Bloodhound: Book Review

Same as always, initial thoughts contain no spoilers or sneezing dogs.

In this sequel Beka is a first year Dog (city guard), but she is trying to strike out on her own and find her own partner instead of just being a third in the great team of Goodwin and Tunstall. Unfortunately for Beka (but much to the amusement of her friends) she has one bad partner after another until the last one finally dumps her. Partnerless again, Beka gets drawn into a project to ferret out a nefarious conterfieter before the entire city crumbles under inflation and riots. Her investigation leads her and her friend Goodwind to Port Cayne where the conterfieter has the local government under control.

I liked this book at least as much as the previous one which is the type of thing you want from a sequel. Pierce said she was concerned conterfieting wouldn't be exciting enough. Admittedly my summary probably doesn't do it justice. I promise there's just as much action and fighting as in the previous, one. After all, she's still dealing with criminals. And unlike our dear Rogue Rosto, these are the type of criminals that don't mind going down as long as they pull you down with them.

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Okay, now for spoilers and Achoo.

I continued to enjoy the development of all the characters. I was disappointed that Beka didn't get to spend more time in Corus (with Rosto), but I still thought Port Cayne was interesting, particularly Sir Lionel of Trebond. Alanna always did say there was insanity in her family. You finally get to see that she wasn't joking. I also didn't mention it in the last review but Pounce is clearly the same cat as Faithful. I did think that Pounce's decision not to help Beka this time was a bit of a plot device, but at least she didn't kill him. I hate it when they kill characters for a plot device. Though I was sad about Slapper. He was both wonderful and revolting all at once but at least he went out epically. I also LOVED the ghosts in the pigeons arguing with each other. That was hilarious.

Achoo was a cute dog but I thought Pierce spent a bit too much talking about her training. Speaking of dogs, I knew Dale was going to be a cad from the get go which made it hard for me to enjoy the romance part. I did, however, like the fact that Rosto got jealous. Sadly it looks like he still has a bit of growing before he has a chance with Beka. But I think he's still ten times the man Dale will ever be. Rosto saved Beka, after all, and he filled her room with flowers while she was recovering. Dale didn't even visit right away when Beka could have died and then he only did it to break up with her! What an undigested whump. Still, I also liked that Pierce didn't make Dale an actual villain. He was just a lame guy. I appreciated that Beka still kept the jewelry Dale gave her. I related to that.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to the third book in this series, Mastiff, said to be released 2010. Beka is a character who's easy to admire. I've never understood her fear of public speaking considering she can so easily kick the snot out of people. But I suppose those are two different things. I'll probably still think it's a good series if, like Keladry, she never gets together with anyone. But I'm still cheering for Rosto. Even if his name does sound a little like some kind of nut. Give me an R. Give me an O. Give me an S. T. O. Rooooosto!

Terrier: Book Review

I read this book ages ago and kept meaning to do a YouTube review but never quite got around to it. I still hope to do that but thought I should probably get my thoughts down in text before I forget them.

Okay, general synopsis first with no spoilers or police brutality. But no worries, spoilers and being knocked about a bit with a baton follows (for all of you who like that sort of thing...).

First of all I loved both the Beka Cooper books books. They're at least on par with the Trickster duology as my favorite Tamora Pierce books. Although, I suppose Beka's a lot more like Keladry than Aly.

Beka Cooper, the distant ancestress of our beloved George Cooper, is saved from a life in the streets by the provost when she impresses him with her criminal hunting skills at the ripe young age of eight. As a teen Beka enters training to become one of the provost's guards, known in her time as the Dogs. But to be a true Dog, she must first survive being a puppy....

Now for the spoilers...

I have a theory that some authors choose to go back in time in their series in order to reignite enthusiasm in the older books. Prequels are a way to get fresh blood excited with a shiny new book without making them go back and read the others first.

Quite, frankly, if this was Pierce's plan, I think it was brilliantly executed. I don't know enough about the sales of the book to comment on that, but I know if I hadn't already read the other books, I'd want to read them now. Plus, I really love the cover art.

Anyway, let's focus on the story. I was interested that the book was in diary form and admittedly a little skeptical because both the books are tomes. It's hard to imagine any diary being thick enough to this story, and as far as I can recall, Beka only every mentions getting a new diary at the end, so that shoots down the possibility of multiple ones.

But aside from that, there were no major inconsistencies, and when I read the diary I found the voice to be 100% believable. This is high praise from me because, while I've liked other books in diary form, I often find points in them where I feel there's more description than belongs in a real diary. As a writer I understand the temptation, but it usually takes me out of the story if I'm faced with long passages of dialog or too much detail. Beka, however, is writing her diary for the detail. She says it's a memory exercise for her police training, so I never really felt like anything she put in was too much since she presents herself as such a keen learner and observer from the beginning. Also, there are points in the diary where it reminds me forcibly that it is a diary. If Beka's tired, her writing gets sloppy and trails off, if she's a little drunk, her writing's a little drunk.

I also appreciated all of the characterization. Even if I didn't like a character, I found them all to be believable. Beka's sister, for example, got on my nerves, but I understood why they acted like they did. I just wanted to slap them every now and then and yell at them about all that Beka did. Still, I quite liked most the characters. My favorite character is Rosto, and it is my hope that he and Beka will end up together. I understand and entirely respect the reasons she blows him off now. But I'm hoping that he eventually grows up a little and proves himself worthy. Plus how cool would it be for the past Rogue to be related to the future one? Although, I'm not entirely sure how Beka is related to George or if she has children. At first I thought she was his great great many times grandmother, but rereading the prologue, it didn't actually say that. She's known as Beka Cooper which may mean she never married. Of course, one doesn't have to marry to have kids. Also, even if she married Rosto, I don't see her changing her name to Beka the Piper. So that's another thing that might be evidence that she does get with Rosto. Hooray!

Okay, okay, enough of my fangirly romance. There was a plot, which was also a mystery and I enjoyed that. I caght onto the mystery of the Shadow Snake's identity a bit ahead of time, but I was like Beka in that I didn't quite want to believe it. Also, when Beka's friend (pretty sure it was Verene) dies, it wasn't like a random ensign on Star Trek but also wasn't an important enough character to make me too upset. So I thought that struck a good balance. Beka's magic powers are a really good fit as well. I think they're more in holding with most Pierce characters who have very limited powers, but find ways to use them to their best advantage. It's kinda like "I hear pigeons...I mean dead people." Plus, I like pigeons.

Well, guess I remembered more than I thought. I was gonna do both books today but I think I'll review Bloodhound tomorrow.