Just when you thought it couldn’t get grimmer, Patty managed to pull it off.
So the City of Glass has shattered and icefire is spilling across the land chasing lots of surviving refugees as it burns and destroys everything in its path.
Then we throw our bunch of rather troubled protagonists from the 1st book into the refugees; have another bunch of them chasing some of them and causing lots of nasty along the way; throw a whole bunch more troubled protagonists into the country they’re heading to; stir up all the political nonsense that a time of crisis deserves and then hit the capital city with a huge bunch of the afore mentioned refugees coming via train and road — oh, and, nearly forgot, the refugees are contaminated with high levels of icefire, mostly injured, very hungry and needing shelter.
The one thing i like about this book is the pacing. Patty keeps everything concerning the refugees really moving along at a good pace until we get to the parts with the politicians. Suddenly, the pace slows and it feels like the story is trudging along. This is so like real life; whenever there’s a crisis you can guarantee the only people dragging their heels — forming committees to discuss things while people are actually dying — will be the politicians who are always more concerned with what they can get out of it for their political careers. Point well made, Patty.
It follows straight on from book one, Fire & Ice, without a pause for breath, and i’m very much diving straight into and devouring book 3, Blood & Tears, with only a little respite to write this review along the way.
So now, if you’ll excuse me, i’m off to read Blood & Tears.
