ssjakira1's Full Review: Mike Carey - Vicious Circle
Wow, almost a year ago to the day, I reviewed Mike Carey's first book, The Devil You Know and when he came out with a new one, even though I gave 4.5 stars to the first book (not sure why, I don't remember it that fondly), I debated and finally figured, "Oh what the heck" and picked up this one.
Felix Castor is back, the tin whistle playing exorcist, who traps ghosts with his music and sends them to...wherever it is ghosts go. Zombies are a part of the world now (though they don't eat brains) and he's even got a bit of a partnership with the succubus that was contracted to kill him in the first book. The times are strange, but Castor just goes with it and tries to pay rent like any normal Londoner.
This time he gets a couple of bizarre job requests. A little girl's ghost has been stolen and he's got to find it. A church has been overcome with some icky kind of darkness that's even baffling Juliet (actually the succubus Ajulutsikael). Except now he's being stalked by a couple of were-beings, the ghost kidnapper is blocking him out in ways Castor doesn't understand, and in a nutshell, he's got no clue just what's going on. Overall, things are sort of going to hell in a hand basket, and the only good thing that seems to have happened is that his good friend Rafi is finally free of the invading demon Asmodeus. Castor can only hope that it's for good and that he can stay alive long enough to see things through.
Castor's pretty much gotten himself into a spot a bit rougher than in The Devil You Know. More than one group wants him dead and some series stuff is about to go down, potentially signaling the end of the world. You'll never know what's going on and how all the different pieces fit together until Castor does, which is good because while it's fun to guess, I hate being able to figure it out right from the get go. However, some of the pieces aren't clear simply because it isn't mentioned like it should have or would have been. For example, when Castor is threatened by the lycanthropes, they tell him to back off his case, but he's got three. When he asks which one, they don't tell him or just give him some stupid analogy that NO ONE would have understood. It simply makes no logical sense for them to beat around the bush. No reader would have pieced anything together anyway. I certainly wouldn't have.
The book was interesting and exciting, with action and good descriptions, amusing dialogue and plenty of mysterious things going on. I still love Carey's inventive use of exorcism, how zombies aren't the brain-eating mindless creatures we're all familiar with (and in fact, "zombie" is no longer politically correct), the whole concept of "life" and what one has to have or be in order to be considered "alive" becomes a subject of government discussion, and the whole Rafi-Asmodeous thing. I was wondering during the first book when or if this would come into play and was happy to see it take on a big role this time. I doubt it will be the last.
I think Carey's second novel is much better than the first, the first sort of easing you into the character and his world. This one just jumps right in, no apologies, head first. What I could have done without though, is the amount of description. I don't mean visuals or sounds or textures per say, but rather things like, "I thought about going left on Hammond Street but then realized that might put me in traffic so I curved back on Lark Street instead." NO ONE CARES! That's one of those "Oh geez, get on with it!" moments because he's just giving you play by play driving and it's completely unnecessary. Get to the point. I think a couple of pages could be cut out from just unnecessary details like that. Equivalent to my writing instructors warning us never to document a character eating an entire bowl of cereal bite by bite.
That was really my only pet peeve. Sometimes I did get a little bored because Castor is always a bit of an ass so it got just a teensy bit redundant, but he's still a cool guy and his friends are, ah, interesting. A ton of people get involved with this one, from the police to-well, I'll let you find out. It's got a great ending complete with excitement, "Oh no!" moments, and a positive feeling of when the next book comes out, you're probably going to read it. I know I will.
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