Reviews

Point of Hopes by Lisa A. Barnett, Melissa Scott

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accidentalspaceexplorer's review

adventurous mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

This was definitely interesting. I really like the unique world, and this first book has the bones of a story & series that'll fully grip me but it didn't quite feel like it was there yet.

aceofwands90's review

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dark mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

2.0

serru's review against another edition

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3.0

This book was actually more like a detective novel than a fantasy novel, and takes place in an alternate history medieval setting where most of the characters are middle-class citizens. Magic is a part of everyday life, mainly in the form of astrology, where the stars determine the lives of the people. There were no coming-of-age rites or epic quests to go on as per the usual fantasy fare; instead the plot revolves around Nicolas Rathe, who works a job equivalent to that of a policeman and investigates a mystery involving disappearing children. The story is utterly simple as all the scenes are basically just Rathe running around the city questioning people-- basically the unglamourous and often uninteresting work that make up what real-life detectives actually do, without any sort of real excitement or action. I wasn't interested in the mystery at all, which there were no real clues about all through the book and then was solved through a series of last-minute revelations. What ultimately kept me interested in the book was its superb world-building, which was detailed, intricate, and felt very real-- probably some of the best world-building I've ever encountered in any story-- and completely outshined everything else in the book.

hazelfizz's review against another edition

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3.0

Would I recommend this book to myself? Yes.

I love "daily-life in foreign times" mysteries (Davis's Falco for example). And I bought this as part of an "LGBT*" bundle. So, the odds were good I'd enjoy this book. And, while I did, there were a couple of disappointing things that give this one only 3 stars (the same as a perfectly serviceable bog-standard $.99 romance novel) instead of 4 (the same as "totally my genre, will read repeatedly").

Plus:
I learned or re-googled several antique words, so that was fun. No sexism, though the main character was male and the setting is Renaissance (clocks & guilds) Rome (pantheon). Same-sex relationships were fairly common and perfectly normal (in a late-20th century, no-marriage, way).

Minus:
First: the two main characters don't flirt at all. They hardly interact, so it's barely a buddy story either.
Second: two suns & some pigeon-like "gargoyles" (which aren't described in detail) point me toward sci-fi as a reader, not fantasy. But then for some reason the MacGuffin is magical, though magic isn't any part of the heavily described daily life. Lots of horoscopes makes the setting anthropologically thorough, but it was only about two-thirds through that I realized any part of that might be "real".

qalminator's review against another edition

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4.0

Enjoyable characters and story, with a few issues.

It could have been shortened some, as there was a lot of repetition, and places where it felt like there was an unnecessary amount of detail. This is an odd thing for me to complain about, as generally I enjoy extra world-details, but this was enough that even I thought it should have been cut down.

There was something at the end that bugged me as well.

Spoiler

Timenard reveals his orrery, knowing full well that any contamination will ruin it, and doesn't have any sort of protection on it? Really? So, I can believe that it had to be revealed to use it. I can't believe that Timenard was foolish enough not to have some means of protecting it, particularly in a world with working guns. All the scene really needed was a failed shot, due to a mystic barrier or some such, then the teams' magists finding away around it or to bring it down, and then the shot to destroy it. So I'm going to pretend that's what happened, as my suspension of disbelief can't deal with it as-written.

As an aside, I find it amusing to have read this right after Ninefox Gambit. Ninefox Gambit was trying to do something very similar to astrological magic, but justify it with some sort of mathematical spacetime manipulation. The astrological magic in Point of Hopes appears to work in much the same way, but it makes a lot more sense a magic than as SF.

lizshayne's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

This was a surprisingly slow building mystery novel...which is not usually what I've been trained to think I'm getting when two dudes with swords stand back to back on the cover.
It mostly worked for me and I think most of my problems were getting my brain back into a different generation of fantasy novels.
It's weird to think about style as a feature of contemporary (ish) books, but this book felt very 90s in a way that took a while for me to get back into.
Still fun, still gonna read the rest of them eventually.

emmascc's review against another edition

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5.0

Actual rating: 4.5 stars

Is there anything better than fantasy mysteries? This was an excellent read and I'm really looking forward to the rest of the series.