Emberley has already suffered losses in the battle
against the Red Vampire plague – and has only just managed to resurrect her
fellow Phoenix Rory from his ashes.
But even with the leader of the Red Vampires dead, the
threat continues – rebel vampire Rinaldo is threatening to use them as a weapon
against the city – and one city block has already been destroyed in the last
conflict.
Still seeking the research which may be the cure to this
threat, Embrley and Jackson have to work with the secret Paranormal Police
Force, PIT to try and survive and stop the bodies piling up: and their own
being among them
This series has so many original elements I love –
starting first and foremost with the whole concepts of the phoenixes as
protagonists. The whole concept of them as beings that resurrect and
reincarnate but are far from without flaws or weaknesses is interesting how it’s
done.
Emberley’s relationship with Rory is fascinating. There
are so many stories out there where we have couples forced into a sexual relationship
because of woo-woo. It’s an inevitable storyline which has two people who hate
each other forced into a romance, with lots of anger and resistance followed by
them finally giving and in and twu love follows. I’m not a fan.
So to have this –have Emberley and Rory care for each
other – but not romantically. How they accept their bond happily, not as a
burden or something which always drags them down; it’s really refreshing. That
this is not pushing them towards romance nor is it some desperate dark sadness that
dogs both of them with angst and tragedy
Not that there isn’t angst in the life of Emberley – but I
also like how this broken relationship with Max is treated. Normally when I see
that a protagonist’s love life is cursed I turn and run so far because oh my
gods the angst that will follow! But here? Not so much. Oh it hurts Emberley
and she’s not happy about it – but that doesn’t mean she can’t work with Max
and isn’t quite happy pursuing other relationships rather than moping all alone
hoping Max comes back to her. She likes Jackson, she has a good time with him.
It is a bit overly sex focused (when, my gods, sometimes I just want them to
get on with the plot and stop worrying about Jackson’s dick) and she has fun
and a life even if her romantic life has all fallen apart that doesn’t mean she
doesn’t have a life.
The main characters, their conflicts and the world really
make this book worth reading. And I really like the take on the elves and if
anything needs expanding then it’s definitely the different kinds of elves and
the powers and cultures they have.
I really feel that this series really does need to trim
some characters and concepts. We have so many sides: we have the Syndicati
vampires, we have the Red Vampires and the wizard, we have apparently new
big-bad Rinaldo . We have the wererats. We have the werewolves. We have our heroes.
We have PIT who are now kind of working with our heroes
We have scientists and lost notes on the virus, we have a
gang of rogue vampires looking for a home, we have a wandering telepath. And we
have some kind of ominous big dark apparently lurking in the future.
It’s all so crowded and confused that I’ve kind of
forgotten big chunks. Like I get that Emberly and Jackson are now working
somewhat co-operatively with PIT but I can’t quite remember how smoothly that
happened. I know they have a beef with the rats but it’s all a little fuzzy as
to why because so much has happened
This also tends to make the story lacking impact and
focus. After shifting most of the focus to Rinaldo as the big bad and the
threat, that underlying fear about the Red Vampire virus gets kind of lost.
There’s this fear of a plague of raging red vampires taking over the city but
it’s all kind of banished into the background and it’s all more about which
group is threatening Emberly and Jackson at the moment, finding tokens (which
could be anything at this point) to placate each faction and generally trying
to stay alive. They keep chasing down this scientific research but I’m not even
sure why half the factions even need or want this research any more.
Ironically I’m also not happy with how some major plot
lines feel like they’re rather cut off. I do like that they are being cut off –
but I feel like some elements- like the big bad wizard, were built up as major
forces and then just kind of were cut off pretty abruptly. I think it comes
down to the lack of space.
There’s also a moment in the book that comes with a huge trigger warning for rape. As in we have an
extremely graphic depiction of a rape. At no part in this book or with this
story was it necessary to have this rape here for plot progression. There’s no
reason why, kidnapped and helpless, Emberley couldn’t have found her power to
save herself before the assault actually happened, it would have changed
nothing
There’s some development of how Emberley, a woman who has
lived for so many centuries, is no stranger to assault: this has some powerful
and deep conversations about how vulnerable women are today and throughout
history. But Emberley is a woman who can quite literally burn anything and
anyone she touches: why is she vulnerable? And can’t this point have been made
any other way? Certainly one that looked deeper and considered Emberley’s
context. Equally, this storyline tried to make the equal point that men are
less used to or aware of the vulnerability of being raped – so Jackson feeling
what Emberley felt was far more violated and horrified than she was. And these
are interesting social points to make – and how someone, especially a cis,
straight, white, able bodied man, is likely to be more horrified by violation
simply because that level of privilege makes this level of violation seem
unimaginable. Again, an important point. But the way it’s done is to make
Emberley be the one to offer comfort to Jackson. To have Emberley be the one
ready to support him, to have Emberley be the one to help guide him through her
trauma – her trauma, her rape. But in a way he almost takes ownership of the
victimhood here, especially as Emberley covers this with a “been there, done
that”. She’s not blasé per se, but she isn’t shocked and his pain seems more
prominent.
In terms of diversity, the only POC depicted are the
Earth Elves. And even then the skin colour is clearly emphasised as being more
related to their species than anything. We have some random small characters who
are POC, but they are POC
We have some LGBT characters. Or had. They’re all dead.
All briefly appearing and all dead. Violently. But not before we had some
sexual explicit blackmail going on.
I like this story and this world – but it needs to pick a
storyline (or two or three). It needs to narrow its scope and remind us who
everyone is by letting some of them develop to something more than the Big Sea
of Names. It needs definition and then I think I could much more enjoy these
excellent characters and the world that has been built around it
