49 Books
See allEnjoyable and a generally cozy mystery. If you enjoyed the preceding Alex Benedict novels you'll provably enjoy this one, too.
That being said it's also bizarrely unimaginative. My feeling at the end was "Oh, okay. Huh. That's... fine, I guess." A few key plot points felt forced for the convenience of the author rather than making sense for the characters. Overall not one of McDevitt's best works.
On the one hand, I love a good alien that is truly, deeply alien to humans. On the other, I do believe this is the single most hopeless take on humanity's future that I've ever read. (Even out of all of the Tchaikovsky I've read, including Cage of Souls.) Very good, very interesting, very depressing. I think I'll skip rereading this one in favor of retaining some hope for the future.
I honestly did not expect to enjoy this as much as I did. I suppose I'd grown a bit cynical about Rothfuss' writing and now I'm feeling a bit silly for having done so. This story reminded me why I fell in love with The Name of the Wind in the first place. Yes, the way he crafts words is excellent, but more than that its just a truly heartfelt story. I can't think of a single thing I would change about it.
Great for fans who want to learn more about Bast, but also is a great standalone short story that doesn't rely on any foreknowledge of the world.