jethrien

Title: Poison Study
Author: Maria Snyder
Genre: Classic fantasy, only after the king gets overthrown in a military coup
Thingummies: 3.5

Synopsis: On her way to the hangman's noose, Yelena is diverted by the director of intelligence for her home country's military dictatorship. It seems that the Commander's food taster has succumbed to his job, and rules state that the next person scheduled to be executed be offered the position. Uncertain death seems better than certain death, so she accepts. But living in close proximity with a frighteningly compentent intelligence agent can be terribly uncomfortable when you have secrets of your own to hide.

Thoughts: By all rights, I really should have given this one a 3. It's a solid, well-paced, and enjoyable fantasy romp, but the writing is clumsy in a number of places (especially the exposition) and several of the big revelations are built way up only to fall flat. (Should I tell him? How about now? Now? No, I should never tell him! Now? "Hey, there's this thing..." "Oh, ok. Can we get back to the main purpose of our conversation now?" "Ok.")

But despite being somewhat disappointed, I still did really enjoy this book. Mostly because it hit a number of my own buttons with a mallet. (Hypercompetent and seemingly impassive intelligence director with a secret love of art? Yes, please. Timothy Zahn, I lay the blame for this one entirely at your doorstep.)

So. It's a little amateurish, but still quite enjoyable. Will I get the next one in the series? Undecided. They've set it up so the character I'm most interested in is unlikely to play too much of a big role in the next book. And some others I found intriguing are equally constrained or dead. But Yelena's not a bad companion. And while the world is not particularly original or revealed with great skill, it's an interesting place nonetheless. We'll see.