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Reading: Living With Ghosts
Jun. 17th, 2016 06:32 pmI bought Kari Sperring's Living With Ghosts in January; as I recall, Amazon recommended it to me while I was buying something by Ellen Kushner because I'd read a post where she cited Lymond as an influence on her, and as it sounded interesting and I'd read a couple of Sperring's LJ posts which made made me inclined to like her and want to support her work I bought it as well.
Living With Ghosts is historical fantasy, set in a city with a seventeenth or eighteenth century feel and a strong French influence, although with a rather different gender balance to the actual seventeenth century (not only is there a queen, but her chief councillors are women, and we also meet a prominent female merchant, among others, while the aristocratic men are mostly playboys) and a much more relaxed attitude to same-sex relationships. There's swashbuckling and duels, ghosts and magic, seduction and intrigue and politics. I liked Sperring's characters a lot, particularly Thiercelin and Gracielis, and Amalie the sensible merchant. I enjoyed the story, too, though I felt the plot got a little confused occasionally (of course, that may just have been me being exhausted) and the resolution seemed very sudden and, actually, rather simple after a long complicated buildup. Also, this may not have been the right week to read about rain and the disintegration of a society. Generally, though, I'd say I liked this a lot.
Living With Ghosts is historical fantasy, set in a city with a seventeenth or eighteenth century feel and a strong French influence, although with a rather different gender balance to the actual seventeenth century (not only is there a queen, but her chief councillors are women, and we also meet a prominent female merchant, among others, while the aristocratic men are mostly playboys) and a much more relaxed attitude to same-sex relationships. There's swashbuckling and duels, ghosts and magic, seduction and intrigue and politics. I liked Sperring's characters a lot, particularly Thiercelin and Gracielis, and Amalie the sensible merchant. I enjoyed the story, too, though I felt the plot got a little confused occasionally (of course, that may just have been me being exhausted) and the resolution seemed very sudden and, actually, rather simple after a long complicated buildup. Also, this may not have been the right week to read about rain and the disintegration of a society. Generally, though, I'd say I liked this a lot.
