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A review by timinbc
The Witness for the Dead by Katherine Addison
3.0
Well, gosh. This starts with what annoyed me about #1. In the first three pages we learn that:
* Ulis is the god; his prelates are Ulineise; The religion has an admin body called the Ulistheileian
* average joes in the church are othalas (women are othalos); dach'othala is an honorific for senior othalas; one of these holds the roile of Ulisothala of Amalo
* Celehar used to work in the Untheileneise Court (NOT the Unseelie Court!)
* Two recent emperors were Varenechibel and Edrehasivar
Later we learn that we learn that our hero had Veleradeise grandparents, and keeps a michelmeire in his apartment. Throughout the book, people live in a world much like ours except that they eat fsdyfghdgf and drink fsdetrfew (for example).
Celahar is the same minor character as in #1, but might as well not be. A very decent individual, which is in itself refreshing, and dealing with some limitations.
Then ... we have the murder of an opera singer, and after the intro we get dozens of pages of a 95%-bog-standard barely-fantasy murder investigation, where we meet a very predictable cast of suspects (OK, I liked Pel-Thenhior).
Addison must have realized that we were barely fantasy anymore, so we skip into a trip to deal with ghouls. That's better. Then there's a will-reading involving Celehar's skills; good.
Eventually the three plots come together, with only one unlikely coincidence required to make it work. I accept it, and pronounce this a worthwhile story after all.
* Ulis is the god; his prelates are Ulineise; The religion has an admin body called the Ulistheileian
* average joes in the church are othalas (women are othalos); dach'othala is an honorific for senior othalas; one of these holds the roile of Ulisothala of Amalo
* Celehar used to work in the Untheileneise Court (NOT the Unseelie Court!)
* Two recent emperors were Varenechibel and Edrehasivar
Later we learn that we learn that our hero had Veleradeise grandparents, and keeps a michelmeire in his apartment. Throughout the book, people live in a world much like ours except that they eat fsdyfghdgf and drink fsdetrfew (for example).
Celahar is the same minor character as in #1, but might as well not be. A very decent individual, which is in itself refreshing, and dealing with some limitations.
Then ... we have the murder of an opera singer, and after the intro we get dozens of pages of a 95%-bog-standard barely-fantasy murder investigation, where we meet a very predictable cast of suspects (OK, I liked Pel-Thenhior).
Addison must have realized that we were barely fantasy anymore, so we skip into a trip to deal with ghouls. That's better. Then there's a will-reading involving Celehar's skills; good.
Eventually the three plots come together, with only one unlikely coincidence required to make it work. I accept it, and pronounce this a worthwhile story after all.