Tuesday, July 27, 2021

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Mister Impossible by Maggie Stiefvater

 




Mister Impossible is the second book in Maggie Stiefvater's "Dreamers Trilogy", which began with last year's "Call Down the Hawk" (my review here).  The trilogy is essentially a stand alone sequel to her highly popular Raven Cycle, with one of the cycle's main characters, Ronan Lynch, being one of the stars here a year after the cycle concludes (the other main Raven Cycle characters only have cameos or references).  I grew to love the Raven Cycle as the series went on - and especially grew to love the characters - and Call Down the Hawk was a really tantalizing series starter in its own right.  Still, unlike the Raven Cycle, each book in this trilogy isn't really telling an independent story, and so Call Down the Hawk left me a bit unsatisfied and wanting more.    

Mister Impossible is similarly not its own complete novel, and thus suffers from pacing issues and second book issues that make it feel for large stretches of the book like it's simply building to something big that the reader hasn't quite gotten to yet.  It's also not a long novel, and tries to feature a good number of important characters, and as such some of those characters kind of suffer for lack of attention.  Still it remains a tantalizing story, with Ronan Lynch being still a tremendous main character, to go along with the other minor characters, that I remain enraptured and eagerly awaiting the finale.  

----------------------------------------------------Plot Summary-------------------------------------------------------
Ronan Lynch and Hennessey have met up with the mysterious Bryde who is trying to teach them to safely learn to use their powers of dreaming for a mysterious purpose.  But Ronan can't seem to feel the leyline when he's awake, and is afraid to reach out and talk to Declan or Adam while on the run.  And Hennessey finds herself feeling alone without her daughters, without Jordan, with the terrifying Lace that haunts her dreams still being present nearly every time she tries deliberately to dream.  

The trio find themselves chased by the Moderators, but with Bryde's help, their combined dreaming powers are enough to put the Moderators on the back foot, suffering loss after loss as the Moderators try desperately to stop the dreamers from destroying the world.  But Carmen Farouq-Lane and her visionary Liliana begin to have doubts as to whether their actions are right, and if there might be another way they could save the world.  

And Jordan and Declan, along with the dreamt Lynch brother Matthew, find themselves in Boston, discovering objects - pieces of art - with the strange power of keeping dreamt beings and objects alive even after their dreamers die.  But as Jordan, Matthew and Declan attempt to figure out what gives these pieces their power, they will also have to figure out who and what they themselves are and what they want themselves to be.  

The powers of these dreamers, these dreamt, and these family members will soon come to a head, and the world will find itself eternally changed by what comes of their clash......
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Mister Impossible features what might be a record for these books in terms of point of view characters: we jump between the perspectives of Ronan, Jordan, Declan, Matthew, Hennessey, and Carmen as the story is told, although our main storylines are essentially four-fold: Ronan's story, Hennessey's story, Carmen's story, and Jordan/Declan's story (with Matthew as an aside to that couple).  Obviously all four arcs intersect (indeed, Ronan and Hennessey spend nearly the entire book alongside each other, but their perspectives on things and interests are so different I consider them different stories) although for large sections of this book, the reader may find themselves waiting and waiting for them to do so, as it sometimes takes an awful while for the important events you know must be coming to happen.  

Thankfully for the most part these characters are excellent.  Ronan Lynch, as the most prominent, remains the same jerky-arrogant yet confused mess that we've always known - desperate to save the leylines, to be able to keep dreaming and bringing things back, but unable to control himself from screwing things up.  As Declan notes at some point in the book, Ronan has always dealt with his mess of wants and desires by becoming a follower of someone else, and in this book that's now Bryde, for better or for worse, and Ronan's confusion makes him start deliberately keeping others who love him - such as Adam - out.  Then there's Hennessey, who is desperate with Bryde's help to control her dreaming so that she doesn't either bring back another daughter or the sinister monster Lace she sees in all her dreams, while also incredibly lonely without her daughters and Jordan who she has left for the first time.  

Less well served our the other characters, although they're still mostly interesting and enjoyable to read.  Jordan's (and Matthew's to a lesser extent) quest to discover a way to stay awake even if Hennessey dies is at times fascinating, especially as she and Declan discover that it possibly could require her to create not just an original piece of art, but a piece of art that she can truly put her own heart into  And Declan alongside her realizes along with Jordan that he can truly be who he wants to be, without pretending, alongside her.  Farouq-Lane's story is really the only weak one of the bunch, as we don't spend enough time with her, making her inevitable turn from the Moderator organization (something you knew was going to happen from book 1) just feel a bit abrupt, and her potential romance not really built up enough to truly work.  Still, she's easy to like and understand, despite being underdeveloped.  

The issue isn't the characters in this book, but really the plot, which is really slow paced and always obviously building to something that doesn't amount to much until the very last act, leaving off with some major cliffhangers.  You know that Bryde's plans for the Dreamers are going to lead to some major world shattering event, and that Ronan and Hennessey are going to wind up with conflicting views on this, from the very start but it takes forever for that to happen.  Similarly, Jordan and Declan's plot features strong moments of character work, but has very little intersection with the plot till perhaps the very end when Ronan and Hennessey interact with the both again, and their plot never really has any global plot relevance before that (this is made worse by the mysterious women-led art-based criminal organization Boudicca showing up, showing Jordan the "sweet metals" which keep dreamers alive, and then doing nothing the entire book).  And things like Farouq-Lane's turn don't get enough development as mentioned above, because the story is so focused on everyone else, for it to really feel like a natural turn, leading to her just feeling there until she becomes important.  

Prior books in this world have had their own individual book plot arc to resolve at the end, but Mister Impossible doesn't even try to create a semblence of one, and the result is that this very much feels like the middle book in a trilogy, expanding the ideas and themes and characters, but not providing any satisfying conclusions.  But even though that disappointed me, it still leaves me eager to see where Stiefvater takes this book in the trilogy's concluding volume, whenever that comes out.

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