CBR15 Books 96-99: More books I read this summer and am only reviewing now to make it to 104

Cassiel's Servant - Jacqueline Carey

Page count: 576 pages

Rating: 3.5 stars

Kushiel's Dart is one of my favourite fantasy books, and books in general, of all time. It stands up, I re-read it this summer in preparation for the release of this. Has Jacqueline Carey done exactly the same thing as Stephenie Meyer and E.L James did, and retold her already existing novel from the POV of another central character? Yes, she has. Was I pretty sure that this was going to be a lot more worthwhile and actually better written than those other books? Also yes. So much so that I pre-ordered this pretty much as soon as I heard about it. 

This is clearly a book written for Carey's existing fans. I'm not sure that a new reader would get as much out of the story, three-quarters of which is indeed a retelling of Kushiel's Dart, told through Joscelin's eyes. In case you are entirely unfamiliar with Carey's epic fantasy story, Joscelin is the loyal and oath-sworn bodyguard and companion to Phédre, our courtesan spy protagonist. Since he's a warrior priest sworn to celibacy, falling in love with a woman who considers sex an act of worship isn't exactly ideal.

The first section of the book gives us entirely new material, with Joscelin's childhood and training with the Cassiline brotherhood, which he has to join while still very young. The training is rigorous and while he makes some friends, it's not a life in which he makes many lasting connections. Seeing certain specific sections of the novel from Joscelin's POV certainly adds more depth to them, and Carey makes it clear that there was a certain understanding between Hyacinthe and Joscelin which Phédre wasn't necessarily aware of.

I'm not sure this book needed to be written, but it's a nice gift to Carey's fans, and it brought me a lot of joy. I really wouldn't recommend it to new readers of her work, though.

Codename Charming - Lucy Parker

Page count: 382 pages

Rating: 3.5 stars

I love Battle Royal. I agree with some people that it should have more Bake-Off scenes, but I absolutely adore it, and the baking-related challenges grouchy Dominic and cheerful Sylvie face while falling in love. Towards the end of that book, Dominic's diminutive younger sister Petunia "Pet" DeVere saves the life of Johnny Marchmont, then fiancée to Princess Rose. Marchmont's bodyguard, Mathias Vaughn, feels very guilty that she got injured on his watch. By the time this book starts, Princess Rose and Johnny Marchmont are married and Pet works as Marchmont's personal assistant. The man is clumsy to the point of parody, and when the ruthless press starts writing scurrilous gossip pieces that suggest that there may be something between Pet and her employer, Princess Rose concocts a scheme where Pet and Matthias start fake dating, preferably being spotted canoodling in public, so the gossip dies down. 

Pet thinks Matthias finds her irritating. Matthias keeps being called ugly and brutish and is dealing with a lot of demons from his past. The two like and respect their employers enough that they go along with the preposterous plan, and hijinks ensue. Since both protagonists have been pining for each other, the fake dating gives them the excuse to finally give in to their feelings. 

Normally I devour a Lucy Parker novel in 24-48 hours. That was also the case with this one, but because it's slow to start and there are absolutely parts that didn't entirely work for me, they were just too farcical. Don't get me started on the reverse parrot heist (IYKYK) and getting locked in a closet. Is it Parker's weakest novel? No, that would still be Making Up (which is still a perfectly fine novel, it just doesn't manage the greatness of most of Parker's other books).

With the Fire on High - Elizabeth Acevedo

Page count: 400 pages

Rating: 4 stars

Emoni Santiago isn't exactly like other high school seniors. She's half African American, half Puerto Rican, and as well as juggling school and a part-time job to try to supplement her family's income, she's also raising her daughter Emma (whom she calls Babygirl). They both live with Emoni's Abuela, who raised Emoni after her mother died in childbirth. Emoni's father was absolutely devastated by the loss and left them both to go back to Puerto Rico. He returns every so often to visit, but Emoni has a very complicated relationship with her father. She has some contact with some relatives from her mother's side, but mostly, it's just her, Babygirl, and her Abuela, fending for themselves.

Emoni loves to cook, and frequently experiments with recipes, giving them her own twist from what feels right. People who eat her food often experience strong emotions, and she dreams of becoming a professional chef one day but also realises that it's a very far-fetched dream. However, when she gets a chance to take part in a special cooking elective in high school, and even travel abroad for a week to Spain, her horizons broaden and her dreams don't seem so impossible after all.

This was a lovely book, with some touches of magical realism. It wasn't quite the emotional gut-punch to me that The Poet X was, but it was a wonderful read and I can see why Acevedo is so highly rated among YA reviewers. I'm looking forward to reading more of her stuff.

Sleep No More - Seanan McGuire

Page count: 368 pages

Rating: 4 stars

Spoiler warning! This is book 17 in the series, and absolutely under no circumstances the place to start. There will also be some spoilers for book 16, because I don't think I could review this book without mentioning what happened to Toby at the end of that one.

October "Toby" Daye doesn't remember her real life. She doesn't remember her husband Tybalt, or her many friends and allies. She believes herself to be a lowly changeling servant, handmaiden to her pureblooded sister August, and living a sheltered life in her mother Amadine's tower. She is not a hero of the Faerie realms or a brave and resourceful fighter. She is meek, and timid and doesn't do a thing without permission. Her entire life is a lie created by a vengeful Titania, determined to shape all of Faerie to her demands. 

It thankfully doesn't take too long for things to start unravelling, little by little. When she accidentally tastes her own blood, she sees things that entirely contradict her current memories. A lot of people start telling her unbelievable things, about who she is and what she has done before. Even so, it takes four months for Toby's friends to reach her and start the complicated work of defeating Titania. Sadly, it takes her far too much of the book to remember her life with Tybalt and the poor man can barely look at her because it hurts him so much.

McGuire also published a book from Tybalt's POV, where we find out what he did in those four months and how he coped with the challenge of losing his beloved. I haven't read it yet, because there's usually pretty much a year between new books in the series, and I want to spread out the goodness so the wait for book 19 won't be so interminable. 

Crossposted on Cannonball Read

CBR15 Book 52: "Kushiel's Dart" by Jacqueline Carey

Page count: 1040 pages

Rating: 5 stars

CBR15 Bingo: Sex (the protagonist is a god-touched masochist courtesan spy)

Kushiel's Dart is the first novel in the Kushiel's Legacy series, which came to number six books in total. Jacqueline Carey also wrote an additional trilogy in her Terre D'Ange universe, and over the course of all of her books, pretty much explored every continent in her alternate-history fantasy world. This first book is set in an alternate historical version of Europe, set at about Renaissance times, or somewhat earlier, although the descriptions of the Skaldi society (Vikings) and the Albans (the Celts and Picts) clearly being from more medieval times. 

Our protagonists come from Terre D'Ange, which is located where our France would be. In this Universe, Jesus died on the cross and his blood, mingled with the tears of Mary Magdalene, fell to Earth, who gave birth to a new deity, Elua. Not acknowledged by the Yeshuite god, Elua went wandering the world in company with a number of angels who felt compelled to go with him. Eventually, Elua and his angelic companions came to the land that would become Terre D'Ange and settled there. Elua's main decree to all of his followers was "Love as thou wilt", and because of this, any sexual act is seen as holy by the D'Angelines. It also means that non-consensual sex of any kind is not only a crime, it's literal heresy. 

Phédre, our unlikely heroine, is the orphaned daughter of a courtesan, who is taken into the household of a mysterious nobleman. She is trained not only in the sexual arts, as a courtesan herself, but taught to watch, listen, observe, and reflect, and her patron, Anafiel Delauney, wants her and his other protegée, Alcuin, to spy for him and ferret out secrets among the nobility who have assignations with them, for reasons he refuses to reveal to them. Phédre has not only sworn herself to the service of Namaah, the goddess of pleasure but is utterly unique in her generation as someone marked by the stern god of punishment, Kushiel. She experiences sexual pleasure through pain, often the more extreme the better, and that makes her a valuable tool for Delauney to ferret out secrets. Both Phédre and Alcuin feel a strong debt of gratitude towards Delauney and therefore serve him with absolute loyalty, but as Phédre gets older, she can't help but wonder what conspiracy her patron is actually trying to uncover. Unfortunately, by the time she figures out the entire truth, she's also unearthed a conspiracy against the Crown itself and needs to be removed.

Since this book is more than twenty years old (originally published in 2001), anyone who wants to can find detailed plot summaries online. I don't really want to reveal too much of the plot, because part of the joys of this book is discovering it all for yourself. In a recent interview, the author herself described the book as "Kinky, but feminist! Epic fantasy, but alternate history! Tattoos! Slow-burn romance! Cool fight choreography! Subversive theology! Big battle scenes! Lyrical prose for readers who love words like ‘ormulu’ and ‘incarnadine!’" So if you think that might be something for you, you should absolutely consider giving it a chance. I hadn't read the book for more than a decade (probably closer to fifteen years by now) and was very happy to discover that it still absolutely holds up as well as it did in my memory, and still very much deserves its place as one of my favourite fantasy novels. I had forgotten just how slow it is to get started, but on the other hand, when the action finally kicks off at about the 40% mark, it doesn't slow down until the very last chapters and some of the action leaves you absolutely breathless. 

I first discovered this book back in 2004. I bought my mass-market paperback copy in Barnes and Noble on Union Square in New York while visiting my BFF Lydia. So it felt extra special to be re-reading it while I was visiting her and her husband now in their house in Vermont. The reason I remember so very clearly when and where I was when I first got this book is not only because it was unlike any fantasy I had read up until that point, pretty much, and it completely engrossed me, but also because the copy of the book that I bought had a misprint, where about halfway through, in possibly the most tense and dramatic section of the whole book (and that's saying something), about 70 pages of the book were missing. There was just a repeat of the previous 70 pages instead. I can promise you that it was a terrible place to suddenly be ripped out of the story, and I had to rush back to the bookstore the next day and secure myself another copy (which thankfully did not have the misprint), so I could see if my beloved protagonists survived their desperate trek through the icy northern wastes (if you've read the book, you know which bit I'm referring to). 

I decided to re-read this now because Jacqueline Carey published her companion novel Cassiel's Servant at the start of August, where we get to know Phédre's unfailingly loyal (if initially deeply disapproving) companion Jocelin Verruil a lot better. Not only do we get to see the events of Kushiel's Dart from his POV, but we also find out about his life before he gave his vow to protect and serve Phédre, no matter what. Unlike E.L. James and Stephanie Meyer, who also wrote POV novels from "the other side", this doesn't feel like a cynical cash grab to me. For one thing, Carey waited more than 20 years after publishing her original novel to do this, and Joscelin's book comes out 12 years after the last book Carey published in her Terre D'Ange universe. She's written a lot of other things in the interim, and I don't think she'd write and publish this companion novel if she didn't feel like it could shed new light on her already cult classic novel. 

It also pleases me that this book happened to become my 52nd review of the year. It feels good to Cannonball on a really excellent novel. 

Judging a book by its cover: In the decades since the novel first came out, it's had many different covers, but this is pretty much the original one. It was recently re-published with some gorgeous UK covers, that I'm going to have to resist buying (I already have the entire original trilogy, I don't need new copies). I know it's probably irrational, but I hate that the illustrated Phédre has bangs - why did anyone think that was a good idea? Phédre is supposed to be absolutely gorgeous (apparently nearly all D'Angelines are near-perfect specimens), and based on the historical setting this is supposed to take place in, that hairstyle feels very out of place.  

Crossposted on Cannonball Read. 

#CBR10 Book 107: "Starless" by Jacqueline Carey

Page count: 592 pages
Audio book length: 21 hrs 41 mins
Rating: 4 stars

Khai was destined from birth to become the Shadow of the Sun-blessed princess Zaryia. Both born during the same eclipse, Khai was the child who caught the hawk's feather thrown by the selected priestess, thus confirming that he was the chosen one. Raised by warrior priests deep in the desert, Khai is trained in all the deadly arts of stealth and fighting, and gets his first chance to kill a man at age nine. He hones all his abilities to become the very best Shadow to his soul's twin, destined to guard and protect her against all evil. Yet when he nears puberty, Khai makes a startling discovery, and needs to reassess everything he previously believed about himself and his identity.

When Khai passes the trials necessary to confirm him as the Sun-blessed princess' Shadow, he makes his way to the court of the king and finally meets Zaryia. The soul twins both feel like they've found the missing piece of themselves, and together have to navigate the gossip and deadly intrigue of the royal family. Zaryia is a scholar and dreams of being a prophecy hunter, but that seems unlikely, living the sheltered life in court that she does. Unexpectedly, however, while preparing for Zariya's betrothal, the princess and the young warrior find themselves and their lives taking an entirely new path - one of adventure and mystery, danger and fellowship.

The dark god Miasmus is rising in the west, and Zaryia and Khai are two of the individuals destined to help stop him from covering the world in death and destruction. If the prophecy hunters succeed, the stars could return to the heavens once more. If they fail, the world will end.

Kushiel's Dart, Jacqueline Carey's debut novel, is still one of my favourite fantasy novels of all time. So the discovery that her most recent novel was a completely stand-alone fantasy, a full book, no interminable waiting for sequels for years and years, was very welcome. The non-western setting of this book was also a pleasant surprise, and the identity crisis our protagonist Khai has to go through over the course of the novel was also interesting.

I listened to this book in audio, and according to Goodreads, it took me about five months to get through the book, so it's difficult for me to say exactly how long the various parts were. The early parts of the book, Khai's upbringing in the Fortress of the Winds with the Brotherhood of Pahrkuhn was all very engaging, if somewhat slow at times. The section at the Court at Merabaht and the backstabbing and intrigue there was probably the least interesting. It felt like the book spent too long dealing with Khai's childhood and every single detailed aspect of his training, then there was a lull when he got to court, only for the plot to get almost too hurried towards its conclusion and the big "saving the world" conclusion. We don't really get a chance to properly get to know the band of adventurers that Zaryia and Khai are destined to fight Miasmus with. Their whole quest happens too quickly and because we've spent too much of the book in the desert, or with the decadent court in Merabaht, we also don't invest enough in the various characters who find themselves in danger, nor care when some of them inevitably perish before the quest reaches its conclusion.

While I really like Khai, and the various Brothers of Pahrkuhn, I found Zaryia and her many excessive endearments a bit grating. Seriously, she calls everyone "my darling", as is pretty much everyone, from the servants to casual acquaintances, to her close and actual beloved family. I think I also would have preferred it if the relationship between her and Khai remained extremely close, but platonic - the romantic development felt forced and a bit tacked on.

As always, the world-building is excellent and as I mentioned earlier, I really liked that the book takes place in a non-western setting, with a middle eastern/islamic feel to the first half, and the bits at sea taking place in what I imagined to be a sort of Pacific island style place. Sadly, because the final third or so, when they go on their adventure, is so hurried, a lot of the later locations aren't given their proper due, the reader doesn't get the same detailed feel for them as the earlier settings in the desert and the court.

This wasn't a bad book, by any means, and I am deeply thankful that the story was wrapped up in one book, no matter how rocky some of the structuring and characterisation was. It kept failing to really hold my attention, though, which (coupled with the fact that I've had a lot on my plate for the latter half of the year) probably accounts for the fact that it took me just so long to get through the audio. I was enjoying the book when I actually listened to it, but never felt any compelling need to pick it back up again and progress, so it took months and months to get though. I may have liked it more if I'd read it in a more compressed time line. Still, it gets four stars for the ambitious world-building and the strides it makes for non-traditional representation. The characters are people of a variety of nationalities and colour, there's various gender identities and sexual preferences among them, one protagonist is disabled (and doesn't get magically healed at any point in the book, either). Well worth a read, if not as gripping to me as the Kushiel books.

Judging a book by its cover: The cover is pretty, and allows the reader to project a lot of their own ideas onto it. There's a number of falling stars, lighting up the sky in the background and falling to the dark earth below. In this book, the gods are physical entities who appear among people. They were once stars in the heavens, but fell (I don't remember entirely why). The skies are dark, except for the sun and the multiple moons. An ancient prophecy speaks of how the stars may be returned to the heavens - that's part of what this book is all about.

Crossposted on Cannonball Read.

#CBR5 Book 128. "Dark Currents" by Jaqueline Carey

Page count: 368 pages
Rating: 4 stars

Daisy Johanssen grew up in the town of Pemkowet in the Midwest. Her mother lives in a trailer and works as a seamstress, her father is an incubus accidentally summoned during an ill-advised Ouija board session when her mother was a teenager. Of course, you'd think being half-demon would make Daisy unusual in town, but there's all manner of supernatural beings in Pemkowet, and tourists travel from all over the country to see fairies and trolls and naiads and the like. Hel, the Norse goddess of the underworld keeps the supernatural element in check, and Daisy is her agent in the mortal world, as well as acting as supernatural liaison with the local police department.

When a young, wealthy college kid drowns and everything suggests supernatural involvement, the tourist trade could be seriously affected. The local police are under a lot of pressure, and Hel isn't all that happy with the situation either. Daisy has to work the case with Cody Fairfax, trying to hide the massive crush on him she's nurtured since high school. She also has to keep a lid on her volatile temper, as giving into the temptations from her demonic dad could set in motion Armageddon.

I'm a HUGE fan of Jacqueline Carey's Kushiel's Legacy series (I especially adore the Phèdre trilogy and the final Imriel book), and while I wasn't as enthused about her attempt at young adult literature, Santa Olivia, I've long been curious about her foray into paranormal fantasy. I just hadn't got round to checking it out. So when Vaginal Fantasy Hangout selected the book as their main read for October, it seemed like the perfect time to give it a try. This was the first book I read for this autumn's 24 hour Read-a-thon, and it was a good choice to begin with - the book is an entertaining and moderately action packed read, with an interesting premise and a cool heroine.

Daisy has obviously never had any direct contact with her dear old Dad, but has a close relationship with her mother, who raised her and helped to make her the helpful and brave young woman she's become. Frequently paranormal heroines have horrible or even villainous parents, so it's nice to get an example of a healthy, supportive and functional mother/daughter relationship. The various female relationships in the book are very well done, actually. There's Daisy's "crazy aunt" of a sort, Lurline, and her best friend, Jen, who she has a major falling out with over the course of the book because they're both interested in Officer Fairfax (and I was so happy when this wasn't dragged out for too long and turned into major, bitchy backstabbing drama).

So yes, there are romantic complications in the book. Cody the werewolf keeps his supernatural identity secret, and is determined that he can never be with a non-werewolf, yet that doesn't stop Daisy and her friend from fancying him. Thrown into the mix there is also Stefan, the intriguing new leader of the local biker gang (who are all ghouls), who clearly wants to get to know Daisy better, and over the course of the book, she also runs into Sinclair Palmer, a handsome Jamaican guy who wants to run a supernatural bus tour in town. Yet considering the steamy nature of Carey's first three fantasy trilogies, even though there are three different love interests introduced, those who like a strong romantic subplot will be disappointed - you don't even get kissing in this book.

You do get promising world building, an interesting premise for a series and a decent gallery of characters. The writing style of this book is much more sparse than the lush, poetic style of the Kushiel books, but there is a lot of humour as well as the mystery that needs to be solved, plus some decent action set pieces. I will absolutely be checking out more books in the series, because I liked "hanging out" with Daisy (and I want to see which of the supernatural hunks she eventually ends up with).

#Readathon October 2013: Hour the fifth

Reading now: Still on Dark Currents
Pages read in the last hour: 71
Pages read in total: 326
Books completed: Nearly done with the first one
Snacks consumed: Danish pepper candy
Mini-challenges completed:
Still nothing new. Going to have dinner and read more

#Readathon October 2013: Hour four

Reading now: Dark Currents - Jacqueline Carey
Pages read in the last hour: 65
Pages read in total: 255
Books completed: None so far
Snacks consumed: Only Coke and water
Mini-challenges completed:
Introductory questionnaire - none of the others have caught my fancy yet

#Readathon October 2013: Hour the third

Reading now: Dark Currents - Jacqueline Carey
Pages read during the last hour: 66
Pages read in total: 191
Books completed: None so far
Snacks consumed: Homemade chocolate chip cookies. Water
Mini-challenges completed:
Introductory questionnaire

#Readathon October 2013: Hour the second

Reading now: Dark Currents by Jacqueline Carey
Pages read during the last hour: 70
Pages read in total: 125
Books completed: None so far
Snacks consumed: Just half a glass of Coke
Mini-challenges completed: 
Introductory questionnaire

CBR3 Book 54: "Naamah's Blessing" by Jacqueline Carey

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Page count: 624 pages
Rating: 3 stars
Date begun: July 7th, 2011
Date finished: July 10th, 2011

This is the third and final book in a trilogy (which is, in turn, the third trilogy set in the fictional world of Terre D'Ange, and this review will contain some spoilers for the first and second books in the series. If you want to avoid them, skip this review, and go read Jacqueline Carey's excellent Kushiel's Dart instead.

Moirin has been away from her father's homeland of Terre D'Ange for years. She has endured much, experienced numerous exotic countries and cultures, but returns with her beloved husband Bao. The land she returns to is much changed. King Daniel is grieving his dead wife to the point where he's no longer able to rule and has appointed an ambitious Regent to rule in his stead, three-year-old princess Desirée, a miniature version of Queen Jehanne, hardly ever sees her father and is being raised by nursemaids. The crown prince, Thierry, is on an expedition to Terra Nova, the recently discovered continent far across the sea to the West. Moirin and Bao do their best to make the princess feel loved and Moirin accepts the role as Desirée's oath-sworn protector, even though several people at court fear and avoid her, due to her half-pagan heritage. When disaster strikes the royal house, Moirin and her husband have to travel to Terra Nova, to prove that Prince Thierry is not dead, as rumour would have it, and bring him back to Terre D'Ange. It's a long and hazardous journey, and mistakes from her past come back to haunt her, making the task nearly impossible.

Naamah's Blessing is in reality the concluding volume of nine books in Jacqueline Carey's alternate history version of our world. Throughout the nine books (the preceeding two trilogies set several generations before this one), she has explored an alternate Renaissance Europe, the Middle East, parts of Africa, and in this trilogy, Asia, Central and South America. Her books are wonderfully researched, and there is a lot of historical knowledge to be gained from them, even though they are set in a fantasy universe. While travelling much greater distances than either Phédre or Imriel, the protagonists of Carey' other trilogies, Moirin's life, although eventful, contain a lot less political intrigue, and that, in some ways, makes this third trilogy less engaging and thrilling than the other two. While it is never boring to read one of these books, neither book in Moirin's trilogy excited me as much as Carey's first trilogy, or Kushiel's Mercy, the third book in the Imriel trilogy. Still, they are great comfort reading, and very well written, so if you enjoy Carey's other Terre D'Ange book, read these as well.

CBR2 Book 59: "Naamah's Curse" by Jacqueline Carey

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Page count: 576 pages
Rating: 4 stars
Date begun: June 12th, 2010
Date finished: June 13th, 2010

WARNING! CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR NAAMAH'S KISS!

For those who may not have heard of her, Jacqueline Carey is the author of two completed fantasy trilogies, and currently working on a third, set in a world which bears similarities to our own. Looking at the map in the front of her books, the geography bears striking similarity to that of our world, but the countries bear different names.

The main characters from her first two trilogies were from Terre D'Ange, the land of the Angels, loosely based on Renaissance France. To quote from her books: "Elua was born when the blood of Yeshua ben Yosef, the son of the one God, mingled with the tears of the Magdelene and was carried in the womb of Mother Earth. With Elua's peaceful wanderings and the one God's rejection of him, seven angels then rejected God to become Elua's companions on Earth. These angels and Elua himself then founded a nation (Terre D'Ange) and comingled with humans before leaving. D'Angelines are the people from their descent. The D'Angelines live after one precept: "Love as thou wilt". They are all strikingly beautiful in different ways, and really open about sex.

As Carey kept writing, she showed her readers more of her fantasy world. The heroine of her third trilogy, Moirin mac Fainche, is the daughter of a D'Angeline diplomat and an Alban priestess. Alba is a mix of Pictish Britain and Celtic Ireland, pretty much. Moirin's people worship the great bear spirit, but as she is half D'Angeline, she is called on adventures, and to find out what that side of her heritage means. Moirin's travels take her across the sea to Terre D'Ange, and much further again, to the great Chi'in Empire (China), where she has to help the Emperor save his daughter, who is possessed by a dragon. It may sound lame, but it's really not! She falls in love with a half-Tartar (Mongolian) peasant boy, the assistant to the scholar she is traveling with, but he is accidentally killed while they are saving the princess. The old wise man she is with, uses Moirin's limited healing powers and his own, to sacrifice his own spirit, and Bao is brought back, at the cost of his Master's life. After his resurrection, Bao and Moirin are also forever connected, as half of Moirin's soul, always connected to the great bear spirit, seems to be lodged in Bao.

Unable to deal with this, and the death of his beloved Master, Bao leaves Moirin, to find out about his own heritage, in the Tartar lands. At the start of Naamah's Curse, Moirin is sick of sitting around waiting for him, so she goes in search of him. This means we get to see Carey's version of historical Mongolia, a real treat for me as I visited the country last year. Moirin does find Bao, and their reunion is glorious, but the book wouldn't be very long if Moirin got her happy ending a quarter of the way in. Moirin is abducted by Vralian priests and taken far away from Bao. Vralia is pretty much Russia, and the priests there worship in a variation of the Greek Orthodox Church. The priests have heard of the shocking customs of the D'Angelines, and this bishop believes if he can "cure" Moirin of her sinful, and lustful ways, and make her a convert, his religion will spread far and wide - to become the only true religion.

By the time Moirin escapes, she realizes that Bao is no longer in the Tartar lands, and as Moirin has been kept in warded chains that drown out their connection, he has traveled in the opposite direction from where she is, and has become captive of the legendary and deadly Spider-Queen of Kurugiri (located approximately where Tajikistan is today). So Moirin obviously has to set off to rescue him, impossible a task as that may seem at first.

Jacqueline Carey's books are always a treat, and Naamah's Curse was no exception. Her language is rich and descriptive, and very evocative. Some readers may be a bit put off by the graphic descriptions of sex in her earlier trilogies, but Moirin, not being a courtesan, as her first protagonist, or a young, beautiful man, as her second protagonist, does not have nearly as much sex and the books are amazing fantasy adventures that I would recommend to anyone. If you've never tried Carey's books, and are curious, I would recommend either starting at the beginning of this trilogy - with Naamah's Kiss, or going back to the very beginning and reading Kushiel's Dart (probably still her best book).