[LISTENED TO: Summer 2021] How the Multiverse Got Its Revenge
The only thing better than finishing an awesome book is discovering that there’s a sequel and the quality and integrity of the sequel is just as strong as the original story.
Everything from the first story is in place here: the characters, the narrator, the tone, and, delightfully, Nicole Poole to read it.
Obviously, there are massive spoilers in this book for the first story. So make sure you read that one first.
But to sum up, Rory successfully avoid an arranged marriage (while not upsetting her arranged husband). She is able to shut down a coup on Urse and ultimately kick-starts a revolution. Not bad for an under age Princess.
But she is done with being a Princess. She rescinds her life and goes off to become a space pirate. She has taken her former royal bodyguards, Thorsdottir and Zhang (so yes, there’s even more time given to these two great characters!) with her. They pledge to protect Rory so they guess they just go with her? And Jaed has come along with them too, mostly because he has nowhere else to go (literally) and he crushes on Rory, too.
So Rory’s team aren’t so much space pirates as do-gooders. They are more like salvagers who might intercept smugglers (this is the equivalent of her telling her mom she’s going to follow Phish and make jewelry).
And for all concerned, Grytt is still in the story although as it starts, she is on Lanscott farming sheep (!) with Rory’s former betrothed Ivar (!!) former crow prince of the Free Worlds of Tadesh {No they are not “together” Grytt is mostly just minding the poor boy while she is “relaxing”). Grytt by the way needed more implants after the last book and is probably 3/5 mecha to human. Which she seems to prefer, honestly.
Rupert is also still with us, although he has renounced his title a Vizier and has stayed on the planet Lanscot. As the story opens, he is reaching out to Rory’s mother Samur, the Regent-Consort of the Thorne Consortium. Things are frosty between them for the various reasons listed above.
Ivar had been visited by a faerie–one of the thirteen who had visited Rory on her naming day–with a warning. Ivar told Grytt who told Rupert who is finding out what Samur knows about this warning. It concerns the vakari people and something called The Protectorate.
The Protectorate are an advanced race of arithmancers. They have been taking over parts of the Multiverse and they are heading for human habitations: Thorne Consortium, Merchants League, The Confederation and the unaffiliated worlds.
Samur knows that even though Rory has renounced her title (Rupert an Grytt won’t tell her exactly what she is doing, however), that political trouble tends to hone in a Princess–former or not.
Back in void-space, Rory’s ship has encountered a derelict ship. A derelict ship that has been attacked. But it was supposedly delivering flowers–why would anyone attack that?
After great deliberation, they discover something on board the ship. It calls itself Rose. Rose is a sentient biological weapon, although in its present state it is not dangerous–it has not been “activated.” But it can sense how people behave around it can do some pretty powerful things.
The long and short of the story is that the Protectorate are looking for Rose and now Rory has stepped in the way.
There are a whole new cast of delightfully amusing and dark characters, and Rory has to use her Princess knowledge while maintaining that she is not one–until it becomes expedient for her to be one.
There’s a lot more battle in this story–much of it is set on a ship that is attacked. The tone is different, which is to be expected. But the overall feel remains the same and it was an excellent conclusion to this duology. Yes, a duology, not a trilogy!
I understand that Eason is writing another book in this world with a different focus. The world she created is so expansive, she could easily write a dozen books and not run out of new material. And I will gladly read all of them. Unless Poole is onboard, because then I’ll let her read it to me–it wouldn’t be the same without her voice teaching this story to me like a much-needed history lesson.
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