I believe I deserve a medal for finishing this book as quickly as I did, i.e. nearly two weeks. Now, I have to say that this is not a bad book by any means. It's intricately plotted, well told, and filled with memorable characters. It also happens to be excruciatingly, painfully, and utterly slow. There are times when I would read what I believed to be a good chunk, only to see that I had only moved about 2% further into the story. This book is a black hole where time and progression is only a relative theory and you're at the mercy of the author as to how long things are doing to drag on and on. All of the action happens out of view from our main character, Chant, who spends the majority of the plot in some sort of captivity, the only thing that changes is the location. For me, someone who is used to more fast-paced works, it became a little frustrating on more than one occasion.

That negative aside, everything else about A Conspiracy of Truths is pretty fantastic. I'm always a sucker for a curmudgeongly old man who knows he's the smartest one in the room, which is an apt description for Chant. This man, all from within a jail cell, brings a society to its knees through ingenuity, cleverness, and sheer dumb luck. There's no finer recipe for revolution. His voice carries the slow pace fairly well and it was a main reason of why I kept reading. He is a man that is devoted to the meaning of his profession, telling stories to just the right people at the right time. His humor comes from reacting to the oddness of the society containing him, one that thrives off bureaucracy and superstition. I saw another reviewer comparing it to Soviet-era Russia and, you know, the parallel isn't too far off. 

The world, though we see little of it, somehow seems enormous as we sit alongside Chant in captivity. This is mainly achieved through the stories of this realm, coming from different places and carrying the views and lessons tied to that culture. There were tragedies, epics, trickster tales, creation myths, all told to either entertain, impart a message, or simply just to pass the time. I really like how this story incorporated its myths/legends/folktales into the overall plot, as well as how the reactions of certain people give a good indication of their true character. Not to give spoilers, but this ultimately reveals a theme of how the stories we choose to give meaning to might not always be the truest ones and that may come back to bite you in the end.

I'm not sure I will continue with the next book in this series. This one was certainly enough for me and I was satisfied with it in the end, even though it concluded with more of a fizzle than a bang. I'm willing to give Chant and the others a rest for now.