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A review by sashas_books
City of Blades by Robert Jackson Bennett
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
5.0
What an unexpected sequel this is, unexpected in ways that turn out to be the right ones. City of Blades is darker, grittier, more cruel, more tragic, more personal than the first book. There are many deaths. There is a lot of heartbreak. It made me feel so much, so deeply.
Our main POV character this time is Mulaghesh. Tough, snarky, stubborn. She has PTSD after the Battle of Bulikov in the first book. She is so damaged, yet unbroken.
“You do what you feel is right not because it is satisfying, but because you find any other option to be intolerable.”
Mulaghesh has mysterious events to investigate and goes to Voortyashtan, a forbidding place that has worshiped war, death, grief, and destruction for hundreds of years. As the mystery unfolds and the stakes climb higher and higher (of course they do), we see the unfolding of Mulaghesh’s backstory, which is horrific.
I loved seeing Sigrud again. The dark spaces this book occupies needed things such as
“How the hells did you get in here?”
“I picked the lock?”
“I have booze hidden all over the place. Dead drop training has its uses beyond espionage.”
Sigrud’s character arc goes to a horrible place, too, though.
War is another main character. The idea of war as something perpetual, something inevitable, something progressive, something glorious (Mulaghesh comes to reject this so wholeheartedly.) War crimes that make everyone into a victim, both the victims and the perpetrators – this is hard for me to stomach, even as I acknowledge that it’s true.
“But a soldier, a true soldier, I think, does not take. A soldier gives.”
“Gives what?”
“Anything,” says Mulaghesh. “Everything, if asked of us. We’re servants, as I said. … A good soldier does everything they can so they do not have to kill.”
“Killing echoes inside you. It never goes away. Maybe some who have killed don’t know that they’ve lost something, but they have.”
Robert Jackson Bennett has put me through a grinder, he has taken me on a roller-coaster ride of darkness, adventure, tragedy, and badass action (go, Mulaghesh). The ending was riveting.
Our main POV character this time is Mulaghesh. Tough, snarky, stubborn. She has PTSD after the Battle of Bulikov in the first book. She is so damaged, yet unbroken.
“You do what you feel is right not because it is satisfying, but because you find any other option to be intolerable.”
Mulaghesh has mysterious events to investigate and goes to Voortyashtan, a forbidding place that has worshiped war, death, grief, and destruction for hundreds of years. As the mystery unfolds and the stakes climb higher and higher (of course they do), we see the unfolding of Mulaghesh’s backstory, which is horrific.
I loved seeing Sigrud again. The dark spaces this book occupies needed things such as
“How the hells did you get in here?”
“I picked the lock?”
“I have booze hidden all over the place. Dead drop training has its uses beyond espionage.”
Sigrud’s character arc goes to a horrible place, too, though.
War is another main character. The idea of war as something perpetual, something inevitable, something progressive, something glorious (Mulaghesh comes to reject this so wholeheartedly.) War crimes that make everyone into a victim, both the victims and the perpetrators – this is hard for me to stomach, even as I acknowledge that it’s true.
“But a soldier, a true soldier, I think, does not take. A soldier gives.”
“Gives what?”
“Anything,” says Mulaghesh. “Everything, if asked of us. We’re servants, as I said. … A good soldier does everything they can so they do not have to kill.”
“Killing echoes inside you. It never goes away. Maybe some who have killed don’t know that they’ve lost something, but they have.”
Robert Jackson Bennett has put me through a grinder, he has taken me on a roller-coaster ride of darkness, adventure, tragedy, and badass action (go, Mulaghesh). The ending was riveting.