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jaceySherwood Smith: The Fox – Inda #2
I'm really loving this series and can't wait to get my hands on the third one. All my earlier reservations about the complicated Marlovan titles and military ranks which change their name if the country is at war etc. have faded with familiarity and no longer jerk me out of the story because I can't remember the difference between a laef and a sierlaef and a randael and a randivar. So this story races ahead for me.
It picks up where Inda left off. Inda is still in exile and building a new life for himself at sea, growing through his teen years. His pirate-fighting marines, hiring out to defend merchant convoys, have just been overwhelmed by a much stronger force and Inda is balanced between life and death. He can join the pirate crew and live, or reject them and be killed. Luckily for Inda there are two Marlovans already forced into the pirate crew and Fox and Barend stop him from doing anything stupid. Though Inda loses some of his marine crew from the first book other favourite characters, such a Tau and Jeje survive and the game is on.
We also get the return of favourite characters from Inda's academy days, his contemporaries are growing to manhood and into the responsibility of their pre-destined lives. Sponge or Evred, the King's younger son; Hadand, Inda's sister destined to marry the thoroughly unlikeable, though oddly vulnerable, heir; Cherry-Stripe and Cama, Inda's classmates, and Whipstick Noth who has taken Inda's place as Shield Arm at home.
Will Inda survive his time on pirate Walic's ship by playing stupid and laying low or will he seize whatever opportunity comes along? Three guesses.
It's not long before Inda's in charge of his own pirate fleet, determined to wipe out the real pirates and then go after the Venn who threaten Iasca-Leror. In the meantime things are moving back at home and crimes that the Sierlaef (the heir to the Kingdom) and the Harskialdna (the King's brother and also his war leader) have committed against Inda's family are coming nearer and nearer to the surface.
This is a rolling, wide-reaching story with a vast scope and wealth of world-detail so intricate and layered that it springs to life in glorious 3-D. The characters, even the minor ones, have depth and we get to see inside their heads because tbis is a book written from multiple points if view. It's a big book, 772 pages, but I couldn't put it down and am instantly ordering the third. Oh, go on, despite my vow never to buy more than one book at a time in a series in case they go sour on me, I think there's absolutely no risk in ordering the last two of these together.
I'm really loving this series and can't wait to get my hands on the third one. All my earlier reservations about the complicated Marlovan titles and military ranks which change their name if the country is at war etc. have faded with familiarity and no longer jerk me out of the story because I can't remember the difference between a laef and a sierlaef and a randael and a randivar. So this story races ahead for me.
It picks up where Inda left off. Inda is still in exile and building a new life for himself at sea, growing through his teen years. His pirate-fighting marines, hiring out to defend merchant convoys, have just been overwhelmed by a much stronger force and Inda is balanced between life and death. He can join the pirate crew and live, or reject them and be killed. Luckily for Inda there are two Marlovans already forced into the pirate crew and Fox and Barend stop him from doing anything stupid. Though Inda loses some of his marine crew from the first book other favourite characters, such a Tau and Jeje survive and the game is on.
We also get the return of favourite characters from Inda's academy days, his contemporaries are growing to manhood and into the responsibility of their pre-destined lives. Sponge or Evred, the King's younger son; Hadand, Inda's sister destined to marry the thoroughly unlikeable, though oddly vulnerable, heir; Cherry-Stripe and Cama, Inda's classmates, and Whipstick Noth who has taken Inda's place as Shield Arm at home.
Will Inda survive his time on pirate Walic's ship by playing stupid and laying low or will he seize whatever opportunity comes along? Three guesses.
It's not long before Inda's in charge of his own pirate fleet, determined to wipe out the real pirates and then go after the Venn who threaten Iasca-Leror. In the meantime things are moving back at home and crimes that the Sierlaef (the heir to the Kingdom) and the Harskialdna (the King's brother and also his war leader) have committed against Inda's family are coming nearer and nearer to the surface.
This is a rolling, wide-reaching story with a vast scope and wealth of world-detail so intricate and layered that it springs to life in glorious 3-D. The characters, even the minor ones, have depth and we get to see inside their heads because tbis is a book written from multiple points if view. It's a big book, 772 pages, but I couldn't put it down and am instantly ordering the third. Oh, go on, despite my vow never to buy more than one book at a time in a series in case they go sour on me, I think there's absolutely no risk in ordering the last two of these together.
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Date: Nov. 3rd, 2011 08:07 pm (UTC)