kjpepper | Oh well played, Ms. Carey

I just finished Kushiel's Justice. I stayed up half the night reading it, got two hours of sleep, and made myself a bit late to work this morning to finish it.

I think I like her second trilogy of Terre D'Ange better than her first so far (cause there's no way she's done, there are too many ends dangling, not least of which being where in the world is Melisande Shahrizai?). I don't know... I know there are some that find Carey's language overly flowery and ornate and her device of taking more or less historical Europe/Asia/Africa and giving the various regions different names lazy on her part and silly in general. But I'm thoroughly hooked on her characters and the sweeping epic they are all caught up in. I admit, I picked up Kushiel's Dart way long ago purely for the notion of "ooooh, fantasy novel with more than a hint of BDSM? yes please." But I'm impressed by the fact that unlike Laurell K Hamilton *sigh* the later books didn't dissolve into porn with a little story thrown in. The kink is still very much there, mind, but it's the rest of the story I'm caught up in now... and I find it surprising that as far as story scope goes I've spent about thirty years with all of them. I'm rather pleased by how the decision to switch narrators from Phedre to Imriel worked out - it makes sense, really. Phedre's adventures ended with the freeing of Hyacinthe. And Imriel no Montreve de la Courcel is such a perfect underdog: he's damaged, and self-absorbed and occasionally a jackass, but he's also quite likable. He started life screwed six ways from Sunday and he's cursed with incredibly bad luck and occasional thoughtless stupidity on top of that. You just want things to work out for the poor bastard and end up rooting for him. Or I did. So much that I spent a half hour sobbing and yelling at Queen Ysandre for being undeservedly cruel to him after everything he'd been through in the first 414 pages at 3:30 am this morning. Actually much the same thing happened at about the same point in Kushiel's Chosen when Melisande reveals herself to the characters - I think I actually screamed, "Oh shit!" *chuckle* It's a rare book that evinces a response greater than a chuckle out of me - I think it's only happened five or six times in my life total.

Well, and so... now I have the next one of these to look forward to, as well as the new Dark Jewels book coming out next year. *impatience*