Title: Shadow Kin
Author: M.J. Scott
Series: The Half-Light City, Book 1
Genre: Urban Fantasy
Release Date: 6 September 2011
On one side, the Night World, rules by the Blood Lords and the Beast Kind. On the other, the elusive Fae and the humans, protected by their steadfast mages...
Born a wraith, Lily is a shadow who slips between worlds. Brought up by a Blood Lord and raised to be his assassin, she is little more than a slave. But when Lily meets her match in target Simon DuCaine, the unlikely bond that develops between them threatens to disrupt an already stretched peace in a city on the verge of being torn apart…
First, this book is told in alternating first-person POV. There are, apparently, character-specific symbols that mark the beginning of each section, but I'll be honest and say that I never paid attention to these. Resulting in it taking me a couple of lines (or paragraphs sometimes) to get into who's voice it was.
I think that there's potential with this author, but unfortunately it just didn't hit the mark for me.
Lily, the main character, is a Wraith. A fae half-breed, with some special powers and has been turned into an assassin by the Lord of the Blood (think vampires), Lucius.
Simon, the other main POV character, is a sunmage. I have to admit that his powers seem pretty spectacular actually, but like Lily's they just came off as boring.
I think my biggest problem throughout the whole books was the lack of urgency about anything.
We're told that the wars between the Fae, Blood, Beasts (werewolves?), and Humans were so bad that they eventually had to make treaties, which are renegotiated every 3 years. So we're thrust into this quasi bad world, where no one is really fighting for anything.
The world building was...erratic at best. Was it medieval? Victorian? Victorian steampunkish? Modernish? I don't know. I stopped caring part way through.
Unfortunately, the characters didn't make up anything for me. Lily was the weakest assassin I've ever had the occasion to read. Not only was she completely under someone else's control (which wouldn't normally bother me so much), but she could barely make a decision to make a decision.
Simon came off as naive and petulant. And, even, at the end a complete and utter asshole - who didn't grovel nearly enough to gain the heroine's forgiveness, much less mine.
In the end, I may try something else by this author in the future, but I certainly won't be looking forward to it as much as I did this one.
Grade: D+
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