Mac is still in Dublin, working with Barrons to find the
Sinsar Dub and defeat the Lord Master, the man responsible for her sister’s
death and the man who is bringing ever more Unseelie into the city. In her
quest to find the book, she and Barrons look for other objects of power and she
tries to decide who to trust and how to learn more about the strange world she
has been thrust into.
I am assured that this series does get better, I’m
assured the plot becomes more exciting, the world develops and, in particular,
Mac, the protagonist becomes more sensible and mature and I will actually root
for her rather than one of the Unseelie chomping on her bones, nom nom nom.
I’m assuming all of this happens in a later book –
because it didn’t in this one. Where are those hungry Unseelie?
The first element I couldn’t pass over was the complete
and utter lack of plot – nothing really happened in this book, there was no
coherent storyline. Oh, there were events, random events poking their heads up
from time to time, but they were just that, random encounters, with no real
rhyme or reason, no real connection to each other and more than a few of them
happened either because of sheer random chance or through Mac’s own
monumentally foolish spunkiness often through simply poor writing or characterisation.
And then none of these events actually go anywhere – they happen, they then
fade back into some kind of background idea.
How does she run into the Sidhe-Seers? She randomly runs
into one of them in the street who, despite the eternal watch word “don’t let
them know you can see them”, lets slip that she can see them. She goes to meet
them aaaaand… nothing happens. How does Mac end up with V’Lane? Because Barrons’s
shop assistant tries to murder her over random, unexplained and unfounded
extreme jealousy. And does that faerie jaunt actually have any real long term
effects on, well, anything? Nope. There’s the Hallow she and Barrons spend a
decent amount of the book looking for – does it make any relevant difference to
the actual story? Nope. The odd guy in the history department she thinks are
cute turn out to know about the fae – how does he? Because Mac randomly decides
to show him her diary. Why? Who know?! Even the big ending felt awfully tacked
on – a character who could easily have been dead in the last book pops up to
reveal very little, do very little, achieve very little, but take up page space
and result in the book ending with everyone in exactly the same place they were
when this book started.
Look, I can see how this is all foreshadowing for future
events and it’s setting various forces and players in motion – which is fine
but there needs to be something else! Have the flesh of foreshadowng, but you
need a backbone of a plot to keep the book going – otherwise it’s just a big
mushy pile of events and foreshadowing with no structure.
I don’t like Mac – I know I’m not exactly supposed to like
her, this is early Mac who is going to get a lot more worldly – but she
bothered me in many ways. She frequently made ridiculous decisions – like the
aforementioned showing her diary of fairy knowledge to random strangers in the
pub. But also we have breaking into Barrons’ garage then being surprised his
collection of classic cars actually has security. Or she trips over a freaking
OTTOMAN clearing out Shades in Barrons’s shop. This is a task that literally
requires you to be able to manage 3 things: hold a torch, walk and operate a
light switch. She could not do it. And she keeps a lot of essential secrets
from Barrons – and, I get it, Barrons is an arsehole (more on that later) who
treats her like shit but “ha he’s keeping secrets, so I will too!” looks
ridiculously childish – especially when keeping those secrets only gets her in
trouble (especially the fact she’s being stalked by a sinister shadowy figure).
Aside from Mac having the brains of a concussed prawn,
she’s also not that nice a person. Her indifference to a man being murdered
because he tried to investigate her sister’s death is stunning. Her treatment
of her parents because she’s adopted is gross. And I loved her standing up to
the other Sidhe-seers and cheered that Mac didn’t trust them (now if she could
apply that to, say, random people in pubs as well). But her motivation is
because the Sidhe-seers didn’t risk life and limb to save her in a desperate
situation? Her entitlement through the discussion, her resentment of them not
putting her first is palpable, especially when she has never risked herself for
others – despite seeing the Unseelie prey upon humans all the time.
Then there’s Barrons the Arsehole. Barrons who tells her nothing, Barrons who orders her around like a small child (and then is always RIGHT, as if that’s a validation of his treating her like a small child). Barrons has zero respect for her and constantly makes demands without any explanation. There’s also a horrible moment I won’t spoil – but Barrons wants to permanently do something to Mac against her will. She defies him and it looks like at last we have some strength… but then he does it anyway and the plot then VALIDATES HIS ACTIONS. She told him not to, she drew a very firm line, he did it anyway – and she then has to say thank you because it was so vital.
The world building is also… shallow. There’s a lot of fae
myths been brought in, but the actual depiction of Ireland feels shoddy. Like
the driving license Barrons apparently has that doesn’t even remotely resemble
European driving licenses – but sounds a lot like an American license. The
measuring of human weight in lbs (not kilos or stones and lbs), the fact Dublin
is apparently the soggiest, wettest place on the planet to poor Mac, missing
the dry blue skies of Georgia (Dublin’s average rainfall is less than Atlanta’s)
and Englismen called “Junior”. And Scotsmen introducing themselves as “of the
Clan X”. Or Mac decides to convince the
police she has a reason to stay in Dublin by getting a job – but she’s a tourist,
she has no right to work! The police could just as easily use that as an excuse
to kick her back to America. And why does an extremely ancient Irish
organisation have a motto in English?
Then there’s the writing. It’s so long winded, every few
pages we have to have these appalling long internal monologues from Mac either
pitying herself, recapping the various characters in the book, reminding us
what various things are, recapping the last scene or doing all of the above. At
length. As an example - she senses a menacing fae outside her door. She then
rambles about clothes, her mother’s disapproval of swearing and myriad other
nonsenses for the best part of a page before actually paying attention to the
threat.
The remaining character is V’Lane – who is
uber-super-duper-sexy and wouldn’t know consent if it hit him across the face
with a haddock and he constantly justified his attempts to rape Mac with “I’m
so amazingly hot I’m not used to people turning me down”.
Finish off with zero inclusion but the O’Bannions beings
deadly dangerous because of that dark, savage, evil Saudi blood in them (that
line could be copied and pasted from a Stormfront website)
Is there anything positive to say? The underlying concept
has promise, the basic premise could be something good. For that, and because
people I trust assure me it will improve, I keep reading – but this book was
not something I could recommend.
