Reviews with content warning for Racism - The Book of Life

The Book of Life, book three of Deborah Harkness' All Souls trilogy, follows Matthew and Diana as they return to the present and reunite with their loved ones under tragic circumstances. Determined to find the last missing pages of the Book of Life (Ashmole 782), they must build new alliances and face old foes.

This final installment was quite similar to Shadow of Night in the sense that the author had too many ideas regarding the plot, subplots and characters. And, instead of making difficult choices, she decided to keep all of her ideas, and work with everything she had which, in the end, it didn't pay off as there were too many loose ends and no real sense of closure.

The never ending subplots and the appearance of new characters who did not bring anything to the main plot participated in slowing down the story and its pacing. I truly believe that with a bit more editing and sticking to the original group of characters, especially the enemies/antagonists present in A Discovery of Witches, the plot would have been much better. Gerbert, Satu and Knox were the main characters opposing Diana and Matthew since book one. It would have been perfect to continue with them, going deeper with their characters and show how dangerous and powerful they are instead of propelling some new character out of nowhere into the role of the mastermind villain. Though, to be fair, I am still convinced that the real antagonists/villains of this story should have been Matthew Clairmont and the de Clermont family. With all the things that we learnt about them throughout the series it would have made so much more sense and I would have loved Diana get back her independence and fight them. (I will give some detailed reasons why I think that Matthew should have been revealed as the villain at the end of my review in the spoiler section)

Despite the fact that my reading experience was negative, I must say that Deborah Harkness' style is amazing. She is extraordinary when it comes to describe landscapes, works of art, and architecture as well as alchemical illustrations (which is not surprising considered that she is herself a professor of history of science). But when it comes to developing characters, making them grow, and having them earn their skills I must say that she is not totally successful.

There is no real moment in The Book of Life, even in A Discovery of Witches and Shadow of Night, where I feel like Matthew and Diana are actually a good match. I miss the intelligent and independent woman with a brilliant career as a history of science professor ahead of her that Diana had in the first book. Instead, she is just relegated in the position of babymaker unable to think for herself and completely stripped away of her independence. Matthew keeps on treating her like a child. Honestly, the story would have made so much more sense if, at the end of book two, Diana had realised that Matthew and his family were not who they pretended to be and that perhaps she needed to seek true allies.

What was also missing for me as I was reading Deborah Harkness' All Souls trilogy was that I did not think that vampires were acting like vampires. None of them were really using their vampiric abilities. Instead they were constantly talking and making empty threats while drinking a glass of fancy red wine. This is also true for the way witches were depicted and how, instead of showing us their powers and how they use it, the author was continuously telling us of how good, how skilled and how powerful Diana and some other witches were without showing it. I faced a similar issue with the status that the daemons held in this series. Daemons did not have powers or abilities compared to vampires or witches and, for this reason, they were disregarded by the other two species as not important. And here again, I have trouble understanding why none of the daemon characters couldn't have played a much bigger role in the search for Ashmole 782 alongside Diana and Matthew as it would have been interesting to see how disruptive a friendship between one member of each species can create a sense of fear within the Congregation and how it could fracture its very power.

Personally, I think that Agatha Wilson, the leader of the Congregation, should have been chosen by the Goddess instead of Diana to shake and break the Congregation's antiquated laws. Agatha has fought all her life for her community but also proved to be an advocator for change. Diana, however, only began to take part in this all thing because she wanted to keep on living her romance with Matthew Clairmont. Diana is unlikeable and so his her vampire husband.

It was also so very disappointing to see characters such as Gerbert and Domenico being turned into ridiculous characters for cheap laughs. Are you really telling me that a thousand year old vampire would allow his hostage to keep her phone and would simply let her go when she kindly asks him if she can leave the castle because she is bored? Are you really telling me that a Venetian vampire would be scared of a witch? Venice was very interested in witches especially when it came to alchemy (cf Venice Pure City by Peter Ackroyd a history/non-fiction book). Of course, there were superstitions in Venice regarding magic much like in any other city but not to the same extent. But no, let's turn one vampire into an idiot and another one into a scaredy cat. Don't get me wrong, my political opinion and personal beliefs are the opposite of Gerbert's and Domenico's but everybody loves a compelling villain in a story and Deborah Harkness did both Gerbert and Domenico dirty. (I wouldn't even call Domenico a villain but more of an antagonist to Matthew. He is just doing his own thing and looking after his own interest, that's all.)

To conclude, unlike Diana's abilities to weave spells and tie knots, Deborah Harkness had difficulties tying her main plot and subplots together which resulted in me not being able to have a real sense of closure at the end of book 3. The All Souls trilogy wasn't an interesting or enjoyable read.

The reasons why I consider Matthew being a villain:

1) During the Crusades, Matthew picked a human to help his family with business and other things. This man was Benjamin Fuchs. However, he turned out to be backstabber snake. So Philippe asked Matthew to deal with him. Now, Matthew being a vampire and Benjamin being human, Matthew had several options open to him a) he could kill Benjamin b) he could torture and kill Benjamin c)he could turn Benjamin into a vampire and torture for eternity... But no, Matthew decided to transform Benjamin into a vampire (Matthew thinks that vampirism is a curse) wishing Benjamin to be afflicted with blood-rage and then casting out Benjamin from the de Clermont family leaving Benjamin as a newborn vampire alone in a city full of humans afflicted with blood-rage. Matthew thought Benjamin would die. What could possibly go wrong with this plan?
This as you can imagine had terrible consequences because guess what?
2) Benjamin didn't die and he left in his path destruction and death. Of course, Diana met him in the 16th century but she didn't know who he was (she didn't know he was Matthew's son). But when Benjamin met Diana, he realised that she was pregnant with Matthew's children and what do you think he did? Well, Benjamin basically decided to abduct witches and find out how a witch could become pregnant with a vampire child therefore he not only abducted witches but he also raped them and tortured them. He perpetuated these horrors for centuries. And who is responsible for all these deaths and violence: Matthew. Benjamin is obviously deranged and is responsible for the atrocities he committed but Matthew shaped him into the monster he became.
3) If Philippe de Clermont died during WWII, it's because of Benjamin and therefore, by not killing Benjamin as his father had told him during the Crusades, Matthew is responsible for his father's death.
4) Matthew killed many of Marcus's children (Marcus is Matthew's vampire son) because they were afflicted with blood-rage. He did that under the orders of his father. Nice (sarcasm)
5) Guess who doesn't end up dead though? Jack, the vampire who has been terrorising humans in England. I mean, of course Jack wasn't going to get killed. Diana and Matthew adopted him when they travelled to 1590 in the second book and so they are convinced he can change though he has worked on and off for Benjamin throughout centuries. Double standards much!
6) Matthew goes to New Orleans to apologise to a vampire named Ransom (one of Marcus's only remaining children) for killing his children. One would expect him to be in a delicate position. But no. Matthew just needs to list the names of the people he killed and to say sorry and everything is forgotten and well. Wow, Matthew Clairmont sure never suffers the consequences of all the horrendous things he has done in his life.

Honestly, with all of these and with what were given to us in the previous books I am baffled that Matthew is the protagonist's love interest.

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