Corambis

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I don't know if it's the two years since the Mirador or if it's Corambis itself, but it wasn't quite the same. Some things felt far too easy; some of the parallelism felt recycled. :/

Just as Mirador had not nearly enough Prick, this one had far too little Mildmay. The third POV didn't fit in as well as Tabby did in the Mirador. (It's unkind to compare books, but less unkind to compare the fourth book in a series to the third.) ( )

Felix and Mildmay go steampunk! It was rather a relief to get them physically away from most of their more traumatic triggers, and Corambis was as well-thought-out, if not as overly-drawn, a society as Melusine ever was. As with The Mirador, the plot of Corambis is pretty fuzzy but I never quite found myself caring, and as with The Virtu, the action takes place so suddenly it may as well be offscreen, but I didn't mind that either. Corambis really brought together all the strengths of the series with much less of some of the less likeable elements (Felix was actually quite a sympathetic character here, finally, and we spent much less time rehashing childhood trauma.)

And also, for no particular reason I found the clipped, Elizebethan rebel accent the sexiest goddamn thing I've read in years. I never would have guessed listening to someone drop the subjects of their sentences would make me weak in the knees. ( )

The first three books in this series are the proper trilogy, wrapping up plot elements. This last novel, Corambis, has virtually no plot continuity with the earlier volumes, and instead is more of an epilogue, resolving certain character and relationship loose-ends, and building out the world a bit more. Nice in an epilogue sort of way. ( )

Melusine and the books following are The Doctrine of Labyrinth series, which refers to the labyrinths that play an important part of the magic in her universe as well as important roles in each of the four books in the series. For me, they really are one long book broken into four volumes.

In Melusine, the characters of Felix Harrowgate, a Cabaline wizard, and Mildmay the Fox, a cat burglar, were introduced. Felix was used by his evil mentor, Malkar, a blood wizard, to destroy the Virtu, the globe that channeled the magic powers and spells of the Mirador’s wizards, an act which drove Felix insame. It isn’t giving much away to say that Felix turns out to be the half-brother of Mildmay, a development that even I, an inexperienced fantasy reader, figured out early on.

Corambis, picking up soon after the events of The Mirador, is the story of Felix’s exile, with Mildmay, and the terrible magical engine that could destroy the nation of Corambis.

I can't recall when I last felt this sad to reach the end of a book because I knew turning that final page meant saying goodbye to characters I'd grown to love.

To do justice to these books without giving much away or without going into details that might spoil the joy of reading these books is darn near impossible. The characters are what makes this series.

Felix and Mildmay, both sold to thief keepers by their prostitute mother, grew up in Melusine’s Lower City, but the paths their lives took were very different. After being a thief, Felix ends up working in a brothel, where he’s found by Malkar and taught how to pass for an aristocrat, which led him to become a wizard of the Mirador.

Mildmay also began as a kept-thief at an early age, but by the time he was 14, had been trained as an assassin, finally breaking away from his keeper and earning a living as a cat burglar and cardsharp. Where Felix is arrogant and vain, the taciturn Mildmay is humble to a fault, living on the edge and old beyond his years. Where Felix is educated, Mildmay is barely able to read. Where Felix has magic, Mildmay has his fists and his tenacity. Their strengths and weaknesses are both complementary and cause for conflict, with each causing the other pain, both intended and not. Entwined in their adventures is the slow progress of their relationship over time as they learn to trust each other and their own feelings. Throw in various forms of magic and magic theory, and the books have a strong foundation.

Told in alternating first person povs, the narratives have distinct voices that will get into your head and stay with you a long time. Because I have a lot of books still waiting to be read, I’ll resist the urge to reread these now. But I doubt I’ll be able to hold out for long. ( )