The Empyrean

Everything I have to say about this series, at length, because somebody asked and I have not stopped since. The dual timeline earns its structure instead of using it to hide a thin middle. Every promise the first chapter makes is kept, which sounds small and is not. I would argue with a friend about the last forty pages for an hour, happily. The antagonist is given an argument rather than a motive, and it is a good argument. There is a scene with a locked door that I have thought about for a week. It reads like it was edited hard, and the seams are all where they should be. The sequel bait is one paragraph long and I did not resent a word of it. Nothing in here happens because the plot needed it to, which is the highest compliment. The point of view switches are signposted so cleanly I never lost my place. I was ready to be annoyed by the framing device and it won me over by page fifty. The book is generous with its own reveals instead of hoarding them for the end. Its worst chapter is still better than most of what I read last year. The friendship at the centre is written with the same care as the romance. There is a real cost to the choice at the end, and nobody is let off it. I have handed this to four people and three of them finished it in a weekend. The descriptions of food are doing characterisation work and I only noticed on a reread. It knows exactly how long to stay in a scene, which is a skill nobody praises enough. The ending is quiet in a way that made the loud middle look deliberate. I closed it, sat still for a minute, and then started the next one. The pacing settles about a third of the way in and never loses its grip after that. I read the middle section twice, once for the plot and once for the way the chapters are cut. The side characters are given enough room to be people rather than furniture. Some of the dialogue does more work than the descriptions around it. It rewards a slow read, and skimming would drop half of what makes it hold together. The ending earns itself, which is not something I say often about a series this long. A few chapters near the end move faster than they need to, and I would have taken more of them. The world is explained by what people do in it rather than by anyone stopping to lecture. Where it repeats itself, it repeats on purpose, and the repetition lands. I would hand this to somebody who told me they had stopped finishing books. The first hundred pages ask for patience and then pay it back with interest. Nobody in this cast is written as a lesson, which is rarer than it should be. The chapter breaks are doing more structural work than the chapter titles admit. I kept expecting a shortcut that never came, and I respect that. Two of the subplots could have been one, and the book would have been shorter and better. The romance is allowed to be inconvenient, which is the only reason it works. There is a stretch in the middle where the geography stops mattering and the argument takes over. It is funnier than the cover suggests, and the humour is never at a character's expense. The prose gets out of its own way exactly when it needs to. I finished it in three sittings and would not recommend that to anyone else. The stakes are personal before they are political, and the order is the whole trick. A secondary character walks off with two chapters and I did not mind at all. It trusts the reader to hold three threads at once and never apologises for it. The quiet scenes are the ones I went back to, not the loud ones. There is one conversation near the halfway mark that reframes everything before it. The magic has rules, the rules cost something, and the cost is paid on the page. I did not believe one of the reversals, and I still turned the next page immediately. The setting is specific enough that I could draw the main street from memory. It is a book about consequences that actually lets consequences happen. The dual timeline earns its structure instead of using it to hide a thin middle. Every promise the first chapter makes is kept, which sounds small and is not. I would argue with a friend about the last forty pages for an hour, happily. The antagonist is given an argument rather than a motive, and it is a good argument. There is a scene with a locked door that I have thought about for a week. It reads like it was edited hard, and the seams are all where they should be. The sequel bait is one paragraph long and I did not resent a word of it. Nothing in here happens because the plot needed it to, which is the highest compliment. The point of view switches are signposted so cleanly I never lost my place. I was ready to be annoyed by the framing device and it won me over by page fifty. The book is generous with its own reveals instead of hoarding them for the end. Its worst chapter is still better than most of what I read last year. The friendship at the centre is written with the same care as the romance. There is a real cost to the choice at the end, and nobody is let off it. I have handed this to four people and three of them finished it in a weekend. The descriptions of food are doing characterisation work and I only noticed on a reread. It knows exactly how long to stay in a scene, which is a skill nobody praises enough. The ending is quiet in a way that made the loud middle look deliberate. I closed it, sat still for a minute, and then started the next one. The pacing settles about a third of the way in and never loses its grip after that. I read the middle section twice, once for the plot and once for the way the chapters are cut. The side characters are given enough room to be people rather than furniture. Some of the dialogue does more work than the descriptions around it. It rewards a slow read, and skimming would drop half of what makes it hold together. The ending earns itself, which is not something I say often about a series this long. A few chapters near the end move faster than they need to, and I would have taken more of them. The world is explained by what people do in it rather than by anyone stopping to lecture. Where it repeats itself, it repeats on purpose, and the repetition lands. I would hand this to somebody who told me they had stopped finishing books. The first hundred pages ask for patience and then pay it back with interest. Nobody in this cast is written as a lesson, which is rarer than it should be. The chapter breaks are doing more structural work than the chapter titles admit. I kept expecting a shortcut that never came, and I respect that. Two of the subplots could have been one, and the book would have been shorter and better. The romance is allowed to be inconvenient, which is the only reason it works. There is a stretch in the middle where the geography stops mattering and the argument takes over. It is funnier than the cover suggests, and the humour is never at a character's expense. The prose gets out of its own way exactly when it needs to. I finished it in three sittings and would not recommend that to anyone else. The stakes are personal before they are political, and the order is the whole trick. A secondary character walks off with two chapters and I did not mind at all. It trusts the reader to hold three threads at once and never apologises for it. The quiet scenes are the ones I went back to, not the loud ones. There is one conversation near the halfway mark that reframes everything before it. The magic has rules, the rules cost something, and the cost is paid on the page. I did not believe one of the reversals, and I still turned the next page immediately. The setting is specific enough that I could draw the main street from memory. It is a book about consequences that actually lets consequences happen. The dual timeline earns its structure instead of using it to hide a thin middle. Every promise the first chapter makes is kept, which sounds small and is not. I would argue with a friend about the last forty pages for an hour, happily. The antagonist is given an argument rather than a motive, and it is a good argument. There is a scene with a locked door that I have thought about for a week. It reads like it was edited hard, and the seams are all where they should be. The sequel bait is one paragraph long and I did not resent a word of it. Nothing in here happens because the plot needed it to, which is the highest compliment. The point of view switches are signposted so cleanly I never lost my place. I was ready to be annoyed by the framing device and it won me over by page fifty. The book is generous with its own reveals instead of hoarding them for the end. Its worst chapter is still better than most of what I read last year. The friendship at the centre is written with the same care as the romance. There is a real cost to the choice at the end, and nobody is let off it. I have handed this to four people and three of them finished it in a weekend. The descriptions of food are doing characterisation work and I only noticed on a reread. It knows exactly how long to stay in a scene, which is a skill nobody praises enough. The ending is quiet in a way that made the loud middle look deliberate. I closed it, sat still for a minute, and then started the next one. The pacing settles about a third of the way in and never loses its grip after that. I read the middle section twice, once for the plot and once for the way the chapters are cut. The side characters are given enough room to be people rather than furniture. Some of the dialogue does more work than the descriptions around it. It rewards a slow read, and skimming would drop half of what makes it hold together. The ending earns itself, which is not something I say often about a series this long. A few chapters near the end move faster than they need to, and I would have taken more of them. The world is explained by what people do in it rather than by anyone stopping to lecture. Where it repeats itself, it repeats on purpose, and the repetition lands. I would hand this to