CBR14Bingo: Dough (I feel like I remember them eating bread in this book? Also there’s the use of currency. I’m struggling with the last two bingo squares.)
I read this based off wicherwill’s recommendation — the idea of Tamora Pierce for adults really hooked me, since I am a life-long Tamora Pierce fan. I’m happy to say that this lived up to the hype! I loaned my copy to my mom, so the recommendation chain is continuing.
In the world of Paladin’s Grace, gods are real and have paladins and temples that do their work. When Stephen’s god is murdered, he has to figure out how to continue in a world without the divine presence that sustained him. He and his remaining paladin friends get taken in by the temple of the White Rat, and he works as a bodyguard/general dogsbody for them. One day, he ends up running into Grace and helping her escape from the Hanged Mother’s acolytes. The rest of the book is a great mix of adventure, serial murder mystery, political intrigue, and romance.
Kingfisher packs a lot in here but the answers were satisfying and I didn’t feel like anything got lost in the complexity. I will say that personally, the trope of two people who can’t communicate that they like each other does irritate me, and it did here as well, but the reason for them both being shy and with no self-esteem was clear. I just don’t like self-sabotaging characters as a means to elongate the romance tension, which I felt like was sometimes what was happening here. I did like the spooky elements of the book, the political maneuvering, and a society with accepted nonbinary characters. Overall I liked this a lot and am going to ask for the next two books for Christmas.
