Cast in Shadow by Michelle Sagara
Seven years ago, Kaylin Neya fled the streets of Nightshade to escape a killer who was after children who had strange markings appear on their skin, markings that had appeared on Kaylin's own arms. Now she's a young officer of the Hawk caste, and when children started disappearing again, she, along with Tiamaris, a member of the Dragon caste, and Severn, a member of the Wolf caste who was once a part of Kaylin's family of street children, and who she does not trust, is sent to get to the bottom of things.
When I read Sagara's Hunter duology(written as Michelle West) earlier this year, I noticed that she was prone to being rather prosy, sometimes with a bit too much romanticism, though not enough to affect my enjoyment. Though not nearly as obvious, that tendency towards being prosy is still evident here, but it feels slightly out of place. While the setting is high fantasy, the plot, setting, and characters have a noirish feel, almost making the book feel more like urban fantasy than high fantasy. All the characters seem to live in more of a moral grey area than a strictly right or wrong, good or bad one, and about the only thing that's consistently portrayed as being "bad" for most of the book is killing children. Even the revelation of the truth behind the event that led to Kaylin fleeing Nightshade and distrusting Severn isn't simple, and is neither a misunderstanding now what it seems.
All in all, a good book, and very different from the other books I've read. I am, though, somewhat confused about the castes. Some seem to be humans who wear the uniform, others humans who have picked up some attributes of the creatures they name themselves after, and others to actually be those creatures in human form. While there seems to be a clear distinction between them in that world (Kaylin is currently a human bearing the Hawk name, but it's mentioned that she could eventually gain wings) I'm not sure that I understand exactly how those lines are drawn myself.
When I read Sagara's Hunter duology(written as Michelle West) earlier this year, I noticed that she was prone to being rather prosy, sometimes with a bit too much romanticism, though not enough to affect my enjoyment. Though not nearly as obvious, that tendency towards being prosy is still evident here, but it feels slightly out of place. While the setting is high fantasy, the plot, setting, and characters have a noirish feel, almost making the book feel more like urban fantasy than high fantasy. All the characters seem to live in more of a moral grey area than a strictly right or wrong, good or bad one, and about the only thing that's consistently portrayed as being "bad" for most of the book is killing children. Even the revelation of the truth behind the event that led to Kaylin fleeing Nightshade and distrusting Severn isn't simple, and is neither a misunderstanding now what it seems.
All in all, a good book, and very different from the other books I've read. I am, though, somewhat confused about the castes. Some seem to be humans who wear the uniform, others humans who have picked up some attributes of the creatures they name themselves after, and others to actually be those creatures in human form. While there seems to be a clear distinction between them in that world (Kaylin is currently a human bearing the Hawk name, but it's mentioned that she could eventually gain wings) I'm not sure that I understand exactly how those lines are drawn myself.