Queen of Nowhere, by Jaine Fenn
Book Review by SJ Higbee
This is the fifth book in this excellent series -- read my review of Principles of Angels here. So would it continue to be as gripping as the previous offerings?
The Sidhe look like us. They live amongst us. They have fearsome mental abilities and considerable physical resources at their disposal. And their biggest advantage? No one believes they exist. Almost no one. Bez is fighting a secret war against them. Always one step ahead, never lingering in one place, she's determined to bring them down. But she can't expose the Hidden Empire alone and when her only ally fails her she must accept help from an unexpected quarter. Just one misstep, one incorrect assumption, and her Sidhe trap -- her life's work -- could end in disaster. Worse, if Bez fails then humanity will be lost to the manipulative and deadly Sidhe...
As is apparent from the back cover blurb, this book veers away from the regular protagonists we have been following to date. Instead, solitary data-hacker genius Bez takes centre stage. I really enjoyed her spiky, paranoid personality as she tries to stay one step ahead from the authorities while fighting the Hidden Empire. Fenn pitches us right into the middle of the action from the beginning of the book, with the tension pinging off the page. Bez is not remotely cosy or particularly approachable and to make me care so much for her so quickly is a harder trick to pull off than Fenn makes it look.
That said, if you haven't yet had the pleasure of reading the Hidden Empire series, then don't be afraid to jump aboard. While there is a considerable backstory, and you would clearly benefit from reading the other four excellent books, Fenn's writing is too slick and accomplished to leave her readers flailing around in confusion.
I also enjoyed the fact that despite the epic nature of the story, which spans a number of worlds light years apart, Fenn manages to mostly keep the focus trained on a small handful of characters, thus raising the stakes for the reader. And the stakes are high, because like a growing number of speculative fiction authors, Fenn isn't afraid to kill off major characters. I stayed up reading far later than I'd intended to discover what happened next. And yes, there are some big surprises along the way -- and not all of them are happy ones. Did I see the finale coming? No. And I'm really looking forward to seeing where this interesting series is going to go next -- because, being Fenn, this could go anywhere|
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