★★★★☆ All about the cassandra sangue

Vision in Silver

Anne Bishop

Vision in Silver is the third novel in Anne Bishop's The Others urban fantasy series. The second novel, Murder of Crows, ended with the Others, in a shock and awe campaign, raiding the compounds that kept cassandra sangue and sold their prophecies for enormous profit. It now transpires that cassandra sangue are psychologically fragile. The folks with whom they've been placed (some are terra indigene and some are allied humans) are struggling to keep the girls alive and healthy.

The problem is exacerbated by the Humans First and Last movement, which is successfully exploiting it for propaganda against the Others. Nicholas Scratch, a pseudonymous demagogue from Cel-Romano, claims that the Others kidnapped vulnerable human girls from facilities where they had been cared for, and are now failing to take care of them. In fact, he is paving the way for a war of the humans of Cel-Romano against the Others of Thaisia.

The other big story is Simon and Meg's deepening relationship. In Murder of Crows Monty noticed that Simon was obviously falling in love with Meg. I say, obviously, because it is obvious to Monty. It is not obvious to Simon, however. Simon is as clueless about his deepening attraction to Meg as any awkward teenage boy with his first crush. This is, so far, more funny than alarming.

Although the story is good, this installment dragged a bit in places. It spends a lot of time on the cassandra sangue's mental health issues and how to deal with them. This seems rather strange, since Meg herself, in the first two novels, was a strong, mentally adventurous young woman with more tolerance for novelty than the average person you run into on the street. Now suddenly she and other cassandra sangue have these pronounced psychological problems, which feel more like a convenient plot device than an organic element of the story.

Consequently, I felt that Vision in Silver was the weakest novel in the series so far. It is still very good, however, and I intend to keep reading.

Vision in Silver on Amazon

Goodreads review

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