Reviews - The Tindalos Asset

The Tindalos Asset by Caitlín R. Kiernan

48 reviews for:

A retired agent is abruptly dragged back into active duty. A follower of Dagon is hard at work ending the world. There's a hound on the loose. All in a day's work for the Agents of Dreamland.

The Hounds of Tindalos are one of my favorite cosmic horror concept; creatures that get at you through aspects of the physical world that are difficult but not impossible to control. I wasn't sure what I'd think about a story where the hounds were an 'asset' so to speak, but I think this story made it work. There is plenty of build-up around the main threat and while there are timejumps like in the last part of this series, I found the ones in this story to be easier to see the point of, so to speak. An interesting read.

eegekay's review

3.25

dark tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

condor_pajo's review against another edition

4.5

dark mysterious

brandonadaniels's review

5.0

This is the third and possibly final book in the series. Like the previous two, the plot of the book is a bit less important than the vibe. It bounces around chronologically, and a few of the tales could work as standalone shorts. I lost the thread a little since the last book, but I still lived revisiting this world.

mamimitanaka's review

3.0

I liked this one but it overall confirmed my main issue with this series - too short! Kiernan builds up to so much and in the conclusion to this one everything just sort of...abruptly comes to a halt, with a lot of plot threads tied up as though the book's last stretch was written on a deadline. I've always liked Kiernan's books for the fact anyone can die at any time, the world they create feels properly dangerous and exciting, though that approach kind of didn't work for the ending here, when so many interesting threads and setpieces could have ended as they did just fine if only they had been expanded on further. Because those threads are really good, and the build up here is done very well This one is more of a popcorn book than the first two entries, and its timeline is essentially linear except for a few generally easy to parse chronological shifts, so this could be a reasonably good start to exploring Kiernan's aesthetic fixations. This book also contains a scene maybe in the top 3 of her hallucinatory cosmic horror moments, one that among pulp novels rivals Langan's in "The Fisherman". But I do really wish and hope this series could get at least one more entry - there's so many interesting things going on here, but so many of them explored marginally, which can be tantalizing and I understand is part of the point of Lovecraftian horror, but dammit, Kiernan is simply so good at it I want to see more of how this universe is built and how the characters within it operate! Thankfully, Kiernan's work as a whole is a treasure of modern dark fiction, so all of their works contribute to the greater mythos at play in one sense or other.