Book #36
I'd recently finished Shadowmancer which was my book to take to work and as this is by the same author I thought I would read this one too. I'd only read this once, when I first got it, and like Shadowmancer before it, it was similar to reading it for the first time. I had a vague remembrance of the plot, but that was no more knowledge than I would have had from reading the blurb anyway.
The general outline is that there's a comet which is going to crash into Earth, possibly killing everyone. It's set in Victorian London but it's hard to tell if it's our Victorian London or if there's a twist to it, such as a parallel universe or something of that nature. It's kind of our history but not as we would recognise it; it seems to be different somehow.
It's well written but could be possibly more engaging than it actually is. The writing style is not simple but seems to be quite hard work and for some reason any dramatic moments that happen seem to be told in a kind of monotone which makes them less dramatic and exciting than they could be. It's as if the author is detached from the story and has no interest in the telling of it. There seems to be a nod to Dickens with one of the characters going on some kind of mystical journey and awakening in an empty grave in a cemetary early one wintery morning. I'm not sure if the reference was intended or if any of the intended audience of young adults would have noticed it. It took me nearly a month to finish the book because as well as the dull writing style, once the angels and religion started to appear in it, I didn't want to read it any more. It was an effort to continue and I only did so because I don't like leaving books unfinished unless they are absolutely dreadful.
There are quite a few characters to keep track of and some of them have different names which makes it a little confusing. The air of detachment makes it hard to really care about any of them which is another reason why I found it so hard to maintain any interest in it. The ending is quite disappointing. It's totally undramatic, there's very little emotion in it and a lot of it seems to be completely contrived. It's almost as if the author either lost interest in it himself and just wanted to get it over with, or that he'd only got a certain amount of pages and so jumped to the ending because he was running out of space. It finishes with a hook that would seem to indicate a sequel but there was nothing in it that would make me feel the need to know more.
All in all, not a great book in my opinion. I don't think this is an author that I could really get to grips with. I don't like how he seems to bring religion to be the main point in all of his works that I have read, whether or not it would seem to be relevant.
