When Jacqueline Carey released "Kushiel's Scion," the first of the Imriel trilogy, I admit to being a little worried. I wasn't sure she could pull off the shift away from Phedre no Delaunay de Montreve, the inimitable and incomparable heroine of the first trilogy of the Kushiel's Legacy series. Well, I was wrong, and Imriel's trilogy turned out to be brilliant. Then she started a third trilogy, and once again I was apprehensive. After "Naamah's Kiss," I wasn't entirely reassured, but I still held onto hope for Moirin's story.
After "Naamah's Curse," that hope is crushed.
I can't put my finger on the exact moment when I realized that everything had gone horribly, horribly wrong, but I do know that every time I picked up this book, the spark of anticipation was weaker, and every time I set it down the disappointment was stronger. I kept waiting for it to pull me in, to entice me, seduce me, to just make me care about these characters. It never did.
By far the greatest sin in "Naamah's Curse", greater than the ridiculous plot contrivances and deus ex machinas, greater than the senseless bouncing around from location to location, greater than the little editorial errors that signal a rush to print, is that the characters here are unbelievable, flat, and one-dimensional. Now, I was never a fan of Bao - my last review described him as a poor man's Joscelin. Well, after this book, I take that back - it's offensive to both Joscelin and poor men. The various minor characters are your basic stock archetypes - the evil religious fanatic, the wide-eyed naďf, the enlightened ruler.
And Moirin? Moirin, who could have been the most unique and fascinating D'Angeline protagonist to date? Moirin, alas, has become the most dreaded and disappointing character of all: the Mary Sue. The girl raised in isolation in the wild who is suddenly an expert on haggling, languages, and trade. The girl whose sexual innocence was so endearing who has suddenly turned into a worldly version of the hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold. The girl who is beautiful and smart and resourceful and popular and strong and has magic powers and whom everyone - except the reader - seems to adore. Gag me.
What about the plot? Well, the strongest section of the book is set in Vralia, which when last we left it had begun the transition to martial Yeshuite power. In the intervening centuries, we are told that a schism has arisen between the followers of a gentler faith, led by Rebbe Avraham ben David and influenced by the martyrdom of the Maghuin Donne shapeshifter Berlik, and a harsher, proselytizing creed obsessed with rooting out sin and purging the world of witchcraft and heathenism. Now, my view has always been that in Carey's alternate history, the two points of departure which had the greatest effect on creating a better world than ours were, respectively, the presence of Elua and the absence of St. Paul. In Pyotr, the Patriarch of Riva, Carey has given us her universe's St. Paul, Augustine of Hippo, and the Spanish Inquisition (bet you didn't expect that!) all in one. He manages to get his hands on Moirin, and, well, you can imagine. This is the only part of "Naamah's Curse" which had any sense of historical relevancy, moral quandary, personal culpability, or any suggestion at all that a major character might be in very real danger. Parts of it were painful to read and had me really worried for Moirin - in many ways, it was like the Darsanga episode in "Kushiel's Avatar."
Sadly, we are gone far too soon from Vralia as Moirin sets out - again - to find Bao, this time across the Himalayas and into Bhodistan. Which development, rather than filling me with awe at her determination and the power of their true love, merely left me shaking my head and sighing "Honey, I hate to break it to you, but Bao is Just Not That Into You." Has any Carey pairing resulted in so little chemistry as these two? I have more enthusiastic reunions with my cat after a day at work than Moirin and Bao can manage after months apart. Seriously, I would rather have seen Phedre hook up with Barquiel L'Envers than watch Moirin follow Bao around for one more minute. Imriel and Claudia Fulvia made a better couple than these two. Moirin, DTMFA.
And the sex? Well, it turns out Lady Gaga had it right after all: "Baby when it's love if it's not rough it isn't fun." The eroticism here is distinctly of the tame Harlequin variety, with plenty of heaving and throbbing but none of the originality or naughty playfulness of either Phedre or Imriel's amorous encounters. Moirin seems to view sex as a fun pastime - which is, of course, perfectly fine, but it lacks, shall we say, any poetry. Sex scenes in the previous books were always either hot, emotionally charged, or (best of all) both. Sex scenes in this book are, well, predictable. Vanilla. And the relationships involved are strictly of the friends-with-benefits variety, which in real life is all well and good, but who wants to read about what amounts to a series of pity-lays?
In short, "Naamah's Curse" was a horrible disappointment. I hate writing these reviews of Jacqueline Carey books, I really do. I thought she had gotten all her hack writing out with "Banewreaker," but it appears there was still some left. This is hideously depressing to me. I simply can't understand how this book went so wrong, and I honestly don't see how the series is going to turn around again. "Curse," indeed.
