So I was torn while sorting this by shelf, because it's not a fairy tale although it is a tale about Faerie, which is very different.

How did I miss Elizabeth Bear? I have this odd feeling I tried this series before and started with Ink and Steel and totally didn't get it (even though it's a separate duo logy). The cover looks familiar, but I lose track so easily...anyway.

One of the really cool things about this book (other than the horse named Whiskey) is how it both works with and against conceptions of the Fae. It takes faeries and the legends about the Sidhe and the British Isles seriously and doesn't mitigate the otherness of the Fae, but it still manages to make them sympathetic characters. Bear doesn't make the fae seem human, but she...shows how the humans almost appear fae from the opposite perspective. And it's impossible to tell what the line is between good and evil, but not in the [a:George R. R. Martin|346732|George R.R. Martin|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/authors/1351944410p2/346732.jpg] "everyone's a jerk" fashion, but in the "wars are complicated when both sides have grudges and are willing to destroy the others to survive and thrive" which I prefer.

Also, I have a soft spot for books that include the Lions outside the NYPL. Anyway, I really enjoyed this and have to pencil in catching up on everything Bear has written.

(Which brings me to two squeecast regulars whose books I love)

It's hard to rate the last book in an ongoing series, especially one like this where each book or pair of books is episodic rather than a giant arc (like some fantasy novels I could mention), especially because this is the last book that [a:Lynn Flewelling|42110|Lynn Flewelling|https://www.goodreads.com/assets/nophoto/user/f_50x66-e0ba3b90c110cd67123d6a850d85373e.png] plans to do with these characters for now.

I will miss them. This entire series has been fun and clever and the best kind of sword and sorcery novels and, in particular, the past two books have been really enjoyable. (I have...mixed feelings about 4 and 5) But the characters carry the day, as they should in such a fantasy.

Reading [author: Lynn Flewelling] and [a:Ellen Kushner|11889|Ellen Kushner|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/authors/1243007888p2/11889.jpg] in close proximity makes me want to introduce the Duke of Tremontaine to Seregil. I can only imagine how oddly that would go.

This was a terrible review, I'm sorry. Consider this a short and odd letter to a fantasy series that I can only endorse as follows:
1) I bought the books in more than one format to read it on Shabbat and lend it.
2) I made my spouse read it.
3) I needed to own every new book that came out and preordered them.

Still cute, still enjoying Milan.

Interesting how many of Milan's heroines are victims of abuse. Not sure whether this leans towards "love replaces therapy!" which is a problematic trope or whether Milan is doing something clever with a deconstruction of the "hurt by a man and will never love again" trope by exploring what kind of hurt it might need to be to justify such a rejection.

The world may never know.

This was a satisfying...continuation/conclusion to the first book; it tied up the looser of the ends, it felt good. I was less invested in the characters this time around, perhaps after the number of deaths last time (except I was still upset when they died so, you know, good job transmitting affect) or just because it felt more like an ensemble cast. The wow-factor of the first (every myth EVER is true) became part of the texture of the universe: still incredibly well done, but expectedly so. The first book not only exceeded my expectations, it raised them. The second book certainly met them and I'm not complaining, but it lacked the impressiveness of the first.

I still highly recommend it. But, because it's a continuation, the impact of the first is somewhat lessened.

Having said all that, Kit Marlowe is the best character ever and the book's handling of the virgin in distress was beautiful and I loved it.

It's Matthew and having a male not only be the virgin who gives power, but can't use it, but also be a little damseled and acknowledge that he's being used for what he can convey and not who he is while still maintaining his existence as a complex character is a brilliant takedown of the entire trope without feeling out of place in a novel more interested in subversion than parody.

Some of the stories were really good, some of them delighted me less and I still could not care less about Aliane so, you know, that didn't exactly help.

Kitten's story was delightful, the second God of the Flame story was brilliant and brought me to terms with the first and I loved Mimic because it was the only non-Tortall story that felt as though it took place in a fully realized world that we were only seeing a slice of.

Having said that, the stories themselves felt...a bit repetitive. What distinguishes Pierce''s novels from being "one strong girl after another" is the time she takes in individuating their personalities and making them people, not just archetypes for fantasy with strong women (not strong™ women). And, don't get me wrong, her archetypes are awesome and we need more of them, but I felt like so many of these stories were either the prologue to novels she didn't have the time or inclination to write or skeleton stories that needed fleshing out. The plot was there, but the sense of people-ness that I associate with Pierce was not always there. But when they were there, these stories were Good!

So after my slightly lackluster review of [b:Whiskey and Water|185639|Whiskey and Water (Promethean Age, #2)|Elizabeth Bear|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1388975269s/185639.jpg|179437], I'm glad to note that this felt entirely like a return to form - I may have enjoyed this even more than the first book.

This is one of those stories that works best as a retrospective; knowing what I do about what happens in the first two books, this sudden switch to "here's how everything started and how Kit Marlowe became the man we've known for a book" was perfect. I know the responses to Bear's language choices was...mixed, but I'm reserving judgement until the epilogue of the next book, when she says she'll explain it.

Finally, this book gave me the historical poetical ship I never knew I wanted and it made me so very happy. And it reminded me why it's a bad idea to finish the third book in a series of four right before Shabbat when my copy of the fourth book is digital.

This was one of those books whose existence makes me happy, whose execution was flawless and that I would recommend pretty much unreservedly. Everything about it worked for me, the story was deftly handled and I thought Sherman did a wonderful job evoking both 1960 and 1860. She wrote her characters well and, in particular, the way she handled race (and wrote a white girl mistaken for a slave) was superb.

Why a three? Well, the beginning was a bit slow and I found myself unable to get beyond my teacherly self who was...assessing the book rather than reading it. I wish I had gotten more into it and I'm pretty sure that was my fault rather than the books. And it seems unfair to the book, but I don't know what else I can do. It was really good and I really cared and devoured it, but ... I so wish I had read when I was 12.

I'm not entirely sure how I ended up reading this book; all the authors I remember mentioning it are people I associate with sff and this is not speculative, except insofar as all historical fiction is speculative.

Griffith has the gift of the historical fiction writer; she knows how to make the pages come to life and make the book more real than whatever happened. Her version takes over reality.
Not that I knew anything at all about Saint Hilda before reading this book, so it wasn't as though there was much to supplant. But her transformation of the 7th century from that weird time period when no one pays attention to Britain into a fully realized world was fantastic.

I tried so hard to finish this on Shakespeare's birthday but, alas, it was not to be (which, I suppose, answers that question).

I loved the Stratford Man duology. I'm not sure which of my friends to recommend it to, but I loved it even more than the first part of the Promethean Age. And I think I may have officially adopted her characterizations of Shakespeare and Marlowe. Especially Marlowe.

Now if I could only figure who to recommend this to...

This is not the first book I've read about time traveling serial killers attacking girls, which I admit is not a popular genre. Still, this one was excellent and I do enjoy Beukes' writing and her talent for evoking characters.