Tag Archives: Sharon Shinn

Uncommon Echoes by Sharon Shinn

by Rebecca

echoinonyxUncommon Echoes
by Sharon Shinn
2019

Echo in Onyx (Book 1)echoinemerald
Echo in Emerald (Book 2)
Echo in Amethyst (Book 3)

I have a somewhat odd perspective on Sharon Shinn because while I really like some of her books and don’t care for others, I am fully aware that it’s a matter of personal preference because I trust her as an author: echoinamethystI trust that she’s going to write really well and that scenarios and tropes that other authors wouldn’t be able to pull off, she can and does. The quality of her writing is always high, but the tone fluctuates enough that I enjoy some of hers and don’t others. These I really enjoyed.

This particular series is also fascinating because the fantasy element is one I’ve never seen before: that some people have “echoes”, ie physical copies of their bodies that give them an automatic entourage. From a practical standpoint, it’s both impressive and ridiculous unwieldy. Each book is a romance plot set in this relatively generic royal fantasy land during a time of unrest… except that there are added complications of all these extra bodies just hanging around. Each person is their own crowd (at least among the nobility.)

Shinn also does an amazing job of showing how conflicted civil wars are: the current monarchy vs the rebel factions, and there’s significant in-fighting on both sides and sympathetic and idiotic aspects of both sides as well. And I, as the reader, am also conflicted, because both sides are being awful in many ways and both sides of trying to make things better for people in many ways, too.

An amusing aspect is how bad all of the characters are at actual physical fighting. I feel like that’s probably a lot more realistic than a lot of fantasy novels: the high ranked nobles are not used to having to actually defend themselves from physical attack so when it happens, they’re incredibly bad at it.

But as the greater political situation continues to be fraught in a variety of ways, the main characters get their happy endings. And I really needed that.

Note: I read these books about a year ago, and enjoyed them, and was writing this review when the national news broke about another young black man who had been killed by the police. And here I was enjoying fantasy romance about wealthy nobility. And there’s a line between enjoying some escapism versus being disconnected from society, and I felt like I had fallen over that line. Now, a year later, with the constant grinding news cycle, my take away is: enjoy what I can, when I can, but don’t lose track of the work that needs to be done in the real world.

Too Hot to Read

by Kinsey

I’ve been struggling to write an entry the past couple of weeks. It’s been so hot and miserable that I’m hardly motivated to do anything more than slowly sip a cold beverage while staring into the middle distance–even reading seems like a lot of work–and nothing I’ve read lately has been inspiring. I want to tell you about books that I love, but recently every book I come across is one I am basically okay with, they’re all fine, whatever. But other people seem to like all of these books, so let’s do a quick round-up:

Rules of Civility by Amor Towles–This has gotten rave reviews and it seems like something I should love–bright young things in New York City in the 1930s! And I did love the descriptions of what it was like to work as a secretary and eat at the Automat. But the main male character (who I guess I was suppose to be pining over?) was a total blank to me and the best friend seemed like a terrible friend that the main character was better off without. Plus, I felt like we were eternally on the edge of a more interesting story that we never quite got to–the book kept making allusions to the fact that the main character was Russian but had Anglicized her name to get ahead in the world, but we never learned anything about her family or why she did that or what the costs were. I wanted more. If you know the perfect glittering 30s book, let me know.

The Pirate King by Laurie King–This is the latest in the Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes mystery series (short version: after Holmes retires to the country, he teams up with a young girl and they end up solving mysteries together). I ADORE the first three, but the later ones have seemed lightweight, like generic mysteries that could be solved by any generic characters. The first few books were so enjoyable because Holmes and Russell and their relationship was so clearly drawn, and I feel like that’s been lost a bit. Only for diehards.

Shape of Desire–Remember when I was talking about how much I love Sharon Shinn? I do still love her, but please don’t read this one. I think this is her attempt to get on the Twilight bandwagon, not with vampires, but by setting a supernatural romance-type story in this world. I am on board with supernatural romance, but this one felt like a twenty-page short story blown out into a whole book. Go reread the angel books instead.

Slow Love by Dominique Browning–A memoir about a woman who gets laid of from her job and finds herself seemed like it would be right up my alley. It’s subtitle is “How I Lost My Job, Put On My Pajamas & Found Happiness,” and doesn’t that sound fun? Eh. Way too much of the book was taken up by her whining about a relationship that ANYONE could have told her was pointless, and as far as I could tell, her happiness consisted of her using her enormous severance to retire to the vacation house she already owned. Less inspiring than I had hoped.

Here’s hoping that my upcoming beach vacation results in a whole stack of books I love and can heartily recommend.

Troubled Waters

by Kinsey

Last week I read A Visit From the Good Squad, Jennifer Egan’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, and it was fine. It was well-written and had a very interesting structure (moving back and forth between characters and time periods) and the famous chapter told in PowerPoint slides was quite affecting. But everyone in the book seemed miserable and my main reaction was to wonder if most people in the world are really that unhappy, because I am not and most of the people I know aren’t. Are all the sad, mean people just clustering together in literary novels? So while I would be happy to discuss Goon Squad more in the comments if anyone else has read it, what I want to talk about instead is the next book I read, Troubled Waters by Sharon Shinn.

I love Sharon Shinn. When I’m poking around on Amazon or on my library’s catalog and realize that she has a new book coming out, I have been know to let out a little squeal of happiness. Her books generally follow a predictable pattern–they are virtually all fantasy stories in which a strong female lead character has to overcome some of obstacle and falls in love along the way. There are often royal families involved, and magic, the characters generally have to come to understand and embrace the powers they have. But don’t think I’m complaining about the books all having mostly the same plot–they’re great! There’s action and romance and excitement and well-drawn characters, and I know that I am going to be satisfied and will enjoy every minute. There’s also a nice feminist foundation underneath it all. The books aren’t explicitly about women overcoming their oppression by men but you get the clear sense that the author is a feminist, and her female characters are fully-realized people.

It can be tricky to figure out where to start with Shinn’s books, because she’s written a ton. There’s a series of middle-reader books that starts with The Safe-Keeper’s Secret, which are fine but a little young for my tastes, and a number of stand-alone books including a futuristic re-telling of Jane Eyre. But the ones I love, and where I would recommend someone start, are the Samaria series and the Twelve Houses books. These are both multi-book series set in two different universes. The Samaria books are about, well, angels. I don’t want to give too much away, but that series has a slightly more sci-fi twist and includes some entertaining Biblical references, even though it is really not at all religious. The Twelve Houses books are a little more traditional fantasy stories about kings and queens and knights and magicians, but I find them nicely grounded with a focus on the people involved and their emotions. I vastly prefer these kinds of stories when they are told on this smaller scale, especially when compared to Game of Thrones-esque enormous epics that seem more interested in the politics rather than the people.

Now that I’ve got all that explained, Troubled Waters isn’t in either of those series, but I’m hoping it’s the start of a new one. It’s the story of Zoe, a young girl who lives with her father in a tiny village far from the capital of her land. When her father dies (which happens on about page 2, no spoilers), one of the leaders of the country appears to take her back to the capital so she can marry the king, and things all spin off from there. There is royal intrigue and magic and a love story and I found the whole thing just charming. The conceit of of the magic in this book is that it is centered around the elements. Zoe has a particular affinity for water, but it feels like Shinn is setting things up for additional books to follow stories of the other elements. As you can probably tell from how brief my review is, Troubled Waters is not breaking any new ground, but I will happily read as many books about this world as Shinn wants to write.