Let me preface this review by saying I really loved Kristin Cashore’s first trilogy, especially Graceling. I remember devouring that first book in about two days—pulled into the complex and compelling world of Katsa and the Graceling realm.
When Cashore’s newest book showed up on NetGalley last fall, I leapt at the chance to read it and put in a request. However, when I actually got the book and started reading, I found myself having a hard time focusing. I put it down to a crazy fall semester and the fact that it was on my Kindle (I still read most of my books the old-fashioned way).
I ended up getting the hardcover version of the book at Christmastime, part of the Jolabokaflodtradition my family started, and so I decided to try again, this time with hard copy in hand. Yet the problem persisted. I began this book sometime in early March and while I was “reading” it, I actually read five other books. I almost didn’t finish it but I’m a slogger (it’s the long-distance swimmer in me) and I wanted to see how Cashore was going to pull it all together.
I wanted to like it, especially after I figured out this wasn’t a straightforward narrative, but I just couldn’t seem to connect. I’m not sure why. I was intrigued by the opening setup of Jane, already an orphan, who has recently lost her guardian, Aunt Magnolia, and who accepts an invitation to a wealthy friend’s house because her aunt had always told her to accept just such an invitation. Also, intriguing was the cast of characters that Jane meets when she arrives at the house, Tu Reviens. I loved Jane’s passion for making umbrellas, the strangely human basset hound, Jasper, and the fact that sparks fly between Jane and another young woman, Ivy, from the moment they meet. There are art thieves and government operatives and even a multiverse or two.
Though I’m typically a fan of nonlinear and overlapping storytelling, all the parts never added up to a coherent whole for me, and that was probably made worse by the start and stop and start way I read it. When I finally finished, my reaction was only of relief; now I could stop two-timing this book. This was clearly a labor of love for Cashore (I gathered after reading the author’s note) so I hope that somewhere there is a universe where I actually liked this book and gave it a much more glowing review.
I liked some part of this novel quite a bit (found the third part the most depressing/bleak) but overall I think I missed the point. Instead of enjoying the possibilities presented, I was kind of sad that they excluded one another – I want the art thieves caught, and the other possibilities to all be realities that could exist in the same story and not exclude on another.