Fantasy - Anne Bishop - Daughter of the Blood (1998)

I mentioned before that the Black Jewels series is my absolute favorite, so it should come as no surprise that when I take a book vacation (defined here as a vacation into a favorite book), I default to these. This read-through, however, I went through every single word and actually discovered some points I always missed. But we're getting ahead of ourselves.

I bought this book in 2004 at a used bookstore that no longer exists. This was another one of those times when my interest in what was going on on the cover led to a great find. The first time I read this, I blasted through it in a day because I liked it so much.

Daughter of the Blood, being the first book in the series, sets up quite a lot for the future to remark on, but let's just go through it like normal, shall we? A powerful seer named Tersa foretells the coming of a mythological being known as Witch before descending into madness. Witch is dreams made flesh, the wishes and desires of a people known as the Blood. Seven hundred years later, she appears: a child with more power on tap than any other member of the Blood ever before her ascension from her birthright. She is the joy and secret of many people, including a sexually brutal man named Daemon who believes he was born to be her lover, his brother Lucivar (who is featured more in the second book), and their father, who happens to be the High Lord of Hell, Saetan. But there are also those who wish to use her for their own purposes, and the fear that this may happen sows suspicion among her own friends.

Of the three books, this one is probably my least favorite, but let me tell you why. I love these characters. There is a lot here that really turns my crank: the human weapon, the brutality and violence, the wide and sparkling spectrum of color. This book has Jaenelle with her shitty family and occasionally in Briarwood. There isn't as much room for friendly interactions, or the fun of her whirlwind personality as it blows through the lives of these men and her friends. Sure, she spends a great deal of time with Daemon, but the danger of the so-called Light Realm (noted, the danger had to be increasingly present to provide contrast with the Shadow Realm of the other books) takes so much precedence that I don't really like this one. I don't like seeing my book-friends in trouble.

Now, to be fair, I still love it. The detail in the descriptions alone is sensuous and brilliant. But of the three, I dislike this one the most.

It occurs to me that I got a little lost in the details up there, but still. If you like blazing magic and brutal violence, diplomacy and relationships, get thee to your bookstore.

9.75/10

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Fantasy - Anne Bishop - Twilight's Dawn (2011)

Before I begin, please understand: I love the Black Jewels series. For that reason alone, Anne Bishop is my favorite author. I don't particularly care for the Tir Alainn trilogy that much, I haven't read the Ephemera duology yet. But this is my favorite book series. So this book was a shoe-in for a ten... if it hadn't been for that last story.

I got the first Black Jewels book, Daughter of the Blood at a used bookstore. I read it in a day, and later got the rest of the trilogy and Dreams Made Flesh. After Dreams, I got every subsequent book in hardcover for my birthday, because the books would always come out in March, and my birthday's in April. In fact, it was a couple of days ago. So when I got this one, which I understand is the last one, because of that last novella, I dropped the book I was reading and read this one, in proper Black Jewels tradition, in a day. Yesterday, even. I used it as a reward for myself in cleaning the house and doing stuff. Awesome, right?

There are a lot of things I love about Black Jewels that I want to get into before I tell you about this book, mostly because then I can reference it. The series is, and has always been, unapologetically violent. That isn't to say that I need a story to be steeped in gore for me to love it, but I would much prefer truthful violence to vague squeamishness in a story. If that's what really happened, then just say it. Don't beat around the bush. And the imagery included in it... you can believe that a man's skeleton can be pulled out of him and lit ablaze while he is still alive. You can believe that a man can be magically exploded so the largest bit of him left are globules of frozen blood on the walls. It has its own beauty.

Related to that is another aspect of these books I love. They go whole-hog with their magic. I know that some people shy away from making a person powerful in their stories out of fear of people saying the person is a Mary-Sue, but why have magic if you can't really show what it does. Black Jewels isn't afraid to have an all-powerful being that is still fragile. It isn't afraid to show you what can really, really do with magic. It isn't afraid to show you illusions, storms that destroy populations, the ability to remove from existence an entire land.

But with that comes a rigid society that I love. Primarily because it doesn't pretend that the Blood are no different from everyone else. They have their own castes and have to be ruled in layers of courts and Queens. And when that society extends in Heir to the Shadows to include kindred, magic-using animals, the politics involved are just delicious.

But what I love most about the Black Jewels series is the relationships between the characters. The trust that is built, crushed, and rebuilt, the interactions that just show how much they have all become an amalgam of relations and family... Even if there were no underlying conflict like an enemy and such, if there was a book of just these characters that I love going about their lives and visiting each other, and threatening each other while declaring that they would guard that person with their life, I would read the shit out of it, and love it forever.

All of that said, Twilight's Dawn. I'm going to do my best to not give away things, but it's probably only going to be a problem when I get to the last story.

Winsol Gifts is the first, and relates the story of Daemon and Jaenelle's first real Winsol. I say real, because it's their third, but during the first, Daemon was too far gone, and the second, Jaenelle was too far gone. In this one, they have to deal with parties, planning, family, and a hectic holiday season. It is essentially all that I want, relationship-wise. It sets a great precedent for the rest of the book, because it is, as I said before, delicious.

Shades of Honor is the second, and probably my favorite. It explores Falonar's chafing in his role as Lucivar's second-in-command, and the results thereafter. Falonar is super dumb. Lucivar was placed as the Warlord Prince of Ebon Rih by the Queen of Ebon Askavi. Just rallying a bunch of like-minded Eyrien's isn't going to depose him. It also allows for more resolution after the events of Tangled Webs than the actual book allowed for.

Family is the third, and takes place ten years after Shalador's Lady, but does not include any of the Terreille cast from that book. It primarily closes the book on Queen Sylvia of Halaway and her family. I'm guessing it was also an indulgence to fans, especially those of the relationship between Sylvia and Saetan.

The High Lord's Daughter is the last. And this is where my review falls apart. Up until this story, I loved it. Ten out of ten. This story explores what happens after Jaenelle dies at nearly a hundred years old. But not in any way that I was hoping. If you intend on reading this book and series, which I still highly recommend, I would suggest not reading the next paragraph. After the bold you can read again.

The last story was not very good. It felt rushed, and the way it spanned a lot of time without really acknowledging how much time between chapters was confusing. It was also confusing because they kept naming their kids after established characters. I didn't know if Titian in that story meant the Queen of the Harpies or the little Eyrien girl. And that shit with Jaenelle Satien and Twilight's Dawn? What horseshit. Trying to make her more than she could be. She's not Jaenelle reincarnated, for fuck's sake. But the primary shittery was how Daemon fell in love with Surreal. No. Wrong. It felt like an exercise to satisfy shippers, much like the epilogue to Harry Potter. Daemon waited hundreds of years for Jaenelle. He's not suddenly going to start boning other girls just so Surreal could get jealous and he's not going to love Surreal. At least it acknowledged how Daemon could never love anyone like Jaenelle. But that whole last story should have been more than an exercise for shippers. It should have explored immediately after Jaenelle passed. The scene in Queen of the Darkness when Daemon breaks down after the witch storm was the most powerful scene in a series full of powerful scenes. We could have had more of that. And what about Kaeleer without its Heart? More times should have been spent on that.

Spoilers over, sorry guys.

Don't get me wrong. I still love the characters and the series. I put it on the same mental shelf as Final Fantasy X and Watchmen. But that last story left a bad taste in my mouth, and the fact that this was what I assume the last book in the series makes me wish the last story wasn't included, for the same reason I hated the epilogue in Harry Potter.

Again, don't take my hating one story as a reason to not get it, or to not dive into the series. I still love it. I occasionally even reread it, and I've tried to lend out Daughter of the Blood many times. Buy it, read it. After all, this book is still going to score high, and I am super glad I got it, if only for Shades of Honor.

9.5/10