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Nov. 10th, 2012 10:40 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsThe thing about Mercedes Lackey's Four and Twenty Blackbirds is that it commits the cardinal sin for a Mercedes Lackey book: it's boring.
Four and Twenty Blackbirds is technically the fourth-fifth-last-whatever in Lackey's magic bards series, but the only thing any bards do in it is get brutally murdered, so I'm not sure if it counts.
Yes, this is a murder mystery! About a MAGICAL SERIAL KILLER! Lackey has clearly read a bunch of pop-psychology books about serial killers and she is very eager to have one-half the Protagonist Team, Tal Rufen the Good Cop, explain all about his serial-killer-related learnings at every opportunity. When a lady is stabbed by a THRUST from a LONG OBJECT, it could be symbolic of something! Who knew, right?
Anyway, Tal Rufen treks to the city of Kingsford and starts working for Lady Judge Priest Ardis -- who is the token Good Priest of the whole series -- to solve the crime! Meanwhile, Mercedes Lackey, in her infinite wisdom, has decided to give us lengthy viewpoint segments from the killer's Evil Accomplice, which means that about 60% of the book reads like this:
THE MURDERERS: Hello, reader! Let me tell you our names and how we commit the crimes!
THE GOOD GUYS: Gosh, I wonder if the murderer could be [murderer] -- no, that's unpossible. Oh, dear, is that two more dead bodies?
THE MURDERERS: la la la murder murder murder la la
THE GOOD GUYS: A clue? No, wait, a dead end. Well, we're still pretty sure it couldn't be [murderer], so at this point we're just plain stumped.
This makes for THRILLING AND SUSPENSEFUL READING, let me tell you. In case you are wondering what exactly our heroes are doing all this time besides scratching their heads and going "gosh, this is a toughie," they're having . . . a romance! Sort of.
And here also is the frustrating thing, because, man, the unspoken romance between an awesome lady priest and her competent and loyal subordinate that can never be acknowledged because of their respective mutual positions and responsibilities and the fact that their life missions are more important to them? Oh, come on, guys, that hits like ten of my narrative kinks! In a good book I would be ALL OVER that.
But this is not a good book, so about ten minutes after they meet, the protagonists each start wondering to themselves if maybe they should throw away everything they've both accomplished in their lives and run away to start up, like, a sexytimes-allowing detective agency or something . . . AND THEN. THE DENOUEMENT.
Okay, so first of all, the good guys do not solve the crime UNTIL THE MURDERERS ATTACK THEM. They seriously have to wait for the murderers to literally come to them. And afterwards everybody's like "you saved the city, what good detecting!" and . . . well . . . no . . .
But also, there's this whole dramatic bit of business where they save each other's lives and Tal Rufen gets wounded trying to protect Ardis and he's lying there bleeding on the ground, and Ardis looks at him lying there bleeding on the ground and is like ". . . . ehhhh, I guess I was never that into him after all!" This after three hundred pages of pining. IT'S ACTUALLY HILARIOUS.
And, I mean, again -- people figuring out that their feelings are not as romantic as they thought and being friends? I really like that trope, I'm all over that! But the way Mercedes Lackey sets it up here, it's basically like there are two ways for people to interact, and those two are "SO DESPERATELY IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE THAT YOU WILL THROW AWAY YOUR CAREER AND LIFE AND GOOD SENSE FOR THEM" and "we're just platonic friends! :D" And that's not . . . how people work . . .
(And if it was, then man, preserve me from romance, it sounds dreadful!)
The other important thing to note is that Ardis has a secretary called Kayne, and every time she appeared I misread her name as Kanye, and those mental images were probably the most entertaining thing about the book.
Four and Twenty Blackbirds is technically the fourth-fifth-last-whatever in Lackey's magic bards series, but the only thing any bards do in it is get brutally murdered, so I'm not sure if it counts.
Yes, this is a murder mystery! About a MAGICAL SERIAL KILLER! Lackey has clearly read a bunch of pop-psychology books about serial killers and she is very eager to have one-half the Protagonist Team, Tal Rufen the Good Cop, explain all about his serial-killer-related learnings at every opportunity. When a lady is stabbed by a THRUST from a LONG OBJECT, it could be symbolic of something! Who knew, right?
Anyway, Tal Rufen treks to the city of Kingsford and starts working for Lady Judge Priest Ardis -- who is the token Good Priest of the whole series -- to solve the crime! Meanwhile, Mercedes Lackey, in her infinite wisdom, has decided to give us lengthy viewpoint segments from the killer's Evil Accomplice, which means that about 60% of the book reads like this:
THE MURDERERS: Hello, reader! Let me tell you our names and how we commit the crimes!
THE GOOD GUYS: Gosh, I wonder if the murderer could be [murderer] -- no, that's unpossible. Oh, dear, is that two more dead bodies?
THE MURDERERS: la la la murder murder murder la la
THE GOOD GUYS: A clue? No, wait, a dead end. Well, we're still pretty sure it couldn't be [murderer], so at this point we're just plain stumped.
This makes for THRILLING AND SUSPENSEFUL READING, let me tell you. In case you are wondering what exactly our heroes are doing all this time besides scratching their heads and going "gosh, this is a toughie," they're having . . . a romance! Sort of.
And here also is the frustrating thing, because, man, the unspoken romance between an awesome lady priest and her competent and loyal subordinate that can never be acknowledged because of their respective mutual positions and responsibilities and the fact that their life missions are more important to them? Oh, come on, guys, that hits like ten of my narrative kinks! In a good book I would be ALL OVER that.
But this is not a good book, so about ten minutes after they meet, the protagonists each start wondering to themselves if maybe they should throw away everything they've both accomplished in their lives and run away to start up, like, a sexytimes-allowing detective agency or something . . . AND THEN. THE DENOUEMENT.
Okay, so first of all, the good guys do not solve the crime UNTIL THE MURDERERS ATTACK THEM. They seriously have to wait for the murderers to literally come to them. And afterwards everybody's like "you saved the city, what good detecting!" and . . . well . . . no . . .
But also, there's this whole dramatic bit of business where they save each other's lives and Tal Rufen gets wounded trying to protect Ardis and he's lying there bleeding on the ground, and Ardis looks at him lying there bleeding on the ground and is like ". . . . ehhhh, I guess I was never that into him after all!" This after three hundred pages of pining. IT'S ACTUALLY HILARIOUS.
And, I mean, again -- people figuring out that their feelings are not as romantic as they thought and being friends? I really like that trope, I'm all over that! But the way Mercedes Lackey sets it up here, it's basically like there are two ways for people to interact, and those two are "SO DESPERATELY IN LOVE WITH SOMEONE THAT YOU WILL THROW AWAY YOUR CAREER AND LIFE AND GOOD SENSE FOR THEM" and "we're just platonic friends! :D" And that's not . . . how people work . . .
(And if it was, then man, preserve me from romance, it sounds dreadful!)
The other important thing to note is that Ardis has a secretary called Kayne, and every time she appeared I misread her name as Kanye, and those mental images were probably the most entertaining thing about the book.
no subject
Date: 2012-11-10 04:53 pm (UTC)I don't remember the end of this book at all.
Maybe I didn't finish it??
no subject
Date: 2012-11-10 05:01 pm (UTC)(But at least no one had sex with either of the giant birds.)
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Date: 2012-11-10 05:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-10 05:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-10 09:28 pm (UTC)the eyecandyDerek Morgan explain it to me.Because ysplz.
no subject
Date: 2012-11-11 04:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-11-11 04:54 am (UTC)That's all.