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Craft Sequence #6
The Ruin of Angels
Max Gladstone returns with The Ruin of Angels, the sixth novel in the Craft Sequence, which The Washington Post calls "the best kind of urban fantasy" and NPR calls "sharp, original, and passionate"
The God Wars destroyed the city of Alikand. Now, a century and a half and a great many construction contracts later, Agdel Lex rises in its place. Dead deities litter the surrounding desert, streets shift when people aren’t looking, a squidlike tower dominates the skyline, and the foreign Iskari Rectification Authority keeps strict order in this once-independent city—while treasure seekers, criminals, combat librarians, nightmare artists, angels, demons, dispossessed knights, grad students, and other fools gather in its ever-changing alleys, hungry for the next big score.
Priestess/investment banker Kai Pohala (last seen in Full Fathom Five) hits town to corner Agdel Lex’s burgeoning nightmare startup scene, and to visit her estranged sister Lei. But Kai finds Lei desperate at the center of a shadowy, and rapidly unravelling, business deal. When Lei ends up on the run, wanted for a crime she most definitely committed, Kai races to track her sister down before the Authority finds her first. But Lei has her own plans, involving her ex-girlfriend, a daring heist into the god-haunted desert, and, perhaps, freedom for an occupied city. Because Alikand might not be completely dead—and some people want to finish the job.
572 pages, Kindle Edition
First published September 5, 2017
228 people are currently reading
2871 people want to read
About the author
Max Gladstone
120 books2,527 followersMax Gladstone is the author of the Craft Sequence: THREE PARTS DEAD, TWO SERPENTS RISE, FULL FATHOM FIVE, and most recently, LAST FIRST SNOW. He's been twice nominated for the John W Campbell Best New Writer award, and nominated for the XYZZY and Lambda Awards.
Max has taught in southern Anhui, wrecked a bicycle in Angkor Wat, and been thrown from a horse in Mongolia. Max graduated from Yale University, where he studied Chinese.
Max has taught in southern Anhui, wrecked a bicycle in Angkor Wat, and been thrown from a horse in Mongolia. Max graduated from Yale University, where he studied Chinese.
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August 20, 2017
New Craft book!!!
I got lucky with an ARC thanks to Netgalley and I immediately got sucked right into the story since I had just gotten caught up with the previous publication-order book, Four Roads Cross.
Unfortunately for me, as well as everyone else who reads these books, I still have to do timeline juggling in my head because the later Full Fathom Five takes place AFTER Four Roads Cross and it's now even worse because the new book doesn't even have a handy number-sequence in the title. Check them out if you don't believe me. :) HOWEVER. Tara's here and badass and Kai who was MC in the previous chronological novel is ALSO right square in the action, so it's pretty easy to assume that we've come into an interesting juxtaposition: book 6 is actually the latest, chronologically! :) Weird, huh?
All right! Let's put that aside, as amusing as it is to contemplate, and get down to my reaction.
The end is as big as all the rest of the books, and glorious and exciting and magical and mind-blowing, but a very long stretch of the novel reads more like a down-to-earth mystery/hardship novel, with a murder, a theft, and lots of god-debt to have to juggle. Kai's estranged sister is in deep trouble.
I admit it took me a bit to get fully into it, but I placed my faith in Gladstone and got led out of the maze with some very heady reveals that had me gibbering with excitement.
Honestly, I just want someone to go on and on about the city and how it resembles not so much a city of the dead, modernized, but how mirror-modern it is to us. I still can't get over the idea of the means they were using to launch satellites into space... a little hint: this UF is full of mind-gnawing monstrosities from demon universes pulled into iron-clad contracts so big that it requires full law firms and multinational business to make it profitable. Extrapolate from that and you see where all the economy is and what might be involved in space-flight.
Mind-blowing, I say! And then there's this little new artifact they made that superficially resembles something like an old trope of a Sword Of Power, but those tropes are just plain toddler-level simple stories compared to this little beauty that was designed to BUILD A NEW *** from scratch. Just... wow. Wanna know? Read away!
This series is freaking amazing. The level of worldbuilding continues to astound and the characters are truly badass, but not in those old-style simple ways. These women and even some of the men are complicated, flawed, full of contradictions, and yet they eat gods for breakfast. :) ... well, Tara does, anyway. :)
There are really few books quite like these. I can definitely name a good handful, of course, but I can confidently raise these very high among the very best fantasies out there, sweeping most away by the sheer strength of its ideas and its facility. :)
Bravo!
I got lucky with an ARC thanks to Netgalley and I immediately got sucked right into the story since I had just gotten caught up with the previous publication-order book, Four Roads Cross.
Unfortunately for me, as well as everyone else who reads these books, I still have to do timeline juggling in my head because the later Full Fathom Five takes place AFTER Four Roads Cross and it's now even worse because the new book doesn't even have a handy number-sequence in the title. Check them out if you don't believe me. :) HOWEVER. Tara's here and badass and Kai who was MC in the previous chronological novel is ALSO right square in the action, so it's pretty easy to assume that we've come into an interesting juxtaposition: book 6 is actually the latest, chronologically! :) Weird, huh?
All right! Let's put that aside, as amusing as it is to contemplate, and get down to my reaction.
The end is as big as all the rest of the books, and glorious and exciting and magical and mind-blowing, but a very long stretch of the novel reads more like a down-to-earth mystery/hardship novel, with a murder, a theft, and lots of god-debt to have to juggle. Kai's estranged sister is in deep trouble.
I admit it took me a bit to get fully into it, but I placed my faith in Gladstone and got led out of the maze with some very heady reveals that had me gibbering with excitement.
Honestly, I just want someone to go on and on about the city and how it resembles not so much a city of the dead, modernized, but how mirror-modern it is to us. I still can't get over the idea of the means they were using to launch satellites into space... a little hint: this UF is full of mind-gnawing monstrosities from demon universes pulled into iron-clad contracts so big that it requires full law firms and multinational business to make it profitable. Extrapolate from that and you see where all the economy is and what might be involved in space-flight.
Mind-blowing, I say! And then there's this little new artifact they made that superficially resembles something like an old trope of a Sword Of Power, but those tropes are just plain toddler-level simple stories compared to this little beauty that was designed to BUILD A NEW *** from scratch. Just... wow. Wanna know? Read away!
This series is freaking amazing. The level of worldbuilding continues to astound and the characters are truly badass, but not in those old-style simple ways. These women and even some of the men are complicated, flawed, full of contradictions, and yet they eat gods for breakfast. :) ... well, Tara does, anyway. :)
There are really few books quite like these. I can definitely name a good handful, of course, but I can confidently raise these very high among the very best fantasies out there, sweeping most away by the sheer strength of its ideas and its facility. :)
Bravo!
October 3, 2017
Discworld meets Final Fantasy in Max Gladstone's Craft novels. I say Discworld because Pratchett's opus was a project about understanding the world through the fantastic, everything from the post to death itself made droll and bitter-funny — and so too the Craft books are a long Mobius journey into a world totally unlike ours and yet full of the same problems. But where Discworld traded in comedy, the Craft deals cards from a deck of modern thrillers and roleplaying games. Nowhere outside Final Fantasy do gods, urchins, fashionably urbane magicians, and technomystic cityscapes collide in such a blast of demonglass and metaphysical pyro.
I drew down on Max Gladstone back in '76, over the issue of a suspicious knock in the engine of the bus we were both riding: I thought I heard a misbegotten name in the rhythm and he seemed likeliest to have done the sabotage. The outcome is unimportant, except that you know he and I are acquainted.
Ruin of Angels is Craft 6, and no, you don't need to read any of the others to understand it, but yes, you'll see the connections if you do. The Craft isn't a linear first-and-then series; think instead of an anthology TV show or Marvel's movies, where standalone stories inhabit a shared backdrop. And it's the attention to that backdrop which makes these books special. The Craft is about how a world works: not 'worldbuilding' in the sense of names on a map and spells in an index, but the world as it lives.
Things you can see in this novel:
1. A battleground hell-world where mechanical centipedes wrestle angels in the bloody slush of burning streets as gods scream impaled on an aurora of thorns. This world exists around you at all times and you could fall in
2. Wizard space program
3. A paladin woman arm wrestling a crocodile man on the night before a major train heist
4. A priestess forced to stop performing blood sacrifice so the dragon she's riding can execute a safe descent and landing
Did you ever wonder how Harry Potter's wizarding world would adapt if it were forced to join 21st century global politics? Do you imagine a future for Middle-Earth in which ambitious Men manufacture Rings of Power at industrial scales and ents lobby against dwarven mining interests? This is the Craft: a world in which the micro-power of magic has transformed the great relationships between nations and the lives of ordinary people.
If a cabal in Agdel Lex decides to listen to the secret whispers of the stars, where do they get the necessary power? What deals do they cut? Who wants in on the enigma of the cosmos?
If a Queen's knight finds that service to the crown is tangled up with the crown's interest in exploiting its territory, does the knight continue to serve?
If a devastated shadow city caught in the last moments of an apocalyptic war exists beneath your home, and the only power holding it at bay is a squid the size of the Chrysler building, do you do whatever the squid tells you?
People like micro-rules: well defined magic, four houses in Hogwarts, kryptonite can harm Superman, Batman doesn't kill. The Craft is about the great patterns which emerge from those rules. If you have the power to repair the world, what do you fix? Who is a 'problem'? Who designs the solution?
Ruin of Angels is, in particular, a story about reconciling histories. Agdel Lex was once a beautiful city of libraries named Alikand, but the outbreak of the war against the gods devastated Alikand and left it frozen in time. Now the squid-worshipping Iskari rule Agdel Lex, and their Rectification Authority maintains the new city overlaid across the old. Anyone who remembers Alikand can open a dangerous breach to the dead city..and that means the Iskari must erase all memory of Alikand, including the families who treasure the books and memories of a lost culture.
Ruin's protagonists are delvers, outlaws who risk the old city to bring back lost books. They are cops and high financiers in the Iskari government. They're bohemian artists and petty criminals. All of them struggle with the momentum of their history. The Iskari must erase old Alikand, for the good of the new city. The delvers can't give up their ancient heritage, for the sake of their ancestors and descendants. The criminals must fence goods from the old city to make a profit, and squirm around the cops to survive. Everyone who wants to do any good must confront the evils that stain their power. And all of them play in the game of new city and old, looking for power or freedom in the frozen cataclysm that looms beneath.
Cop or delver, banker or outlaw, everyone can point to the past and say: "See? I have a reason for what I do."
Into this mess of conflict comes a banker named Kai, answering a call from her estranged sister Ley: she needs a ton of money, millions of thaums, tonight, for reasons that involve a knife, a corpse, a dead body wired into the head of a gigantic spear, and her ex-girlfriend.
Ruin isn't the fastest of the Craft novels, partly because it's in many ways the richest, and it wants you street-level acquainted with the city of Agdel Lex and its microcultures: but it is cleanly structured and ruthless in its escalation. The characters tangle in dyads and triads, a sister's love for her sister putting pressure on that woman's tense reunion with her ex whose grand schemes are driving the city's lead cop into strange alliances which complicate a girl's efforts to avoid hero-worship from an old friend. (I particularly liked the banker Fontaine, a woman who's goofy drugs-and-overwork routine gradually bares a harder truth she's maybe ignoring too hard.)
If the Craft books face one great challenge it's Max's commitment to goodness. A story about our attempts to rebuild the grinding cogs of civilization demands as many tragedies and compromises as triumphs, but Max, out of bloody-minded and universal compassion, wants to find the good road forward for even his bittiest players. No one sinks back into dream-dust addiction and dies in an alley, or gives up and runs after one too many interplanar traumas. I think this is strength as much as weakness — we need a story where a few brave good people can stand up to the tentacles of the Man and push back, and already we know who gets hurt when the Man gets hurtin'.
But after six Craft books, the flawless choreography of the finales, which give everyone from street to stratosphere a role to play in the great crisis, might feel too neat. (I think, weirdly enough, of Sabriel, a perfectly conventional beat-the-villain adventure which pays enough of a price in character blood to sell the danger. Sabriel's theme is Death, and Death must be paid. Angels' theme is incompatible worlds: why not put someone sympathetic, Fontaine perhaps, on the far side of that divide from our protagonists?)
Look: ultimately what's vital about the Craft is the cry to wake up. "Look," these books say, "look at the marvelously and incomprehensibly huge apparatus of civilization in which we live! Isn't it crazy how this causes that?" But the Craft doesn't stop there. Always, in the latter Craft novels, is the reminder to step back and listen. Something's cracking down low in the system. Something's running out. A change needs to happen, and it's going to hurt, and it may already be too late.
"The world is full of complexity," the Craft novels say. "But we need to do a few simple things. Care more for others. Consider what we're going to do tomorrow about the problems we make today. And listen to the stars. You might hear something scuttling your way."
I drew down on Max Gladstone back in '76, over the issue of a suspicious knock in the engine of the bus we were both riding: I thought I heard a misbegotten name in the rhythm and he seemed likeliest to have done the sabotage. The outcome is unimportant, except that you know he and I are acquainted.
Ruin of Angels is Craft 6, and no, you don't need to read any of the others to understand it, but yes, you'll see the connections if you do. The Craft isn't a linear first-and-then series; think instead of an anthology TV show or Marvel's movies, where standalone stories inhabit a shared backdrop. And it's the attention to that backdrop which makes these books special. The Craft is about how a world works: not 'worldbuilding' in the sense of names on a map and spells in an index, but the world as it lives.
Things you can see in this novel:
1. A battleground hell-world where mechanical centipedes wrestle angels in the bloody slush of burning streets as gods scream impaled on an aurora of thorns. This world exists around you at all times and you could fall in
2. Wizard space program
3. A paladin woman arm wrestling a crocodile man on the night before a major train heist
4. A priestess forced to stop performing blood sacrifice so the dragon she's riding can execute a safe descent and landing
Did you ever wonder how Harry Potter's wizarding world would adapt if it were forced to join 21st century global politics? Do you imagine a future for Middle-Earth in which ambitious Men manufacture Rings of Power at industrial scales and ents lobby against dwarven mining interests? This is the Craft: a world in which the micro-power of magic has transformed the great relationships between nations and the lives of ordinary people.
If a cabal in Agdel Lex decides to listen to the secret whispers of the stars, where do they get the necessary power? What deals do they cut? Who wants in on the enigma of the cosmos?
If a Queen's knight finds that service to the crown is tangled up with the crown's interest in exploiting its territory, does the knight continue to serve?
If a devastated shadow city caught in the last moments of an apocalyptic war exists beneath your home, and the only power holding it at bay is a squid the size of the Chrysler building, do you do whatever the squid tells you?
People like micro-rules: well defined magic, four houses in Hogwarts, kryptonite can harm Superman, Batman doesn't kill. The Craft is about the great patterns which emerge from those rules. If you have the power to repair the world, what do you fix? Who is a 'problem'? Who designs the solution?
Ruin of Angels is, in particular, a story about reconciling histories. Agdel Lex was once a beautiful city of libraries named Alikand, but the outbreak of the war against the gods devastated Alikand and left it frozen in time. Now the squid-worshipping Iskari rule Agdel Lex, and their Rectification Authority maintains the new city overlaid across the old. Anyone who remembers Alikand can open a dangerous breach to the dead city..and that means the Iskari must erase all memory of Alikand, including the families who treasure the books and memories of a lost culture.
Ruin's protagonists are delvers, outlaws who risk the old city to bring back lost books. They are cops and high financiers in the Iskari government. They're bohemian artists and petty criminals. All of them struggle with the momentum of their history. The Iskari must erase old Alikand, for the good of the new city. The delvers can't give up their ancient heritage, for the sake of their ancestors and descendants. The criminals must fence goods from the old city to make a profit, and squirm around the cops to survive. Everyone who wants to do any good must confront the evils that stain their power. And all of them play in the game of new city and old, looking for power or freedom in the frozen cataclysm that looms beneath.
Cop or delver, banker or outlaw, everyone can point to the past and say: "See? I have a reason for what I do."
Into this mess of conflict comes a banker named Kai, answering a call from her estranged sister Ley: she needs a ton of money, millions of thaums, tonight, for reasons that involve a knife, a corpse, a dead body wired into the head of a gigantic spear, and her ex-girlfriend.
Ruin isn't the fastest of the Craft novels, partly because it's in many ways the richest, and it wants you street-level acquainted with the city of Agdel Lex and its microcultures: but it is cleanly structured and ruthless in its escalation. The characters tangle in dyads and triads, a sister's love for her sister putting pressure on that woman's tense reunion with her ex whose grand schemes are driving the city's lead cop into strange alliances which complicate a girl's efforts to avoid hero-worship from an old friend. (I particularly liked the banker Fontaine, a woman who's goofy drugs-and-overwork routine gradually bares a harder truth she's maybe ignoring too hard.)
If the Craft books face one great challenge it's Max's commitment to goodness. A story about our attempts to rebuild the grinding cogs of civilization demands as many tragedies and compromises as triumphs, but Max, out of bloody-minded and universal compassion, wants to find the good road forward for even his bittiest players. No one sinks back into dream-dust addiction and dies in an alley, or gives up and runs after one too many interplanar traumas. I think this is strength as much as weakness — we need a story where a few brave good people can stand up to the tentacles of the Man and push back, and already we know who gets hurt when the Man gets hurtin'.
But after six Craft books, the flawless choreography of the finales, which give everyone from street to stratosphere a role to play in the great crisis, might feel too neat. (I think, weirdly enough, of Sabriel, a perfectly conventional beat-the-villain adventure which pays enough of a price in character blood to sell the danger. Sabriel's theme is Death, and Death must be paid. Angels' theme is incompatible worlds: why not put someone sympathetic, Fontaine perhaps, on the far side of that divide from our protagonists?)
Look: ultimately what's vital about the Craft is the cry to wake up. "Look," these books say, "look at the marvelously and incomprehensibly huge apparatus of civilization in which we live! Isn't it crazy how this causes that?" But the Craft doesn't stop there. Always, in the latter Craft novels, is the reminder to step back and listen. Something's cracking down low in the system. Something's running out. A change needs to happen, and it's going to hurt, and it may already be too late.
"The world is full of complexity," the Craft novels say. "But we need to do a few simple things. Care more for others. Consider what we're going to do tomorrow about the problems we make today. And listen to the stars. You might hear something scuttling your way."
January 25, 2024
Moonlit rooftops spread for miles, cascading downslope toward the Wrecker Tower and the bay. Stillness, cabs, waves - and there, to the south, movement. Dark figures leapt from roof to roof. Their robes fluttered like wings at the apex of every leap; one lashed out with a tentacle to catch a water tower spar. By night the city could be an overgrown ruin, a human jungle, a labyrinth replete with minotaurs, a haven and a hell at once, but the Wreckers left a trail of certainty where they passed; the streets beneath them met at right angles, and never could have been other than they were.
"Three of them," she counted. "What the hells did you do?"
"You know," Ley said. "The usual." And she ran.
Every time I read one of the books in this series I'm convinced it's my favourite, but this time I think The Ruin of Angels actually will take the crown (at least until I do the title-number-order reread). All of these books can be read as a standalone, but the extra dimension of seeing familiar characters pop up again was lovely; and who could read one of these and stop there?
As usual, Max Gladstone makes the most of the fantastic world he's created in his Craft Sequence. There's so much here to play with - a brief aside on the provenance of a particular herb reveals an island that sounds like it could provide a novel's worth of story on its own - and there's always delights mixed in with all the stories of gods and epic stakes. Kai, from Full Fathom Five, returns, and her reluctant family reunion introduces us to a set of characters just as real and investable as he ever made (I don't usually care about romance, much less chivalrous, but show me a more precious pair than Gal and Raymet, I challenge you).
And in this city whose reality depends on just who's looking at the time, we get a heist story with, as promised, epic stakes and gods. It wouldn't be Gladstone if there wasn't a bit of a cautionary tale along with it , but if you're not in the frame of mind, you can also just sit back and enjoy his fantastic story in the unusual setting of metropolitan fantasy that he does so, so beautifully well.
I've mentioned a few times how little I like finishing series, and I was more reluctant than normal to let this one end. But - thank you, Max Gladstone - there's the title order re-read to come, and I couldn't resist finishing the reading challenge for the year with the current finish to a series I've loved so much. Let's hope there's more to come!
Edit on title order re-read completion! There is indeed another and a second "another" coming out in April (2024). And yes, again, this is my favourite, as has each of the others been. Title re-read order is my preferred now, I think. I'll just have to keep testing the theory :)
"Three of them," she counted. "What the hells did you do?"
"You know," Ley said. "The usual." And she ran.
Every time I read one of the books in this series I'm convinced it's my favourite, but this time I think The Ruin of Angels actually will take the crown (at least until I do the title-number-order reread). All of these books can be read as a standalone, but the extra dimension of seeing familiar characters pop up again was lovely; and who could read one of these and stop there?
As usual, Max Gladstone makes the most of the fantastic world he's created in his Craft Sequence. There's so much here to play with - a brief aside on the provenance of a particular herb reveals an island that sounds like it could provide a novel's worth of story on its own - and there's always delights mixed in with all the stories of gods and epic stakes. Kai, from Full Fathom Five, returns, and her reluctant family reunion introduces us to a set of characters just as real and investable as he ever made (I don't usually care about romance, much less chivalrous, but show me a more precious pair than Gal and Raymet, I challenge you).
And in this city whose reality depends on just who's looking at the time, we get a heist story with, as promised, epic stakes and gods. It wouldn't be Gladstone if there wasn't a bit of a cautionary tale along with it , but if you're not in the frame of mind, you can also just sit back and enjoy his fantastic story in the unusual setting of metropolitan fantasy that he does so, so beautifully well.
I've mentioned a few times how little I like finishing series, and I was more reluctant than normal to let this one end. But - thank you, Max Gladstone - there's the title order re-read to come, and I couldn't resist finishing the reading challenge for the year with the current finish to a series I've loved so much. Let's hope there's more to come!
Edit on title order re-read completion! There is indeed another and a second "another" coming out in April (2024). And yes, again, this is my favourite, as has each of the others been. Title re-read order is my preferred now, I think. I'll just have to keep testing the theory :)
Read
January 6, 2019I have...mixed feelings about this one. So mixed, in fact, that I finished this one weeks ago and tried to come up with a review, or at least a rating, and then put it off and read something else altogether. Ruin of Angels is in some ways classic Max Gladstone, with its strong female cast (hardly any male characters in this one at all), snappy writing, and overall weirdness (living giant squid tower, anyone?). Yet this one feels like an odd mash-up between Firefly-ish train heist and Gladstone's more usual gods + transactions plots. There's a lot of frantic running. Things go wrong (as expected). Tara Abernathy makes an appearance, but I'm not totally convinced she's necessary. There might be more flash and less substance, but I can't quite put a finger on why I finished it feeling unsatisfied.
September 20, 2017
Can someone please have a conversation with me about mentions of women shaving their legs in fantasy novels? I have a pretty extreme negative reaction to it (read: it fills me with rage), but maybe it's just me.
Aaaaaanyway, it took me a really long time to get into this one. I just couldn't seem to get attached to any of the new characters until very late in the game, and though I was very excited to see Tara Abernathy again so soon, she's honestly hardly in this book at all (but yay, Kai and Izza!). And I could. Not. Bring myself to care about the train heist thing that...um...why exactly were they doing that again, and what exactly happened during it, and...I dunno. I guess I just somehow found the whats and the whys more difficult to figure out or focus on or give a shit about in this book than in previous installments, and though the end is pretty epic in a lot of ways, the final sentence--what?
While it looks like most folks seem to have really loved it, I guess I felt like I missed the business dealings side of this world, and the small details--the vast majority of this book just seemed a little more traditional urban fantasy than the other books in the series have to me, albeit with waaaay fewer dudes. I think there are maybe three or four male characters total in this book, and several are only mentioned a few times at all, and all are minor characters at most. That Gladstone kind of turned that tradition on its head sort of made up for the leg shaving comment a little for me. Seriously, am I the only person it bothers?
Never mind.
Aaaaaanyway, it took me a really long time to get into this one. I just couldn't seem to get attached to any of the new characters until very late in the game, and though I was very excited to see Tara Abernathy again so soon, she's honestly hardly in this book at all (but yay, Kai and Izza!). And I could. Not. Bring myself to care about the train heist thing that...um...why exactly were they doing that again, and what exactly happened during it, and...I dunno. I guess I just somehow found the whats and the whys more difficult to figure out or focus on or give a shit about in this book than in previous installments, and though the end is pretty epic in a lot of ways, the final sentence--what?
While it looks like most folks seem to have really loved it, I guess I felt like I missed the business dealings side of this world, and the small details--the vast majority of this book just seemed a little more traditional urban fantasy than the other books in the series have to me, albeit with waaaay fewer dudes. I think there are maybe three or four male characters total in this book, and several are only mentioned a few times at all, and all are minor characters at most. That Gladstone kind of turned that tradition on its head sort of made up for the leg shaving comment a little for me. Seriously, am I the only person it bothers?
Never mind.
January 20, 2025
Stars: 4 out of 5
I love coming back to this world. It's so rich and complex, and every book shows us a new facet of it. I feel like each book gives me more puzzle pieces to a giant picture that I'm assembling by reading the series.
In this book, we reconnect with Kai from Five Fathoms Deep, and she is away from her island in a city she doesn't understand or particularly like, trying to help her estranged sister. Well, first Kai reluctantly meets with her sister and refuses to help her, but then she spends the rest of the book trying to rectify that error.
I missed Kai. She is a very good character. She isn't a Craftswoman, she doesn't have much personal power. She is a priestess to idols made by men from scratch to store their soul stuff in. And very recently a real priestess to a new Goddess. She is out of her depth in this strange and broken city where the God Wars started, and where the first Craftsman is still frozen in time, dying but not dead, tearing the world apart.
I loved this city. Both the Alikand that was lovingly preserved in the books and stories of its citizens and the broken Dead City where the war was still being fought in infinity, with both sides endlessly dying but not quite dead. And the strange order of the squid city that was so foreign to both the other cities, but was necessary to keep the wound of the Dead City from destroying the rest of the world. I am happy that Kai found a solution that preserved Alikand in the end.
I have one issue with this book - it dragged a little bit in the beginning when the heist of the train was being organized. We spent too much time with Kai's sister, and I didn't particularly like her as a person. Yes, I understood her motivations by the end of the book, and I could even sympathize, but I still think she could have handled all of this better if she stepped on her pride and asked for help, instead of trying to play everyone around her. You could argue that she caused most of the problems she worked so hard to solve afterward.
I was happy to see Tara again since she is by far my favorite character in the series, but she doesn't play a very big role here. She helped where she could, but was mostly relegated to the background. Which I understand. This is Kai's book. And the Blue Lady's, because she finally came into her full powers here. The Goddess of thieves and street children lost and forgotten people, the fleeing, the downtrodden. The one who ate the Wastes.
What I love the most about this series is that despite some horrible things that happen to the characters in the books, there is always a hopeful note in the end. Kai and her sister finally make peace, and the poppy fields around Alikand are blooming once more.
Onward to the next book in the series.
I love coming back to this world. It's so rich and complex, and every book shows us a new facet of it. I feel like each book gives me more puzzle pieces to a giant picture that I'm assembling by reading the series.
In this book, we reconnect with Kai from Five Fathoms Deep, and she is away from her island in a city she doesn't understand or particularly like, trying to help her estranged sister. Well, first Kai reluctantly meets with her sister and refuses to help her, but then she spends the rest of the book trying to rectify that error.
I missed Kai. She is a very good character. She isn't a Craftswoman, she doesn't have much personal power. She is a priestess to idols made by men from scratch to store their soul stuff in. And very recently a real priestess to a new Goddess. She is out of her depth in this strange and broken city where the God Wars started, and where the first Craftsman is still frozen in time, dying but not dead, tearing the world apart.
I loved this city. Both the Alikand that was lovingly preserved in the books and stories of its citizens and the broken Dead City where the war was still being fought in infinity, with both sides endlessly dying but not quite dead. And the strange order of the squid city that was so foreign to both the other cities, but was necessary to keep the wound of the Dead City from destroying the rest of the world. I am happy that Kai found a solution that preserved Alikand in the end.
I have one issue with this book - it dragged a little bit in the beginning when the heist of the train was being organized. We spent too much time with Kai's sister, and I didn't particularly like her as a person. Yes, I understood her motivations by the end of the book, and I could even sympathize, but I still think she could have handled all of this better if she stepped on her pride and asked for help, instead of trying to play everyone around her. You could argue that she caused most of the problems she worked so hard to solve afterward.
I was happy to see Tara again since she is by far my favorite character in the series, but she doesn't play a very big role here. She helped where she could, but was mostly relegated to the background. Which I understand. This is Kai's book. And the Blue Lady's, because she finally came into her full powers here. The Goddess of thieves and street children lost and forgotten people, the fleeing, the downtrodden. The one who ate the Wastes.
What I love the most about this series is that despite some horrible things that happen to the characters in the books, there is always a hopeful note in the end. Kai and her sister finally make peace, and the poppy fields around Alikand are blooming once more.
Onward to the next book in the series.
September 2, 2017
“YES.” That is the only word I found when I went to look at my first draft of this review and I thought I should keep it. It really translates my state of excitement and joyfulness upon finishing this book, how this book did justice to a remarquable cast of characters, while juggling with an epic number of plotlines.
It is important to note that 90% of the characters in this books are women and I loved all these ladies SO MUCH. When I say that this book has almost only women protagonists I’m not kidding, I can only remember one or two names of men, and they were really secondary characters. Women were everywhere in this novel: as side characters, main characters, antagonists… This was amazing to me. It didn’t even strike me before nearing the end of the novel and trying to do a mental list of the important characters.
Regarding the chronology in relation to the five first books, this is the equivalent of the start of the second season of the Craft Sequence. (Max Gladstone said that in answer to a goodreads question here.) So this is the sixth book both in publication and chronological order, and mostly set some time after the events of Full Fathom Five since Kai is back as a main character in The Ruin of Angels. This book could be read as a standalone, but I still think it would be even MORE enjoyable if one has read the others! There are guest appearences of some characters previously met in the other books, mentions of some events of importance… I had binged-read the first five right before jumping on that one and I can say this was the best experience possible!
There is A LOT happening in this book. It felt like a murder mystery, with thefts and family secrets and big corporations and… you got the idea! The start of it all is that Kai is back in this really weird city because her sister asked for her help. She’s unconvenienced by this but family is family and she went anyway. I have mentionned it in the review of the first five books, but I feel compelled to say again that Kai is a trans woman of color. There is also a heist happening at one point of the novel involving several women, and a lot of them are queer. Like, all of them if I’m not mistaken. Like I said, SO MANY COOL (QUEER) WOMEN.
Max Gladstone made a little twitter thread on what this book is about and he says it best:
"Hey! Listen! RUIN OF ANGELS hits stands NEXT WEEK! Kai, and Izza, and a train heist, and sisters, and a squid tower!
This is a book about troubles in close relationships, about good intentions gone wrong, about self-deception and self-liberation, and family.
Also, venture capital, surveillance culture, startups, the Future (which is Murder), geopolitics, soul trade, mapping, & criminal evangelism."
WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT. This book has everything, everything I tell you.
The wolrdbuilding going into this city is mind-blowing, when Kai first put step into the city, she almost passed out and I can say that it has the same effect on the reader. There is a lot to take in but it is so rewarding in the end.
And the end! Oh my god (😉), it hints at something big coming, at more stories, more more more and I’m super ready.
This series keep on proving to me with each new book that yes yes yes this is one of my new favourite that I will re-read a lot in the future. One of these where I will discover new details and secrets with each new reading, where I will fall in love with the characters again and again, and be eagerly waiting for more wonderful additions to this wonderful sequence. Add to that those gorgeous cover art and I’m sold for ever and ever to the Craft Sequence.
A review copy (eARC) of this book was provided by the publisher. Some things might change in the final copy.
Review first posted on my blog
It is important to note that 90% of the characters in this books are women and I loved all these ladies SO MUCH. When I say that this book has almost only women protagonists I’m not kidding, I can only remember one or two names of men, and they were really secondary characters. Women were everywhere in this novel: as side characters, main characters, antagonists… This was amazing to me. It didn’t even strike me before nearing the end of the novel and trying to do a mental list of the important characters.
Regarding the chronology in relation to the five first books, this is the equivalent of the start of the second season of the Craft Sequence. (Max Gladstone said that in answer to a goodreads question here.) So this is the sixth book both in publication and chronological order, and mostly set some time after the events of Full Fathom Five since Kai is back as a main character in The Ruin of Angels. This book could be read as a standalone, but I still think it would be even MORE enjoyable if one has read the others! There are guest appearences of some characters previously met in the other books, mentions of some events of importance… I had binged-read the first five right before jumping on that one and I can say this was the best experience possible!
There is A LOT happening in this book. It felt like a murder mystery, with thefts and family secrets and big corporations and… you got the idea! The start of it all is that Kai is back in this really weird city because her sister asked for her help. She’s unconvenienced by this but family is family and she went anyway. I have mentionned it in the review of the first five books, but I feel compelled to say again that Kai is a trans woman of color. There is also a heist happening at one point of the novel involving several women, and a lot of them are queer. Like, all of them if I’m not mistaken. Like I said, SO MANY COOL (QUEER) WOMEN.
Max Gladstone made a little twitter thread on what this book is about and he says it best:
"Hey! Listen! RUIN OF ANGELS hits stands NEXT WEEK! Kai, and Izza, and a train heist, and sisters, and a squid tower!
This is a book about troubles in close relationships, about good intentions gone wrong, about self-deception and self-liberation, and family.
Also, venture capital, surveillance culture, startups, the Future (which is Murder), geopolitics, soul trade, mapping, & criminal evangelism."
WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT. This book has everything, everything I tell you.
The wolrdbuilding going into this city is mind-blowing, when Kai first put step into the city, she almost passed out and I can say that it has the same effect on the reader. There is a lot to take in but it is so rewarding in the end.
And the end! Oh my god (😉), it hints at something big coming, at more stories, more more more and I’m super ready.
This series keep on proving to me with each new book that yes yes yes this is one of my new favourite that I will re-read a lot in the future. One of these where I will discover new details and secrets with each new reading, where I will fall in love with the characters again and again, and be eagerly waiting for more wonderful additions to this wonderful sequence. Add to that those gorgeous cover art and I’m sold for ever and ever to the Craft Sequence.
A review copy (eARC) of this book was provided by the publisher. Some things might change in the final copy.
Review first posted on my blog
October 16, 2017
I should state up front that I'm not the target audience for this book. I enjoyed the first couple of books in the Craft Sequence, but the more I read of it, the more tedious I found it. Reusing the characters seemed like a cool idea in theory, but not in practice; it felt like the characterization got lazier with each book, and I couldn't find myself vested in any of the characters in the stories.
Six books into the series, The Ruin of Angels is no different. Gladstone gets rid of the told-out-of-order sequence of the books and starts writing them all in chronological order, but he brings in two characters he's already used in previous novels -- Kai Pohala and Tara Abernathy. He also avoids the whole soul-as-money and magic-as-justice tropes on which he hung the first five books, which was a relief, but it didn't make much difference to me. I didn't feel engaged in any part of the story. It took a long time for anything to get going with the plot, which didn't help matters.
Like all the books, there were a lot of neat ideas, but the characters were flat, the narrative was unengaging, and the plot was pretty boring. Gladstone has his fans, who I'm sure will love this and fawn over the book, but I found myself just wanting to be done with it. As a friend of mine put it, the shine is off the apple, but for me, the apple is bruised and attracting fruit flies. I won't be returning to the series.
Six books into the series, The Ruin of Angels is no different. Gladstone gets rid of the told-out-of-order sequence of the books and starts writing them all in chronological order, but he brings in two characters he's already used in previous novels -- Kai Pohala and Tara Abernathy. He also avoids the whole soul-as-money and magic-as-justice tropes on which he hung the first five books, which was a relief, but it didn't make much difference to me. I didn't feel engaged in any part of the story. It took a long time for anything to get going with the plot, which didn't help matters.
Like all the books, there were a lot of neat ideas, but the characters were flat, the narrative was unengaging, and the plot was pretty boring. Gladstone has his fans, who I'm sure will love this and fawn over the book, but I found myself just wanting to be done with it. As a friend of mine put it, the shine is off the apple, but for me, the apple is bruised and attracting fruit flies. I won't be returning to the series.
April 1, 2025
I’m glad to know this continues on still, because every time we get to be with previous characters, it just always turns out to be a fun and good time. This does have a different “voice”, signalled by the divergence in cover art, I suppose (I had wondered what was up with that).
It’s got all Gladstone’s hallmarks, though: rich diction, cool setting ideas, and a good plot set at a good pace. If this series proves anything it’s that he is a reliable and consistent voice that also manages to be unique; something all too rare in this genre, ironically.
It’s got all Gladstone’s hallmarks, though: rich diction, cool setting ideas, and a good plot set at a good pace. If this series proves anything it’s that he is a reliable and consistent voice that also manages to be unique; something all too rare in this genre, ironically.
July 15, 2023
Satisfactory, but not as great as prior books in the series. Probably because I was not a big fan of Kai's little sister issues. However, it was good to have Tara back.
November 25, 2017
I'm kind of sad to write this review, since Max Gladstone is one of my favorites, and The Craft Sequence has been stellar. This one just didn't connect with me. It's from a different publisher with a different art style, but I figured it would feel the same as the first five books, which I really loved, but it didn't really feel that similar.
The beauty of this series of the great mix of realism and surrealism, pushing the weirdness of dragons, sorcerers, demons, and skeleton kings with actuaries, lawyers, investment brokers, and ombudsmen. Here, we got some of the characters from those stories, but they showed up in a more typically fantastical plot -- treasure hunters and Lovecraftian monsters and angels and mythical warriors. There is definitely a good amount of trope inversion and a lot of modern characters, but it all felt a lot more stereotypical and cliche than the normal Gladstone book.
The pace also started really slowly, and the ramp up in intensity coincided with a bit of confusion in the setting and plot. I don't want to describe the confusion, since it's a bit of a giveaway, but I'll say this: Gladstone did an ok job with something that China Mieville mastered in The City & The City.
All in all, it's still a good book, but compared to the first five books, it was a bit of a letdown. I'm sure others will still love it, but it wasn't for me.
The beauty of this series of the great mix of realism and surrealism, pushing the weirdness of dragons, sorcerers, demons, and skeleton kings with actuaries, lawyers, investment brokers, and ombudsmen. Here, we got some of the characters from those stories, but they showed up in a more typically fantastical plot -- treasure hunters and Lovecraftian monsters and angels and mythical warriors. There is definitely a good amount of trope inversion and a lot of modern characters, but it all felt a lot more stereotypical and cliche than the normal Gladstone book.
The pace also started really slowly, and the ramp up in intensity coincided with a bit of confusion in the setting and plot. I don't want to describe the confusion, since it's a bit of a giveaway, but I'll say this: Gladstone did an ok job with something that China Mieville mastered in The City & The City.
All in all, it's still a good book, but compared to the first five books, it was a bit of a letdown. I'm sure others will still love it, but it wasn't for me.
November 17, 2017
Gladstone continues doing his own thing and rocking it. This time it’s venture capital, mind controlling squid-gods, investment banking, Lovecraftian alternate realities overlaid upon our own, and flannel clad and bearded hipsters.
I still for the life of me can’t figure out how the man makes this stuff work so well, but by the Blue Lady he does. Even with Oathbringer waiting for me, this was engrossing. If I have a complaint, it’s that the last 20% or so was entirely supertense climax, and not being a Deathless King I have to breathe at least once and a while. Easy 5 stars.
I still for the life of me can’t figure out how the man makes this stuff work so well, but by the Blue Lady he does. Even with Oathbringer waiting for me, this was engrossing. If I have a complaint, it’s that the last 20% or so was entirely supertense climax, and not being a Deathless King I have to breathe at least once and a while. Easy 5 stars.
July 7, 2023
A flight attendant stood in the aisle, frowning. "We're landing soon. Please raise your tray and refrain from excessive prayer."
There were so many loveable things in this book - the characters (almost exclusively women), all the sapphic relationships and tensions, our favourite trans protagonist, AMAZING worldbuilding. I wanted to love this and I'm pissed at this book for not letting me. The reasons for this are actually pretty simple this time around - it was so god damn slow! I don't mind slow books, I don't even mind books where literary nothing happens! What is too much for me is a book that is almost 600 pages long that has so much exposition that when actually something does happen I don't even care anymore! *sigh*
It's a family library." She glanced up and down the narrow street, drew close to Raymet, and tried to keep her voice level. "The wars broke up libraries families spent centuries building. What wasn't looted fell into the dead city-my family's books, the Ko's, all the old collections."
"I know that."
"But you don't live it. I know every book in the Hala collection. I feel the ones we've lost-like missing teeth."
If I were to rate the potential of this book, it would easily be a five star... as it is, I have no clue how to rate this, because I just didn't enjoy it... I counted pages way too much and switched to audio half-way-through because I needed to do something while reading it or I would go mad. The paradoxical part of course being that... if this hadn't so much potential, I wouldn't mind its faults half as much...
The one thing that really had my full attention the whole time was the romance between Raymet and Gal (F/F), I love those two so much. I just love the reserved but also kind of overly dramatic rule-stickler that is also hell-of-a-fighter falling in love with sort-of-shy nerdy mechanic. Ugh! Love them!
"Here, sanity is a security issue. Deranged perceptions, including conspiracy theories, can breach consensus reality, and let the dead city in. That's why the Rectification program exists." She touched her breastbone. "We all doubt, sometimes. We doubt ourselves, our worlds, our truths. It can happen to anyone. Even to people of faith. When we can no longer bear the work, we seek refuge in a clearer mind."
There is also this beautiful metaphor (or is it allegory? I'm not sure about the terms...) being woven into the book, where you have two cities a top of each other, the old dead city and the new city the colonizing culture is imposing on it. It obviously isn't that simple, but you know, for the sake of this review... Gladstone works with this image really well, making it almost a philosophical novel and I loved that. Unfortunately, he works a lot with another metafor too (concerning Ley's character) and I liked this one much less since it felt over-repeated to me (though, I have to say, it came back satisfyingly in the end).
My definite point being, this needed more editing. There is a beautiful succinct novel with philosophical core and sapphic lusting in this book somewhere, but unfortunately it got drowned it all the redundant words (huh, feels a lot thematic). What a shame...
P.S. I feel bad giving this the same rating as to Two Serpents Rise, this book was better, but it also felt to me like I was reading it forever, so 🤷🏽♀️
BRed at WBtM: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
July 16, 2023
This might be my favorite of the Craft books, but it's still not quite getting into five-star territory for me. It has some of the same strengths and weaknesses that recur throughout the Craft Sequence.
This book stars the best (I think) of the sequence's prior characters--Kai, Izza, and to a lesser extent, Tara--and also brings in some excellent new characters and sets up compelling relationships and dynamics between them. The cast is vibrant and diverse, and queer romance gets a spotlight it hasn't had in the other books, which I very much enjoyed. Kai's trans-ness isn't as well done as it was in Full Fathom Five, mostly just because it isn't as present (in FFF, it was smoothly integrated throughout her characterization, but here, it's more of a "blink and you'll miss it" detail), but there were still moments that I appreciated on that front, as well, particularly , and Gladstone's at least not repeating the clumsy mistakes of in Last First Snow.
But as much as I enjoyed the cast, where this book really shines is, as usual, in the world-building. The layered cities of Agdel Lex, Alikand, and the dead city create a fascinating setting rich with both story potential and real-world parallels, and Gladstone lets neither go to waste. Thematically, the book digs into (among other things) colonial occupation and the power of propaganda and mass belief regardless of reality. I could've happily spent two or maybe more books exploring these cities and their peoples. This book also develops the aftermath of the events of Full Fathom Five and, like all the Craft books, stretches the possibilities of Craft and gods and everything in-between in ways that feel new and fresh but never out-of-place with what came before.
The book's biggest weaknesses are pacing and coherence. It's long, and there are definitely places where the story drags; at the same time, this setting and its new characters have so much potential that Gladstone tries to bring out that a lot of it, in the end, feels like it got shortchanged. The book isn't as scattered as some of its predecessors, and most of the pieces came together in the end, but there's just too much crammed into it for all of it to be as lush and satisfying as it could have been. Gladstone's tendency to explain nothing and rapidly dip in and out of things, sometimes never to return to them (viewpoints, world-building elements, etc.), only exacerbates the problem. On the thematic level, in particular, it's entirely too easy to miss the forests when all Gladstone ever shows you is a handful of trees.
The last thing I want to make note of is how this book handles torture. It's still not perfect, but I think it's a distinct improvement over the prior Craft books. The story and setting are, as usual, flooded with background torture apologia, with all manner of characters (heroes and villains, major and minor) saying and believing that torture works, but the way things play out when it finally comes down to it ends up powerfully (if still imperfectly) subverting that message by tying it to the idea that those in power have been lying about how the world works, and by showing the reader that they're wrong. It could have been clearer and more complete (without still portraying torturers as competent, knowledgeable, and controlled--all false), but I appreciated it.
This book stars the best (I think) of the sequence's prior characters--Kai, Izza, and to a lesser extent, Tara--and also brings in some excellent new characters and sets up compelling relationships and dynamics between them. The cast is vibrant and diverse, and queer romance gets a spotlight it hasn't had in the other books, which I very much enjoyed. Kai's trans-ness isn't as well done as it was in Full Fathom Five, mostly just because it isn't as present (in FFF, it was smoothly integrated throughout her characterization, but here, it's more of a "blink and you'll miss it" detail), but there were still moments that I appreciated on that front, as well, particularly , and Gladstone's at least not repeating the clumsy mistakes of in Last First Snow.
But as much as I enjoyed the cast, where this book really shines is, as usual, in the world-building. The layered cities of Agdel Lex, Alikand, and the dead city create a fascinating setting rich with both story potential and real-world parallels, and Gladstone lets neither go to waste. Thematically, the book digs into (among other things) colonial occupation and the power of propaganda and mass belief regardless of reality. I could've happily spent two or maybe more books exploring these cities and their peoples. This book also develops the aftermath of the events of Full Fathom Five and, like all the Craft books, stretches the possibilities of Craft and gods and everything in-between in ways that feel new and fresh but never out-of-place with what came before.
The book's biggest weaknesses are pacing and coherence. It's long, and there are definitely places where the story drags; at the same time, this setting and its new characters have so much potential that Gladstone tries to bring out that a lot of it, in the end, feels like it got shortchanged. The book isn't as scattered as some of its predecessors, and most of the pieces came together in the end, but there's just too much crammed into it for all of it to be as lush and satisfying as it could have been. Gladstone's tendency to explain nothing and rapidly dip in and out of things, sometimes never to return to them (viewpoints, world-building elements, etc.), only exacerbates the problem. On the thematic level, in particular, it's entirely too easy to miss the forests when all Gladstone ever shows you is a handful of trees.
The last thing I want to make note of is how this book handles torture. It's still not perfect, but I think it's a distinct improvement over the prior Craft books. The story and setting are, as usual, flooded with background torture apologia, with all manner of characters (heroes and villains, major and minor) saying and believing that torture works, but the way things play out when it finally comes down to it ends up powerfully (if still imperfectly) subverting that message by tying it to the idea that those in power have been lying about how the world works, and by showing the reader that they're wrong. It could have been clearer and more complete (without still portraying torturers as competent, knowledgeable, and controlled--all false), but I appreciated it.
December 14, 2022
5 stars
Pretty easily the best of the Craft Sequence for me. The best setting, the best of Gladstone's writing, the best cast of the characters and one of the coolest premises for a book that I've read in a while.
Pretty easily the best of the Craft Sequence for me. The best setting, the best of Gladstone's writing, the best cast of the characters and one of the coolest premises for a book that I've read in a while.
November 10, 2023
At this point, there's no need for me to say that I loved this book: Gladstone has fast become one of my favorite authors, and a few years down the line, if he continues to keep his consistency in terms of publishing and quality up, he'll probably rival folks like Sanderson and Butcher in terms of how much I care about his books. As it is, I stayed up on the day of release so that I could buy the ebook as soon as it was available, and I read the book in three sittings - and that was only because my reading of the book overlapped with a lot of work; I would have read it in one go otherwise.
On to the book itself - this book continues what is the Craft sequence's hallmark now - take concepts from the real world, and put them into a fantasy setting - this book is about metropolitan identity (i.e., what does a city mean to its residents?), sisterhood, a smattering of history and heist stories and a dollop of start up culture in one go.
The rest of the review contains minor spoilers about what the book is about.
The start up culture bit is interesting - it's clear that Agdel Lex is supposed to come across as some sort of Bay Area. What's interesting is how Gladstone interprets the internet as some sort of homogenizer of thought. One other thing that surprises me is how fast Gladstone is moving this world - he has mentioned in a place or two that he will, in the long term, be taking the Craft sequence to space, but I really didn't expect it to happen *quite* this early. I won't go into too much detail, but suffice it to say that a character that seems to be strongly influenced by Elon Musk talks about how the Craft is destroying the Earth (is that what the Craft sequence's world is called?) environment, and speaks about leaving the Earth (or at least, going to other planets for resources).
However, I'm letting a small part of the book take over my review - the book has a lot more interesting things, including the Lovecraft-inspired Iskari (who have been mentioned many times in other books, but we've never met any of their squid lords before this). The references to the mythology of the Iskari are interesting, and (as with every Craft book), the Iskari have their own interesting magical police force - except these guys police reality itself, and their presence maintains Agdel Lex, instead of letting people fall through the cracks of reality there and find themselves in the dead city Alikand.
The Angels of Alikand are an interesting addition to the magic system of the book, and the new characters in this book (except, to be honest, Kai's sister Ley) are quite compelling. It's also enjoyable to see Tara from a different person's perspective. I also loved the callback to Last First Snow when she thinks about Elayne Kevarian.
Anyway, I've said a lot about the book without saying anything: the crux is that if you like high concept fantasy, great worldbuilding and magic systems, and tightly plotted story, you should have been reading the Craft sequence yesterday. Catch up for lost time, and go read at least Full Fathom Five before you pick up this book!
============================================================
Audiobook reread (March 2023-November 2023):
Hooey, that took quite forever, didn't it? In this book's defense, my life was non-conducive to audiobooks for a while there, and it's much harder to get pulled into and finish a book I've already read as I've gotten older. What's more, this reread of the Craft sequence was predicated on wanting to refresh myself due to the pending release of Dead Country , but unfortunately I wasn't able to get to this book until Dead Country had already dropped, which further reduced my drive to read it.
In the end, I read almost a third of Dead Country before pausing to go back to this book. While Dead Country is supposed to be standalone, it was very clear from the beginning that it would be more fun if I remembered what happened in this book. And given that I had read this book only once, that was... a problem.
In any case, I don't really have much to say about this in reread that I didn't already say in my previous review except that while I do think Gladstone introduced many interesting characters in this book, the conflicts he gave them were not as compelling (and in some cases -- like Ley's entire arc and like Izza's issues with her messiah status) were downright irritating to read. I will say that Ley is an immensely more enjoyable character when you already know her motives, however.
The Craft sequence is, in my opinion, a modern classic -- you should read it as soon as possible! The plan for me now is to jump back into Dead Country which is an alternative entry point into the series if you want to try something more recent than Three Parts Dead.
On to the book itself - this book continues what is the Craft sequence's hallmark now - take concepts from the real world, and put them into a fantasy setting - this book is about metropolitan identity (i.e., what does a city mean to its residents?), sisterhood, a smattering of history and heist stories and a dollop of start up culture in one go.
The rest of the review contains minor spoilers about what the book is about.
The start up culture bit is interesting - it's clear that Agdel Lex is supposed to come across as some sort of Bay Area. What's interesting is how Gladstone interprets the internet as some sort of homogenizer of thought. One other thing that surprises me is how fast Gladstone is moving this world - he has mentioned in a place or two that he will, in the long term, be taking the Craft sequence to space, but I really didn't expect it to happen *quite* this early. I won't go into too much detail, but suffice it to say that a character that seems to be strongly influenced by Elon Musk talks about how the Craft is destroying the Earth (is that what the Craft sequence's world is called?) environment, and speaks about leaving the Earth (or at least, going to other planets for resources).
However, I'm letting a small part of the book take over my review - the book has a lot more interesting things, including the Lovecraft-inspired Iskari (who have been mentioned many times in other books, but we've never met any of their squid lords before this). The references to the mythology of the Iskari are interesting, and (as with every Craft book), the Iskari have their own interesting magical police force - except these guys police reality itself, and their presence maintains Agdel Lex, instead of letting people fall through the cracks of reality there and find themselves in the dead city Alikand.
The Angels of Alikand are an interesting addition to the magic system of the book, and the new characters in this book (except, to be honest, Kai's sister Ley) are quite compelling. It's also enjoyable to see Tara from a different person's perspective. I also loved the callback to Last First Snow when she thinks about Elayne Kevarian.
Anyway, I've said a lot about the book without saying anything: the crux is that if you like high concept fantasy, great worldbuilding and magic systems, and tightly plotted story, you should have been reading the Craft sequence yesterday. Catch up for lost time, and go read at least Full Fathom Five before you pick up this book!
============================================================
Audiobook reread (March 2023-November 2023):
Hooey, that took quite forever, didn't it? In this book's defense, my life was non-conducive to audiobooks for a while there, and it's much harder to get pulled into and finish a book I've already read as I've gotten older. What's more, this reread of the Craft sequence was predicated on wanting to refresh myself due to the pending release of Dead Country , but unfortunately I wasn't able to get to this book until Dead Country had already dropped, which further reduced my drive to read it.
In the end, I read almost a third of Dead Country before pausing to go back to this book. While Dead Country is supposed to be standalone, it was very clear from the beginning that it would be more fun if I remembered what happened in this book. And given that I had read this book only once, that was... a problem.
In any case, I don't really have much to say about this in reread that I didn't already say in my previous review except that while I do think Gladstone introduced many interesting characters in this book, the conflicts he gave them were not as compelling (and in some cases -- like Ley's entire arc and like Izza's issues with her messiah status) were downright irritating to read. I will say that Ley is an immensely more enjoyable character when you already know her motives, however.
The Craft sequence is, in my opinion, a modern classic -- you should read it as soon as possible! The plan for me now is to jump back into Dead Country which is an alternative entry point into the series if you want to try something more recent than Three Parts Dead.
September 5, 2017
Max Gladstone returns to the world of his Craft Sequence and especially the character of Kai, a protagonist in the prior novel Full Fathom Five. While there are references to the events of that novel, the plot stands on its own. I don’t know if it’s the first book I’d suggest as an introduction to the series, but it could work, especially if you’re looking for a fantasy book with queer female characters.
Also, I think I can keep this review free from spoilers of prior books. So read without fear!
Kai is in Agdel Lex on a business trip (they’ve got a tech industry, mainly centered around the nightmare telegraph), and she hopes to reconnect with her sister, Ley, while she’s there. But Ley’s tangled up in something Kai doesn’t understand. All she knows is that she has to help her sister.
Yet, that isn’t all Ruin of Angels is about. During the God Wars, the city of Alikand became a battleground and ruins. The city of Agdel Lex was built on top of Alikand by a colonial empire, the Iskari. Yet the existence of Agdel Lex is precarious, balanced over the alternate reality of Alikand and the dying city. It’s possible (if dangerous) to venture into the dying city, but the Iskari Rectification Authority is rigorous in tracking down anyone who breaches the realities.
Besides Kai, the other main POV character is Zeddig, Ley’s ex-girlfriend. Zeddig is a native of Agdel Lex/Alikand, and her life’s mission is to save as much of her people’s history as she can. She dives into the dying city to rescue books, which she then returns to the proper owners if she can. Near the start of Ruin of Angels, Ley comes to Zeddig with a deal: she needs Zeddig and her crew (two other queer women!) to help her pull of a heist. In return, she’ll give Zeddig technology that will let her delve into the dying city for longer than ever before.
And thus Ruin of Angels is also the story of an indigenous people trying to preserve their culture and history in the face of colonial oppression. While the Craft Sequence may take place in a world of talking skeletons, demons, and dragons, it never fails to reflect on our own modern world and the challenges that come along with it.
Indeed, Ruin of Angels looks set to propel the course of the Craft Sequence’s world even closer to ours, with the idea of space exploration and technology being introduced. I can’t even tell you how much I love this idea! It’s not something that I’ve seen explored before in fantasy. Then again, that sentence could apply to so many things in the Craft Sequence. This series is brilliant, imaginative, and truly unique. I never fail to appreciate it’s combination of modernity and magic.
I also love how these books consistently have a diverse cast and well written female characters. In fact, almost all of the major players in this book are women! I was very excited when Tara, from Three Parts Dead, made an appearance. It’s always neat to see familiar characters through new eyes. As I’ve already mentioned, this book has a lot of queer female characters in important roles. Kai’s trans, her sister Ley is lesbian, Zeddig is also lesbian, Zeddig’s partner in crime is bi, and there’s her love interest as well. It was delightful.
However, I don’t think Ruin of Angels is my favorite Craft Sequence book (that title’s preserved for either Full Fathom Five or Last First Snow). It didn’t drag me in as hard as the best of the Craft books, and I think it had problems with pacing and tension at times. Still, it’s a Craft Sequence book. A weak Craft Sequence book is still going to be fantastic.
Ruin of Angels once again proves that if you’re not reading the Craft Sequence, you’re really missing out.
Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.
I received an ARC in exchange for a free and honest review.
Also, I think I can keep this review free from spoilers of prior books. So read without fear!
Kai is in Agdel Lex on a business trip (they’ve got a tech industry, mainly centered around the nightmare telegraph), and she hopes to reconnect with her sister, Ley, while she’s there. But Ley’s tangled up in something Kai doesn’t understand. All she knows is that she has to help her sister.
Yet, that isn’t all Ruin of Angels is about. During the God Wars, the city of Alikand became a battleground and ruins. The city of Agdel Lex was built on top of Alikand by a colonial empire, the Iskari. Yet the existence of Agdel Lex is precarious, balanced over the alternate reality of Alikand and the dying city. It’s possible (if dangerous) to venture into the dying city, but the Iskari Rectification Authority is rigorous in tracking down anyone who breaches the realities.
Besides Kai, the other main POV character is Zeddig, Ley’s ex-girlfriend. Zeddig is a native of Agdel Lex/Alikand, and her life’s mission is to save as much of her people’s history as she can. She dives into the dying city to rescue books, which she then returns to the proper owners if she can. Near the start of Ruin of Angels, Ley comes to Zeddig with a deal: she needs Zeddig and her crew (two other queer women!) to help her pull of a heist. In return, she’ll give Zeddig technology that will let her delve into the dying city for longer than ever before.
And thus Ruin of Angels is also the story of an indigenous people trying to preserve their culture and history in the face of colonial oppression. While the Craft Sequence may take place in a world of talking skeletons, demons, and dragons, it never fails to reflect on our own modern world and the challenges that come along with it.
Indeed, Ruin of Angels looks set to propel the course of the Craft Sequence’s world even closer to ours, with the idea of space exploration and technology being introduced. I can’t even tell you how much I love this idea! It’s not something that I’ve seen explored before in fantasy. Then again, that sentence could apply to so many things in the Craft Sequence. This series is brilliant, imaginative, and truly unique. I never fail to appreciate it’s combination of modernity and magic.
I also love how these books consistently have a diverse cast and well written female characters. In fact, almost all of the major players in this book are women! I was very excited when Tara, from Three Parts Dead, made an appearance. It’s always neat to see familiar characters through new eyes. As I’ve already mentioned, this book has a lot of queer female characters in important roles. Kai’s trans, her sister Ley is lesbian, Zeddig is also lesbian, Zeddig’s partner in crime is bi, and there’s her love interest as well. It was delightful.
However, I don’t think Ruin of Angels is my favorite Craft Sequence book (that title’s preserved for either Full Fathom Five or Last First Snow). It didn’t drag me in as hard as the best of the Craft books, and I think it had problems with pacing and tension at times. Still, it’s a Craft Sequence book. A weak Craft Sequence book is still going to be fantastic.
Ruin of Angels once again proves that if you’re not reading the Craft Sequence, you’re really missing out.
Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.
I received an ARC in exchange for a free and honest review.
September 25, 2017
I adored this.
More Tara. More godpunk fractured worlds. Magic corporations and nightmare powered telecoms. Artists and angels and squid-borg-parasites.
Max Gladstone's writing is the perfect balance of poetry and story; both dreamy painterliness and fast-paced action.
And I'm pretty sure that this is the most beautiful and true paragraph about being trans ever published in a fantasy novel:
"“I understand that during initiation Kavekanese priests and priestesses rebuild themselves around their soul, which allows the smooth and complete correction of many . . . bookkeeping errors. Not all of us have such access, and medical Craft has certain path-dependent limitations: physical transformations of any sort are trivial if you don’t mind dying in the process. I happen to enjoy my independence—not to mention my heartbeat. I’m happy to share a moment later, but can we focus on business for now?”
“Of course,” Kai said. She did not look at Eberhardt Jax in the brief pause as he lifted his briefcase to the table and spun the wheel locks on its latch. That much she could offer, even in this room, even chained and buttressed by their roles of venture-priest and pitchman. The pool let her rewrite herself from the inside out, but she still felt a stab of anxiety meeting mainlanders who knew: do they see me, or are they looking for something inside me that isn’t there at all? Jax must have felt the same. Worse. But they weren’t meeting to discuss that."
Other bits of beauty and squee-ing and tears:
"It answered in a language she didn’t understand, that sounded like the death of something beautiful."
***
"There, in the sky, approaching a foreign city beneath the belly of an ancient beast, tossed by winds, stuck in coach because the priesthood didn’t think this side trip rated business class, she felt the touch of a cool blue hand upon her brow. The touch melted against her forehead and rolled down her skin like honey tears, hot and sweet and deep, to bead and tremble on her lips, then slip within. She tasted salt and sand and volcanic rock. Root musk rolled down her tongue into her throat. She burned all over at once, and exhaled the beauty worming through her veins."
***
"So easy to look out at the world through warped glass and think the world was warped itself. Easy, too, to live in a warped world and forget that, with effort, you could make crooked lines straight."
***
"The city changed—buildings changed, streets changed, languages changed—but people adapted, and endured."
***
"The boy with the flowers blocked her path. His eyes were big and wet and needy, and that need ran deeper than the sale. The scar on his cheek drank sunlight. He offered her a flower."
***
“I do not understand you. But neither do I understand fire, or starlight, or storms, and I love them."
***
"The flood reared, cobra-like and vast, slavering mouths and crooked claws and burning eyes, and struck.... She fought to remain herself in the flood. A reflex, the oldest battle: she knew who she was, she knew her body, knew her past and her home and her family and her soul. She clung to them."
***
"She was larger than the limits of her skin."
***
“I heard—legs. Skittering closer. Whispers older than time. They speak in the pulses of distant suns. They’re so, so hungry. And they smell us.”
More Tara. More godpunk fractured worlds. Magic corporations and nightmare powered telecoms. Artists and angels and squid-borg-parasites.
Max Gladstone's writing is the perfect balance of poetry and story; both dreamy painterliness and fast-paced action.
And I'm pretty sure that this is the most beautiful and true paragraph about being trans ever published in a fantasy novel:
"“I understand that during initiation Kavekanese priests and priestesses rebuild themselves around their soul, which allows the smooth and complete correction of many . . . bookkeeping errors. Not all of us have such access, and medical Craft has certain path-dependent limitations: physical transformations of any sort are trivial if you don’t mind dying in the process. I happen to enjoy my independence—not to mention my heartbeat. I’m happy to share a moment later, but can we focus on business for now?”
“Of course,” Kai said. She did not look at Eberhardt Jax in the brief pause as he lifted his briefcase to the table and spun the wheel locks on its latch. That much she could offer, even in this room, even chained and buttressed by their roles of venture-priest and pitchman. The pool let her rewrite herself from the inside out, but she still felt a stab of anxiety meeting mainlanders who knew: do they see me, or are they looking for something inside me that isn’t there at all? Jax must have felt the same. Worse. But they weren’t meeting to discuss that."
Other bits of beauty and squee-ing and tears:
"It answered in a language she didn’t understand, that sounded like the death of something beautiful."
***
"There, in the sky, approaching a foreign city beneath the belly of an ancient beast, tossed by winds, stuck in coach because the priesthood didn’t think this side trip rated business class, she felt the touch of a cool blue hand upon her brow. The touch melted against her forehead and rolled down her skin like honey tears, hot and sweet and deep, to bead and tremble on her lips, then slip within. She tasted salt and sand and volcanic rock. Root musk rolled down her tongue into her throat. She burned all over at once, and exhaled the beauty worming through her veins."
***
"So easy to look out at the world through warped glass and think the world was warped itself. Easy, too, to live in a warped world and forget that, with effort, you could make crooked lines straight."
***
"The city changed—buildings changed, streets changed, languages changed—but people adapted, and endured."
***
"The boy with the flowers blocked her path. His eyes were big and wet and needy, and that need ran deeper than the sale. The scar on his cheek drank sunlight. He offered her a flower."
***
“I do not understand you. But neither do I understand fire, or starlight, or storms, and I love them."
***
"The flood reared, cobra-like and vast, slavering mouths and crooked claws and burning eyes, and struck.... She fought to remain herself in the flood. A reflex, the oldest battle: she knew who she was, she knew her body, knew her past and her home and her family and her soul. She clung to them."
***
"She was larger than the limits of her skin."
***
“I heard—legs. Skittering closer. Whispers older than time. They speak in the pulses of distant suns. They’re so, so hungry. And they smell us.”
November 14, 2017
As always, Gladstone has written an immersive story, this time about start ups, art, and ventures that are all a bit strange. As to be expected. I love that we got Kai back. Full Fathom Five was one of the highlights of the craft sequence for me, and following her and Izza made for fun times. They're strong, and witty, and very much full of doubt whether or not they're doing the right thing.
This was a fair bit longer than the previous novels, and it felt it. Not in a bad way, as there was so much packed into it, but it did take me longer than I thought it would to get through it. Thinking on it, I'm not sure there was anything that happened that I disagreed with, or wanted more answers about. With Gladstone, I generally just start and see where he'll take me, what strange things he'll show me. And I really wasn't disappointed.
This was a fair bit longer than the previous novels, and it felt it. Not in a bad way, as there was so much packed into it, but it did take me longer than I thought it would to get through it. Thinking on it, I'm not sure there was anything that happened that I disagreed with, or wanted more answers about. With Gladstone, I generally just start and see where he'll take me, what strange things he'll show me. And I really wasn't disappointed.
June 3, 2018
Beautiful covers, interesting blurbs, and an interview with the author, brought me to this series in the first half of this year. I have since then read four of the six standalone novels in Max Gladstone’s Craft Sequence series, that are connected by the world they are set in, themes, and some characters that reappear here and then. My ratings range from 4 to 5 stars and I spent many hours experiencing and discovering the setting.
The Craft Sequence needs a focused reader who learns by observation and not by explanation or information, who will be greatly rewarded for their effort by being able to delve into a highly imaginative and innovative place where Gods are real, magic exists, and are combined with an encompassing system of trade and payment (of worship and souls). Add to this action, intrigue, and diverse characters of ethnicity, gender and sexual identity and you have one very satisfied Mel.
This installment features Kai, a priest and transgender woman, whom we first met in Full Fathom Five, and her lesbian sister Ley, who is the reason for all kinds of dubious ongoings in this book. But there are even more great female characters with their own agencies, so readers looking for books with a strong and respectfully written cast of female characters will delight in this book.
A highly recommended book and series! Enjoy!
____________________________________
Genre: Fantasy
Tags: Trans Character, Lesbian Character, F/F Pairing, Gods, Magic
Rating: 4 stars
Blog: Review for Just Love
Disclosure: ARC for Review
____________________________________
Wow, it took me a whole month to get through my second read. That is how little time I have nowadays for reading. The book is great and my rating stands, but as long as I don't have more time on hand, I will be staying away from this series.
The Craft Sequence needs a focused reader who learns by observation and not by explanation or information, who will be greatly rewarded for their effort by being able to delve into a highly imaginative and innovative place where Gods are real, magic exists, and are combined with an encompassing system of trade and payment (of worship and souls). Add to this action, intrigue, and diverse characters of ethnicity, gender and sexual identity and you have one very satisfied Mel.
This installment features Kai, a priest and transgender woman, whom we first met in Full Fathom Five, and her lesbian sister Ley, who is the reason for all kinds of dubious ongoings in this book. But there are even more great female characters with their own agencies, so readers looking for books with a strong and respectfully written cast of female characters will delight in this book.
A highly recommended book and series! Enjoy!
____________________________________
Genre: Fantasy
Tags: Trans Character, Lesbian Character, F/F Pairing, Gods, Magic
Rating: 4 stars
Blog: Review for Just Love
Disclosure: ARC for Review
____________________________________
Wow, it took me a whole month to get through my second read. That is how little time I have nowadays for reading. The book is great and my rating stands, but as long as I don't have more time on hand, I will be staying away from this series.
November 25, 2020
Thanks to Netgalley for providing a copy of this book for review.
This book was not an easy read and it felt like it took a long time. I wavered between three and four stars and then decided the end pushed it to four.
The book's main character is Kai, the Kavakanese priestess from Full Fathom Five who in the past made a living designing small gods for big players to hide their soul assets in. She's come to Agdel Lex as a venture capitalist but ends up getting drawn into a heist that her sister Ley is planning.
When reading this book I realized just how hard I look for real-world analogues in secondary worlds. This one was very difficult. Was it San Francisco? Rome? I realize that part of the point is that these books don't correspond one-on-one to our world and I shouldn't expect them to. But I really wanted to put this book into a real-world political and cultural situation I could understand. In the end, I settled on Jerusalem/Istanbul.
The reason for this is that Agdel Lex is several cities in one. Most people live in Agdel Lex, which has been stabilized into its reality by the squid god-worshipping Iskarites. These Iskarites are probably going to make interesting antagonists in the future. They have Lords (squids) attached to them if they are of any importance, and these Lords allow them a certain level of communion with their God and allow them to suck their foes into a sweet and placid certainty that everything is fine, everything is going to be okay, can't we just get along? And maybe a squid for you, too?
Anyway, the Iskarites' certainty that a desert city will be dry, hot, dusty and sunny has imposed Agdel Lex over the original city, Alikand. Alikand is wetter, darker, has vine motifs and was ruled by the 50 Families. Alikand survived without Gods in a world run by them because the 50 Families collected magical tomes and used these tomes for the strength to remain independent. They could summon Angels to defend their city.
Alikand was/is being destroyed by the first great Craftsman, Maester Gerhardt in a mutually destructive battle. But Gerhardt refused to die and part of this city, the dead city, is trapped in time a century ago, literally frozen in the midst of the cataclysmic battle that changed everything. Delvers can drop into this frozen city in the past and make off with valuable items, but it's extremely dangerous- usually more than a couple of minutes there will kill you. Plus the Iskarites will sense any change to their perception of Agdel Lex and come find you and give you a squid of your very own if they can catch you after you change cities. It's a bit like The City and The City by China Mieville= three cities are right next to each other but one city refuses to acknowledge the other two and is trying to draw the other two into its reality.
Anyway, Ley and her crew, which includes a grad student who is also their tech expert, a Camlaan knight on a quest for her own destruction, and a 50 Families noble descendent who delves the dead city for pieces of her own past, are planning a heist. I never took to Ley the way any of the other characters did- she was never honest, never open, and while her art gave the crew a way of perceiving the dead city that allowed them to spend much more time there than they could have otherwise survived, I never felt like the positives to her presence outweighed the negatives.
I've been thinking about cities lately and how they are the construction of many different peoples' realities turned into a kaleidoscope that makes the sum of the city to all of its inhabitants. I've also been thinking about art and different purposes for it. This book puts all that together right as I've been thinking about it. I think what Gladstone is getting at is that art can provide a new perspective on an entity like a person or a city that can create a community reaction that ushers an new reality or point of connection into being. This can be used for positive or negative purposes. A National Anthem, the blocky Brutalist art and architecture of Soviet Russia, even a meme, they all change how people see things, and isn't that really changing reality itself?
Gladstone doesn't dwell upon this, though, because there's a heist to be pulled on the massive trains bringing vital magical materiel (think oil tankers) through the southern Wastes to the city. The Wastes are populated by almost-dead gods (other ways of seeing and knowing) and the train is heavily warded. There's a heist, and double-crossing, and a big fight, and an inconclusive ending that leaves all the characters in different places that they need to find their way out of, whether that place is an orphanage, prison in the living Squid Spire that just wants all of them to find a way to get along, abandoned in the Wastes, or back in Agdel Lex with the sneaking suspicion that this isn't over yet.
So, the reason that I raised the book a star is because there is a Rocket Ship!!!! Gladstone is going to spaaaaaace! That's also why I spoiler-warninged this review, because I had to say something. The last big battle involves the Rocket Ship, one last trip to the dead city, the reappearance of Angels, and the Wastes breaking into Agdel Lex at last. It's a lot. And it was fun.
This still isn't my favorite of the books. I've always had a hard problem attaching to Kai, and Ley is even worse as a potential protagonist. It was slow and heavy going as I was trying to figure out what the hell was happening. I did love the idea of the superimposed cities, although I felt like the art connection wasn't as solid as it could have been. There's a hint of an even worse threat than anything we've seen yet, and I'm interested to see where this goes. So be prepared to sink some time into this book. I wondered whether it was worth it about halfway through. For me, it was.
This book was not an easy read and it felt like it took a long time. I wavered between three and four stars and then decided the end pushed it to four.
The book's main character is Kai, the Kavakanese priestess from Full Fathom Five who in the past made a living designing small gods for big players to hide their soul assets in. She's come to Agdel Lex as a venture capitalist but ends up getting drawn into a heist that her sister Ley is planning.
When reading this book I realized just how hard I look for real-world analogues in secondary worlds. This one was very difficult. Was it San Francisco? Rome? I realize that part of the point is that these books don't correspond one-on-one to our world and I shouldn't expect them to. But I really wanted to put this book into a real-world political and cultural situation I could understand. In the end, I settled on Jerusalem/Istanbul.
The reason for this is that Agdel Lex is several cities in one. Most people live in Agdel Lex, which has been stabilized into its reality by the squid god-worshipping Iskarites. These Iskarites are probably going to make interesting antagonists in the future. They have Lords (squids) attached to them if they are of any importance, and these Lords allow them a certain level of communion with their God and allow them to suck their foes into a sweet and placid certainty that everything is fine, everything is going to be okay, can't we just get along? And maybe a squid for you, too?
Anyway, the Iskarites' certainty that a desert city will be dry, hot, dusty and sunny has imposed Agdel Lex over the original city, Alikand. Alikand is wetter, darker, has vine motifs and was ruled by the 50 Families. Alikand survived without Gods in a world run by them because the 50 Families collected magical tomes and used these tomes for the strength to remain independent. They could summon Angels to defend their city.
Alikand was/is being destroyed by the first great Craftsman, Maester Gerhardt in a mutually destructive battle. But Gerhardt refused to die and part of this city, the dead city, is trapped in time a century ago, literally frozen in the midst of the cataclysmic battle that changed everything. Delvers can drop into this frozen city in the past and make off with valuable items, but it's extremely dangerous- usually more than a couple of minutes there will kill you. Plus the Iskarites will sense any change to their perception of Agdel Lex and come find you and give you a squid of your very own if they can catch you after you change cities. It's a bit like The City and The City by China Mieville= three cities are right next to each other but one city refuses to acknowledge the other two and is trying to draw the other two into its reality.
Anyway, Ley and her crew, which includes a grad student who is also their tech expert, a Camlaan knight on a quest for her own destruction, and a 50 Families noble descendent who delves the dead city for pieces of her own past, are planning a heist. I never took to Ley the way any of the other characters did- she was never honest, never open, and while her art gave the crew a way of perceiving the dead city that allowed them to spend much more time there than they could have otherwise survived, I never felt like the positives to her presence outweighed the negatives.
I've been thinking about cities lately and how they are the construction of many different peoples' realities turned into a kaleidoscope that makes the sum of the city to all of its inhabitants. I've also been thinking about art and different purposes for it. This book puts all that together right as I've been thinking about it. I think what Gladstone is getting at is that art can provide a new perspective on an entity like a person or a city that can create a community reaction that ushers an new reality or point of connection into being. This can be used for positive or negative purposes. A National Anthem, the blocky Brutalist art and architecture of Soviet Russia, even a meme, they all change how people see things, and isn't that really changing reality itself?
Gladstone doesn't dwell upon this, though, because there's a heist to be pulled on the massive trains bringing vital magical materiel (think oil tankers) through the southern Wastes to the city. The Wastes are populated by almost-dead gods (other ways of seeing and knowing) and the train is heavily warded. There's a heist, and double-crossing, and a big fight, and an inconclusive ending that leaves all the characters in different places that they need to find their way out of, whether that place is an orphanage, prison in the living Squid Spire that just wants all of them to find a way to get along, abandoned in the Wastes, or back in Agdel Lex with the sneaking suspicion that this isn't over yet.
So, the reason that I raised the book a star is because there is a Rocket Ship!!!! Gladstone is going to spaaaaaace! That's also why I spoiler-warninged this review, because I had to say something. The last big battle involves the Rocket Ship, one last trip to the dead city, the reappearance of Angels, and the Wastes breaking into Agdel Lex at last. It's a lot. And it was fun.
This still isn't my favorite of the books. I've always had a hard problem attaching to Kai, and Ley is even worse as a potential protagonist. It was slow and heavy going as I was trying to figure out what the hell was happening. I did love the idea of the superimposed cities, although I felt like the art connection wasn't as solid as it could have been. There's a hint of an even worse threat than anything we've seen yet, and I'm interested to see where this goes. So be prepared to sink some time into this book. I wondered whether it was worth it about halfway through. For me, it was.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 24, 2019
This book is just lazy. Too much emphasis is put on people who just magically happen to be perfect for their roles and are flawless but for the flaws the exhibit like shields against being Mary Sues. Too much of the book is wasted trying to impress upon the reader, the magical intoxicating quality of Ley. Honestly. Noone cares in reality. It's stupid. The plot takes a backseat and the world devolved into a caricature for the egos of the one dimensional characters in the book to play with. I never thought I'd be glad there weren't many more of the craft sequence books when I first started reading them..
April 15, 2019
For some reason the second half of this Craft book didn't grab the way the others did. I'm not sure why. Maybe because I waited too long after reading Kai's first outing. Also, the dual city was done so well in The City & the City that there is a very high bar for that idea.
Gladstone is still good, but not my favorite in the series. But that might change.
Gladstone is still good, but not my favorite in the series. But that might change.
September 22, 2023
For some reason Max Gladstone’s The Ruin of Angels has been sitting on my shelf since it came out. I liked the first Craft quintet, so I think my completist brain just felt weird about another Craft book with different cover art and title convention and all that? Anyway, I was missing out, because Ruin of Angels is just as much of a fun time as the others, combining the hellscape of finance capitalism with the hellscape of necromantic god-war blood magic fantasy stuff. A train heist is also involved, as we know how I feel about heists.
Our protagonist, mostly, here is Kai Pohala, a priestess/idol-maker/investment banker from Kavekana, who scores a whirlwind business trip to the Iskari colonial city of Agdel Lex, which does not go according to plan. Agdel Lex is built on top of a place just known as “the dead city,” which is the former civilization of Alikand in its last moments, eternally being torn apart in the death throes of a major Craftsman in the Gods War. There are also, secretly, pockets of Alikand, remembered into being by the descendants of the old ruling families, before the Iskari showed up to impose their very specific and top-down version of order and good governance on the place, which at the moment is unfortunately just about the only thing preventing the dead city and all the creepy monsters in it from breaking through. The Iskari are some sort of squid-based parasitic religion with impressive mind- and reality-control powers, and also they are smarmy dickwads–really excellent villains all around.
Another thing Agdel Lex has is Kai’s estranged sister Ley, a preternaturally charismatic human who lots of people wind up loving and wanting to work with and generally taking paths other than “avoid at all costs” around, which usually seems to be ill-advised. Ley redeems herself at the end by working with a bunch of other people to help de-upfuck the situation that she got them all into by always trying to do big ambitious projects without telling any of the people she dragged into what the fuck was going on. Fortunately we don’t have to spend a lot of time in Ley’s head because for the first 90% of the book she truly just sucks as a person. Instead, we spend time with Kai, obviously, and with Ley’s ex-girlfriend and delving partner Zeddig, and Zeddig’s other delving partner Raymet, and a mysterious lone Camlaander knight errant named Gal, and a street urchin prophet named Izza, and our old buddy Tara Abernathy. These people do not all necessarily work as a team, and frequently find themselves at apparent cross purposes with each other, largely due to the fact that they are all operating on extremely limited information (a situation that is frequently at least partly Ley’s fault). Everyone tries to pick apart what the fuck is happening and protect, to the best of their ability, Ley as she flees from the cops and the squiddy Rectification Authority agents, who are after her for a murder that she absolutely, 100% committed. (She had reasons, but was she going to tell anyone what they were? No, she was going to demand help because Just Trust Me.)
I realize this grumping may make it seem like I dislike Ley as a character. I assure you the opposite is true. Ley is a great character. She is just a great character of a fucked-up, infuriating, utterly insufferable person. I enjoyed being all like “What is this bitch’s problem” very much.
This novel is longer than any of the other ones in the Craft series so far but I feel like that’s perfectly acceptable as we get to explore not just a new city, but a new three-cities-in-one, and also how laboriously difficult it is for our gang of fucked-up weirdos to get on the same page about anything is a pretty integral theme here, so stuff takes a while. The pace is fairly frenetic, as everyone is continually scrambling to stay ahead of the Rectification Authority, the cops, zombie gangsters, Ley, and sometimes each other.
Anyway, there’s been another book released in this series that I totally missed hearing about, so I’m hoping it’ll take me less than another five years to read Dead Country.
Our protagonist, mostly, here is Kai Pohala, a priestess/idol-maker/investment banker from Kavekana, who scores a whirlwind business trip to the Iskari colonial city of Agdel Lex, which does not go according to plan. Agdel Lex is built on top of a place just known as “the dead city,” which is the former civilization of Alikand in its last moments, eternally being torn apart in the death throes of a major Craftsman in the Gods War. There are also, secretly, pockets of Alikand, remembered into being by the descendants of the old ruling families, before the Iskari showed up to impose their very specific and top-down version of order and good governance on the place, which at the moment is unfortunately just about the only thing preventing the dead city and all the creepy monsters in it from breaking through. The Iskari are some sort of squid-based parasitic religion with impressive mind- and reality-control powers, and also they are smarmy dickwads–really excellent villains all around.
Another thing Agdel Lex has is Kai’s estranged sister Ley, a preternaturally charismatic human who lots of people wind up loving and wanting to work with and generally taking paths other than “avoid at all costs” around, which usually seems to be ill-advised. Ley redeems herself at the end by working with a bunch of other people to help de-upfuck the situation that she got them all into by always trying to do big ambitious projects without telling any of the people she dragged into what the fuck was going on. Fortunately we don’t have to spend a lot of time in Ley’s head because for the first 90% of the book she truly just sucks as a person. Instead, we spend time with Kai, obviously, and with Ley’s ex-girlfriend and delving partner Zeddig, and Zeddig’s other delving partner Raymet, and a mysterious lone Camlaander knight errant named Gal, and a street urchin prophet named Izza, and our old buddy Tara Abernathy. These people do not all necessarily work as a team, and frequently find themselves at apparent cross purposes with each other, largely due to the fact that they are all operating on extremely limited information (a situation that is frequently at least partly Ley’s fault). Everyone tries to pick apart what the fuck is happening and protect, to the best of their ability, Ley as she flees from the cops and the squiddy Rectification Authority agents, who are after her for a murder that she absolutely, 100% committed. (She had reasons, but was she going to tell anyone what they were? No, she was going to demand help because Just Trust Me.)
I realize this grumping may make it seem like I dislike Ley as a character. I assure you the opposite is true. Ley is a great character. She is just a great character of a fucked-up, infuriating, utterly insufferable person. I enjoyed being all like “What is this bitch’s problem” very much.
This novel is longer than any of the other ones in the Craft series so far but I feel like that’s perfectly acceptable as we get to explore not just a new city, but a new three-cities-in-one, and also how laboriously difficult it is for our gang of fucked-up weirdos to get on the same page about anything is a pretty integral theme here, so stuff takes a while. The pace is fairly frenetic, as everyone is continually scrambling to stay ahead of the Rectification Authority, the cops, zombie gangsters, Ley, and sometimes each other.
Anyway, there’s been another book released in this series that I totally missed hearing about, so I’m hoping it’ll take me less than another five years to read Dead Country.
December 27, 2020
3.5 stars
This story has all of Gladstone's strengths and weaknesses on full display.
It has brilliant ideas, world building, and compelling characters that feel so human, even when they're not. From the smallest little inclusions like postal demons' annoyance with improper mail to three cities meshed into each other and their liberation, Gladstone's work is a feast of stories, big and small.
And here begins the biggest faults. There is just too much. Frankly, my usual pet peeve with Gladstone's later work is the tendency that the first half of the book is build up to a later pay off. And here, with nearing 600 pages, that is never more obvious and hard to stomach. It borders on feeling like watching someone spend hours set up domino pieces, painstakingly and skilfully, but none the less as exciting as watching exactly that. It's a slow burn that should have had a harsher editor, both to manage the sheer amount but also the prose itself, which had started to be much more purple than the previous books in the series.
However, as always there was the payoff, and the last 200 or so pages were a delight. I just wished we could have gotten there more smoothly. As it was it felt like the stories were threading on each other, fighting for space, and ended up feeling like they didn't always contribute that much. Tara Abernathy could have been any Craftswoman, she felt the most squeezed in, but frankly, the story could have been trimmed to be more Kai and Lei focused as a whole.
As such, this book is both the weakest and the strongest in the series. It's ambition and scope were too grand for the execution to manage it fully, but still leaves the reader satisfied with a compelling story, rich characters, and a happy ending.
This story has all of Gladstone's strengths and weaknesses on full display.
It has brilliant ideas, world building, and compelling characters that feel so human, even when they're not. From the smallest little inclusions like postal demons' annoyance with improper mail to three cities meshed into each other and their liberation, Gladstone's work is a feast of stories, big and small.
And here begins the biggest faults. There is just too much. Frankly, my usual pet peeve with Gladstone's later work is the tendency that the first half of the book is build up to a later pay off. And here, with nearing 600 pages, that is never more obvious and hard to stomach. It borders on feeling like watching someone spend hours set up domino pieces, painstakingly and skilfully, but none the less as exciting as watching exactly that. It's a slow burn that should have had a harsher editor, both to manage the sheer amount but also the prose itself, which had started to be much more purple than the previous books in the series.
However, as always there was the payoff, and the last 200 or so pages were a delight. I just wished we could have gotten there more smoothly. As it was it felt like the stories were threading on each other, fighting for space, and ended up feeling like they didn't always contribute that much. Tara Abernathy could have been any Craftswoman, she felt the most squeezed in, but frankly, the story could have been trimmed to be more Kai and Lei focused as a whole.
As such, this book is both the weakest and the strongest in the series. It's ambition and scope were too grand for the execution to manage it fully, but still leaves the reader satisfied with a compelling story, rich characters, and a happy ending.
July 2, 2018
The Ruin of Angels is the most recent entry in The Craft Sequence and it feels different in tone from the previous five books. Longer and more complex, I feel like the Sequence has entered Act 2. The topic Gladstone is tackling here deals with history and competing culture. While I was reading it, I was reminded of a great historic city like Jerusalem, where you have Temple Mount with the ruins of the First and Second Temples and Al-Aqsa. With issues of religion, language and basic culture, the delicate balance and occasional outright hatred between two cultures superseding one another are captured in a similar-feeling tone in Agdel Lex and Alikand, the former built on, literally, the ruin of angels.
I was frustrated in this book by one of the central characters, Kai Pohala's younger sister Ley. You can check out my thoughts in the Buddy Read discussion of this book. (see it on the blog... http://marziesreads.blogspot.com/2018...) My frustrations were outweighed by my enjoyment of the rest of the book, in particular, the presence of Issa, who we first met in Full Fathom Five and of course, Kai and Tara. Izza has matured and evolved. New characters Zeddig, Gal and Raymet were rich and unique. Each woman has their own unique code of honor. Gladstone has also introduced an intriguing and charismatic new male character, Jax, who I think we will see again in future books. He ominously warns of forthcoming global disaster, due to climate and resource issues. Isaak, a male friend of Izza's from her earlier life in Agdel Lex, was a character with a lot of pathos.
All in all, a book I loved. My real question is, it's been almost a year since this book was published. When will we be graced with more Craft Sequence?!
I was frustrated in this book by one of the central characters, Kai Pohala's younger sister Ley. You can check out my thoughts in the Buddy Read discussion of this book. (see it on the blog... http://marziesreads.blogspot.com/2018...) My frustrations were outweighed by my enjoyment of the rest of the book, in particular, the presence of Issa, who we first met in Full Fathom Five and of course, Kai and Tara. Izza has matured and evolved. New characters Zeddig, Gal and Raymet were rich and unique. Each woman has their own unique code of honor. Gladstone has also introduced an intriguing and charismatic new male character, Jax, who I think we will see again in future books. He ominously warns of forthcoming global disaster, due to climate and resource issues. Isaak, a male friend of Izza's from her earlier life in Agdel Lex, was a character with a lot of pathos.
All in all, a book I loved. My real question is, it's been almost a year since this book was published. When will we be graced with more Craft Sequence?!
May 13, 2020
A city where reality is broken, broken characters with their broken relationships mingle.
All the characters, all the time, running around, pushing their agenda. I enjoy the world Gladstone has created, and am happy we got my favorite duo - Kai and Izza - back. Stakes are high, the second part of the novel was tight. The first, not so much, and there was too much characters, in my humble opinion. I feel that new characters didn't get their moments to really develop and shine - Raymet blew my mind and made me tear up, but it came very late in the book. That scene alone made me bring the rating up by one star.
All the characters, all the time, running around, pushing their agenda. I enjoy the world Gladstone has created, and am happy we got my favorite duo - Kai and Izza - back. Stakes are high, the second part of the novel was tight. The first, not so much, and there was too much characters, in my humble opinion. I feel that new characters didn't get their moments to really develop and shine - Raymet blew my mind and made me tear up, but it came very late in the book. That scene alone made me bring the rating up by one star.
May 26, 2019
A bit too slow to start -- too many plot threads trying to move simultaneously -- but once it hits its stride it is *amazing.* Call it a 4.5, rounded up because squid.
December 8, 2017
Gladstone has written: "This is a book about troubles in close relationships, about good intentions gone wrong, about self-deception and self-liberation, and family. Also, venture capital, surveillance culture, startups, the Future (which is Murder), geopolitics, soul trade, mapping, & criminal evangelism."
All the three stars are for that. I give no additional stars for the way all that is delivered in this one.
It all seems forced, and it seems that whenever the plot had to change something, Gladstone just layers on more magic-and-gods.
Men are incidental in this one, and I'm OK with that. The relationships are developed so that they are what matters. There are perhaps rather too many pair-ups for plausibility, especially when we even get hints that Bescond might get hooked up.
The macro plot is not bad - one group wants to regularize things at any costs, others understandably don't like that they (and their world level) will cease to exist. But the micro plot seems to be full of actions that happen only because they are needed to get us to the finale. And isn't it convenient that ALL the people who do anything happen to know each other?
I especially wondered about Jax.
With squid and Lords and Ladies (nod to Terry Pratchett) and all that, it's quite distracting to see things like an ending with a linen suit, a sundress and a picnic basket. Did we miss the Nordstrom's as we dodged the squid and the Watchers and the falling debris? There are several of these throughout.
Also way too many typos and misused words. And I will NOT accept that the past tense allows "she sweat" and "she grit her teeth."
But back to the first paragraph. I admire the book just for that.
I may be done with this series, though. It's pretty clear that it's going to go on for as long as the books sell. Maybe if he brings back the King In Red ...
All the three stars are for that. I give no additional stars for the way all that is delivered in this one.
It all seems forced, and it seems that whenever the plot had to change something, Gladstone just layers on more magic-and-gods.
Men are incidental in this one, and I'm OK with that. The relationships are developed so that they are what matters. There are perhaps rather too many pair-ups for plausibility, especially when we even get hints that Bescond might get hooked up.
The macro plot is not bad - one group wants to regularize things at any costs, others understandably don't like that they (and their world level) will cease to exist. But the micro plot seems to be full of actions that happen only because they are needed to get us to the finale. And isn't it convenient that ALL the people who do anything happen to know each other?
I especially wondered about Jax.
With squid and Lords and Ladies (nod to Terry Pratchett) and all that, it's quite distracting to see things like an ending with a linen suit, a sundress and a picnic basket. Did we miss the Nordstrom's as we dodged the squid and the Watchers and the falling debris? There are several of these throughout.
Also way too many typos and misused words. And I will NOT accept that the past tense allows "she sweat" and "she grit her teeth."
But back to the first paragraph. I admire the book just for that.
I may be done with this series, though. It's pretty clear that it's going to go on for as long as the books sell. Maybe if he brings back the King In Red ...
November 22, 2019
The Ruin of Angels was such a disappointment! Max took a character I didn't care for, tried to make her more likeable by giving her an even more unlikeable sister, and took my favoritest character in the series, and made her... boring. Ugh! The story tried to be twisty by trying to make unlikeable characters better once we knew them, but I just never could care about them. Ugh! So sad, I want to go back and reread Three Parts Dead just so I can be sure to remember how great this series can be.
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