I (on my rating system) gave the City of Last Chances 3.5 stars

The synopsis really pulled me into this book. I am someone who enjoys world building and I think that was well done in this novel. Additionally, I enjoyed the writing, too, as it was quite easy to read and Tchaikovsky's prose are quite stunning. My issue is unfortunately no knock to A.T., rather, I just am not a fan of multi-pov stories. I am someone who enjoys first person POV from 1 or occasially 2 characters? I felt that at times I was just reading a little quicker to get back to the POV's I enjoyed & because of that didn't let certain hints or plot details sit with me long enough. I have not read many portal fantasies but I found this to be what I was assume is a standard "portal" style plot?

Overall, if you find the synopsis intriguing, you enjoy Multi-POV's, and want to read some great (annotation worthy) writing, I would say to give this a go!

***3.0 Stars***

Overall,
In general I really enjoy Adrian Tchaikovsky as an author and I really enjoyed his Children of Time series. I wanted to love this book, however it missed the mark for me. As someone who loves meaty deep lore fantasy and science fiction, I thoroughly enjoy diving into a new world and meeting a host of characters. Where I think this book falls through is that while it has a whole host of characters and a interesting world, the fact that its a standalone hurts it. I found that there were so many character perspectives that it was difficult to invest fully in any of them. I think if this was given a bit more room to breathe and was perhaps a duology or even a trilogy, where we spent just a bit more time with the characters I may have cared more. As it is there were several parts where I was truly struggling to continue. All in all I think there will definitely be people who love this book, and it wont stop me from reading more from this author.

***I received an ARC of this book from Netgalley and HeadOfZeus, in exchange for my free and honest review. Thank you for the opportunity to read this book early #CityOfLastChances #NetGalley ***

Since getting back into sci-fi and fantasy a few years ago, Adrian Tchaikovsky has been one of my favorite discoveries. I’ve loved nearly everything I’ve read of his—including my favorite novellas of both this year and last year, plus the terrific Children of Time that seems the most popular entry point into his work—and his output is so high that there’s never a risk of running out of things to read. And so when I saw that he was diving back into fantasy with City of Last Chances, it was easy to put in an ARC request.

City of Last Chances takes place in the city of Ilmar, a secondary-world fantasy locale with a couple uncanny elements that go beyond run-of-the-mill magic: the Reproach that captures the minds of most who dare enter, and the Anchorwood that bends the rules of space to connect to far-distant outposts, but with great cost to those not sufficiently warded. But there’s much more than strange magic stirring up trouble in Ilmar—Palleseen occupiers are working to stamp out local religion and culture in their endless pursuit of perfection, and the occupation has made for strange bedfellows among traditionally unfriendly neighbors, with natives and foreigners, workers and nobles, thieves and academics finding themselves thrown together under the Palleseen thumb. City of Last Chances provides point-of-view characters from each of those groups, along with a few from the occupiers themselves, as it places the tiles for a revolutionary mosaic.

Usually, I find that having too many perspectives too quickly can make it hard to immerse in a new story, but despite having double-digit POV characters before returning to anyone previously introduced, there’s something about the writing style that makes it work. It’s written with a sort of detachment that tells the reader about the characters as pieces of an overall story, rather than really putting the reader into the minds of the characters—we see everyone’s motivations, but we’re not swept away by them, rather invited to consider each as from above. This makes for a less disorienting introduction, and the skill in storytelling makes it easy to keep reading to see what shape the mosaic will take.

And while all the pieces are there for an epic, City of Last Chances doesn’t progress the way you’d expect from a traditional epic fantasy. There is no main character, no hero destined to pull the bickering factions together and overcome the evil. Rather, there are a lot of groups working at cross-purposes for self-interested reasons. Those disparate goals and actions still lead inexorably to uprising, but there’s nothing neat about their path, and there’s certainly nothing neat about the resolution.

A clear strength of City of Last Chances is shining an unflattering light on all the pieces of rebellion that can’t quite manage to work together, but the main weakness is the other side of the same coin: being above it all makes it hard to be emotionally invested in it all. Reading City of Last Chances made me think back on all the previous Tchaikovsky works I’d read, and the way he so often makes the detached writing style work for him. It perfectly captured the ennui of a battered veteran of the time wars or the hollow depression of an anthropologist with an emotion-blocking device, it delivered the clinical tone needed to describe the evolution of a race of spiders, and here it allowed readers to navigate myriad factions without being overwhelmed. But though he’s made it work in so many contexts, there are some tasks for which it’s just not the right tool, and that became clear in the final chapters of City of Last Chances. It’s simply hard to invest in so many self-interested characters. And the few who are devout—the priest of a dying religion, a starry-eyed revolutionary undergraduate—invite pity more than empathy; the poor foolish souls just don’t have the foresight to disentangle themselves from hopeless causes. It’s a cynicism that’s apt for 90% of the novel, but feeling it through 100% just takes so much sting out of the climax.

Make no mistake—this is still an excellent novel. Readers who enjoy Tchaikovsky’s style and don’t mind a proliferation of POVs are bound to enjoy it. The prose is engaging and the social commentary is often perfectly on point. And the failure to bring everything together for an emotionally satisfying finish is as much feature as it is bug. While a few may play at it, there are no heroes in this book, and we should expect no heroism. In the cold light of day, the occupiers are morally bankrupt, and the resistance is too. That’s the story, and it’s well-told and interesting from start to finish—good enough that I’ve flirted with a five-star rating even without the emotional impact I’d have liked. But for all its praiseworthy elements, there’s just not quite enough soul to move it into the pantheon of favorites. I appreciated it, and I enjoyed it, but for all its many strengths, it didn’t fully capture my heart.

Recommended if you like: messy revolutions, mosaic novels.

Overall rating: 16 of Tar Vol’s 20. Four stars on Goodreads.

Thank you Head of Zeus and NetGalley for the arc of City of Last Chances by Adrian Tchaikovsky in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.

For years I have been determined to but, never quite got round to reading any of Adrian Tchaikovsky’s books. I own a few but, they have languished on my TBR as I remained daunted by the reputation and my impression of him as an author. City of Last Chances is not your traditional fantasy, there is no beginning, middle or end. There is just Ilmar, a city on the precipice, teetering in the balance of domination or revolution.

This is not a story driven by a protagonist as traditionally known, Ilmar is the protagonist. Tchaikovsky makes Ilmar animate. A city where all that is magical, industrial, mysterious, tragic but, oh so alive, swirl together to create a heaving, political, maelstrom that pulses with life.

Dominated by The Sway, the people of Ilmar see the erasure of their culture, their rights, their magic and their lives, day by day, as The Sway endeavour to achieve the perfection of order that is their life blood. e chafing under their rule as their culture is erased. As students have always done throughout history, the students of Gownhall dream of revolution, workers long for the rights that bring freedom, people long for escape from the tyranny of logical perfection and the people of The Wood..they long for something…but, only they know what that is.

Ilmar is a pot ready to boil, conflict is bubbling below the surface forcing revolution to the boil as the desire to to break free of The Sway’s colonialism and forced destruction of Ilmar’s culture, history, religions, language, rights and even music.

The characters in this book are a whole population, each chapter focusing anew or suddenly returning to a character, in what at first glance appears to be without order or purpose but, thus us part of the journey as their stories flow and meld, bringing to life the passion, colour and magic that is Ilmar.

This book is one that can be read again and again, and there will still be new strands, nuances and meaning to be gleaned from it. This book is a total onion of an historical fantasy Revolution take; it has a multitude of layers, depth, scope and a bite that will bring tears to your eyes.

4.5 stars that I will probably up to 5 on my next read!

Wow. This book took me by surprise. It's hard to write a review on it without spoilers. It was hard to get into at first, the writing style is different to any of Adrian Tchaikovsky's other novels (and I think I've read them all!) He really is a master of so many different styles and genres.

There's no real plot that I can describe other than a city occupied by an invading force, filled with rebel factions, and small events that paint a bigger picture of a city about to explode into madness. The city sits next to a portal to other worlds, and has collected a variety of inhabitants who we will follow, from very different backgrounds with very different motivations. There's mystery, magic, so much lore. Even though we don't leave the city, the tidbits we get about the greater world around us are alluring and create a vivid, tantalizing glimpse of what else is out there. The characters are all unique individuals with riveting personalities and stories, none of them are heroes, but they're all going to have an impact, one way or another. You just have to read it really!

I'm incredibly upset that this is currently written as a standalone. This is a world that I need to explore. I need to know what happens to these characters, I want to follow their journeys, I want to visit their homelands. Please write more in this world! Definitely a 5 star read for me.

There are not many books that will require me to have a second read to get a handle on that I would recommend without first doing that second read. But in Tchaikovsky's case, he has more than deserved day-and-date purchase from me. In that regard, I highly recommend City of Last Chances to anyone who is picking up fantasy for the first time.

For all its chaos of a multitude of characters and ever-changing viewpoints (better described in other reviews), Tchaikovsky has written a book about a world that only exists on exploitation: whether that is the citizens of Ilmar in their personal and business affairs, in Palleseen toward its neighbours and its own politics, or between a dying god and his only priest. You may expect a story with a clear sense of beginning, middle, and end and you will find some kind of that in here.

But this is a book that is taking a snapshot in time of a fantasy world with a very real sense that things often don't but can get better. Tchaikovsky is a brilliant writer, and he is a voracious writer, and for that I understand how this can be a - very - slow book; but if a portrait is a thousand words, this is a thousand portraits in a thousand words.

City of Last Chances is an ensemble lead portrait of a city teetering towards revolution while under occupation by the rule-obsessed Palleseens. Ilmar is a city of magic- backed up against the Anchorwood which, beyond its monster filled mists, contains gateways to other worlds- but also one of harsh reality. Labor tension is on the rise, the academics seem more interested in discussion and action, while the ousted aristocrats hunger for more power. All the while, the hand of Palleseen control grows only stronger. But then- a high stakes betting game goes wrong, a treasure is stolen, and a high ranking Palleeseen official is dead.
It’s just a small, strange occurrence but is it enough? Will revolution finally begin?

I really enjoyed this book. It has a sprawling cast but each chapter links back to the one behind in, despite following a different character, in a way that kept me from getting lost. There were so many excellent characters but my favorites were Lemya, a passionate student who becomes disillusioned by the realities of resistance but never looses her fervor, and Ruslov, a thug who falls in love with a poet and strikes an uncomfortable bargain with an inflexible god.

The book is far more about atmosphere and character than action- although there are some nice bits of it sprinkled along. It reminded me a good deal of Les Miserables, the book not the musical, but in a good way. While nothing in this rivals Hugo’s sewer tangent, the story takes it time in a similar way and has thematic echoes especially in how the story of the student revolutionaries unfolds.

I would recommend- I very much enjoyed it- but with the caveat that I think you need to be someone who enjoys a bit of dense, character-and-world driven fantasy.

DNF @ 50%

By all metrics, this book should have worked for me. Tchaikovsky takes an interesting and experimental storytelling approach to The City of Last Chances, passing a baton between character POVs as they become the moving force in Ilmar’s imminent uprising against an oppressive colonizing regime. The characters themselves, on paper at least, are extremely well fleshed out for how little screentime each has, with distinct voices, fascinating backstories, and running the gamut of morality. And finally, the worldbuilding in Ilmar is impeccable. There’s so much to bite into in this story, and not just through the Ilmari history, but the various factions, neighboring lands, opposing authority groups are so well developed I could easily see people reading this book two or three times just to pick up the details missed on the previous readthrough. The technical aspect to Tchaikovsky’s writing is impeccable, in a way I rarely see. However, despite all these factors there was just something that wasn’t clicking for me and I can’t figure out exactly what. The City of Last Chances is definitely a slow book, and it takes about 30-40% to really start grabbing you. It’s also one of those books that dumps you in the middle of the action and says, figure it out, which is something I usually love. I’ll probably give this one another shot later when I have more time to just sit down and read.

A portrait of a city under occupation starts with Yasnic, the sole remaining priest of a frail god. The Pallaseen occupiers have no belief in gods, although they accept the previous state religion as long as it doesn't speak against them. But all the little sects that used to exist have slowly disappeared. Ilmar is a city that was always a little unworldly since it borders the Wood which is a gateway to other worlds. The plot of the book starts with one of the occupiers, Sage-Archivist Ochelby, entering the Wood with his entourage to reach new worlds where the Pallaseen might spread. But the safe conduct that he was carrying has been stolen and he and his companions are killed with only one survivor who flees to a forbidden area of the city. Is this the catalyst that will cause the people of Ilmar to rise up. Will the students, workers, criminal underclass and former aristocracy be able to find enough in common to overthrow the Pallaseen?

This is the first book by Adrian Tchaikovsky that I have read, I have known the name for some years as an author worth checking out, and I′m very pleased this is the book I started with. The story is one that is often a fantasy setting and the characters are the archetypes you might expect to see, but at the same time I found the characters vivid and full of nuance. The book for me was like a many-petalled flower opening, one chapter unfolding to lead on to the next character and chapter. There were characters with only a brief appearance who made an impact, and some background ones like Hellgram who had come through the Wood from another world and was forever searching for his wife, who step into the spotlight in later chapters. And at the end we come back to the gentle, generous Yasnic who has been changed by events and at the same time become even more himself.

The book is standalone and I think a good read for all fantasy lovers.

Thank you to Head of Zeus and NetGalley for providing me an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

City of Last Chances was like anything I'd read previously and, to be completely honest, I felt a little out of my depth at first. This is a book that requires your unadulterated attention. From the beginning, you are thrown into an intricate political and religious ideology. I was constantly going back and forth between the story and the glossary in order to comprehended the many factions of the city and government as we jump between perspectives. However, once I established a foundation of understanding, I was completely submerged in this simply epic fantasy novel.

The city of Ilmar is home to a plethora of lost souls; wanderers, thieves, refugees, scholars and factory workers all of which cower under the rule of a seedy criminal underworld and Palleseen Occupation, a brutal regime imposed by a merciless government that demands order and 'perfection'. The city is on the brink of rebellion and with each character we are introduced to a new spark ignites.

Tchaikovsky creates an immersive world containing so many oddities and details that I simply can't do them justice within this review. The City of Last Chances features a corrupt system of enslaved demons, portals into other worlds fiercely guarded by ferocious monsters, forbidden magical artifacts and disgruntled forgotten God's and their disillusioned priests. It was a wonderful, immersive and, at times, slightly confusing read.

My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Head of Zeus for an advanced copy of this new fantasy novel about the city on the edge of both forever and revolution.

When people think of the genre of fantasy some unfamiliar with the genre will immediately assume something like Lord of the Rings, with elves, dwarves and dragons vying for thrones or jewelry. Not many can look beyond the curtain and see the richness of plots and the different ways that fantasy can include religion, myth, occult thinking, politics even revolution and a science fiction, reflecting the world around it and trying to make sense out of what doesn't make any sense at all. City of Last Chances by Adrian Tchaikovsky is one of these kind of fantasy novels, a story that encompasses many worlds and many ideas.

A few years before, as we begin the novel the City of Ilmar has been conquered by the Palleseen, who believe in order and perfection in themselves and others. A perfection that is slowly pushing the population of the city closer and closer to rebellion. Ilmar has never been known for it's peace and many of the people are spending more energy fighting each other than the Palleseen, including criminal, religious and magical groups. The City is also near an are called the Anchorwood, which acts as a bridge to other places, with its own protectors and own dangers lurking inside, adding different sets of wanders and lost people to the city, for good and ill. Slowly events are starting to move to inevitable conclusion. A God wakes up cold and asks his only remaining priest for a blanket. A higher up is killed in the Anchorwood, as a game is played nearby calling in the powerful from all over.

I could go on, but there is a lot going on and my description is not doing service to everything that happens in just the first three chapters. Honestly other writers would make a10 volume series, and probably die about the fourth book in. Each page has ideas, magic, politically thoughts and the reality of living in an oppressive society, be it a fantasy world or the real world. Tchaikovsky is not afraid to throw his readers into the deepest end of the pool, whirlpool might be a better description, and saying here we go follow along. This is a book that will take careful reading and constant flipping to the dramatis personae and factions in Ilmar page just to follow along. Though by the fifth chapter things do start connecting. The writing is deep, lots of descriptions of the world, not a lot of explanation. The constant changes in narrative point of view might not be helpful either. However things do become clearer, and each character is written differently than the others which helps.

Tchaikovsky has real skill in putting this all together, and his built a good rapport with readers who will give this book a chance. I enjoyed it and while it took me longer to read than I thought I really enjoyed the book and where the story took me. Recommended for fans of Adrian Tchaikovsky of course, and for readers who love big books that will envelope them and make readers think, wonder and enjoy. A very good book for the holidays, both to read and to gift.

I didn’t finish this book — I got a quarter of the way through, over a month-long period, before giving up — so take this review with the fact that it could have gotten better later on.

I found this a hard book to get into, mostly because I didn’t find any appeal in the characters and the plot wasn’t interesting enough to provide the motivation to continue reading about characters I didn’t care about. The main reason for this is that the novel contains so many character perspectives, so you can be reading one chapter and almost get to the point of emotional investment, only for the chapter to end and you’re swung to another character’s POV. Additionally, while I’m used to having to put a little more effort into understanding worldbuilding for fantasy and science fiction novels, because I wasn’t enticed by the characters or the plot, having to jump back and forth between the story and the included t: dictionary is incredibly frustrating and pulled me out of the story more often than anything in the content pulled me in.

All in all, I found this book disappointed. I thought it needed more editing with punctuation use, and I couldn’t believe the fact that the author had won a writing award when I came across a scene where eyes were referred to as “orbs” — I thought we left this to bad fanfiction?

This is excellent fantasy with expansive character and world building. It took me a few chapters to settle in to what was happening and to start to get a grip of the many characters introduced at the beginning of the book. But from that point on I was drawn deep into the story. Thank you to Head of Zeus and NetGalley for the ARC. The views expressed are all mine, freely given.

A standalone full of complexity, interest, and political machinations, this book is absolutely fantastic. It begins very, very confusingly - Tchaikovksy has no mercy at all for the reader. You are dropped into the world with no background and no explanation, bouncing from perspective to perspective. However, once you wrap your mind around the dynamics and world, it is more than worth fighting through.

The narration style was a bit jarring, but once I was accustomed to the style it was easier to follow. Each chapter is lead with a paragraph giving you background, which was enormously helpful. The characters are well developed in a very short time, which is beyond impressive.

Revolution, indoctrination, and oppression are themes that weave throughout this tale. It is extremely thought-provoking, so prepare to take your time. But if you do, it will be worth it.

City of Last Chances, by Adrian Tchaikovsky, is one of those novels that I completely admired all the way through but had a hard time connecting to many of the characters, so that while the reading experience was enjoyable, it was more an intellectual pleasure than an immersive, emotional one.

The novel is set in the titular city of Ilmar, suffering under the heavy boot of an occupation force left over from the city’s conquest three years earlier by the Palleseen, a people who seek “perfection” in themselves and others via “correct principles of law and thought.” While the city seems stable on the surface, it seethes with anger, resentment, greed, and ambition as various factions have their own view of what resistance looks like and who should lead any eventual rebellion should one occur, as well as who should benefit from it. These factions are not new-born from the conquest, but are long-standing opposed forces in the city: the criminal underworld, who have found little difference in the scorn with which they are treated by the overthrown duke and his aristocracy or the victorious Palleseen; the Armigers, the old families more concerned with a return to power rather than a return to independence; and the Siblingries, the factory workers who toil for the conquerors as they did for the upper classes before and feel oppressed by both. In the mix are the idealistic students of Gownhall University; the Allorwen, a downtrodden and mistrusted group of refugees from a land conquered earlier by the Palleseen; and most mysterious of all, the Indwellers, the enigmatic people who control the ways in and out of the Anchorwood, an ancient grove that acts as a portal through to other worlds for those who can pay the price of safe transport.

Soon into the novel, someone steals an important artifact, and the theft acts as a catalyst, throwing a match into the gasoline-soaked kindling of the city and sparking an outburst of violence that surprises everyone. The protagonists in this complex stew include, but aren’t limited to:
• Blackmane: An Allorwen conjurer and pawnbroker of ancient and sometimes magical items
• Yasnic: Last priest of his particular god, whom only he can see
• Langrice: owner/barkeep of the Anchorage, the tavern with some sort of connection to the Anchorwood
• Hellgram: the bouncer at the Anchorage, a magic-user, and a foreigner come via the Anchorwood accidentally
• Lemya: a student of Gownhall and idealistic patriot
• Maestro Ivarn Ostravar: a teacher at Gownhall
• Father Orvechin: leader of the Siblingries
• Aullaime: Allorwen conjurer who works for the Siblingries
• Carella and Evene (the “Bitter Sisters”): the powerful pair of criminal overlords
• Ruslav: enforcer for the Bitter Sisters
• Fleance: a thief

As you can see from that only partial list, we’re working with a lot of characters here. And rarely are more than two or three together at a time, which means a number of sub-plots peppering the over-arching dual narrative of the search for the stolen item and the possible rebellion against the Palleseen.

The world Tchaikovsky presents is absolutely fascinating. Despite its tight focus geographically, because the characters come from different regions, cultures, and even worlds/dimensions, the novel offers up a rich stew of highly original elements: different types of magic, belief systems, governing systems, along with other basic magical tropes such as portals and curses, etc. We get tantalizing glimpses of all these without a lot of info dumps or an unnecessary amount of detail, and while I don’t mind exhaustive world-building, there’s something to be said for this method as well, which offers up a bit of mystery to nicely complement the fantastical.

Those different cultures and beliefs also create a good foundation for the tension that underlies the whole novel beyond the obviously occupiers-occupied conflict as the various factions battle for power and long-standing mistrust of “the other” (of which there are many) rises up again and again. The “underdog uprising” always lies on the horizon of promise, but the way in which everyone has their own agenda here — as groups and/or as individuals — constantly interferes with any attempt at serious revolution, as well as allowing room for thoughtful exploration of serious topics such as labor-owner conflict, the refugee experience, fascism, colonialism, the desperation of poverty, and more.

Besides these overt prejudices, the resistance also has its blind spots. One of my favorite moments is when we learn that the laborers, whom we’ve been conditioned to root for, are themselves oppressors, as what runs their mills are magically enslaved demons. And so we get sharply moving passages like this:

Not that there wasn’t a part of him that wouldn’t have shaken that demon’s taloned hand like a brother, but that would have been a step too far. And so he watched the beast being enslaved to them ills again and knew that even as he fought every day for a better life for his people, he was a collaborator in a larger war. And he hated it.

Nor does Tchaikovsky shirk his villains, the Palleseen, in terms of complexity, as we see factions and competition amongst the occupiers as well — people jockeying for position, people trying to move up in the ranks or having differing views toward the “taboo” local customs.

The plot is complicated but not overly so, and takes some unexpected twists and turns even beyond the way you’re never sure what someone will do thanks to the aforementioned tensions and ambitions. It does move slowly, especially during the first half or so of the novel, partially because so many characters need to be introduced, and the structure — multiple points of view moving serially one to the other — slows pace a bit as well thanks to the sheer number. I confess at times I felt I was making little forward progress, though I never considered giving up. Finally for the positives, the prose is sharp and vivid and a good match for the fertile creativity of the plot and world-building.

My single issue with City of Last Chances was, as noted in the intro above, my inability to really connect with the characters beyond one or two. Don’t get me wrong; they were all interesting. Rich, complex, well-characterized. But something — possibly the number of them, possibly the structure which had me shifting from one to the other, maybe their own often guarded nature — created a sense of distance. The exception for me was Yasnic, who won me over pretty immediately and for whom I had a soft spot all the way through to the end.

How well one engages with characters is of course a classic YMMV element, so my inability to do so is more an observation than a criticism, and, since as I said above, I both enjoyed and admired City of Last Chances, it’s an easy book to recommend.

Epic fantasy with amazing world building. Couldn’t ask for better. Thank you for letting me read your work. Loved it.

The worldbuilding in this is some of the best I have ever seen. It is beautiful, thoughtfully written. Every character that is introduced is fully rounded out; we learn their whole history and motivations. You will have empathy for *everyone* that is getting a POV chapter. The flip side of this, the story moves slowly. You are in this for the beauty, not the action.

I couldn’t get into this, unfortunately . So I DNF. Thank you to the publisher for the opportunity to read and review this ARC,

Thank you NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to read this book early! This book was pure fun and I would recommend it to anyone looking to fill the void that the completion of the Mistborn books have left. You can argue that the main character of this book is Ilmar, a city on the brink of revolution. Magic running wild, a brutal government, and primordial forces encroaching creates an utterly claustrophobic read in all the best ways. The synopsis of this book is purposely vague and its effect is the reader being surprised at every turn and never quite knowing who is going to survive the story to come. Absolutely fantastic new fantasy.

Having read a fair few books by Adrian Tchaikovsky, I think this is my favourite.
The story is tight and well written as ever and the format of the story limiting everything into just one city is a marked change from the author's usual ambition and favour for the expansive nature and it just works brilliantly.

The characters are as vibrant and dazzling as always, holding and moving the story backwards and forwards with precision. The story itself is not anything new, but just told with such style and panache. For me, the inclusion of a little bit of horror and supernatural characters to the plot was great to read and very well done, as I could just feel the unsettling element and it added an additional layer of depth and intrigue to the story.

This is a stand alone book, not part of a trilogy, but substantial and engaging enough to love and treasure. One of the author's very best.