Thursday, August 30, 2012

Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness

#2 All souls trilogy
Copyright: 2012
Publisher: Viking
Genre: fiction
Pages: 592
My rating: 3/5

It's been awhile since I finished this one, but like with the others I had other things going on and I'm just now getting my review out there.

Here's is a description as taken from Amazon.com:
"Together we lifted our feet and stepped into the unknown"—the thrilling sequel to the New York Times bestseller A Discovery of Witches
Deborah Harkness exploded onto the literary scene with her debut novel, A Discovery of Witches, Book One of the magical All Souls Trilogy and an international publishing phenomenon. The novel introduced Diana Bishop, Oxford scholar and reluctant witch, and the handsome geneticist and vampire Matthew Clairmont; together they found themselves at the center of a supernatural battle over an enchanted manuscript known as Ashmole 782.
Now, picking up from A Discovery of Witches’ cliffhanger ending, Shadow of Night plunges Diana and Matthew into Elizabethan London, a world of spies, subterfuge, and a coterie of Matthew’s old friends, the mysterious School of Night that includes Christopher Marlowe and Walter Raleigh. Here, Diana must locate a witch to tutor her in magic, Matthew is forced to confront a past he thought he had put to rest, and the mystery of Ashmole 782 deepens.
Deborah Harkness has crafted a gripping journey through a world of alchemy, time travel, and magical discoveries, delivering one of the most hotly anticipated novels of the season

I adored the first book in this trilogy. I read it pretty fast and couldn't get enough of it. Couldn't wait for the second one to come out.   

This time around I was excited to start the second one but quickly found that I couldn't keep my interest in it. I don't want to use the baby as an excuse but I am busier with the baby. I don't have a lot of time to sit down and just read at home without interruptions.  I started to just leave this book at work and I would read it while I pumped, which is one reason it took so long to read it.   I have also been going through a lot, a lot of depression and mental pain.  So that has not helped either.  I only mention this for one reason. I honestly thing if I had been in a better place mentally, more like my old self, than I would have liked this book better.  As it was, every time I went to read it my mind would wonder off and I would be distracted. 

Being distracted while reading this book isn't a good thing because there are a TON of characters.  So I did find myself confused at who was who and what was going on, etc. 

I've read other reviews for this book and talked to others who have read it and they have been very pleased.  So don't let this review put you off the book.

2 comments:

bermudaonion said...

Aw, too bad. Maybe it's a case of the wrong book at the wrong time.

Unknown said...

That's def. what happened Bermudaonion.