With 11 ensemble characters (not counting the odd Greater Demon) to juggle, Clare uses up most of her chunky page count untangling the romantic snarls of the first two volumes-plus chucking in occasional attacks by lesser demons or raving maniac Tatiana Blackthorn to give her demon-slaying Edwardian-era Nephilim something to do besides steamily tonguing one another, lengthily weltering in secret longing and self-loathing, or (at last!) explicitly consummating their ardor.
YA)īelial, Prince of Hell, makes his move on London in this trilogy closer. The villains look like villains, the right people show up on cue and the frissons of love are just plain odd in this fast-paced, unabashedly over-the-top novel, but readers who want some revolution with their romance may be happy to suspend disbelief and enjoy the swashbuckling.
While rampant spies, gunplay, cross-dressing young male prostitutes, stolen kisses, angry mobs and even the gory public execution of Robespierre keep things spicy, Rees pauses to spell out, often rather stiffly, the political motivations of her characters, with relation to issues of class inequality in particular. The beautiful heroine, still under the guise of “Captain Blaze,” then embarks on a perilous journey to find her missing father and brother, whose allegedly seditious words have marked them as traitors to England’s king. When this fearless 17-year-old living in 1794 England finds out her fiancé cheated on her, she disguises herself as a rough-and-tumble highwayman and gallops off, determined to humiliate the “lecherous, double-dealing, false-hearted, despicable, craven little villain.” She does, too. It’s best not to mess with Sovay Middleton.
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