The Dust of 100 Dogs
78. A. S. King, The Dust of 100 Dogs
Emer Morrisey, though only a girl, has a reputation as one of the most fearsome pirates of the Spanish Main. Yet on the day when everything she wants most - her one true love and treasure galore - is within her grasp, a longtime enemy catches up with her, cursing her with the dust of 100 dogs. The curse forces Emer to live 100 lives as a dog, until she is finally reborn as the human Saffron Adams in 1972. Saffron has just one thing on her mind: return to the Caribbean island where she hid her treasure more than 300 years ago, reclaim her lost wealth, and break free of her loser family forever. As Saffron searches for Emer’s buried treasure, past and present collide in unexpected ways.
I was extremely disappointed with this book. I liked the concept, but the execution fell far short of the idea. I must say, I was immediately put off when I read an Evil Nun story near the beginning of the book; since those stories tend to piss me off, I’ll admit I was somewhat prejudiced against the rest of the book. However, I do think there are artistic problems with this novel as well. For starters, the “100 lives as a dog” thing was almost completely irrelevant to the rest of the story. As events progress, Emer shares a few things she remembers from her lives as a dog, but they don’t fit with the plot, and I found them distracting - Emer could have just time-traveled into the future, and the main story wouldn’t have suffered at all. Secondly, I couldn’t stand Emer as a character: I found her actions inconsistent, I didn’t care about her quest, and I don’t think she grew or changed at all in the course of the novel. Some of her choices were just plain bewildering. For example, her Irish village is destroyed by Cromwell’s soldiers when she’s a child, but when she grows up she decides to engage in piracy against the Spanish! Since she supposedly resents the English for destroying her home, and Spain and England are hostile to one another at this point, shouldn’t she be on Spain’s side? I could go on, but I’ll spare you further ranting. The only thing I enjoyed about this book was Saffron’s vivid daydreams about graphically torturing the people who annoyed her. Those were funny; but otherwise, I disliked pretty much everything about this book.