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A review by kblincoln
Rings of Anubis by E. Catherine Tobler

4.0

Are you more plot oriented or character oriented? The reason I ask is that if you are plot-oriented, this Steampunkery/Egyptian mythology adventure might frustrate you a little.

As it did me.

But I am, in the end, willing to hang on to multiple-different-time flashbacks that add backstory and somewhat hazy plotting paragraph to paragraph (a couple times a chapter I had to go back and re-read the preceeding paragraph to remember what was going on or why someone answered a question that was asked like three paragraphs back) because Folley and Mallory are multi-layered creations of angst.

They both have pasts that cause complications with family members. I can't say much about Folley's problems without massive spoilers that are more fun to discover along with Folley, but suffice it to say it involves disappointing her father and yearning after a disappeared mother.

And Mallory is contending both with hiding a major part of his nature at the same time as dealing with the death of a wife who possibly was keeping secrets of her own.

meanwhile, they're both on the trail of some Egyptian rings and a mysterious mummy called 'The lady'. There are airships. And sometimes they crash. And there's a vineyard with oddly believable vinaculture being done.

And there's a pivotal scene near the end of the book when things get quite action-packed, time jumpy and Egyptian-mystical where Mallory suddenly acts like a complete jerk-wad just to force Folley to accept a part of herself that I did not care for.

But I would probably buy the second one on Amazon if its less than $2.99 to find out what happens. Folley and Mallory separately pack an emotional-arc punch, although their "together" relationship didn't ring many bells for me.