Book 3 of the
fantastical detective duo, Ana Dolabra and Din Kol, takes them to the heart of
the empire, to its agricultural core where augmented cattle grow the size of wagons
and whose feed is picked by small cats conditioned by a fungus to keep up with
their need for food. It’s also the area where Din is from and where he hasn’t
been back to since he agreed to be augmented as a scribe.
Two
families rule over the area. Now the son of one family has killed the daughter
of another. Ana and Din need to solve the matter before the families descend in
an open warfare, as that would threaten the food supply. She’s bored already.
But from
the start it becomes evident that the crime isn’t as straightforward as they
believed. The manner of killing has oddities. There have been several earlier
deaths in one of the ruling families. It has made the matriarch believe her
family is cursed and seek out guidance from the gods of people who inhabited
the empire before—and still maybe rule it. And every time the pair thinks they’ve
made progress with the investigation, a twist of fate pulls the rug from under
them.
To solve
the case, Ana has to delve deep into the history of the area and unearth things
that she’s in a unique position to know about. But some secrets of the ancients
should stay hidden.
This was
another great book. The manner with which the victims were killed was unique and
something that is only possible in this world, which makes the mystery feel
fresh. Ana was more active in the investigation than before, and her character gained a bit
of depth. Din was having a personal crisis or two, one that had to do with his
augmentations and another with his family that made an appearance. He wasn’t quite
as promiscuous as in the previous book, but he had his moment. We were
introduced to yet another interesting group of augmented people, the Osrii, who
scent and taste the world to determine its state. And the mystery that is Ana came
a little bit closer to solving. Maybe.
I received
a free copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
This is the second book in the Shadow of
the Leviathan series. It’s set in a wonderfully unique secondary world where
the centuries old emperor, the last remnant of the original people, rule over a
population modified with blood from humongous sea creatures who once a year
make to the land, destroying everything. The entire empire is harnessed to
either fight the leviathans or to make use of them.
This time, we follow the investigative duo,
Dinios Kol, the narrator, and his superior officer in the law department, Ana
Dolabra, outside the empire to Yarrowdale, a small seaside kingdom that the
empire has rented for a century for its practical geography. The dead
leviathans are floated there to The Shroud, a secret facility where everything
useful is extracted of them. It’s dangerous work, as the leviathan blood
mutates everything around it instantly, but necessary. Now the century is up
and the empire is trying to negotiate a new contract with the king.
One of the negotiators has been killed in a
bizarre fashion and the body disappeared from inside a locked, upper-floor
room. Ana and Din have arrived to investigate. Well, Din investigates and Ana
stays in her room to avoid overpowering herself with too much stimulus like
always. Nevertheless, it doesn’t take her long to figure out how it was done.
That turns out to be the easiest part of the case.
A conspiracy against the empire seems to be
afoot, and the perpetrator is not only capable of changing their appearances,
but highly intelligent too, thanks to illegal modifications. Poor Din has his
hands full as he hunts the killer through swamps to king’s court and even to
The Shroud itself, all the while risking his life to instant mutation by
leviathan blood stolen by the killer who has made it into a weapon.
Even Ana seems stumped, her behaviour
turning more bizarre by the day. But nothing escapes her, and in the end, the truth
turns out to be fairly simple and, as she says, banal. She’s very disappointed.
Reader is less so. I sort of guessed where the case was headed to, but allowed
myself to be distracted by the false leads. And even if the killer’s
motivations were fairly simple in the end, the case was entertaining.
Murder wasn’t the only crime committed. Ana
learns that the officers working for the empire at the Shroud have misused
their power and illegally modified the workers. All in the name of greater
good. In the end, the only arrest she’s able to make are these people. But it’s
a lesson for Din as well, about the importance of the work they’re doing for
the empire and the meaning of justice.
The greatness of the series is in the
characters. Din, the engraver with perfect memory, thanks to his mods, has
personal troubles. His father’s debts are his to pay, and the bank is doubling
the payments, now that he’s working in such a high-risk area. He has difficulty
sleeping, so he finds willing bed-fellows, men and women, where ever he goes to
avoid his own bed. He dreams of joining the legion to fight the leviathans, and
returning to the man he left behind, but he knows that the bank will never
allow that.
With the amount of sleep he got in this
book, it’s a wonder he’s able to function through it, let alone have several
sword fights. But he’s ever curious and able to detect the smallest details,
thanks to his modifications. And in the end, after several talks with Ana, he’s
even able to make up his mind about the legion.
There was maybe a character discrepancy with
the previous book though. I don’t remember well, but I seem to recall Din had
trouble reading, which was only once referenced to in this book when letters
danced in his eyes. Yet he seemed to be able to read well throughout the book. Maybe
I misremember, but it caught my eye.
Din was joined in his investigation by a
new side-kick, Malo. She’s a warden, a local working for the empire with a modified
sense of smell and sight. Her job is to track and fight smugglers in the swamps.
She’s a fun, rough character and not a love-interest or bed-fellow, which I
found refreshing. The end saw her needing to change her life, and maybe we’ll
see her in later books too.
The most interesting character is, like before,
Ana. She starts as her usual cantankerous, highly intelligent, and easily
distracted self. But as the case progresses, she morphs into something else,
and some of it is clearly deliberate. Din doesn’t know what to make of it, and
she won’t talk. It could even be that she can’t talk about what kinds of modifications
she has. She can hint though, and what Din learns through his investigation is
so mind-boggling he refuses to believe it.
This was another great book. It retained
the cozy feel despite the gruesome mutations and sword fights, the world
remained intriguing, even if this one didn’t have mushroom houses, and the
case, despite the banal ending, was good. I’m very eager to read more of Din
and Ana’s investigations.
I received a free copy from NetGalley in
exchange for an honest review.
The Tainted Cup starts the Shadow of the Leviathan series of fantasy mysteries. As always,
Jackson Bennet has created a wonderfully innovative world that isn’t a mere
backdrop but an integral part of the story, and characters that the reader can
root for.
The story
is set in a vast empire lined by the sea at one edge, where each wet season
huge leviathans try to enter the land, kept at bay by a wall. All the efforts
of the empire, especially the military, is directed at protecting the people
from these creatures. But they’re useful too, as their blood is used for
modifying and genetically manipulating everything from people to animals and plants.
Dinios Kol
is an engraver, a person whose brain has been altered to remember absolutely
everything. He’s been assigned as an assistant to Ana Dolabra, a criminal
investigator banished to a tiny village near the sea. She’s susceptible to
outward stimulus and goes blindfolded most of the time. And she never visits
the crime scenes herself. That’s why she has Kol.
A puzzling
murder has happened in a manor of one of the most influential families in the
empire. A tree has burst from inside a visiting military officer. The crime
doesn’t take Dolabra long to figure out, but then there turns out to be more of
these murders, which takes the pair to the town nearest to the seawall where
the military is preparing for the wet season.
This was an
excellent book and an intriguing mystery. Told from the point of view of Dinios
Kol, the mystery deepens and its scope widens at every turn. He’s the perfect protagonist
for the story, curious, single-minded and persistent. With his ability to
remember everything, he conducts a steady investigation. But solving the crime is
left for his boss. She’s a Sherlock Holmes type of person who makes huge deductive
leaps that leave others puzzled, the reader included. But she definitely finds
the truth in the end.
It's also a
warning about the human manipulation of nature. At every turn, the story relies
on the consequences of altering the people and the nature, and the toll of the
endless war against the leviathans. I have a notion they’ll turn out to be both
more important and less destructive than the people believe.
Despite the
gruesome nature of the murders, the story has a cozy feel to it. Kol goes about
his investigation, making friends and finding new things about himself and his
abilities. There’s even a bit of romance for him, if too briefly. The ending sends
the pair for more adventures. I hope there will be an entire series of the two
solving crimes around the empire.
I received
a free copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
