This is the second in this series. The first is "Poison Study" (my favorite) and the last is "Fire Study" (my least favorite). In this book Yelena returns to Sitia to meet her family and to be trained in the art of magic.
This book is most interesting to me because of Yelena's family and because of the continuing development of her relationship with Valek, who I can't help but adore. I also like the glimpses of the other characters that I've learned to love--Ari and Janco and even the Commander (and his "cousin"). We also meet new likeable characters--Bain, his apprentice (whose name I can't call to mind right now and I'm too lazy to walk into the next room to get the book), the horses... and some not-so-likeable characters like the wannabe king and his unsavory henchmen. And Roze, one of the master magicians.
I was sorry that the conflict in this story involved yet another sadistic man, raping and killing a series of girls. Get a new storyline, will you? Why all the torture and rape? I also was not particularly interested in Yelena's magic. I liked the first book a lot more because Yelena's character was developed so fully apart from magic. She had experienced awful things and yet managed to overcome them and become a whole, strong person. I really liked that. This book was just Yelena being a maverick, running off and solving all the problems in Sitia almost single-handed.
I still liked this, though, because it tied up the loose ends from book one, "Poison Study". It was worth reading just because of that. Oh, and because reading about Yelena and Valek's unique bond and the way it works to assist both of them is pretty cool. I like Valek so much! Sigh.
Book 3, "Fire Study", however, is just more of the same maverick behavior from Yelena. There's more of the characters we like, but this story did not capture me the way the first book did. I'll go back and re-read it eventually and review it here, but later.... Meanwhile, read "Poison Study". It's so good!
No comments:
Post a Comment