Customer Reviews

The Shadow Queen (Black Jewels, Book 7)

5 star:		(29)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I love Anne Bishop's "Black Jewels" triologies, and really enjoyed "The Invisible Ring". This book, not so much. The story about Cassidy was very good. The inserts about Janelle et al were distractions.

Part of the charm of the "Black Jewels" was that the characters were larger than life. In the follow-on books, they get more ordinary all the time. Maybe Anne Bishop wants to humanize them all. To me they come across as whiny and irritating.

Glad to see that there will be more written about Cassidy, but overall it was kind of disappointing. It would have been better written strictly as a book about Cassidy, with Janelle, Daemon, Saetan, and Lucivar making small cameo appearances in the style we saw of Daemon in "The Invisible Ring". And yes, we get it. Janelle and Daemon have sex like bunnies. It's getting boring, and comes across as filler.

I'm afraid to say that Anne Bishop's books have reached the point that I'll be checking them out of the library to see if they're worth buying, rather than preordering every thing she does.

Like most of the other reviewers, I really liked Cassidy and Gray--and I didn't find Theran that bad, since there's room for a lot of later character development there. I also found the Jaenelle/Daemon interludes distracting and mostly irrelevant--they reminded me of Tangled Webs, which was a major disappointment. They were especially annoying as the story drew ot a close, I found myself looking at the centimeter or so of unread text and wondering when she was going to get back to the real story. Saetan's rampage against the extortionist/adulteress was really stupid, I thought, and added nothing to the story. I know how hard it is to let one's favorite characters go and move on, but Bishop needs to do that with Jaenelle and, especially, Daemon. I was never one of those who was completely enamored of him, anyway. He's really too powerful, and that gets boring. And all the sex seems, well, kind of adolescent. I thought that Tangled Webs was kind of a metaphor for Bishop's problems with the Black Jewels world--it was like she was trapped in a world she had created, but couldn't think of any imaginative way to expand it--like Surreal etc., trapped in that silly house.
The Shadow Queen, on the other had, had real flashes of brilliance, and I read it in one day. (Tangled Webs was put back on the shelf before I finished it.) I want to see more of the new characters, and less of the old ones--I loved them in the trilogy, but it's time to move on. I'd like to hear more about the Landen, like to see more of Cassidy and Gray, hopefully doing more than gardening (but not necessarily just having sex, either)--and more, much more, of the whole wonderful world Bishop created. This book was a start, but it felt unfinished.

This imaginative world consists of 3 parallel realms. There are 2 kinds of people, the ruling aristocrats with paranormal powers called the Blood, and everyone else, the Landen. The Blood have a central power structure of one Queen surrounded and balanced by a court of 12 Warlords. Around this central structure are their relatives, friends, spouses, etc. Over centuries, the Blood became twisted and tainted by aristocrats who used their powers cruelly. At the end of the Black Jewel Trilogy books, a wave of power swept all three realms, killing all those of the Blood who were tainted.

2 years later, the territory of Dena Nehele in the realm of Tereille is in trouble. During the power wave, so many tainted Queens were killed that there remained no Queens left able to hold a court. As a result, there are 100 Warlords with no one to balance them. Even worse, these Warlords are the ones victimized by the evil Queens before the storm. They appeal to the shadow realm of Kaeler for a Queen who can come to Dena Nehele, a Queen who knows the Old Ways.

Cassidy is the Queen who goes to Dena Nehele to teach these traumatized people how the Blood should rule.

Cassidy was a delight. Wise, smart, and knowledgeable about the Old Ways, she soon has the people in Dena Nehele supporting her. I loved reading about her and how she taught these people what the Blood should be, living in honour and protecting the Landen.

However, Theran, the man sent to bring her, was an utter jerk. Everytime Cassidy did something wonderful, he thought she was being selfish, stupid, careless or dumb. He was prejudiced, tactless and really idiotic. For example, he sees that she's plain and he dislikes her because she won't impress the other men. He sees she's in danger and doesn't protect her. She protects a Landen child and he thinks she's jeopardizing everything.

There is a lot of Jaenelle, Lucivar, Daemon and Saetan from the Black Jewel Trilogy. We see how they deal with their past trauma in their current situations. As much as I loved these characters, I found it very jarring to continually change to their stories from the story involving Cassidy.

So basically I loved Cassidy's story. Unfortunately, it was regularly interrupted by side stories about Jaenelle and Daemon. Even worse, Theran had too much time in this book. Almost everything Cassidy did was followed up by some stupid bitter viewpoint from Theran.

The story ended too soon. I wanted to see Cassidy reach out to the Shalador Queens and see her get together with Gray. Instead, it ended with Theran realizing he should be a better person and maybe not be so critical of her (well, duh!).

Hm, after writing this review, I just read an interview with the author, who said she'd be writing 2 more Black Jewel books, the second part of Cassidy's story (hurray!) and another book of short stories. Well, I hope there will be less Theran in the next book, or that at least he grows up.

For those who have read the Invisible Ring, this is the story of the Grey Lady's home centuries later, after the tainted Queens are removed and the land has to heal itself.

So only 4 stars from me.

First off, this book had a strong central plot which, had it been allowed to develop fully, would have taken off and just carried its readers with it. That said, I really think that Bishop is bowing to pressure from her publishers who have decided that anything "Black Jewels" related and hence related to the characters from the original trilogy is what is going to sell. This is a shame because, unlike her other series/worlds, this one is excellently crafted and offers a lot of potential for imaginative expansion. I loved "The Invisible Ring" mainly because it was about all *new* characters and had Daemon Sadi as a very minor (albeit important) character. Here when the story should be about whats going on in Dena Nehele, its interrupted by Daemon and Jaenelle having sex. What is up with that anyway? One would almost classify the original trilogy as almost prurient (while it dealt fairly graphically with some very sexually violent behavior, it always stopped well outside the bedroom as far as the main characters were concerned) Bishops' books of late have been getting more and more focused on the sex to the detriment of the story.

I hope the next one is better but I don't think I'll be pre-ordering it. It's a shame because this book had so much potential.

I'm a fan of the Black Jewels stories and characters. That being said, I felt the author tried a little too hard to include characters from her previous works, to the detriment of the story. Rather than switch back to Daemon and Jaenelle going through the steps of their same old, tired dance, the author should have focused on fleshing out the new story, which had the potential to be very interesting.

I was also unhappy with the ending - the book seems to just stop, with many questions unanswered. I can't tell if the author is trying to prepare for a sequel or just got tired of writing. I gave this story 3 out of 5 stars because I did enjoy it, but many things about it irritated me.

"The Shadow Queen" is a book in two pieces. One piece is the stand-alone plotline that is described on the back cover: after finally getting rid of all this fantasy land's corrupt Queens, the remaining Warlord Princes are in desperate need for a strong leader, a Queen to lead this female dominated society. The highest ranking Warlord Prince (T--) goes to a neighboring country in an attempt to convince one of their Queens to lead this troubled country. The other plotline follows the continuing adventures of Sadi and his new wife J--, from Bishop's previous books, and involves a meandering series of adventures loosely related around the other plotline.

The first plotline (rebuilding a country) was a strong idea with much potential, mostly of which is ignored. T-- comes across as myopic, stuborn and stupid, where it is clear that the author intended instead that he simply had different solutions to the problem, solutions that clashed with the approach taken by the new Queen (C--). C-- in turn struck me as ignorant and stupid. Her job depends upon making a good impression on people in general and the Warlord Princes in particular, yet she never makes an attempt to dress the part, get to know her Warlord Princes, get to know her new people, or do anything that would have established her as a leader. The excuse is that she is "ugly" but that was clearly an easy-out excuse intended to let the author off the hook, so that she could return to her preferred "Sadi" plotline. Mostly, though, this plotline simply suffered from lack of attention. Overall: 5-star idea with a 2-star implementation.

The second plotline (continuing adventures of Sadi) was...boring. Strong characterization borrowed from previous books, yet nothing new or exciting. No challenges, no problems to be addressed, no villains, no nothing. Just a repetitious extension of the previous novels, with quite a bit of self pity added and way too many "I'm so great" moments intended to belittle or control T--. Overall: 1-star idea with a 3-star implementation.

I just finished reading The Shadow Queen. And I loved it!

Several weeks ago, I read the reviews posted here and came away with the sense that readers were disappointed with the interweave of Cassie/Theran/Grey's story with Janaelle/Daemon/Saetan SaDiablo family story.

Come on, y'all!
In the past books, Daemon was shattered and slowly painstakingly pieced his being back to sanity. Jaenelle burned through all the threads that made up her being, was pieced together by the love & faith of the Kindred & came back to human body too quickly.

Did you not yearn for the continuing tale of their lives, their healing, their adjustments to the new world formed by Witch's sacrifice? I did! And now we are gifted to follow that journey, alongside Terreille's healing journey through Grayhaven.

I find Ms. Bishop is masterful & convincing in describing the journey out of trauma & dissolution. To me, these characters are not "characters"; they are real & internally consistent. I'm delighted to have insight into their continued development.

For those readers who only see Jaenelle & Daemon's story as a distraction or just filler sex, my recommendation is to re-read the series, appreciate the development of character, of relationships & of plot.

My hat is off to Anne Bishop both for her rich imagination that described these worlds and for her crafting of story - skillful & eloquent & engaging.

I am very excited about this book. After the Black Jewels Trilogy was finished, I often wondered what happened to the people of Terreille after the "taint" was removed. And at last I got to find out a little bit. I must say that I agree with many of the other reviewers here in that I loved Cassidy, and found her endlessly fascinating, but was less thrilled with the chapters concerning Daemon, Jaenelle, and Saetan. I loved the Trilogy, have read it several times, and I love those three characters. But in this book the stories involving those three seem forced, as if the author tried to insert mini-plots about them after the fact. I imagine some editor or something at the publishers saying, "But everyone loves those characters. You have to include something about them. You have to provide drama for Daemon, Jaenelle and Saetan." And the author forcing some undeveloped plots into the book as a result. Also, the dramatic conflicts provided for those three characters contained nothing new. Daemon is tortured again over the sexual abuse he suffered as a pleasure slave. Saetan is tortured again over losing his sons because of a manipulative woman's machinations.

But what I found to be most objectionable was that after reading every book in the series and feeling like I really know these characters and what makes them tick,this book contained actions that seemed out of character for them, particularly Daemon.

Spoiler Alert!!!

In other words, I simply cannot believe that Daemon Sadi would ever under any circumstances not recognize Jaenelle. He could be enspelled; he could be drugged; I think he could be given a frontal lobotomy and I would not believe for one second that Daemon would mistake Jaenelle Alexander laying on his bed for any other woman, much less try to hurt her. It seemed ridiculous. The subplot where Saetan killed a woman that reminded him of Dorothea was the same kind of thing. It didn't seem like something Saetan would do. In other books, Saetan's MO in dealing with people he feels are guilty and deserving of punishment is to wait til they are in hell and under his jurisdiction and then paying them back for whatever it was they did.

Aside from those issues I really enjoyed the book. I loved The Invisible Ring and I think the author was able to tie in this story to the last one very cleverly. The idea of the treasure and the clues and the letters from the characters of the previous book was really fun, as well as giving the reader an idea of what happened to characters we cared about. Another bright spot is Vae, the sceltie. I have to say I adore her; she is so funny. And if readers were allowed to vote on the contents of future books, I would vote -- More Kindred!

I've heard that there is going to be a sequel and I am delighted. I'm very curious about what happens to Cassidy and Grey. And I am hoping the author will develop more of the Dena Nehele characters in depth. In a lot of ways, most of the them besides Cassidy, Grey and Theran are caricatures, and I think they could be really interesting. And if the author chooses to include Daemon, Jaenelle, and our other favorites from the series I'm hoping they play more of a support role like Lucivar did in this last book, or that the challenges they face are something new.

I liked the book, but it has its faults.

The book was sold as a story about Cassidy, who comes to Dena Nehele in order to save the territory. Unfortunately, the "cameo" appearances of Daemon, etc. were more than just cameos - they dominated half the book.

I didn't really understand why there were several different stories about Saetan etc. in the book, and they didn't do anything much to help the progress of the story in general. I think I would have enjoyed it more if they weren't there.

However, I must say that the rest of the book was awesome. Even Theran, because he sort of shows the transition of the old to the new from a first person perspective. So in this sense, the entire Cassidy story was great.

I finally bit the bullet and borrowed The Shadow Queen from my local library. After Tangled Webs, I'll be honest; my expectations were in complete nadir. Initially, I was pleasantly surprised. I was intrigued by the idea Ms. Bishop put in place; how would the people of Terreille feel about the "Old Ways" after the centuries of abuse they endured at the hands of Dorthea and Hayll? I also liked the concept behind Cassidy, essentially a normal character without the ludicrously unlimited amount of power and resources we've become accustomed to in the Black Jewels Universe. The subsequent execution though, left me cold.

I've said it in my earlier review of Queen of the Darkness and I'll say it here too. Ms. Bishop needs to vary her phrases something fierce. I didn't bother to count the number of times "killing field" or some variant thereof was used but it was waaay too many. Not only does she repeat these little gems ad nauseum but she loves to spice up the rest of the book with frustratingly meaningless descriptions. I know she did this to a certain extent in the original trilogy, Janelle's "slivery, velvet coated laugh" for example, but at least there she kept it to a minimum. Recently she's gone completely mad with them. My personal favorite, in this book, occurs somewhere around page 314 in the hard cover edition currently available in the States. Saetan gets his voice described as "like a velvet coated whip." This makes no sense at all. Think about it, how would a velvet coating soften the blow received from a whip? Answer, it wouldn't, in fact the nubby, drag reducing properties of the velvet, to say nothing of its absorbency, might make getting beaten with one worse than with the standard issue slick leather version.

All nitpicking aside, the writing in these later books is just sloppy. The characters from the original trilogy lack any kind of cohesion and the new additions seem like they would be better as side characters so sketchily are they written. Saetan, for example, goes bizarrely insane and brutally murders a villain while hallucinating that she's Dorthea. While his motivation is explained late in The Shadow Queen the continuing changes introduced to the character in the later books make little sense in the context of the original. I ask you, how does a character who is constantly described as a man so honor bound as to be unable even to injure a witch no matter how much she deserved it (in the original) blithely commit genocide ("Zuulaman" in Queen of the Darkness) as well as one of the most brutal killings of a witch we've seen in the series (Vulchera The Shadow Queen)? It makes him appear callous in the extreme when one thinks back to his role during the Black Jewels Trilogy. Why, if he had done all of this or was capable of doing any of it, did he let Daemon and Lucivar suffer for so long? Why did he not do more to support or even save Jaenelle? (And don't give me that `she was keeping him out of Beldon Mor' garbage, she wasn't always there) Not to mention, how can we the readers accept that man who is totally emotionally destroyed by killing a revolting child-rapist or who feels deep compassion for sparrows and daffodils (Heir to the Shadows) is able to just have a bit of a sniffle and then get on with his life after wiping an entire race and its land out of existence? Surely some of those people, plants and animals were uninvolved in ex's nastiness. It destroys the original, subtle, interesting motivation and balance of the character. The longer the series continues the more difficult it is to identify with or even understand the characters.

I'll get back to the supposed main plot of The Shadow Queen now. I've actually only got one objection to the book but it's a doozy. Theran, the best new character in these books, raises some very good questions about the "Old Ways." Why are they better, for example? How does one institute them to the people who aren't naturally inclined to submit to a certain woman? Are all parts of a culture or society that don't conform immediately and perfectly to this other system simply worthless or can they be incorporated? Not only are these concerns not addressed; a number of them are simply brushed aside. I, for one, find stories in which a dominant foreign power simply bulldozes a preexisting group because the ways of said outside group are "better" rather difficult to read. Despite all of the lip service given to "blending" peoples, masked as infuriatingly puerile gardening references, the real message is conform to our ways or GTFO. I understand Theran's frustrations, they're mine.

It's this weird crypto-imperialist thinking is the major problem with every aspect of the book. Cassidy is a perfectly likable character initially and might have become one of my favorites; but for the fact that she suddenly arrives in Dena Nehele knowing nothing about the cultures there or the underlying tension or even the basic history and becomes this paragon of the right way to live. Everyone else has to bend to her: there is no requirement for her to actually try to internalize or even acknowledge the way in which things have been done. I don't buy the idea that everything before the purge was bad and I don't think Ms. Bishop does either. She seems to go out of her way to establish that the males in Dena Nehele aren't inherently bad. The way in which she goes about "redeeming them", however, is quite awful.

I would love to see Theran and Cassidy actually talk to one another about their different ideas for the direction of Dena Nehele; you know, talk through your disputes and reach a compromise like adults, rather than dance around the idea by planting a frickin' metaphor garden. Don't even get me started on Gray by the way. Again, an interesting character who could have been used in cool ways to frame ideas about abuse of power and the need for a balance between old and new ways who is just tossed aside. The bare minute he sees Cassidy his character vanishes and he becomes a cipher for the overly subservient, hen pecked males of the original coven. Really people, and I say this as a woman with a very bitchy streak, you can't behave like the ladies in the coven (constantly belittling and infantilizing the men in your life) and expect them to like you. Life is about give and take and partnerships of equals, of complimentary strengths and support and that is exactly what this book lacks.

I will probably read the rest of this series out of masochistic curiosity but I'm sure Theran will simply become another cardboard villain. The status quo will chew him up and spit him out on the way to inevitable triumph. Hurray.