Jacob was home schooled, quiet, well educated and is now
away for college, doing all the right things, following the rules and living
frugally. And desperately avoiding his evil family and their pledge to the dark
ones with which they one day intend to destroy the world
It was an unconventional upbringing.
Getting used to New York City after such a beginning
would be difficult – but when his sister arrives in town fully intending to
kick start the apocalypse, it’s all Jacob can do to rally what defences he can
to save the city and save the world.
It’s hard not to love the concept of this – Jacob, a
meticulously nice if rather boring boy is escaping his family cult. Except his
family cult is literally empowered with cthulu-esque monsters from the Deeps
who are trying to end the world. And can do it. That’s a twist on the cult
story.
The whole story is set in New York City where Jacob has
to fight off his sister Esther using every ally the city has to offer – and it
has a lot to offer. The world setting here is incredibly rich with several
kinds of gods and pantheons, multiple supernatural creatures, a deep and varied
magic system (I love the whole using of stones to channel and shape magic) and
a wide selection of mythologies all concentrated into this extremely diverse
city. It was huge and it managed not to be confusing because it constantly
suggested depth and detail without us having to delve deeply into each one. We
get the shape of, say, Antoinette’s voodoo or Dorothea’s knight powers or
Carter being a child of the Hindu gods without having to use a vast amount of
detail to explain it – but still including enough to get a sense of depth and
creation there. The backstory’s there, we’re just not going to bog down seeing it
all yet.
The story is action packed and extremely tense. Jacob’s
fight with few resources against the seeming impossible power of his sister –
backed by her completely moral-less pursuit of power. He has to struggle to get
people to take her seriously and as the battle continues it gets more and more
desperate as each ace they pull up, each master plan they prepare frays and
falls in the face of Esther’s power. There’s an amazingly well maintained sense
of tension here and a real sense of the threat Esther represents. This is one
of the few books where, several time over, it really felt like the story was in
the balance and the protagonist could – and probably would – lose.
And I loved the ending – I can’t say any more than that without
a terrible, unforgiveable spoiler.
Jacob is a fascinating character full of levels. He feels
a level of guilt for his family’s legacy and actions but isn’t willing to
wallow in it. He understands why people are suspicious and wary of him and doesn’t
blame them for it, but nor is he going to spend a lot of unproductive time
apologising for what his family has done (and it’s a nice combination of both
not feeling good about his family’s legacy but not exactly being willing to
accept the blame for it either). He’s immensely practical in his thinking, but
at the same time very overwhelmed by the situation he’s in – he’s very much a
fish out of water and it pretty much shows by how conscientious and careful and
meticulous he is – but that also reflects his upbringing (after all, if you’re
imprecise and careless when summoning dangerous monsters of the netherworld
then bad things happen). He also really shows his combination of being
extremely well educated, even classically educated, but at the same time very
much isolated and raised in a very rural, unsophisticated area – it’s a really
hard combination to pull off and it’s done excellently. On top of all that he
has a vast amount of confidence because he has been raised to think how
powerful they are (and he does have mastery of an extremely powerful form of
magic) while being full of doubt because he is so out of place in New York.
There’s so much that goes into Jacob as a character, all of these layers and effects and influences are clear in his character making him very real, very complex and very interesting to follow.
While Jacob gets the most in depth build, most of the
major side characters have a decent amount of attention fleshing them out –
from Carter the Indian Nephilim with his extremely wealthy family and heavy
expectations, to Antoinette, the daughter of a powerful Mambo who inherited her
shop, her stock and her connection to the Loa even if she’s not entirely sure
she wants it. And there’s Dorothea, one of the Broadway Knights, ex-cop drawn
to protect the weakest and most vulnerable in the city after watching her
brother’s decline. They all have a story, no matter how briefly alluded to
among all the action, any character that is there for any length of time rather
than just met in passing has some history has some sense of themselves as
people which is great to see. There’s a real push to make sure they are people,
not just names or additions to Jacob Greene.
It’s also a really diverse cast the fully represents the
diversity of New York City. Carter is Indian, Antoinette and Dorothea are
Black. We have a clan of Native American werewolves and one of the hearts of
New York is defended by some powerful South Asian Raskshasa’s. They stop to
rest briefly in the home of a Chinese couple (who are both lesbians), Jacob’s
best friend in college is a Filipina, they stop at a Pacific Islander doctor.
Every step of the way the background cast is diverse, some just seen briefly,
some with Jacob for the entire fight, there’s constant racial diversity and two
minor lesbians. Sometimes it’s mentioned in passing, sometimes it’s a cultural
connection to their magic but not always and usually there is an attempt to
convey culture and experience with each as well – whether it’s Dorothea’s
acknowledgement of racism, Carter’s abstention from beef, the way the Raskhasas
dress – there’s usually more to them than just “this is Fred. Fred is black.”
It’s an excellent representation of a truly diverse city – but not only a truly
diverse city, but a city that is stronger for its diversity, a city that is all
the more powerful when these diverse elements stand together against Esther
Greene
Several of these characters are obviously powerful women –
the head of the Rakshasa, Antoinette, Dorothea to name a few. And the main
enemy is Esther – Jacob’s sister; she’s evil, she’s demonic and she’s
incredibly powerful. Not only is she powerful but Jacob fully accepts that at
all times – even when it comes to pure physicality like wrestling. Jacob is
never ashamed or reticent in admitting that Esther is better than him, more
dangerous than him, knows more than him and is stronger than him. Jacob is
extremely powerful – but he never fails to acknowledge the greater skills and
powers of anyone around him – and definitely not his sister.
So much of this book works that it’s really hard for me
to pull up any criticism. I think, perhaps, at times the action can be oddly
paced. We’ll have moments when everything is moving so fast and we get so many
names that I can’t keep track and we suddenly have someone running along with
us and I’m not sure who they are. Or there’s one moment when Antoinette and
Jacob are running through a burning building and I’ve kind of forgotten why
they’re there or how they got there because it’s all moving so fast. And then
there’ll be another moment when Jacob seems to be kicking back and relaxing and
everything seems awfully slow – and it makes sense in the context of the story
(waiting to prepare a defence or literally having to stop to eat) but sometimes
it can be jarring. Similarly, while Jacob’s elaborate language is a perfect
reflection of him, sometimes it gets in the way of the action and the movement.
These are small complaints though, not far off nitpicking – it’s a truly
excellent book that I’m not only eager to see the series continue, but I’m
sorely tempted to sit down and re-read it and run through all the awesome all
over again
