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cultureulterior's review against another edition
2.0
Anachronistic worldbuilding and language which is completely unsuitable for the setting
vinayvasan's review against another edition
4.0
I have been a WW2 buff for a long time and when you combine the settings of WW2 with something straight out of X-Men, you definitely have a winning hand as far as I am concerned. The Milkweed Triptych by Ian Tregillis was the last good one I had read in this genre. A fab series but also one was that remarkably gloomy and dire. In that regards, At the Table of Wolves brings back elements of yore infusing a grain of dash and gallantry to the proceedings and notably makes it a better book. Combined with the fact that it has a female lead allows it to bring other elements of spycraft than the traditional male-centric ones
Kim Tavistock, our lead with powers of her own, uncovers a conspiracy as well as a dashing charming Germany spy. With the powers that be refusing to believe in fancy stories of people with powers or the fact that they can be used on something large scale as the invasion of Britain, it falls on her to take steps. She isnt a professional but what she has is oodles of grit, a clever brain and the ability to adapt to the situation. Not knowing whom to trust, including her dad, Kim is often forced into a corner but makes her own stand. While it is set up as a series, the book functions well as a one-off as well and is quite an engaging read
Kim Tavistock, our lead with powers of her own, uncovers a conspiracy as well as a dashing charming Germany spy. With the powers that be refusing to believe in fancy stories of people with powers or the fact that they can be used on something large scale as the invasion of Britain, it falls on her to take steps. She isnt a professional but what she has is oodles of grit, a clever brain and the ability to adapt to the situation. Not knowing whom to trust, including her dad, Kim is often forced into a corner but makes her own stand. While it is set up as a series, the book functions well as a one-off as well and is quite an engaging read
jaironside's review against another edition
5.0
I think I must have been exactly in the target audience for this one because it just hit all the right beats for me. Set in an alternate pre WWII Britain, At the Table of Wolves follows young journalist, Kim Tavistock as she negotiates the shadowy world of British Intelligence. Yorkshire born, Philadelphia raised Kim, is still recovering from a personal loss which happened while she was a child during WWI. This has sharpened her sense of moral obligation and loyalty to her country, as well as her hatred of the growing Nazi regime in parts of Europe. So what makes this alternate history? Well, in this world, certain people are born with 'talents' - mental abilities which give them an edge over ordinary people. Kim is possessed of a talent called 'the spill' - which in essence means that whatever someone most wishes to hide or keep secret, will be the very thing they confess to her. Other talents include the ability to move objects telekinetically, future view and trauma view, as well as various others. This slight deviation in normal human progression has very subtly altered a few tiny pieces of history. (So this could be classified as urban fantasy- alternate history)
Where some of the luke warm or negative reviews are coming from is, I think, because this is not your typical X-Men style of powered individuals. We're not talking superhumans here. The talents are subtle, and while they are essential to the plot, there's comparatively little in the way of massive, psychic powered explosion or action sequences. So if you're looking for that, or for the more typical strains of urban fantasy with supernatural humans, then this isn't going to deliver. Personally, I found the pre-war setting, the historical detail and the subtle supernatural angle to fit really well with what is essentially a spy thriller. Minor point here, I know we've all seen at least one James Bond film and as fun as they are, let's be honest, real spy work is 90% puzzle solving to 5% frustrated boredom to 5% actual action. This is far more of the George Smiley order of spies than anything created by Ian Fleming. Which really worked for me but if you're a fan of frenetic pace and not having to do too much thinking, this might not hit the spot for you!
I loved the characters. They were all well developed. No one was entirely a white hat or a black hat, and everyone had motivations for what they did. This was especially apparent with Herr von Ritter, who was a very enjoyable antagonist and more than a little chilling. I also loved the way Kenyon captured the feel of the time both in the upper and lower classes. No one really likes to admit it, but until Germany invaded Poland, Britain contained a lot of people sympathetic to the Nazi cause. (Thank the gods Edward was forced to abdicate!) This is a great book. Deftly woven, subtle and exciting. It makes you wait for the action but the tension is spot on and when it finally does give you an action scene, it really delivers. Intelligent work by an author who really knows whats she's doing and understand what she's writing about. Highly recommend.
Where some of the luke warm or negative reviews are coming from is, I think, because this is not your typical X-Men style of powered individuals. We're not talking superhumans here. The talents are subtle, and while they are essential to the plot, there's comparatively little in the way of massive, psychic powered explosion or action sequences. So if you're looking for that, or for the more typical strains of urban fantasy with supernatural humans, then this isn't going to deliver. Personally, I found the pre-war setting, the historical detail and the subtle supernatural angle to fit really well with what is essentially a spy thriller. Minor point here, I know we've all seen at least one James Bond film and as fun as they are, let's be honest, real spy work is 90% puzzle solving to 5% frustrated boredom to 5% actual action. This is far more of the George Smiley order of spies than anything created by Ian Fleming. Which really worked for me but if you're a fan of frenetic pace and not having to do too much thinking, this might not hit the spot for you!
I loved the characters. They were all well developed. No one was entirely a white hat or a black hat, and everyone had motivations for what they did. This was especially apparent with Herr von Ritter, who was a very enjoyable antagonist and more than a little chilling. I also loved the way Kenyon captured the feel of the time both in the upper and lower classes. No one really likes to admit it, but until Germany invaded Poland, Britain contained a lot of people sympathetic to the Nazi cause. (Thank the gods Edward was forced to abdicate!) This is a great book. Deftly woven, subtle and exciting. It makes you wait for the action but the tension is spot on and when it finally does give you an action scene, it really delivers. Intelligent work by an author who really knows whats she's doing and understand what she's writing about. Highly recommend.
ninjamuse's review against another edition
2.0
In brief: In an alternate 1930s Britain, Kim Tavistock has the spill, the ability to draw secrets out of people, which she’s anxious to hide. Then she’s asked to get close to a suspected spy to uncover a Nazi mole and suddenly she’s holding more secrets than she can safely handle. First in a series.
Thoughts: I didn’t go into this expecting a spy thriller, but I probably should have. (I’d heard “superpowers” and “World War II” and “fans of Agent Carter and Captain America” and imagined a full-on superheroic battle.*) I liked it though, once my expectations adjusted. Didn’t love, because it could’ve been a bit more thrilling, but definitely liked.
Oh, it’s well-paced and well-written, with interesting characters and tensions and a good spread of espionage set pieces, but it also feels very much like a British drawing room drama. It’s an interesting angle to take a story like this, and proof that you can write a spy novel without constant action and by prioritizing female experiences, but … again, not what I was expecting. I wasn’t expecting multiple POVs either, but they helped keep the tension up, so that’s all right.
I did like Kim, who’s just clever enough to pull things off but naïve enough to get into trouble, and I liked how her subplots ended up meshing at the end. (I always like books that pull that off.) The subplot with Rose, her family’s developmentally delayed maid, is especially sweet and important, and everything between Kim and her father is … intriguing, let’s say. It’ll be interesting seeing how that, and Kim herself, develops as the series continues.
I also found the superpower-related world-building pretty neat, though a bit surface. They come from a unique event, they’re still new enough to the world to be mysterious, they’re not the usual slate of powers, and they’re not all solely good or solely evil, though Kenyon doesn’t shy from pointing out the darker and more disturbing sides all the same.
All the same, nothing really struck me enough about this to make it stand out or get me to rush out in a few months when the sequel drops. I suspect this is more a me problem more than a book problem, and there’s a decent chance I’ll pick the sequel up at some point, when I’m in the mood.
* Which is probably coming at some point in the series, mind you.
Warnings: Nazis, it almost goes without saying. Specifically, Nazi and similarly conservative views of homosexuality and mental disability, including slurs for the latter. One gay character, killed partway through for plot. Slight redemption of main Nazi character.
6.5/10
Thoughts: I didn’t go into this expecting a spy thriller, but I probably should have. (I’d heard “superpowers” and “World War II” and “fans of Agent Carter and Captain America” and imagined a full-on superheroic battle.*) I liked it though, once my expectations adjusted. Didn’t love, because it could’ve been a bit more thrilling, but definitely liked.
Oh, it’s well-paced and well-written, with interesting characters and tensions and a good spread of espionage set pieces, but it also feels very much like a British drawing room drama. It’s an interesting angle to take a story like this, and proof that you can write a spy novel without constant action and by prioritizing female experiences, but … again, not what I was expecting. I wasn’t expecting multiple POVs either, but they helped keep the tension up, so that’s all right.
I did like Kim, who’s just clever enough to pull things off but naïve enough to get into trouble, and I liked how her subplots ended up meshing at the end. (I always like books that pull that off.) The subplot with Rose, her family’s developmentally delayed maid, is especially sweet and important, and everything between Kim and her father is … intriguing, let’s say. It’ll be interesting seeing how that, and Kim herself, develops as the series continues.
I also found the superpower-related world-building pretty neat, though a bit surface. They come from a unique event, they’re still new enough to the world to be mysterious, they’re not the usual slate of powers, and they’re not all solely good or solely evil, though Kenyon doesn’t shy from pointing out the darker and more disturbing sides all the same.
All the same, nothing really struck me enough about this to make it stand out or get me to rush out in a few months when the sequel drops. I suspect this is more a me problem more than a book problem, and there’s a decent chance I’ll pick the sequel up at some point, when I’m in the mood.
* Which is probably coming at some point in the series, mind you.
Warnings: Nazis, it almost goes without saying. Specifically, Nazi and similarly conservative views of homosexuality and mental disability, including slurs for the latter. One gay character, killed partway through for plot. Slight redemption of main Nazi character.
6.5/10
kamreadsandrecs's review against another edition
3.0
The worldbuilding and the characterisation also have their own issues. The concept behind the emergence of Talents, in particular, gives me pause. The idea is that the bloom occurred because World War I was so violent and traumatic that it basically forced an emergence of Talents in an entire generation of people. The logic here is that if an event is sufficiently violent, tragic, and traumatic enough, it can cause Talents to come out in people who were involved in it. Which now raises an interesting question: why are Talents only discussed after World War I? If all that is needed is a violent, traumatic event, then surely many people ought to have Talents already. Should not colonised countries like the Central American countries, India, and many others across the world be teeming with Talented people, given how violent colonisation efforts were in those places? What about the American Civil War? Surely that was tragic and violent enough to cause the necessary trauma needed for the emergence of Talents, so why doesn’t Kim, who lived in the United States for a while, make mention of any Talented people there? This strikes me as a rather large hole in the worldbuilding, one that needs to be filled in as quickly as possible – preferably in the next book of the series.
Unfortunately, the above situation means that the novel is not able to explore themes like colonialism and racism. While tackling Nazism is all well and good, especially in today’s cultural and political climate, the world could have been given so much more depth – and a much stronger thematic scaffolding – if the worldbuilding had been more carefully constructed.
Full review here: https://wp.me/p21txV-Gh
geriatricgretch's review against another edition
2.0
I finished this book because the story was suspenseful so I wanted to know how it would end, but I was screaming at the characters and their inconsistencies the entire time. Like, on page x, it would be stated that the main character never forgot anything, then on page x+1, she'd forgotten something. And at one point it's important that she always wears one kind of watch given to her by her mother but at at least one point she's wearing an Elgin (which I only noticed because Chicagoland what up), so like...why?
It just also was not a satisfying spy novel unless you like novice spies who make so many mistakes that they're only still alive at the end due to the weird, out of character, and unexplained benevolence of the enemy (spoilers? But it's a series so...). I'll admit I've been reading Mick Herron lately and reminiscing about John Le Carre, so the spy bar is pretty high and I know this is someone kind of bumbling into spy life but my god, this main character should have been dead on like page 50 and the British government's secret operations were compromised so many times that if the series ends with them winning WWII I'd be shocked.
The cringe level of non-resolution of the father-daughter relationship was also painful to sit through, if important (I guess?) for plot and story accuracy.
It just also was not a satisfying spy novel unless you like novice spies who make so many mistakes that they're only still alive at the end due to the weird, out of character, and unexplained benevolence of the enemy (spoilers? But it's a series so...). I'll admit I've been reading Mick Herron lately and reminiscing about John Le Carre, so the spy bar is pretty high and I know this is someone kind of bumbling into spy life but my god, this main character should have been dead on like page 50 and the British government's secret operations were compromised so many times that if the series ends with them winning WWII I'd be shocked.
The cringe level of non-resolution of the father-daughter relationship was also painful to sit through, if important (I guess?) for plot and story accuracy.
juliusmoose's review against another edition
2.0
I found this book pretty boring, and I finally gave up about 150 pages from the end and skipped to the last 30 pages.
The book has a pretty good premise: it’s set in the ’30s and trauma from the Great War unleased psi talents in the population. The Nazis have taken over in Germany and are maybe considering invading England. There are Nazi sympathizers at home. The plot seemed like it should be good: spying on Nazis! dastardly plans! psi talents!
And yet this book managed to be boring. I just didn’t really care what happened to any of the people. And there were two groups of spies trying to foil the Nazis and each thought the other was working with the Nazis and maybe that’s realistic and probably that was supposed to increase the drama/tension but I just found it really annoying.
Also it kind of bothers me that the Great War seems to be the first mass trauma event to unleash these latent psi powers. Like, there were a lot of traumatic events before it: the American genocide of the Native Americans. Slavery. The british colonization of India. The Belgian Congo! Like, the author could have tied this in with the racism of the time and had people be like, of course the lower races showed these power, but now they’re appearing in white people! Or it could have been like, something something chlorine gas is necessary to activate these powers but once they’re activated they can spread, so like Joe who was at the front gets the powers but then he goes home to heal and his kid sister gets them and one of the nursing sisters, etc.
Anyway this book seemed like it should have been good but actually it was pretty boring, the end.
The book has a pretty good premise: it’s set in the ’30s and trauma from the Great War unleased psi talents in the population. The Nazis have taken over in Germany and are maybe considering invading England. There are Nazi sympathizers at home. The plot seemed like it should be good: spying on Nazis! dastardly plans! psi talents!
And yet this book managed to be boring. I just didn’t really care what happened to any of the people. And there were two groups of spies trying to foil the Nazis and each thought the other was working with the Nazis and maybe that’s realistic and probably that was supposed to increase the drama/tension but I just found it really annoying.
Also it kind of bothers me that the Great War seems to be the first mass trauma event to unleash these latent psi powers. Like, there were a lot of traumatic events before it: the American genocide of the Native Americans. Slavery. The british colonization of India. The Belgian Congo! Like, the author could have tied this in with the racism of the time and had people be like, of course the lower races showed these power, but now they’re appearing in white people! Or it could have been like, something something chlorine gas is necessary to activate these powers but once they’re activated they can spread, so like Joe who was at the front gets the powers but then he goes home to heal and his kid sister gets them and one of the nursing sisters, etc.
Anyway this book seemed like it should have been good but actually it was pretty boring, the end.
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