![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Review - Kushiel's Mercy
Mar. 18th, 2009 12:54 amIt's odd to think how much I love the first trilogy and how much I struggled with the second trilogy. They're different kinds of stories, really, I think. The first trilogy definitely has love in it, and to some degree, magic, but there's also a lot of heroism-in-unlikely-places and politics. Politics and heroism definitely have their place in the second trilogy, but love and magic hold centre-stage. I wasn't expecting it. Another issue is that Imriel is a less mature hero than Phèdre, and his trilogy covers shorter spans of time.
The plot is definitely Jacqueline Carey all over, but Sidonie and Imriel just don't carry it as well as Phèdre and Joscelin, for me. All the same, I enjoyed it quite a lot, when I didn't stall with reading it. I think it's best to just bear in mind that it's a different kind of story. And that Imriel isn't Phèdre -- where Phèdre opens doors with her body, Imriel has to wait and chafe, and that carries through to the reader, I think!
In terms of this book alone, it definitely brings the trilogy to an amazing finish. The very last chapter made me grin and clap my hands. A lot of the events of the book are painful -- Jacqueline Carey, once again, spares the readers nothing. I think it's partly my hatred of lying/deceit/seeing people being deceived that makes this book very hard to read. There's a lot of that.
In terms of characters, Phèdre and Joscelin are unimpressive, in this book, for plot reasons. It makes me uncomfortable to see them so wrong, for once. I know they're spell bound, but I also feel like somehow they should doubt, somehow they should realise Imriel is right... Melisande is also another interesting point. It feels odd seeing her with much less ambition, content, mellowed out some by motherhood. I don't really like the point it makes about motherhood, in one sense. It shouldn't make you "soft". But I also like that she was redeemed somewhat.
I definitely liked this trilogy, even though I stalled with it, but my feelings are much more conflicted than with the first trilogy, and I don't think I'll be taking it up to reread very soon.
The plot is definitely Jacqueline Carey all over, but Sidonie and Imriel just don't carry it as well as Phèdre and Joscelin, for me. All the same, I enjoyed it quite a lot, when I didn't stall with reading it. I think it's best to just bear in mind that it's a different kind of story. And that Imriel isn't Phèdre -- where Phèdre opens doors with her body, Imriel has to wait and chafe, and that carries through to the reader, I think!
In terms of this book alone, it definitely brings the trilogy to an amazing finish. The very last chapter made me grin and clap my hands. A lot of the events of the book are painful -- Jacqueline Carey, once again, spares the readers nothing. I think it's partly my hatred of lying/deceit/seeing people being deceived that makes this book very hard to read. There's a lot of that.
In terms of characters, Phèdre and Joscelin are unimpressive, in this book, for plot reasons. It makes me uncomfortable to see them so wrong, for once. I know they're spell bound, but I also feel like somehow they should doubt, somehow they should realise Imriel is right... Melisande is also another interesting point. It feels odd seeing her with much less ambition, content, mellowed out some by motherhood. I don't really like the point it makes about motherhood, in one sense. It shouldn't make you "soft". But I also like that she was redeemed somewhat.
I definitely liked this trilogy, even though I stalled with it, but my feelings are much more conflicted than with the first trilogy, and I don't think I'll be taking it up to reread very soon.
