Life Update – Short Hiatus

Life has been rather hectic lately.  I’m starting a new job this week and the transition is taking a lot of my time away from fun things, like reading and blogging.  Once I get settled in and on track with my new schedule, I’ll be back and posting like crazy.  Bear with me!  I have to go from being an early morning person to being a late night person due to a schedule change.

Review: The Thief’s Daughter by Jeff Wheeler

3 1/2 Stars

This is the second installment of the Kingfountain series, the sequel to The Queen’s Poisoner.  To get the most out of this book, you will want to read the series in order or much of the plot will not make any sense and you will not get a full scope of the setting and the machinations in place.

It is now nine years later and Owen Kiskaddon has grown from a shy and nearly mute hostage into a strapping young knight, one of King Severn’s most trusted advisors.  He has been living in the North, being trained by the Duke of Horwath and growing up along side his best friend and granddaughter of the Duke.  Owen and Evie have deepened their friendship into something more.  The future that Owen and Evie see for each other seems bound to be destroyed by the machinations of their King, a man who demands loyalty above all else.

A test of that loyalty comes in the most unexpected way.  A challenger has appeared to try and take the crown from King Severn.  A pretender who is claiming to be one of the King’s nephews, who were believed to have been killed if not by the King, then by his command.  This threat is taken seriously by the King, are  man who has lived under the shadow of these rumors for the entirety of his reign.  King Severn charges Evie and Ow en with securing an alliance with their neighbors, the very country that has been harboring the man who claims to be one of King Severn’s “lost nephews”.

There is also the appearance of a new poisoner, trained by Mancini, who is now the head of the Espion, the spy network.  She becomes a very pivotal character throughout this book and her loyalty is inspiring as is Owen’s struggle to be loyal to his King without betraying his own heart.  There are many twists and turns and a lot of action and intrigue packed into this book.  There is also more focus on the Fountain and the magic that comes from the Fountain.  We get to see how not only Owen uses this magic, but how it grows and manifests itself and how others use it as well.

There are a lot of twists and turns in this book and it was nice to see Owen as an adult rather than an eight year old child, scared of his own shadow.  He’s turned out to be a very strong young man.  The conflict between his heart and the loyalty he feels toward his King is an amazing struggle and you really do feel for Owen as he struggles to find the right path.  I didn’t always agree with the path that the characters did end up taking, but they were well thought out and well written.

I did get tired of the whole loyalty thing, it was the whole reason that I dropped half a star.  I understand the strong ties that are formed and wanting to be loyal to your leaders and those you admire or even fear.  But it’s harder to take when the person you are giving your loyalty to doesn’t deserve it.  Time and again, King Severn has proved himself unworthy of the loyalty that Owen, Evie and others show to him.  But time and again, they ignore their reservations and their own feelings to keep an increasingly unstable leader happy.  At this point, it’s become blind loyalty and I don’t think that does any favors to a character as strong as Owen.  We’ll see what happens in the next installment.

Again, the author is using historical context and figures to draw the world in which Owen lives.  He has re-imagined what the world would have been like had King Richard III survived the Battle of Bosworth.  The similarities are very clear for anyone who has ever looked into the history of King Richard III and the mystery of the Princes in the Tower.  A fantasy novel with real historical context, pretty cool if you ask me.

 

Review: Her Final Breath by Robert Dugoni

4 Stars

This is book two in the Tracy Crosswhite Series.  While you will still enjoy reading this book by itself, you will definitely understand the back-story and get more out of the book itself if you read the previous book My Sister’s Grave.

Tracy is back in Seattle after finally solving the mystery surrounding the murder of her sister two decades earlier.  She comes back to a new killer who the media has dubbed The Cowboy.  He’s killing women in a manner that’s eerily familiar to Tracy.  The women are all hog-tied and die by strangulation.  Is this a copycat or did the wrong person end up behind bars 10 years ago?  A case that involved her captain, Johnny Nolasco and one that he would prefer to keep buried.  Just to add more intrigue, it seems that someone has it out for Tracy after leaving a noose behind at the shooting range for her to find.  Is it the Cowboy or is someone else targeting Tracy?

This is another fairly solid police procedural.  There is drama between Tracy and her captain that gives some additional tension.  He’s a slime ball who has had it out for Tracy ever since they were in the police academy.  The man can definitely carry a grudge.  Their negative chemistry was really good.  He second-guesses every move she makes and he undermines her at every turn through some pretty under-handed methods.  Ever wonder how the media got some of their juiciest tidbits?

The Cowboy was definitely an interesting serial killer.  I was definitely surprised to see who the killer ended up being.  I did enjoy how the case was solved.  I really didn’t see it coming.  It was just one small detail.  One vigilant police officer.  And that’s all it takes sometimes.  I really did enjoy the interaction that Tracy had with the killer in the end.  And I would have paid good money to see the look on her captain’s face.

I did not enjoy the stalker angle.  I know that it ties in the first and second book.  But I just didn’t think that it fit with the rest of the story.  It was nice to see Dan is still in the picture and their interaction and chemistry is still there.  They make a really great team.  I hope that they’ll continue to be able to team up together in the future, because this is certainly not the end for Tracy Crosswhite.