Carey, Jacqueline - Naamah's Curse
Fri, Oct. 29th, 2010 10:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterAs you can probably tell, I am a) trying to catch up on old reviews (not even really old ones! Just from the past few months!), b) reading a lot, and c) trying to keep up with my reading so I don't add to backlog.
Possibly one day I will blog about something that is not books.
No, I lie. I will never stop talking about books! Books! Books books books books!
(This reading thing! With the long plotty books! It is still so awesome!)
Anyway, this is book 2 of one of Carey's typical epic trilogies. I read it about two months ago, so my memory is pretty fuzzy. I was extremely wary about this book despite the first book visiting a China analogue and amazingly NOT making my head explode because of the cover. I mean, at least it's not a red sari, and I really hope it's not supposed to be the heroine on the cover, since the heroine is from the world's equivalent of a Celtic tribe.
I have mostly forgotten everything that happens that does not involve Bao, since I have an unabashed crush on him. Moirin sets out to go after Bao after he leaves at the end of book 1, and although some of the details about life in a Tartar tribe are interesting, separating Moirin from people she already has a relationship with sucks a lot of the life out of the book. I think this book actually has many of the same problems the second book in the Phedre trilogy does; both separate the heroine from the romantic lead and put them in adventures with people they don't have much vested emotional interest in, and because of that, it loses a lot of what I like about Carey (her many relationships between women and her non-judgmental take on sexuality and romance). The Imriel trilogy, on the other hand, was actually strongest in its second book, and I think a lot of that was precisely because even though there was that separation between the hero and the romantic lead, it was a separation that placed the hero in a setting where he was forming more emotional connections and not just traveling around doing heroic stuff.
Also, what Bao ends up doing made me roll my eyes a bit and think less of him, which makes me unhappy! I like Bao! I want him not to be a jerk! Unfortunately, the later addition of magic is a little too random for me (much as it also was in the Imriel trilogy book 3).
I with I had more notes on how Carey is writing the Yeshuites; I feel she's doing something and showing her version of how Christians separated themselves from Jews post-crucifixion in terms of ideology and philosophy, but it would make me a lot happier if there were actual Jewish people (or her Jewish analogue).
And finally, Bhodistan, aka India. I rolled my eyes a little at the obligatory mention of the caste system, but I did very much like that there is a Bhodistani queen. Unfortunately, she pales a bit in comparison with Snow Tiger, largely because Moirin spends much less time in Bhodistan than in Ch'in. I don't remember anything too headdesky, mostly just that I wish there had been more of Bhodistan and especially the queen.
In conclusion: This is very much a middle book of a trilogy where some momentum gets lost. I still love the central romance, but although I didn't end up wanting to chuck the book at something, I also think Carey didn't handle her India analogue as well as she did with the China analogue in book 1.
Possibly one day I will blog about something that is not books.
No, I lie. I will never stop talking about books! Books! Books books books books!
(This reading thing! With the long plotty books! It is still so awesome!)
Anyway, this is book 2 of one of Carey's typical epic trilogies. I read it about two months ago, so my memory is pretty fuzzy. I was extremely wary about this book despite the first book visiting a China analogue and amazingly NOT making my head explode because of the cover. I mean, at least it's not a red sari, and I really hope it's not supposed to be the heroine on the cover, since the heroine is from the world's equivalent of a Celtic tribe.
I have mostly forgotten everything that happens that does not involve Bao, since I have an unabashed crush on him. Moirin sets out to go after Bao after he leaves at the end of book 1, and although some of the details about life in a Tartar tribe are interesting, separating Moirin from people she already has a relationship with sucks a lot of the life out of the book. I think this book actually has many of the same problems the second book in the Phedre trilogy does; both separate the heroine from the romantic lead and put them in adventures with people they don't have much vested emotional interest in, and because of that, it loses a lot of what I like about Carey (her many relationships between women and her non-judgmental take on sexuality and romance). The Imriel trilogy, on the other hand, was actually strongest in its second book, and I think a lot of that was precisely because even though there was that separation between the hero and the romantic lead, it was a separation that placed the hero in a setting where he was forming more emotional connections and not just traveling around doing heroic stuff.
Also, what Bao ends up doing made me roll my eyes a bit and think less of him, which makes me unhappy! I like Bao! I want him not to be a jerk! Unfortunately, the later addition of magic is a little too random for me (much as it also was in the Imriel trilogy book 3).
I with I had more notes on how Carey is writing the Yeshuites; I feel she's doing something and showing her version of how Christians separated themselves from Jews post-crucifixion in terms of ideology and philosophy, but it would make me a lot happier if there were actual Jewish people (or her Jewish analogue).
And finally, Bhodistan, aka India. I rolled my eyes a little at the obligatory mention of the caste system, but I did very much like that there is a Bhodistani queen. Unfortunately, she pales a bit in comparison with Snow Tiger, largely because Moirin spends much less time in Bhodistan than in Ch'in. I don't remember anything too headdesky, mostly just that I wish there had been more of Bhodistan and especially the queen.
In conclusion: This is very much a middle book of a trilogy where some momentum gets lost. I still love the central romance, but although I didn't end up wanting to chuck the book at something, I also think Carey didn't handle her India analogue as well as she did with the China analogue in book 1.
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Mon, Nov. 1st, 2010 03:07 am (UTC)