Tangled Mind

What is it in humans that makes us so eager to believe ill of one another? ... What makes us so hungry for it? Failed idealism, he suspected. We disappoint ourselves and then look around for other failures to convince ourselves: it's not just me. [Prologue]

Audiobook reread, after listening to The Sparrow. It's many years since I last reread: here are my brief notes from 2007 reread. I stand by my original opinion, that this is not nearly as good or as well-structured a novel as The Sparrow. There is gorgeous prose, interesting ideas and a crowd of new characters: but there is also uneven pacing, political manoeuvring, and outright war.  There are, possibly, too many viewpoint characters, and a lack of the precise focus of the first novel. And there are several developments which felt unnecessarily cruel. ('She died last year.')

Narrated by Anna Fields, who manages the many accents and character voices -- across three species and a dozen nationalities -- admirably, with the sole exception of Northern Irish priest Sean Fein. I was especially impressed by her range of masculine voices.

I still hope for more SF from Mary Doria Russell, and I wish more of her books were available as ebooks in the UK.

... wizards he knew about sold curses and told fortunes. They did not crawl about inside one's heart and talk from other people's mouths and compel them... [loc. 2560]

Reread: I first read this in the 1990s, I think, and recall liking it: this was before I reviewed everything I read, so I don't know what I thought about it then. This time around, without having reread the two preceding novels of the 'Rusalka' trilogy, I was confused and unengaged.

Perhaps it was not the blind malignancy of fate making my life so complicated. Perhaps it was me. [Whiskeyjack, loc. 4159]

Rereads to sustain me through a bad cold and the aftermath of my birthday celebrations: I can think of few better remedies.

Whiskeyjack (original review here) introduces layers of complication, curses, several people who are not who they say they are, and Mr Dart's magic becoming more obvious to those around him. After reading Olive and the Dragon, Jemis' mother's letter has new poignancy.

Blackcurrant Fool (original review here) is the one where they all go to Tara: there are highwaymen, kittens, dens of iniquity, and Jemis' toxic ex-girlfriend. Also a devastating denouement, and some healthy post-colonialism. In some respects this is my least favourite of the novels, though it can't be because of the setting...

Love-in-a-Mist (original review here) is a country-house murder mystery, with a unicorn, the revelation of the Hunter in Green's identity, coded messages in the personal ads, and a missing heiress. I think this might be my favourite so far.

Even just rereading my old reviews is making me want to plunge on to the currently-final novel, and the novellas... but I will save those for especially awful days between now and Bubble and Squeak.

[They say] that keeping them here in the pits is too much, that it goes beyond war. They say we should just kill them, make them slaves or send them home, but ah, I like the pits. It reminds us that all things must change. I recall the Athenians as they were a year ago: their armour flashing like waves when the moon is upon them, their war cries that kept you up at night, and set the dogs howling, and those ships, hundreds of ships gliding around our island, magnificent sharks ready to feast.[loc. 131]

I reviewed this back in December 2023: prepublication review. Since then, I've been puzzled by readers saying they'd expected something light-hearted and humorous -- then I discovered that it won the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction 2024, and that it was being promoted as 'bold and funny', 'Fierce, funny, fast-paced', 'hilarious' etc. Reading these plaudits, you may be surprised to find that the novel's mostly set in a concentration camp, where prisoners (chained and starving) are regularly beaten to death.

“The real reason necromancers keep being born to the Stones line is not because the Stoneses are blessed of Saint Death. It is because the first necromancers of the Founding Era instigated a wrong long ago, and Saint Death wants to put to right. [loc. 6868]

My review from January 2024. Reread to prepare for my ARC of the second in the trilogy, Saint Death's Herald, of which the review is imminent. There was a lot in Saint Death's Daughter that I'd forgotten, and some of the novel resonated differently this time round. (The Blackbird Bride misgenders Lir!) Still splendidly complex, lexical, comic, tragic and inventive.