Her life had been built on lies and stolen chances, a series of tricks, and evasions, and sleight of hand. She already knew the language of demons. She’d been speaking it her whole life. [loc. 7235]
I liked Ninth House so much that I preordered this sequel as soon as it was listed. My expectations were high: unrealistically so, perhaps, for this was something of a disappointment. Perhaps it's 'unexpected trilogy' syndrome, or rather 'unexpected middle book of trilogy'. The world-building is as dark and as fascinating as in Ninth House (which I reread immediately before reading this) but the plot feels less coherent, more a rollercoaster of triumph-defeat-triumph-defeat, and I didn't feel the characters were as fully realised in Hell Bent as in the earlier volume. I was hoping to get more insight into Dawes, and I didn't find Mercy's role in this novel especially credible.
There are a lot of new elements (including a vampire, and salt spirits, and a cat with a history, and a serial killer) and also a couple of elements that really shouldn't be new -- that is, they should have been mentioned, at least, in Ninth House, given how much they matter to Alex.
Pleased to see that an imprisoned demon is familiar with the works of Diana Wynne Jones ...
Fulfils the ‘title starts with H’ rubric of the 52 books in 2023 challenge.
No comments:
Post a Comment