The Prey of Gods

Nicky Drayden, 2017
(July 2017)

Reviewed over at Strange Horizons. Fun, in a kind of slapdash, puppyish way.

Full Fathom Five / Last First Snow

Max Gladstone, 2014/2015

(April 2017)

  

OK, so I’m aware that there’s a sixth installment of the Craft Sequence coming out later this year, but I think I’m going to hold off on the rest for the immediate future. I think Gladstone is better at ending books than beginning them.

Three Parts Dead / Two Serpents Rise

Max Gladstone, 2012/2013

(March 2017)

  

Welcome to the Craft Sequence, I guess. Good, solid secondary (?) world urban fantasy, featuring lawyer-wizards, gods, and disaffected wage slaves. It’s kind of addictive, so I’m probably going to work my way through the first five books in fairly short order (the sixth is due out this autumn). More thoughts on the deeper meanings of this blend of High Fantasy and Late Capitalism when I’ve got it all under my belt, as I’m not entirely sure it’s all working quite as it should just yet. Short term, however, I’ll merely state that Three Parts Dead is a better book than Two Serpents Rise: the central character is more compelling, the philosophical editorializing is less intrusive, and the story is less reliant on a fairly predictable face-heel turn. As I write this I’m partway through Full Fathom Five, and while some of these flaws are still evident, I’m pleased to report that for the most part things are definitely moving in the right direction.