Review: Murder of Crows by Anne Bishop

[calissa]

Murder of Crows is the second of Anne Bishop's The Others books. It is set on an alternate Earth where the supernatural Others--vampires, werewolves, Elementals, etc--are the dominant species. Humankind live in small villages or occasional cities that are surrounded by the Others' territory. Each city is also obliged to have a Courtyard at its heart--a place of residence for Others who wish to live in the city and where human law does not apply. The series focuses on Lakeside Courtyard who are harbouring blood prophet Meg Corbyn. Although human, Meg's status as a blood prophet places her somewhere between the predatory Others and their human prey. However the master of the institution Meg escaped from--a man known only as the Controller--will stop at nothing to get her back.

I loved Anne Bishop's Black Jewels Trilogy but I have found her subsequent books increasingly shallow. This shows up across the board--in her characters, her worldbuilding and her plot.

Her alternate Earth has an interesting premise but I don't think it has been thought through well enough. For example, resources are tightly controlled by the Others with just enough doled out for humanity to survive and to make the inventions that the Others approve of. Under these circumstances, would humanity really have the same level of technology as it does currently--as seems to be the case? Also, the Others are at least as intelligent as humans so why aren't they the ones inventing things? They could probably find a way to do it more environmentally sustainable fashion, especially since that is one of their key concerns.

The characters lack distinctive voices, even repeating the same phrases. For example, the Controller is known as the Controller no matter who is referring to him. To compound matters, many of the characters are simply carbon copies of those in her other novels. Like Daemon in the Black Jewels Trilogy and Sebastian in the Landscapes of Ephemera series, Simon is the bad boy with the heart of gold looking to protect his powerful yet fragile love interest.

The Others are so overpowered in comparison to the humans that there isn't a whole lot of tension to the plot.

If you're looking for a bit of light romantic fluff (and we all need some fluff from time to time), this might be your book--especially if you're looking for a side order of urban fantasy and environmental crusading. However, if you expect any depth it may be best to look elsewhere.

Comments

[onewhitecrow]

The thing that always gets me about these ruled-by-monster worlds is that a) you always need more prey than predators, or everyone dies and b) if there are more humans than nasties (and it makes me so sad when werewolves are lumped in with nasties, 'cause that's a Christianity-sticking-devil-horns-on-old-folk-belief thing, and even the Bête du Gévaudan had softer legends related to her when not terrorising the peasantry) then the nasties shouldn't bully the majority too much and/or get too close, else here comes the garlic, the silver and the flaming torches...the Magpyrs' plotting in Carpe Jugulum is probably the chillingly closest I've seen to a setup like this that'd actually work.

Do you have any non-romantic fluff you might recommend?

[calissa]

Hmm... good question. Honestly, most of what I read has at least some element of romance in it. The Lies of Locke Lamora was a fun adventure, though I had some issues with the portrayal of women (despite it being better than a fair chunk of fantasy).

Prickle Moon by Juliet Marillier was a lovely collection of stories, some with romantic elements, though quite a few without (unfortunately my copy is being borrowed at the moment so I can't check how many). Just be a little cautious with that one if you have animal abuse triggers.

If you're into horror, I hear that Kaaron Warren does some excellent stuff.

[onewhitecrow]

People find it depressingly "necessary" these days, though I have far less objection to a well-written subplot than to things that borrow tropes from Romance as a genre, since those tend to be unfortunate at best.

The Lies... has sat on my to-read list forever, but it looks sort of huge and I'm in desperate need of low-concentration idiocy right now since I haven't read a book since January. I could carry on with the Temeraire series, I suppose, but those sort of seem to need reading at one go so that you can get up the speed to flash over the plot holes etc.

I'm considering starting the Pretty Deadly series, since a couple of friends recommended it, though the name and cover of the first issue scare me...

Noted, with caution.

Nah - I've rarely encountered it done well enough to seek out. I read...well, here - eclectically, but mostly fringe fantasy if I have a choice, with a high violence threshold if it's done well and a low one if it's gratituous, suspiciously gender-biased or cartoony.

[calissa]

I wouldn't call it low-concentration idiocy, but it might be worth checking out some of Kim Westwood's work. I've read The Courier's New Bicycle and Daughters of Moab. They might be up your alley, though they tend to be dark and may need trigger warnings as well (I vaguely recall drug use in the former). I'm going to have to sit with the low-concentration idiocy a bit longer, especially if you're looking for something without too many plot holes.

Mind if I add you on Goodreads?

[sidheblessed]

I wonder if she's trying to emulate the Black Jewels success by having the same basic relationship structure in her protagonists? In which case, I think she's rather mistaken what made both the Black Jewels and Daemon and Jaenelle's relationship work. (I thought both the story and the relationship worked because of extensive worldbuilding and character development.)

I haven't read anything beyond the Black Jewels trilogy but even I hope she moves away from the bad boy with a heart of gold/powerful but fragile girl standard. Even if she just flipped the genders so we had a bad girl with a heart of gold/powerful but fragile boy, that'd shake it up a little. Personally, I like to see all different kinds of relationships explored and I bet a good deal of her readers do, too.

Of course, I still kind of want to read more of her books, but I'd be going into them expecting a bit of fluff for when the mood strikes.

[calissa]

Well, if you decide you want to go ahead with reading her work, let me know. I have most of the stuff set in the Black Jewels world and some of the stuff that's not (though not Murder of Crows--that was a loan from my sister).