A review by lizardskin
Skinner Luce by Patricia Ward

5.0

This book ranks among the best books I've read this year. I'm honestly surprised that I haven't seen mention of it anywhere--this should have been nominated for awards, something. I first came across this book around the time it came out, on the shelf of a bookstore, and was immediately drawn in by the amazing cover art. The writing is beautiful, visceral, and gripping. The combination of the otherwordly and the setting of contemporary Boston/New England is perfectly executed--normally I'm resistant to contemporary settings, for no particularly good reason, but in this book it doesn't feel jarring or forced. It also manages to deal with the topic of slavery/servitude in a way that doesn't feel heavy-handed or like it's trying to impart some great message. Instead, it highlights the misery of an experience that is completely dehumanizing and utterly inescapable, but which the characters fight to survive nonetheless.

The only thing that bugged me a little is

that I would have liked just a little more information about what really is going on with the Nafikh, and why the service system is the way it is. Especially with everyone needing to have jobs in the human world--like, the Nafikh designed this whole system, couldn't they make servs that didn't run the risk of attracting human attention? Why are they even allowed to buy themselves out anyways, with human money? Also, couldn't the sentries just destroy the gates and cut the Nafikh off? I assume the Nafikh built the gates, and could fix them from the other side. But also, why do the sentries/servs even care whether or not humans get hurt, or find out about them, since the Nafikh are obviously powerful enough to deal with the fallout. Even though they haven't invaded earth and just use it as a weird vacation spot, there's no reason to assume they couldn't deal with humanity if it tried to fight them off. Anyways, I don't need an explanation of how everything works, but I feel like there needed to be just a little bit more in the way of hints or suggestions to explain why the system stays the way it is.

Anyways, this book is great, I highly recommend it.