(no subject)
After The Hidden City, which I loved, City of Night feels like kind of like a marking-time book - mostly because it's conveyed pretty early on that the entire movement of the story is Rath getting to the point three-quarters of the way through the book where he can write this letter:
Dear Sister,
I know we haven't spoken at all in the decades since I flounced out when you decided to leave home and be awesome, but as I have received ten million supernatural portents of doom telling me that I'm going to die by the end of the book, I thought I should let you know that I am bequeathing you my pet psychic street urchin and her wacky gang of misfits. Please feed them and take them for walks regularly.
(If you want, you can also have my collection of maps to the demon-haunted undercity and my wig collection.)
Love and kisses,
Rath
Up to this point, the book is mostly composed of Jewel and her gang of street urchins worrying about money, people telling Rath that if he ~continues on his dangerous course~ he's going to die by the end of the book, and Rath explaining what his plans are for dying at the end of the book.
After this point things get significantly more exciting and often heartbreaking! Which is pretty impressive of Michelle West, given that Rath has already explained most of what is going to happen and the rest has appeared in flashbacks in the Sun Sword books. And despite its marking-time feeling, the book is still enjoyable, but I am definitely more looking forward to the next one, which looks to focus a lot more on one of those story-tropes that I have a secret guilty fondness for: Street Urchins Transplanted Into Luxury Have Culture Clash, Must Learn Table Manners.
Dear Sister,
I know we haven't spoken at all in the decades since I flounced out when you decided to leave home and be awesome, but as I have received ten million supernatural portents of doom telling me that I'm going to die by the end of the book, I thought I should let you know that I am bequeathing you my pet psychic street urchin and her wacky gang of misfits. Please feed them and take them for walks regularly.
(If you want, you can also have my collection of maps to the demon-haunted undercity and my wig collection.)
Love and kisses,
Rath
Up to this point, the book is mostly composed of Jewel and her gang of street urchins worrying about money, people telling Rath that if he ~continues on his dangerous course~ he's going to die by the end of the book, and Rath explaining what his plans are for dying at the end of the book.
After this point things get significantly more exciting and often heartbreaking! Which is pretty impressive of Michelle West, given that Rath has already explained most of what is going to happen and the rest has appeared in flashbacks in the Sun Sword books. And despite its marking-time feeling, the book is still enjoyable, but I am definitely more looking forward to the next one, which looks to focus a lot more on one of those story-tropes that I have a secret guilty fondness for: Street Urchins Transplanted Into Luxury Have Culture Clash, Must Learn Table Manners.