CBR15 PASSPORT (Stamp #6: Books recommended by friends. Namely ALL of you.)
When Cannonballers can’t shut up about a book, you read it. I’d like to say I’m sorry it took me so long to read it, but…nope. ‘Cause I have the opportunity to read the other two books in this trilogy without waiting for them to be published. Hee hee!
Yikes! You guys were not wrong about this one. In the last year or so I have found my way back to science fiction and fantasy and I do not regret it. World building! Neat crazy weird shenanigans!
This book is terrifically hard to talk about without spoiling things. The plot runs deeeeeeeppppp, people! As so many of you have already read it, it is also a big “womp, womp” of a review to write. This path is worn down. And, it’s always harder to review something you really, really like. So, hard.
Muir creates a world built upon the creation of Nine Houses, each a distinct part of a universe held together by an all-powerful god-like Emperor. Oh, and it’s a universe full of necromancers. Lots of bones here, people. Lots and lots of bones. Each house’s leader is a necromancer protected by a cavalier. Each is paired, for the most part, from birth.
When the emperor calls for all of the houses to compete for the Lyctorhood, each pair from the houses shows up: by the book soldiers, mismatched twins and a haircut, puberty-struck and inseparable teens, a historian and her unequipped husband, brains and the brawn, the sickly and the strong, the religious zealots, the guilt-ridden daughter, and her indentured servant. The winning necromancer will ascend as an immortal disciple that serves alongside the Emperor.
Okay. Deep breath. It’s a gothy space romp inside an escape room inside a haunted house with Hunger Games-level competitors locked inside. How did I do? It’s also a book about trust and friendship among people who don’t trust or have friends. People wounded by circumstance, stunted by duty, beholden to centuries of tradition and religious belief. And feelings. It’s about pesky feelings you feel despite yourself. Pesky feelings that have been holding you together without you knowing it.
It was a glorious read and I can’t wait to crack open the next one.
