Review: Shadow in the Empire of Light

Shadow in the Empire of Light by Jane Routley
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

This book really wasn’t to my taste. Too many horrible people - even a paedophile. Really not what I want to be reading about.

I really liked the idea of Katti, Shine’s telepathic cat. I also enjoyed the Mooncats. I’d have liked to have seen a lot more of these two aspects.

There were too many different characters introduced too quickly for me to keep track of. Almost none of them had enough page time for me to get to know them. The vast majority of them were nasty, and only out for themselves, just wanting to spend their time drugged, drunk and having sex. Every single character seems to look down on “the peasants”, and even Shine, who does consider them to some extent, seems to see them mostly as a mass of nameless servants.

The plot itself seemed to take forever to get going, it wasn’t until three quarters of the way through that any progress was made. Unfortunately, the finding out what happened to Shine’s mother plotline was postponed until (I assume) the next book.

Shine did finally permit herself to leave at the end of the book, which redeemed it a little. But the constant misery and powerlessness of the only characters I cared about meant that I didn’t enjoy this book. However, if you prefer your magical worlds darker, you may enjoy this book.

I was given a free copy of this book, my opinions are my own.

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