The Chronicles of Ixia // by Maria V. Snyder

1. Poison Study
   1. Assassin Study
2. Magic Study
3. Fire Study
   1. Power Study
4. Storm Glass
5. Sea Glass
6. Spy Glass
   1. Ice Study
7. Shadow Study
8. Night Study
   1. Shattered Glass
9. Dawn Study

I first read these books a few years ago and really enjoyed them, so I was pretty excited to use some Christmas money to purchase the whole series in paperback this past year.  With piles of books awaiting my attention, I probably shouldn’t have picked up Poison Study, but I just felt like it was what I wanted to read, and I did! And honestly, although this series is nine books long (plus short stories) and clocks in over 4000 pages altogether, I can’t really regret delving back into it, because these were exactly the books I was looking for.

One aside before I really get into this review – these books were originally published as three separate trilogies (Study, Glass, Soulfinder).  You could probably skip the Glass trilogy if you wanted to and still get what is happening overall, but the books really do build on each other. All of the short stories, except for Shattered Glass, are found on the author’s website for free and do add fun backgrounds to different things.  However, you basically have to read Ice Study, which genuinely should have been included at the beginning of Shadow Study – it’s really a prologue/introduction for that book with some fairly vital information in it.  ANYWAY

The first three books are narrated by Yelena, a young woman who is imprisoned, for murder, in the country of Ixia.  We gradually learn that several years ago the king/royal family of Ixia were deposed and assassinated and the country is now run by a man known as The Commander, who has a very strict code of conduct to which everyone must adhere.  There aren’t a lot of personal freedoms in Ixia – you need permission to do basically everything – but people have jobs and homes and aren’t being ruled by a despotic magician, so there’s that.  The Commander is particularly strict about magic – if you have it, you’re killed, end of story.  Magicians, according to the Commander, cannot be trusted ever.

Which makes relations with the neighboring country to the south, Sitia, a little exciting at times, since that country is ruled by a small group of Master Magicians and a council composed of one representative from each clan in the country.  Many people in Sitia have magic, and it’s used for all sorts of things.

The story begins with Yelena being taken from the dungeon to meet with the Commander’s right-hand man/assassin Valek.  There are a lot of stories about Valek, how he personally killed the king and his family, how Valek slaughters every magician born in Ixia, and how he knows all and sees all.  Valek offers Yelena a chance at life: she is next in line on death row, but if she wants she can instead take on the job as taste-tester for the Commander.  If she’s good at it she might live for a while longer.  Yelena takes the job, and that’s when things get interesting.

I really like these books because I really like Yelena.  She’s intelligent and determined, and rarely makes stupid decisions for the sake of making the story more dramatic.

Another things I was realizing when I was reading these books – there isn’t even a hint of the fantasy tropes that really get on my nerves, namely the whole “she wasn’t like the other girls because she was into fighting” especially combined with “she must overcome the patriarchy to earn even a smidge of respect!!!”  Instead, Snyder gives us a world where men and women are equals, without a lot of fuss.  Men and women do the same jobs, without a lot of fuss, in both Ixia and Sitia.  At one point in the series, a military officer in Ixia is demoted and punished because it’s discovered that he hasn’t been treating women equally.  But all of this is done without a lot of drama or fanfare.  I’ve always felt that stories about sexism being overcome in fantasy worlds are kind of dumb – if you’re making up a fantasy world, why don’t you just go ahead and make one up that looks like what you want??  And Snyder has done just that.  I can’t remember a single time in the story that Yelena (or the narrator of the Glass series, Opal) is told that she can’t do something because she’s a girl, and I just find that quite refreshing as I find plots about women overcoming the patriarchy to be SO. BORING.

The middle trilogy, the Glass books, are narrated by a different character, Opal.  Sadly, I don’t like Opal nearly as well as Yelena.  She tends to whine a lot.  She’s kind of rude and unfriendly, and complains a lot about not having friends without recognizing how unfriendly she is.  The Glass books are also longer than the others for some reason and it felt like they were never going to end.  Honestly, the  next time I read this series I’ll probably skip these three because Opal just isn’t worth my time.  A lot happens in those books that is kind of important to the overall plot, so I think they are worth reading once in the context of the series, but while the rest of the books all got 4 and 4.5 stars from me, Opals were 3* – just sort of there.  I also don’t really care for the way Opal’s love story unwinds, which is definitely part of my ambivalence towards those three books.

The final three books are non-stop action, and while I enjoyed them, it does get A Bit Much at times.  Snyder has a habit throughout the entire series of having people get kidnapped – I kind of wish I had started counting how many times it happened – it’s basically her favorite plot twist, and it happens a LOT in these three books as well.  Instead of a straight first-person narration like we had in the other books, the final three books also have some chapters of third-person narration from the perspectives of other characters.  Overall I liked it and it meant that the action was able to keep going because the reader could always be where something was happening, but it also meant that sometimes the story felt a little choppy, as we were constantly hopping back and forth between characters.  It wasn’t as big of a deal when there were only two or three threads, but sometimes there are more than that and I found myself almost forgetting what was happening five characters ago.

All in all, if you enjoy fantasy, I think you’ll find a lot to like about these books.  Yelena is such an engaging, resourceful character.  The world-building is done well and is completely absorbing.  While Snyder definitely relies a little too heavily on having people kidnapped to move her plot along, overall the stories move well.  I would totally read more books set in this universe – maybe ones about the next generation??

Like I said, this is my second time reading this series, so if you’re interested in my original thoughts, you can find them here.

The Eyes of Tamburah // by Maria V. Snyder

//published 2019//

A couple of years ago I went on a bit of  Maria V. Snyder kick, reading the nine books in the Chronicles of Ixia and loving ALL of it.  Snyder’s world and character building were both excellent, and I fell in love with everyone.  All that to say, I was pretty excited when I saw that Snyder was coming out with a new book this year, which is also going to be the start of a new series (Archives of the Invisible Sword).  And then I was pretty disappointed to find out that there were some complications with Snyder’s publisher, and The Eyes of Tamburah wasn’t going to be available in the US for an indeterminate amount of time!  So (and I’m telling you guys this entire story because I know you definitely care haha) I had to go a roundabout way.  Snyder has an independent bookstore in Pennsylvania with which she is connected (it’s the place to go if you want to buy autographed copies), and they purchased a bundle of her books from Australia to resell here – and as far as I know, it’s the only way to get it here in the US!  So since I preordered a copy, I even got to have it signed, which is cool.

Luckily, after all that effort, Eyes was totally worth it, as I enjoyed every word.

The main part of this book that was super fun was Snyder’s world-building.  Shyla, the main character, lives in a world that is entirely desert – humans live underground to avoid the deadly rays of the midday sun, and much of the world’s class divisions can be marked by how far down someone lives – the further into the ground you are (the higher numbers), the richer you have to be.  Shyla is definitely not one of the rich – she was abandoned and left to die as an infant, and was found and rescued by an order of monks who live outside of the city, in their own (underground) monastery.  When Shyla came of age, she decided to not take her vows and join the order (the term “monks” is used loosely in this book to describe both male and female members of the order, and the vow of chastity is not included in this religion – basically somewhat but not really at all like what we think of as Catholic monks haha), but instead has been making her own way in the city. But the reason that she was abandoned as a baby is because Shyla is “sun-kissed” – blonde, rather than dark-haired like virtually everyone else – so she is still somewhat of an outcast in the city, where she works, studying and interpreting maps for archeologists and treasure hunters.

But things get a little crazy for Shyla as the story opens – she has helped an archeologist, Banqui, find his way to an artifact known as the Eyes of Tamburah.  Banqui discovered them, only to have the stolen from him almost immediately.  Now the ruler of the city, the Water Prince, is convinced that Shyla knows something about their current location, and soon Shyla is caught up in a wild adventure, desperate to find the Eyes.

So, like I said, I totally enjoyed this book.  Shyla is very likable and a reasonable heroine – she was intelligent and clever without being obnoxious. She was a good fighter, but didn’t feel like a boy with a girl’s name. She was brave, but not foolhardy. She was focused on facts, but wasn’t emotionless.  Other characters were also interesting.  The world-building and the society are done very well.  But where the book somewhat fell down for me was the almost frantic pace, combined with a few too many groups of people.

Basically, Shyla is running around trying to find the Eyes, and multiple groups of people are trying to also find the Eyes as well as Shyla herself.  It started to get a bit confusing and convoluted, especially when various groups and individuals would suddenly betray Shyla, then a few chapters later they would explain how it wasn’t REALLY a betrayal, it just looked like one because of such-and-such reason, and then someone else would betray Shyla, and then it turns out it wasn’t REALLY a betrayal, and then the one group that fake-betrayed her earlier would do it again, and it got slightly repetitive and also basically put me into a position where I couldn’t really let myself like any of the other characters because I literally had no idea which people I was supposed to like/root for/hope would win.  It left me feeling off-kilter for the majority of the book, and at the end I still wasn’t completely convinced that the “good guys” were really the good guys.

Still, this didn’t put me off from enjoying the book anyway.  If you can just accept it as a total romp, it’s a good time – a sort of Indiana Jones or Jurassic Park kind of vibe, where everyone is running around and crazy things just keep happening.

I also had a good time reading an Australian book, if that makes sense. Things were measured metric instead of standard, and there were little turns of phrase that I enjoyed.  I realized recently that it actually really annoys me that publishers change English books depending on where the English book is being published – for instance, my British Harry Potter books are actually a lot different from the US versions, and that is super aggravating.  If a book is written in English, by someone who is British, and is set in Great Britain – I don’t want it to be “Americanized” in its terms, spelling, and punctuation.  I want it as the author wrote it – the whole thing is look into a slightly different culture, and I like it that way!  It isn’t completely applicable in this case, since the book is set in a fantasy world, but still.  I like seeing phrases and terms that are used in other English-speaking countries, especially if the book is set in a different English-speaking country!

Anyway, I got all rambly there, but the point is – The Eyes of Tamburah was a super fun read.  If you’ve read Snyder’s other books, I don’t think this one will disappoint you.  Snyder also did a great job wrapping up a lot of loose ends in this one, while still leaving plenty of things open, in a not-aggravating way, to lead into the next book – a book for which I will eagerly be watching.

Soulfinders Trilogy // by Maria V. Snyder

• Shadow Study
• Night Study
• Dawn Study

For those of you who haven’t been following along, I’ve been reading Snyder’s ‘Study’ books, except they really should all be included under the Chronicles of Ixia title without multiple trilogies confusing everything.  Reading the three trilogies not in order would be quite confusing, so I’m not sure why they are listed separately at all.  At any rate, the first three books (Study series) focused on Yelena and had her as a narrator throughout.  The next three books (Glass trilogy) focused on Opal and had her as a narrator.  These final three books return to Yelena as a main character, and while she narrates large sections of them, Synder also gives us third person views from multiple other characters.

//published 2015//

I really enjoyed the earlier books (although I found Opal’s story to be much weaker than Yelena’s), but was blown away by , how fantastic these last three books were.  They really came together for some fantastic storytelling.  With the world-building well established, Snyder was able to weave all kinds of threads together, and I was on the edge of my seat throughout.

//published 2016//

At first, I was a little leery of the multiple perspectives.  While I was excited to hear from some of the other characters, I was concerned that it would bog down the pace, and did a bit, especially in Shadow Study.  Snyder really wanted to give the readers a lot of background on Valek, and did so by having Valek sort of travel down memory lane, so it would be something like, “Valek sat in his office, sifting through papers.  But his mind kept drifting back to the day of his first mission…” And then it would launch into the story of his first mission, which was fine, except Snyder did not do a very good job of differentiating between flashback time and real time.  Instead of inserting a paragraph break, it would just sort of muddle back into the real-time story and was always a bit of a jolt.  Plus, we obviously couldn’t have Valek mentally meandering back in time when he’s in the middle of doing something exciting, so the Valek sections were slow on action and long on background.  It worked fine, and it was important to truly understand things that had happened to him in the past in order for the actions in the next two books to have their full impact.

//published 2017//

In the last two books, the action turned up to about level ten and never looked back.   There were some great twists and I enjoyed every page.  I couldn’t  believe that Snyder was able to wrap everything up in Dawn Study, but she did.  And I really, really appreciated the fact that she didn’t feel a need to kill off a bunch of people in the final book just to prove how hardcore her story is.  (I don’t mind characters dying when it forwards the story, but it aggravates me when they are killed just so the story has more ‘grit’.)

I don’t really know if these books are considered ‘adult’ fantasy or YA, but while Yelena (and Opal) start out as teens, time actually does pass in this series, and everyone gets older.  Yelena is in her 30’s by the end, and Valek talks about being ‘too old’ at 41 for this type of thing.  I quite liked adults doing adult things for once.

While my understanding is that Snyder says she isn’t going to write any more about Valek and Yelena, she seems to have left the door open for revisiting the world they live in.  Another trilogy focusing on the next generation would be incredibly fun stuff.

If you’re interested in reading these books, I definitely recommend getting on Snyder’s website and reading the short stories that she has posted for free there.  Honestly, it was kind of annoying because I felt like some of those stories included some pretty crucial information, and really should have been included as prologues or something instead of ‘optional’ reads.

Also, I apparently lucked out, because Dawn Study was just published this year, so no waiting for me!

Final ratings:  4/5 for the Soulfinder trilogy; 5/5 for Dawn Study in particular; 4/5 for the Chronicles of Ixia as a whole.

October Minireviews // Part 1

Well, here we are in the last week of October and not a single book review posted!  I’m going to try to catch up with some minireviews, but we will see what happens.  I’ve actually been reading some good books lately, but life has just been too busy to be conducive to review-writing!

A is for Arsenic: The Poisons of Agatha Christie by Kathryn Harkup

//published 2015//

This book was first brought to my attention by Cleopatra, and I was immediately attracted the combination of a nonfiction book on a rather random topic, and learning more about the science behind Agatha Christie’s murders.  This book did not disappoint.  It was informative and engaging, full of fascinating information without becoming too lecture-y.

The format of each chapter made each poison accessible.  Each starts with an incident of Christie using the poison in a story, followed by the history of the poison, a scientific explanation of how the poison actually kills someone, the antidote (if any!), famous real-life cases of the poison being used, and then tying back in to Christie’s use of the poison in her stories.  Throughout, I was consistently impressed with the overall accuracy of Christie’s use of poisons and descriptions of their symptoms.

Although reading this book made my husband nervous, Harkup is quite clear that (in most cases), science has advanced enough to make it difficult to get away with poisoning, although I was genuinely quite astonished at the fact that ricin, found in castor bean plants, is so very poisonous.  I’ve always heard the old saying that if you don’t like someone you can make them some castor-bean tea, but after reading this book it does seem that these plants should come with a more thorough warning, especially for families with small children who like to play in the garden!

Overall, this book was a surprisingly engaging read.  My only real complaint is that while Harkup did provide a interesting introduction, the book ended rather abruptly – a few closing comments would have been nice to sort of tie everything back together.  Still, with so much information presented in such an interesting manner, I really can’t complain too much.  Definitely recommended for people interested in bumping someone off or just learning more about the science behind Christie’s works.

Glass Trilogy by Maria V. Snyder

First off, I would have been quite annoyed if I had read these books in the order listed on Goodreads.  If you are interested in reading all of Snyder’s books set in Ixia/Sitia, read the three Poison Study books, then the Glass books, and then the Soulfinders books.  I’m in the middle of the second Soulfinder book, and think that I would have been rather confused if I hadn’t received all the background from both the Glass trilogy and also a short story available on Snyder’s website, that really should be included as a prologue to the first Soulfinder book, as it has a lot of critical information.

ANYWAY the Glass trilogy itself was really good, but the main character/narrator, Opal, was just not as likable to me as the main character/narrator of the Poison Study books (Yelena).  Opal always felt like she was three steps behind and more worried about herself than anything else.  But by far the worst part about the trilogy were the love triangles, yes, plural, because the players switched about between different books, and none of the options were good.

Overall, I would give these three books 3/5, maybe 3.5.  The stories weren’t bad, it was just that I found Opal so annoying and felt like she consistently made the wrong/selfish choice.  I also felt like the conclusion to the love triangles was kind of weird and made me uncomfortable – more in the next paragraph, so skip it if you are worried about spoilers!

SPOILER PARAGRAPH FOR REAL: Opal is kidnapped/tortured by a guy in the beginning, and in the end, that’s the one she ends up with!  He goes through this huge change of heart, etc., but Opal’s attraction to him began before the change and before she knew he had changed.  The way that it was presented made me very uncomfortable.  The whole thing was really weird.

Dot Journaling: How to Start and Keep the Planner, To-Do List, and Diary That’ll Actually Help You Get Your Life Together by Rachel Wilkerson Miller

//published 2017//

If you’re like me and like to have things explained to you (thoroughly), instead of that artsy ‘just follow your heart and do what looks right to you’ nonsense, this book may be for you.

I’ve been intrigued by the concept of Dot/Bullet Journaling, because I am way into lists and also into journaling and I also actually have started making notebook inserts and selling them on Etsy, and most people are using them for this type of thing. Miller does a really nice job of explaining the concept of dot journaling, and then laying out some basic guidelines and ideas. She does emphasize that the entire point of this method is its flexibility and convenience of being able to make it your own, but also gives actual real examples and ideas.

My only personal issue with this book is that a lot of times the pictures were the explanation, which was totally fine, except sometimes the pictures also crossed the middle of the book, which meant that important parts of the pictures were tucked down inside the binding and were not readable. This seemed like a really obvious flaw that could have been fixed before printing, as it occurred on multiple occasions. It does make the book look nice, having the pictures cross both sides of the book, but then maybe a different binding should have been chosen, as this really aggravated me.

Overall, though, this was a friendly and accessible book that made me feel like it is possible to use a dot journal without having to be a really creative and artsy person.

The Turtle of Oman by Naomi Shihab Nye

//published 2014//

This was my latest book from my Bethany Beach Box, which despite mostly 3/5 reads, I have been enjoying.  I actually really like children’s fiction, and it’s been interesting to see what books are considered worth promoting this way.  Turtle was another 3/5 read, honestly mostly because it was quite boring.  As an adult, it was rather obvious that Nye’s entire goal was to write a book that showed a Muslim family in a Muslim country in a positive light.  There is nothing wrong with that, but considering how people complain about books written in the 1950’s and how they’re “too sweet” and not at all “realistic”, it seems a little strange to turn around and praise a book that is basically sugar.

Aref and his parents are moving from Oman, a country in the Middle East, to Michigan, so that his parents can complete their doctorate degrees.  Aref isn’t happy about leaving, and most of the book are little adventures that he has with his grandpa as they visit all of their favorite places together.  I honestly ended the book feeling quite aggravated with Aref’s parents, who seemed to feel that their education and life was more important than Aref being close to his grandpa.

But what really  bogged this book down were the lists.  We’re told at the beginning that Aref and his family love learning new things, and then writing down what they have learned that day.  So throughout the book, whenever Nye wants her readers to learn something, we have to suffer through a list, in Aref’s handwriting, telling us about the habits of turtles or how awesome it is to live in Oman under the rule of a sultan, which really added to the boring factor in this tale.

I realize that I am not the target audience for this book, but even at the age of ten I don’t think that I would have enjoyed reading a bunch of lists.  All in all, this book came across as a book that practically screamed USE ME FOR A UNIT STUDY IN YOUR SECOND GRADE CLASSROOM, but in my mind didn’t have a lot to offer just simply as a story.

Study Series // by Maria V. Snyder

I’m not really sure where I first heard about the Study series, but Poison Study came across my radar at some point and has been languishing on the the TBR for eons.  I finally got around to requesting it from the library.  I like to get the first book from a series, and if I like it, then I request the rest.  I reserved the rest of the series about three chapters into Poison Study.

According to Goodreads, this is a series of six books, followed by the Glass series, and there are several short stories interspersed throughout.  Since I decided to read the shorts, I happened to actually be on Snyder’s website, where I found out that Goodreads really has the order wrong: Snyder wrote the first three Study books, then the three Glass books, and finally the three Soulfinder books, which, because they have the same main character as the Study series, have now been lumped in with those first three books, despite the fact that the Glass books fall in between, both in publishing order and chronologically within the series.

Since one of my few obsessions in life is reading all the books in a series in the order they were meant to be read, I was pretty tickled that I discovered this after finishing the third of the Study books, allowing me to jump right into the Glass trilogy on schedule, even though it did mean that I had to check them out as Kindle books instead of getting the hard copies like I prefer.

This is a lot of digression.  The point is – I am really enjoying these books.  And what this post is SUPPOSED to be about is the first three Study books:  Poison Study, Magic Study, and Fire Study.

//published 2007//

The trilogy focuses on Yelena, a young woman who, at the beginning of the tale, is in prison awaiting execution.  But she is presented with a choice: die as scheduled, or die… later.  In the meantime, if she chooses, she can become the Commander’s new food taster.  Yelena accepts the position, and soon is in training by the Commander’s second-in-command, Valek.

Snyder paces this book quite well, and does an excellent job with world-building.  I was completely drawn into the story, mostly because I actually really liked Yelena.  So often in YA, female protagonists (who are all the rage) are quite obnoxious.  I found Yelena to be refreshing.  She was intelligent and athletic, but not at the expense of being a girl.  Throughout Snyder’s world, women are in positions of power, and there is no real fuss made over it, which I really liked!  I’m quite tired of heavy-handed attempts to ‘rebel against the patriarchy’ within YA (especially fantasy), wherein authors create worlds in which women have no rights, and then spend the entire time complaining about.  I much, MUCH prefer this method, where a world has been created where women and men work equally, side by side, and individuals are chosen by whether they are best for the position, not whether they are male or female.  In the next two books, which take place mostly in the neighboring country where there is magic, there are multiple clans of people – but again, instead of creating a world with different races and lots of racism and then griping about it, Snyder has created a world with several clans of people (with different physical aspects, cultures, and skills) – who actually all work together and treat one another as equals.  Delightful!

//published 2007//

I also loved the complete absence of a love triangle!  Yelena falls in love in the first book, but is separated from her heart-mate (such a lovely term) in the second book.  Towards the beginning, she runs into this other guy, and I was super scared that he was going to become this other love interest, but in a refreshing twist, Yelena stays true to her original love and completely sees through the second guy’s act.  Fabulous.

//published 2008//

These books aren’t perfect.  At times they felt rushed and a bit chaotic, but overall I found the pacing to be good and the characters felt real and reasonable.  I’m kind of in love with Valek, and I’m sooo excited that Yelena and her brother start working together, because sibling teams are one of my favorite things.  I really liked watching Yelena grow, especially as she learns about her magical powers and how to wield them.  She was a bit obnoxiously independent at times, which got a little old, but on the other hand, I felt like it fit with her background.

I think these are probably considered YA, but Yelena is a bit older than the traditional YA protagonist, being around 19-22 throughout the course of the books.  I much preferred this and found everything far more believable at this age.  It also meant that even though there is some sex in these books (100% off-screen, hurrah!), while I wasn’t exactly okay with it, I was way more okay with it than I am when it’s a couple of 16-year-olds pledging their undying love.

However, I will say that I feel like Snyder really uses the whole kidnapping/rape scenario a bit too freely.  I kept remembering that viral video from a while back – ‘Hide yo’ kids, hide yo’ wife, cuz they rapin’ ever’body up in here!’  Legit, like how many people can get kidnapped and raped in a three-book period of time…???

My other big beef with these books is none of the covers are very good.  There’s so much potential for some really fabulous cover art with these, and they are all super bleh.

Overall, 4/5 for the trilogy. I’m almost done with the third Glass book – I haven’t liked that trilogy quite as well, but it’s been alright.  I’m looking forward to rejoining Yelena, though!

Also, I’m having a bit of a personal dilemma.  A couple of weeks ago, puppy Paisley rooted through my library book basket while I was gone and completely destroyed a paperback, so I had to pay for it and it was all quite embarrassing.  Now, would you believe that she swiped Poison Study OFF THE COUNTER while I was at work the other day, and destroyed that one, too!?  It is at least still readable (which was a good thing, because I wasn’t actually done reading it at the time), but I’m quite embarrassed to take it in and confess to yet ANOTHER dog fiasco!  I’m thinking about just continuing to renew it forever….