A review by ergative
The Ember Blade by Chris Wooding

3.0

This had a lot of the features that I enjoyed about the Tales of the Ketty Jay series: complex international politics (or at least, pieces put in place to allow for complexification of international politics as the series unfolds); lots of characters coming together as an enforced ragtag team of thorns-in-the-side of Power; backstories unfolding over time to uncover motivation and values across different types of people. And, of course, the easter-egg references to other bits of SFF tradition. We definitely had a Star Wars trash-compactor scene here. However, none of it quite scratches the same itch. A lot of the confrontations feel pretty samey: something always goes wrong and comes down to split-second last-minute rescues or escapes. Also, this is built around a magical macguffin and a Chosen One type narrative, and that, too, is a bit tired. Maybe Wooding will do something fresh with it as the series progresses, but so far it's played pretty straight. Finally, and perhaps more personally to me -- but also most prominently in my view -- the story does not revolve around a washed-up, approaching-middle-age failure, but instead a kid who has to do a coming-of-age. I'm pretty bored with coming-of-age stories, and, like the magical macguffin and the Chosen One, this is played pretty straight. 

I'll probably read the rest of the series. I remember that Wooding took a few books to really earn my allegiance with the Ketty Jay series. The first book in particular in that series felt very dude-heavy, with women being treated with awkward kid gloves by an author who was not quite comfortable writing them yet. That is absolutely not a problem in this book: there are many women, with varied skills and personalities and backstories. So it's clear that Wooding is aware of things that need work, and is able to fix them over the course of a series. I'll see if this one picks up too.