After a series of dubious events force Zoey and her people
back to the House of Night after they managed to escape in the last book they
are left only with a random series of poems to guide them to finally drive off
Kaloma.
Yes, it’s time for another House of Night book, inflicted
on me by Cyna and Mavrynthia, who will either be co-defendants
in my trial for trying to annihilate humanity for no longer deserving to exist,
or will be the people I blame in my defence. I intend
to use this link spam in my defence argument.
Let’s start small – this book is utterly overwhelmed with
stand-alone-stuffing.
I’ve
said before that this series treats their readers as having the intelligence of
algae – every book feels the need to recap every single book that has
passed before. By the time we get to book 8 it will be 10,000 pages long and
only 100 pages of it will be actual plot, the rest will be endless, painful,
dull recap
Which pretty much sums up well over 100 pages of this
book. We have a brief introduction of the Red Fledglings, most of them who are
nothing more than a name (and the one who isn’t, frankly, would probably be
preferable as a name). Zoey and Erik begin their relationship do-si-do and they
all do… nothing. They hide in the tunnels, safe from their enemies that hates
going underground. They have no idea what to do but they’re safe unless they go
outside and are attacked by their enemies.
Which Zoey promptly does. Of course she does. In a desperate, forced attempt to move this limping plot forward, Zoey abandons even her limited supply of common sense. She gets injured, they belatedly decide they simply have to return to the House of Night for REASONS so we can try and drag out a storyline
I say try. Because when they get there they do…. They do… uh… well Zoey and Stark connect and then they escape. That’s pretty much it until the very last chapter. It’s one bizarre distraction which was really all about Stark and the clumsy relationship and terrible love dodecahedron (more on that later).
The one attempt at a plot line is the prophecy of how to
get rid of Kaloma the big bad, brought by Kramisha, the convenient source for
more Nyx “wisdom”. Like the last book, this prophecy involves everyone
scratching their head about how impossible it is – only Nyx has even less faith
in her minions than I do! Rather than suffer Zoey & co struggling to figure
it out, she again plays Irritable Bowel Goddess and gives Zoey her special “feelings”
whenever she’s right. Honestly when deciding what special people they need to
banish Kaloma they didn’t even need the prophecy – they just needed to read the
phone book aloud and wait until Nyx started churning
“Aaron A Aaronson? No Nyxy feeling, not him… next!”
Of all the bafflingly awful parts of this book, I think
Nyx baffles me the most. Sure it’s not the most offensive, it’s not the most
vile, but it’s the part that makes the least sense.
Kaloma and Neferet take over the school and possibly plot
to take over the High Council. The kill the last High Priestess and then use
woo-woo to stop the rest of vampirekind from finding out…. All of which would
be utterly impossible if Nyx would do something. Let’s be clear, Nyx isn’t an
aloof god – she constantly gives Zoey psychic feelings, she constantly sends
them visions and prophecies, she even appeared last book to have a 10 minute
conversation with Zoey and Aphrodite. She’s quite a chatty goddess. But she
couldn’t appear before the teachers and say “nope, naughty bad guy!”? She
couldn’t send a memo to the high council or something?
And don’t give me the “free will” excuse. Refusing to
send a memo while the whole school is mind controlled into being happy little
drones, even accepting and welcoming a rapist among them cannot possibly be
excused in the name of “free will.”
Brace yourself readers, we’re now entering the dread pit
known as Zoey’s love life.
And I’m going to start by saying something almost
positive (well, it’s less “positive” and more “my expectations are so utterly
lowered that anything being less than completely awful is an amazing relief”).
Zoey and Erik end up back together (more on that later) and Erik is much more
pushy with his attentions, his kisses more sexual. Zoey, probably rightly,
assumes he is now initiating sex because she is no longer a virgin and there’s
that nasty idea that once a woman has had sex with one woman she is somehow now
“fair game” – in the same way a woman’s sexual history is often attacked in
rape trials. Zoey is quick to realise and reject the idea that because she had
sex with Loren means Erik is now in a stronger position to cross that same
line. Which is good
Except she never actually vocalises any of this or
challenges Erik. So he makes a move on her… and she draws away. He backs off,
but it’s less “I’m out of line” and more “wait, softly, don’t drive her away”
because he then tries again later. It’s not respecting the barriers she raises,
it’s him stepping carefully so she doesn’t make her “no” too firm. It’s like a hunter
stalking their prey or taming a wild animal more than actual respect.
Now to Erik and Zoey’s rekindling their relationship –
which basically involves Zoey and Erik deciding the other is hot so they’re
basically going to just move past all the bullshit between them – Zoey’s infidelity,
Erik’s repeated public humiliation of her – all of it is completely ignored
because hawtness (let’s face it, Erik has no other personality at all).
Venturing into this new relationship with a man who has
already made it extremely clear that he has no wish to be anything other than
monogamous Zoey promptly dances into the middle of her miserable love
dodecahedron.
And let’s be clear here – this is not the depiction of a
healthy polyamorous relationship even if we’re clearly building up to a reveal
that High Priestesses have several men in their lives. Zoey rekindled her
relationship with Erik – after they broke up after her infidelity no less – on the
understanding that they were monogamous. In fact, Erik’s character is defined
by his jealousy and anger about Zoey with other men – it’s quite literally his
sole personality trait. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying this relationship is
healthy and if Zoey decides to end it because Erik is a controlling, obsessive
arsehole who needs a swift kick to the yin-yangs then yes I would completely
agree. But pursuing a relationship with someone you KNOW was hurt by you being
with another man and then kissing another man within hours of that fresh start
is not good for any relationship- and more than a little arseholish.
Part of the problem for this is Zoey’s odd understanding of
attraction and the overwhelming slutshaming that permeates this series. She
seems to believe that if she likes a guy/is in a relationship with a guy then
she should not be attracted to any other guys ever. While that is often
presented as our sexist and anti-sex society’s moral ideal, very few people are
actually like that. But not only does Zoey repeatedly shame herself for daring
to be attracted to other men – but she seems incapable of the idea of saying no
to a relationship with a guy she finds attractive, like attraction
automatically makes the relationship unavoidable. She may be in a relationship
with Erik, but she’s attracted to Heath – so why would she object to him kissing
her (in front of Erik no less?) twice? Why would she not kiss Stark back when
he kisses her – that would involve saying no. That would involve something resembling
self control. That would involve a concept of cheating that recognises the
first step of cheating is ACTING not FEELING. That would involving respecting
the people you’re in a relationship with and the promises you made to them
It’s also essential for the clumsy moral lesson that this
book desperately tries to make – that we can all make good choices. And it
fails. Oh gods it fails. It fails with Zoey because her difficult “good” choice
is saying no to Kaloma. The big terribad evil who is hot and (of course) finds
Zoey compelling. The only way saying no to this guy is in any way an
achievement or moral triumph is if you’ve already established that Zoey finds
it nearly impossible to say no to a hot guy who shows an interest in her.
Despite this awfulness, it pales next to the moral
trainwreck that is Stark and the Red Fledglings, he bad naughty vampires. Stark
has returned from the dead (predictably) and becomes an arsehole. No, let’s not
be subtle about this. He becomes a rapist, a predatory, vicious, self-obsessed,
violent rapist. And, in a stunning moment of actual clarity, Zoey’s gang of
servile minions condemns him for his awfulness
Zoey thinks they’re terrible mean and judgemental because
of it (because he’s hot and interested in her of course. This is Zoey’s
morality). Because Stark deserves another chance, Stark deserves forgiveness
and redemption and to kiss Zoey repeatedly and spend all night in her bed –
never mind actual actions. Never mind the people he hurt. Never kind the
complete lack of any attempts to address this – Zoey is trying to redeem him
from the very first second. She doesn’t even pause to consider what he’s done –
his redemption is all she cares about and is quickly achieved by the end. This
was clearly always intended – because he was introduced as “the Bad Boy.”
Despite nothing about him being the “bad boy” until he dies, is reborn and
becomes a rapist. This whole sexy bad boy persona is BUILT around him being a
rapist.
While we’re considering the awfulness of Stark’s redemption
we need to look at Stevie-Ray and the other Red Vampires; who ate at least one
homeless person. The whole gang treats this as… an unfortunate and embarrassing
incident. Like that office party where you got sloppy drunk and threw up on the
boss's shoes. It’s super-duper embarrassing but not evil, right? They seems to
alternate between dismissing the incident as an embarrassing faux pas, or being
disgusted because it was a HOMELESS PERSON. Let’s stress this – whenever they
talk about this person Stevie-Rae ate they emphasise they were a homeless person.
Nor a person, not a human – a homeless person (with the undertone of how icky
and dirty that is) – both disposable and repulsive.
That leaves us one more horror to face – the depiction of
marginalised characters.
Shaunee, the series recurring WOC, a Black woman and
walking Sassy-Black-Woman stereotype (which isn’t even remotely made better by
her having a white clone who duplicates all of these stereotypical mannerisms)
continues to be awful with little real role or presence or personality. She
does regularly refer to herself as a food stuff (caramel, coffee, etc) in between
her quips. And yes, she will mention her race fairly frequently given the lack
of any actual role in the book because how else can you get maximum useage from
a token.
She is now joined by Kramisha, another Black woman,
complete with this author’s idea of how Black people talk. Their terrible,
terrible, terrible idea of how Black people talk. It’s sassy, it’s angry, it’s
aggressive and it’s pretty cringeworthy. Kramisha is also sure to mention the
race of everyone around her – this white guy, that white boy, etc just in case
we forget she’s Black for a moment. We also have a briefly mentioned Hispanic
guy who is “thuggish” with “sagging pants”
And why is Kaloma white anyway? If he’s a fallen angel
who took up with Native Americans and part of a Native American history and
mythology?
Then there’s Jack and Damian – who can’t do anything
without mentioning they’re gay, usually in the most awful stereotypical way.
Whether it’s Kramisha calling them gay-white boys, to huge amounts of
stereotypical assumptions based on their sexuality, to the Twins’ new habit of
calling Damian “Queen Damian”. Of
course, Zoey always introduces them as gay on first meeting – because it’s
never ever their choice whether they come out or not. Oh and Heath throwing
around “gay” as an insult. And Jack? He faints, he weeps, he cries and screams,
he’s derided as weak but he can gift-wrap! We have a “very gay squeal” I cringe
every time his name is mentioned.
Throw in lots of slut shaming and girl hate (there’s “ho”
“slut” and “bitch” merrily scattered around), actually comparing themselves to
Martin Luther King (no, really), some gross ableism (“special needs” as an insult,
really?)
Her grandmother is still around and she herself is
Cherokee – which is all there for woo-woo! Yes, special special woo-woo.
Mythology, magic, curses and blesses, woo-woo, woo-woo, woo-woo. I long one day
to find a Native American accountant.
Really, I have to say this whole book is… so very very
very typical. And now I have the next one to look forward to…
