiracies, two alien races out for her blood, an incurable virus that’s eating her alive.

Now, with the captain missing and everyone — even her own government — determined to hunt her down, things are going from bad to impossible. The sensible plan would be to hide and wait for things to blow over, but Devi’s never been one to shy from a fight, and she’s getting mighty sick of running.

It’s time to put this crisis on her terms and do what she knows is right. But with all human life hanging on her actions, the price of taking a stand might be more than she can pay.

My Review:

The titles of the Paradox series did not really resonate with me until Devi herself brought it to my attention.

“Hello, Deviana,” he said, his voice calm and dreamy. “It is always a pleasure to share space with any companion of my darling Novascape and Copernicus. I was just about to start a game. Do you play chess?”

My smile vanished. Why did all these former Eye types keep asking me that? “No,” I said, “I don’t know how.”

I feel you Devi. I’m not a chess fan myself, and I do not enjoy anyone trying to turn chess into a metaphor for life. It’s just a game people. Personally, I hope that by the time human society has expanded into several galaxies, and encountered a multitude of sentient alien life, we would have moved beyond the chess obsession.

Which is to say, that unlike Marlene, the chess comparisons do not resonate with me. Devi’s character does evolve over the course of the series (which I discussed in detail in my review of Honor’s Knight), but, much to my chagrin, she doesn’t mature into a queen in her own right.

However, we’re all forever grateful that Devi booted Charkov off the angst-ridden-love-slave train. I finally started to get behind their relationship once he’d started sharing necessary information about the Eyes, Maat, and the Daughters with Devi. Basically once he stopped waffling and went all in, I could ship it.

Then…well, then I found out why people have been comparing this series to urban fantasy. “Devi, I am a tortured old vampire man, the last survivor of my species planet, who never understood love until you. Alas, my demon symbiont hates you for bringing joy to my soul and will forever try to take you from me. I am so utterly selfishly enslaved by your vagina that I couldn’t bear to leave before, but now, despite always knowing this would happen, I truly know how dangerous I am. Woe. Ennui.”

“The only way you put me in danger was by not telling me this shit earlier!” I yelled, ignoring the pain in my throat as I shot to my feet as well. “If you want to beat yourself up over something, beat yourself up over that, but like hell am I letting you abandon me out of some stupid, chivalrous, self-punishing sense of guilt.”

YES. Of course, being Devi, she immediately solves the problems that Eyes have been plagued with for 90+ years on symbiont control. The Eyes clearly needed to recruit more practical soldier types, and fewer True Believers.

Once we all stop rolling our eyes at the romance hurdles, Rachel Bach decides to use the opportunity to drop a Paradoxian-society-bomb in our laps.

I couldn’t help it. I burst out laughing. It was horribly inappropriate, but I couldn’t stop. He just looked so damn earnest. “You can’t get me pregnant,” I said when I finally got a hold of myself. “I’m Paradoxian, remember?”

The look on Rupert’s face at that moment was absolutely priceless. “What does that have to do with it?”

“I never got out from under the ban,” I said, wiping my eyes. “Honestly, Rupert, what kind of girl did you think I was?”

If Rupert had looked bewildered before, he looked absolutely dumbfounded now. “Ban?”

My smile faded. “The king’s fertility ban.” When that got nothing, I spelled it out for him. “All Paradoxians are sterilized at twelve. Breeding rights aren’t returned until you’ve finished your military service.”

Rupert’s bewildered expression had turned horrified by the time I finished, and I put my hands on my hips. “How do you not know this? The ban’s been in place for over a century. It was all over the Terran propaganda during the Border Wars.”

“Exactly,” Rupert said. “I always thought it was just propaganda.” He pushed up on his elbows, looking me straight in the face. “You’re seriously saying your government forcibly sterilized you?”

“Not forcibly,” I said. “My mom took me in to get it done on my birthday. The whole thing was over in ten minutes. And it’s not like it’s forever. I’ve been eligible to have it reversed for years. I just never saw the point. I mean, do I look like the sort of person who wants to worry about babies?”

I finished with a grin at the ridiculousness of that idea, but Rupert was still staring at me like I’d grown a second head. “I’m sorry,” he said, falling back on the bed as he reached up to rub his temples. “It’s just, it sounds a bit barbaric.”

“How so?” I asked, lifting my chin. “All Paradoxian children are wards of the king. You can’t let just anyone have them. We’re not animals, having babies all over the place. Barbaric, indeed. If you ask me, we’re the civilized ones. You Terrans let anybody be a parent no matter how young or unprepared or undeserving they are.”

As I said this, I was again reminded how blessed I was to have been born under the Sacred King’s prudence. I couldn’t imagine growing up in the Republic with no living saint to watch over you. But while I was feeling rightly superior, Rupert had started to chuckle.

I still love the universe-building in this series, but what the fuck is this shit?!

Devi your creepy religious government has literally taken control of your body as a means of forcing military service and ensuring that only the devout breed?! How are you not bothered by this?! At this point, all my hopes that Devi would take out the so-called Sacred King when she dismantled the Eyes horrifying Daughter system crumbled into dust.

In the end, Devi could never buy into the Eyes’ fervor, because she was already a True Believer. Just a different flavor of devout, and no amount of exposure to other species, races, cultures, societies, and proof that her goddamn Sacred King was willing to sell of any of his (female) wards to the Eyes’ on a moment’s notice was going to change that.

In Heaven’s QueenDevi finally realizes that she has no one to rely on but herself and her Cook. Even Maat is an unpredictable ally. (Though you really can’t blame her. Almost a century of being used, abused, betrayed, and disregarded – it’d be hard to believe in sincerity).

Caldswell, Brenton and company all play a big part in the finale, namely trying (and failing) to put a leash on Devi. The problem with putting a bioweapon inside a sentient being is that person is going to have an opinion on how it is used. And when that person is Devi, said opinions will be expressed with a multitude of firepower and sass.

I can’t really delve too much into the overarching plot without giving things away. But it is safe to say that Paradoxians are creepily brainwashed from infancy, Terrans are moronically unable to think in any fashion that is not directly linear, and together they are both easily duped by and alien race, a psychotic immortal teenager, and/or a gun-happy mercenary.

Escape Rating: C+ for taking me on an exhilarating ride, and giving me the most unsatisfying conclusion. The last few pages of the book are just like watching the last few minutes of Battlestar Galactica. (Wow, that show was awesome….wait so Hera just screwed a bunch of neanderthals? Whaaaaa?). 

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Honor’s Knight by Rachel Bach

honors knight by rachel bachFormat read: ebook (purchased)
Formats available: ebook, paperback, audiobook
Genre: Space opera
Series: Paradox, #2
Length: 374 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: February 25, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

Devi Morris has a lot of problems. And not the fun, easy-to-shoot kind either.

After a mysterious attack left her short several memories and one partner, she’s determined to keep her head down, do her job, and get on with her life. But even though Devi’s not actually looking for it — trouble keeps finding her. She sees things no one else can, the black stain on her hands is growing, and she is entangled with the cook she’s supposed to hate.

But when a deadly crisis exposes far more of the truth than she bargained for, Devi discovers there’s worse fates than being shot, and sometimes the only people you can trust are the ones who want you dead.

My Review:

Marlene absolutely loved Honor’s Knight, calling it “Beauty and the Beast on steroids.” Once again I am forced to open my Paradox review by disagreeing with the pop culture comparisons previously tossed around. This is not a book about creepy stockholm-syndrome forced hook-ups. If we’re going to go the Disney route, Devi is more Elsa than Belle.

When we first see Devi in Honor’s Knight, she has no memory of anything important that happened in Fortune’s Pawn, from the big important things (like the ability to kill with an invisible black goo), to the little things (such as the name of that cook guy who is inexplicably repugnant).

On the bright side, this means no one is going to kill her anytime soon. Well….perhaps it would be better to say no one wants her dead for knowing too much. Devi’s still got a big target on her back, except now she’s even less sure why.

The great thing about Devi in this entry is that she starts asking questions. Our favorite ambitious merc has realized she’s stumbling about in the middle of a shit-storm, and she needs to decide how to navigate through it without getting splattered. No more ignoring the weird stuff, or blindly accepting facts as parsed out to her – Devi finally begins to really pay attention to the world around her.

In a way, Devi’s previous disinterest in anything other than shooting things up helps her look at the issues of the phantoms, the daughters, and Maat without any preconceived notions. Everyone else involved in this FUBAR’d “strategy” to “save the universe” is absolutely unwilling to accept that they have utterly lost control of the situation – if they ever even had it in the first place.

What kind of alleged intelligence organization thinks allowing aliens to create an insane immortal out of an angry teenage girl is a solution to anything? Much less to then sacrifice hundreds (thousands?) of other teenaged girls to become disposal insane copies of the original? The father of one such girl sums it up best:

Our children were taken to be fodder for a salvation that was a miracle for everyone except those it destroyed. But the true villainy of the Eyes isn’t that they made a hard choice, but that they never sought to find another. I have been a soldier all my life. I understand that sacrifices must be made. But we’ve known about the phantoms for seventy years now. In that time, the Eyes have become experts at keeping the secret, experts in hiding, in responding quickly to signs of a phantom attack. They even learned to manage the lelgis. But the one thing they have never improved, never sought to improve, were the lives of Maat and her daughters. They had their miracle, their weapon, and they have never sought to find another.

Bravo! Encore!

Devi ultimately shares this view, and as the story unfolds, quickly capitalizes on her unique status in the universe as Black Goo Carrier to force the Eyes to start looking for another way.

We spend less time with the inhabitants of the Glorious Fool this time around, which is really for the best. How much insanity can one crew really deal with while credibly maintaining their ignorance? Novascape must be doing an insane amount of space-weed to keep her head so firmly in the clouds.

We do, however, get a deeper look into Paradoxian society. Which, let’s just say, is not for me. Nothing like a theocratic aristocracy to put me off my food.

“Yes, but I need to tell it to the baron myself,” I explained. “Can I see him?”

The guard looked at me like I’d just asked the impossible, which, to be fair, I had. Now that I was back on the king’s land, I was a peasant again, and peasants did not demand to speak to barons. But I wasn’t about to start talking phantoms and plasmex plagues to a door guard.

“I just need five minutes of his time,” I pleaded. “If he doesn’t want to hear more after that, I’ll take the consequences.”

The punishment for wasting a noble’s time could be severe if you put them in a bad enough mood.

[…]

Though my face was now parallel with the floor, I saw the baron wave dismissively through my cameras. “Only idiots ignore unexpected urgent messages,” he said. “Now, sit down and tell me what’s so goddamn important. And it had betterbe important, soldier, or you’re going to learn what it means to waste the king’s time.”

I paled. Threats like that were normal, but I’d never heard a noble curse before. As blood relations of the Sainted King, they were above such vulgarity. But I wasn’t about to tell the baron that.

Is it possible for Devi to emigrate to a society that doesn’t pretend it’s ruling class are made up of gods? Where you can’t be publicly tortured for not bowing and scraping enough? PLEASE TELL ME THE SERIES ENDS WITH DEVI TELLING THE SAINTED KING TO SUCK IT!

Fingers crossed! Devi spends most of the book telling everyone making demands of her – Maat, The Eyes, The Defector Eyes, The Cook, The Captain – to, essentially, fuck off. It’s awesome. I have hopes for a destroyed monarchy in book 3.

Back to the romance, which Marlene seems to think is big part of this book. I think we can all sum it up as the fact that Rupert got some, would like to continue getting some, and apparently is willing to do whatever it takes to make that happen. He’s like a teenager blowing off curfew to hang out with his ONE TRUE LOVE FOR REALS MOM I’LL NEVER LOVE ANYONE LIKE HER EVER AGAIN. It’s alternately sweet and annoying. Thankfully, Devi keeps him in his place.

Escape Rating: B+ for not boring me with romantic ennui and allowing Devi to really cut loose this time around. When we leave off, Devi’s cut off from everything and has nothing left to lose. I can’t wait to see her go nuts in Heaven’s Queen.

Review: Fortune’s Pawn by Rachel Bach

œFortune's Pawn by Rachel BachFormat read: ebook (purchased)
Formats available: ebook, paperback, audiobook
Genre: science fiction romance
Series: Paradox, #1
Length: 341 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: November 5, 2013
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

Devi Morris isn’t your average mercenary. She has plans. Big ones. And a ton of ambition. It’s a combination that’s going to get her killed one day – but not just yet.

That is, until she just gets a job on a tiny trade ship with a nasty reputation for surprises. The Glorious Fool isn’t misnamed: it likes to get into trouble, so much so that one year of security work under its captain is equal to five years everywhere else. With odds like that, Devi knows she’s found the perfect way to get the jump on the next part of her Plan. But the Fool doesn’t give up its secrets without a fight, and one year on this ship might be more than even Devi can handle.

If Sigouney Weaver in Alien met Starbuck in Battlestar Galactica, you’d get Deviana Morris — a hot new mercenary earning her stripes to join an elite fighting force. Until one alien bite throws her whole future into jeopardy.

My Review:

I picked this up because I was in desperate need of some space opera – and Marlene had nothing but nice things to say. Plus, she reassured me this was a not just an excuse to have tentacle sex in zero gravity. (Before you ask, no I have not read the book I linked to. But when you google “tentacle sex zero g” – it was the first hit.)

First things first, Devi is no Ripley. Particularly not Ripley from Alien (1979). As a die-hard fan of the Alien series, I can assure you that Ripley began as a hidebound rule follower willing to let her crew die in order to follow standard protocol. Basically the opposite of Devi. The Starbuck reference works for me. Just imagine Starbuck with actual career ambitions – though all the self-sabotaging behaviors intact.

Generally, the most important part of any foray into a new science fictional universe is the world-building. Which, to be perfectly honest, Fortune’s Pawn was rather lacking on. There are two primary human governments….maybe? They are allies-ish? Possibly a theocracy vs democracy situation, or is it a monarchy vs corporatocracy dynamic?

In this particular instance, the ambiguity works. You do not get the impression that the universe doesn’t make sense, simply that Devi, our POV character, doesn’t really give two shits about it. Devi is a woman driven by one goal: to become the best-of-the-best-of-the-best, SIR! (Anyone catch that reference?) Politics and sociology are ancillary to her desire to be one of the most feared fighters in her society, so she doesn’t dwell on them.

Which is why it is such a rude shock to her to learn that bureaucracy plays a role in recruitment of Devastators. Following the advice of a friend, she leaps at the chance for a shortcut, resigns her commission, and signs up to work freelance security on the most dangerous ship flying. Devi’s single-minded ambition prevents her from asking questions she really should be asking, and allows her to stumble blindly into the middle of sociopolitical FUBAR that could do far worse than kill her off.

Devi’s colleagues aboard the Glorious Fool each harbor a wide-range of personality disorders that may not lay out precisely why they are on the suicide ship, but definitely imply enough for the readers to explore some possibilities. (Though not Devi, the girl is a bit dense.)

The only thing that fell flat for me was the “romance.” It was a very minor subplot, so it did not detract from the story as a whole….but seriously, is Devi really so damn desirable that a guy would gamble away careers and lives on the chance to hit that? No. She’s really not.

Escape Rating: B+ for blazed right through it and on to books 2 and 3. Fortune’s Pawn is a very enjoyable read, and leaves you, not with an eye-gougingly irritating cliffhanger, but a huge dose of wtf that means you will immediately pick up Honor’s Knight. (Review to follow next week.)

 

 

Review: Heaven’s Queen by Rachel Bach

heaven's queen by rachel bachFormat read: ebook purchased from Amazon
Formats available: ebook, paperback
Genre: Science fiction; space opera
Series: Paradox, #3
Length: 388 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: April 22, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

From the moment she took a job on Captain Caldswell’s doomed ship, Devi Morris’ life has been one disaster after another: government conspiracies, two alien races out for her blood, an incurable virus that’s eating her alive.

Now, with the captain missing and everyone — even her own government — determined to hunt her down, things are going from bad to impossible. The sensible plan would be to hide and wait for things to blow over, but Devi’s never been one to shy from a fight, and she’s getting mighty sick of running.

It’s time to put this crisis on her terms and do what she knows is right. But with all human life hanging on her actions, the price of taking a stand might be more than she can pay.

My Review:

Fortune's Pawn by Rachel BachThe chess theme of the titles of the books in the Paradox series is kind of a play on words. There are many times in the series when someone asks Devi if she plays chess. But in Fortune’s Pawn (reviewed here), Devi was a pawn of numerous forces. She, and the ship The Glorious Fool, seem to be dicing with Lady Luck and always losing. In Honor’s Knight (reviewed here), Devi is a knight errant searching for a way to save everyone, and in Heaven’s Queen, she meets the self-styled queens of heaven.

As the story progresses, the “gang” of The Glorious Fool gets scattered to the four corners of the galaxy, or so it seems. Every faction is on its own, doing its own thing to save the universe and save Devi.

Except that Devi and Rupert are the only ones who really want to save Devi, everyone else just wants to keep the secrets deep and secret, and save the universe. So many people are willing to die to keep the truth on the down low, instead of either fixing the real problem, or blowing things wide open.

There’s definitely a parallel to “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or of the one”. The issue is in who decides which are the many and which are the few. Also that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” only works if everyone agrees about who the enemy is.

In Heaven’s Queen, the humans discover that their biggest allies have a completely different agenda than everyone thought, and that their supposed mutual enemy is not really an enemy at all. Also that the ally is self-absorbed and narcissistic beyond human comprehension. Something that the allies don’t really care about, because they’ve been fooling us all along.

Devi’s search for a cure for her disease, and her search for truth, push the story in amazing directions. Not just the truth about her disease, but the truth about her entire life and the way she’s lived it.

The truth can set you free. In Heaven’s Queen, Devi’s truth sets everyone free.

honors knight by rachel bachEscape Rating A: I wish the hero’s name wasn’t Rupert. For some reason, that makes me think of bad historical romances, instead of kick-ass science fiction. Which is what Heaven’s Queen and the entire Paradox series is, fantastic science fiction with a touch of romance.

Lots of reviews proclaim that the Paradox series is SF for people who normally like urban fantasy. I’m not so sure about that. I love urban fantasy, but I’m not quite seeing the parallel. Maybe that’s just part of the paradox?

Devi is a heroine who sees a problem and does everything she can to solve it. Whether that means thinking her way around it or shooting through it, she gets the job done. But that’s what mercs do, get the job done. It’s either that or they don’t survive.

Part of the problem that Devi and Rupert have to solve is what they will be to each other. They are both living embodiments of deadly danger, and neither has any experience with relationships. Devi because she’s always thought that attachments were a distraction, and Rupert because his nature is sometimes uncontrollable. When they break down the barriers, they discover that they are perfect for each other. Also, they both believe it’s short-term, because they can’t possibly survive. Then they realize that they care for the other’s survival even more than their own.

Once they both have what they want, then they have to figure out how to keep it, and each other. The ending is a sweeping upstroke that is guaranteed to make you smile. And sigh.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.

Review: Honor’s Knight by Rachel Bach

honors knight by rachel bachFormat read: ebook purchased from Amazon
Formats available: ebook, paperback, audiobook
Genre: Space opera
Series: Paradox, #2
Length: 374 pages
Publisher: Orbit
Date Released: February 25, 2014
Purchasing Info: Author’s Website, Publisher’s Website, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Book Depository

Devi Morris has a lot of problems. And not the fun, easy-to-shoot kind either.

After a mysterious attack left her short several memories and one partner, she’s determined to keep her head down, do her job, and get on with her life. But even though Devi’s not actually looking for it — trouble keeps finding her. She sees things no one else can, the black stain on her hands is growing, and she is entangled with the cook she’s supposed to hate.

But when a deadly crisis exposes far more of the truth than she bargained for, Devi discovers there’s worse fates than being shot, and sometimes the only people you can trust are the ones who want you dead.

My Review:

The Paradox series is all about secrets. Bigger and badder secrets, and more and more desperate means of preserving them.

And although Mr. Spock famously said that “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or of the one”, the big secrets in the Paradox series are wrapped around the questions of “who decides” which needs are which.

Fortune's Pawn by Rachel BachAt the end of Fortune’s Pawn (reviewed here), Devi Morris had her memories altered because some of the powers that be decided that she knew things about the way the world worked that were way too dangerous to be let out of the bag.

Just because Devi’s memories of certain events were wiped did not mean that several other people/entities were not aware that she was a participant in those events. Too many people and factions either want what she knows, or want to kill her to keep that knowledge secret.

Memory rearrangement is not perfect, especially when part of the wipe is an attempt to make someone forget the love of their life. Those kinds of memories are too integrated into too many senses and emotions, and are triggered too easily.

Also, part of the purpose of the memory wipe is so that Devi will continue to be used by those same powers that be. If there is one thing that Devi Morris will not let continue, it is being kept in the dark and used.

She needs all the information she can grab just to survive.

None of the self-described “good guys” in this story actually are good. They all believe that they have chosen the lesser of evils, in order to protect the general population. But the evil that they have chosen is to sacrifice young women with the ability to manipulate the element plasmex, enslaving them to an insane woman so that they can plug a leak between the universes.

It works, sort of, but after 70 years of fighting, an endless number of these young women have been forced into mindless slavery, and murdered when they themselves go insane.

And that crack between the universes, well, what’s that all about? An opening has let “phantoms’ into our side, beings that destabilize whole planets. But what are the phantoms? Why are they doing it? What do they want?

No one knows. No one has even tried to know. The sentient races just keep destroying them, and chewing up young women in the process.

There has to be a better way, but no one seems to be interested in finding it. Until Devi gets involved. Devi’s been infected with a virus that can kill all the phantoms. The problem for Devi is that it can kill all of everything, including her, unless she gets it under control.

Half the universe wants to control her, and the other half wants to kill her on sight.

Little does she know, the situation is only going to get worse.

Escape Rating A: While part of me wants to say “Romeo and Juliet on steriods” as a description of the love story part, that isn’t strictly true. It’s more like “Beauty and the Beast”, although both Devi and Rupert would describe themselves as the beast, and the other as the beauty. There are multiple forbidden aspects to their romance, not the least of which if either of them loses control, they can unknowingly kill the other.

The problem with that, is that in order to fall in love, a person does need to lose some control. Both Devi and Rupert are capable of being living weapons if they let that happen. Talk about frustration!

This series, as a whole, is Devi’s search for the truth, a truth that everyone wants to keep from her, and that many want to kill to keep in general. On the other hand, Devi is pretty deadly herself.

Devi sees firsthand the destruction that can be wrought by the plasmex phantoms. However, she has also seen firsthand the deterioration and destruction caused by the “good guys” kidnapping and forcing into mental slavery the girls who are holding back the tide. Devi is certain that if people in general knew about the girls, the “daughters of Maat”, they would move entire planets, or at least entire planets’ worth of money, into researching a better solution.

But there are too many interests vested in keeping things the way they are, and not all of them are human.

The virus that Devi was accidentally infected with is one such possible solution, although one with a massively deadly side effect. A lot of the story is Devi on the run, trying to find the best way to use what she has, before it kills her.

heavens queen by rachel bachOne of the terrific things about Devi as a character, is that no matter how many times someone manages to capture her, she never gives in to victimhood, and she never waits for rescue. She’s a merc and it’s her job to rescue herself.

Honor’s Knight is definitely the middle book in the Paradox trilogy. While the plot keeps moving ahead at lightspeed, you can tell at the end of the book that there is definitely more story to be told. It’s a good thing that Heaven’s Queen is already out, because I didn’t stop two seconds between finishing Honor’s Knight and diving into Heaven’s Queen.

***FTC Disclaimer: Most books reviewed on this site have been provided free of charge by the publisher, author or publicist. Some books we have purchased with our own money or borrowed from a public library and will be noted as such. Any links to places to purchase books are provided as a convenience, and do not serve as an endorsement by this blog. All reviews are the true and honest opinion of the blogger reviewing the book. The method of acquiring the book does not have a bearing on the content of the review.