Thursday, November 8, 2018

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Ruin of Stars by Linsey Miller




Ruin of Stars is the second half to the duology begun with Linsey Miller's 2017 dark YA fantasy book, Mask of Shadows, which I reviewed a little while back.  Readers of that review may remember that I really really enjoyed Mask of Shadows due to its lead character, Sal/23/Opal being utterly tremendous.  It didn't matter that the plot was merely ordinary - Sal made the story well worth reading, as a non-binary hero with PTSD bent on vengeance....who also finds it in themselves to learn to love as well, between her plots in a competition of assassins.

Ruin of Stars is even better than Mask of Shadows.  Again it's due to the characters, not the plot - the plot IS better this time around, but still isn't the greatest.  But Sal remains tremendous, and some of the side characters - both old and new - take steps up to truly shine as well.  And while the plot isn't the greatest, it manages to be far more powerful in its darkness, to result in a book that I could not finish fast enough.

Note:  Again, like its predecessor, this book was read as an audiobook, so apologies if I misspell some names/concepts.  The audiobook reader is excellent for what it's worth, although it's sometimes tricky to tell what dialogue of Sal is being said aloud and what is merely being thought in their head.  
-----------------------------------------------------Plot Summary----------------------------------------------------
North Star. Deadfall. Riparian. Caldera. Winter.  Sal's list of Erlend Nobles responsible for the death of her family and country of Nacea is down to 5, and Sal knows the identities of three of the five already.  And with Sal now appointed as Opal, an official assassin as part of the Queen of Igna's Left Hand, with Erland having attempted once more to secede from Igna, Sal now has the authority and support in getting their revenge upon these five.  And of course, to rescue Elise, Sal's lover who was kidnapped by her father....the one on Sal's list known as Winter.

But Elise doesn't need to be rescued, as she's trying to use her noble position to keep the war from killing the innocent citizens in her father's territory.  And mysterious things have begun to happen in Erland territory - from kids disappearing and men being skinned, as if killed by the evil Shadows that once destroyed Nacea - and these things are being blamed upon Igna.   As Sal begins their quest to get their revenge, they will soon find that things aren't what they seemed after the Civil War destroyed their family...and magic may truly not be gone after all.

And in the face of the renewed horrors of war, where magical terrors may be making a come-back, and where the evil nobles are once again attempting to impose their strict order upon the world....can Sal achieve their bloody vengeance without losing their own identity in the process?
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Again, for the second straight book, Ruin of Stars is made tremendous by its protagonist and first person narrator.  Sal is even more tremendous than in the first book, as this book continues Sal's growth as Sal learns more about who they are, and struggles to cope with the idea that their bloody vengeance may be contrary to the ideals of their people's own culture, a culture Sal realizes more and more that they know little about.  Moreover, as magic makes its return in this book (mild spoilers here, but you'll see this coming a mile away), Sal suffers even more symptoms of their PTSD and struggles to overcome it in order to achieve their own goals.  It's all written extraordinarily well, making Sal an incredible character to read and incredibly easy to root for.  And in this incredibly dark plot, Sal's experiences can be absolutely heartwrenching, and it works so damn well.  (Sal's also pretty damn capable which helps quite a bit - they're not just a bundle of traumas, so I don't want to make it sound like that).

The secondary characters actually take a leap in this book as well, which pushes this book over the top.  Sal's servant Maud is absolutely amazing as a sarcastic woman taking her own initiative to try and help Igna in the war in dangerous ways, and helping Sal not get themselves killed in the process.  I loved Maud so damn much, and I suspect you will too.  The love interest Elise also remains excellent and grows throughout, never being a damsel-in-distress and having one scene that just shows her development as she sheds some ingrained prejudices she had that she'd not realized she'd still taken from her father.  And then there are the two new good guy characters I'm not going to spoil here, one of whom is just a tremendous leader from a similar background as Sal whose actions in the climax are utterly tremendous.

As for the plot, again it's merely good instead of great, but the darkness involved here goes up a lot - not every character will make it out of this story alive, and some pretty traumatic events will occur and be described as the book gets further on.  I had some complaints at first as the book makes Erlend into a blatantly evil country at first - not just warmongering with selfish leaders, but also bigoted and homophobic - when the first book seemed to indicate that Igna wasn't quite as good as Sal thought it was and things weren't quite black and white (they're definitely black and white here), but the book makes it work quite well as a driving force for the Non-Binary Sal and their friends to carry-on.  Less successful is the book's attempt at some major twists - I can't imagine any readers won't be expecting one character NOT to be a traitor from pretty damn early on, and the twist near the end regarding the bad guys' plans doesn't make sense if you think about it too much.  Still, the book ends on a very effective conclusive note, and is very damn satisfying.

Really really enjoyed this duology, and look forward to more Miller's work to come.




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