Alex

Beautiful writing that perfectly captures Circe's duality of straddling the worlds of gods and mortals.

In the early chapters, where Circe's life is filled with the unknowable whims and indescribable wonders of Olympians, Titans, nymphs and monsters, so much of her narration is deeply abstract and metaphorical. As if to say that only poetry and high prose could come close to conveying that world to mortal minds.

Then, after Circe's exile gives way to a wide-ranging retelling of The Odyssey and The Telegony from Circe's point of view, the narration slows - where pages once covered centuries, eventually we slowly cover years, then seasons, then days - and becomes more plain, less abstract, more dialogue heavy. But, that doesn't mean there aren't plenty of fantastic turns of phrase, even here.

It makes sense for Circe's story to stretch into the Telegony and reach for the stories of Telegonus and Telemachus, but, as with the controversy of the Telgony itself, it does represent a pity at the same time that it not only robs Odysseus of his “happy ending”, but robs Circe of loving a man who deserved it. Her relationship with Telemachus never feels as rich, deep or earned, but by the end, he turns out to be the only truly good man she ever met. Sadly, the story does not really interrogate this fact.

But then, it is told from Circe's point of view, and Circe is never shy of acknowledging her own failures and flaws. So perhaps to her own mind, the Telegony's Odysseus is all the better match for the woman who birthed Scylla out of spite anyway.

A life-changing book that holds the mysterious power to completely rewire your brain and how it will process language, wit and humour for the entire rest of your existence.

A truly brutal book told in three distinct parts, from three distinct point of views - none of which belong to the titular and central ‘vegetarian' who the story is technically about. In fact, she's treated horribly throughout by each of the protagonists as barely more than a thing; an accelerant for their own declines.

In reality, though, the story is all at once a deconstruction of (particularly Korean/patriarchal) culture, depression, suicide, mental illness and most common, and perhaps damning, of all - the myriad ways in which we fuck each other up in ill-fitting, toxic relationships that should end considerably sooner than they inevitably do...

In some ways, it's a repeated anti-love story. In others it's an uncomfortable gaze into the depths of depression. Consistently, though, it delivers gut-punch after gut-punch if you've ever lived through any version of the topics covered within - even if they are heightened to extremes.

(More of a 3.5, really).

For a 700-odd page book, probably the most surprisingly strong element of Wings and Ruin is the pacing. Almost the entire first half is dedicated to a slow, tense build-up towards inevitable war, punctuated with the immediate fallout of the events of the previous book's climax, and various fanbaiting twists of the knife in vengeance towards a ‘ship' now firmly sunk.

And then, almost impossibly as if by surprise, all hell finally breaks loose. Cinematic style action dominates the next several hundred pages, and it's all as exciting, daring, tense and dramatic as you could ask for.

That none of it ever really feels either rushed or unhurried is a solid credit to Maas.

Unfortunately, for a story based in the brutality of all-out warfare, it severely lacks teeth or consequence. A deus ex machina too far, a convenient save of a main character just in too many times. The ending falls flat on its face and undoes too much of what the rest of the book did right.

The actual writing is no better or worse than the previous books, although I might go genuinely insane if I have to consider the thought of one more “vulgar gesture”. It's perfunctory. It'll get you from point A to point B in the story and largely won't get in the way or need you to decipher or interpret any lost meaning. It's fine.

The writing, the story, the characters, the mechanics of everything from basic letter-writing to the fundamentals of the multiverse, are all deliberately opaque, obtuse and often difficult to parse and follow. Which, in some ways is as much a positive as it is a negative, but it does make it a challenging read.

But, look beyond the sci-fi window dressings - with it's Douglas Adams heavy inspirations - and this is as classic a love story as it gets. Romeo and Juliet across all of time and space.

The story unfolds primarily through letters written by the two protagonists at the leading edge - and on either side - of a Time War that, even to them, seems to have no real meaning or intended end beyond war itself. Steadily the two develop an unrequited love from their existing rivalry and mutual respect. As they do, the story quickly develops from being one that's almost entirely exclusionary to the reader - filled with concepts, names and forms that are referenced but never explained - to one almost everyone can relate to in some fashion.

Once the story has its hooks in you, it's impossible to put down, though it does take a while to get there. But, the non-linear, timey-wimey nature of the story's core also encourages repeat reading, and I think it honestly would be even better as whole the second or even third time through.