Warning for SPOILERS.
This volume had less of the graphic nudity (thank goodness) but more violence that happens at unexpected moments. It felt a little slower to me, until the very end when wham, lots of stuff happens. Two main story arcs here. Alana and Marko travel to the planet where their favorite author lives in a lighthouse tower filled with books. It was great. They have family time, play board games, discuss parenting and plans for the future (slim prospects, as they’re both fugitives), and literature with a writer. Such everyday stuff, until someone with vengeance who’s also in need of help for their attacker, breaks into the scene.
Backtrack: Marko’s angry ex is in cahoots with the Will now (bounty hunter on Alana and Marko’s trail) reluctantly at first but then I guess they start to like each other? They have the ex-slave girl in their care and she finally gets a name: Sophie. They end up on a planet that looks beautiful, but eating the food there makes people hallucinate ex-lovers who incite them to do violent things. The Will gets knocked out of the picture. In a terrible way. And then Gwen desperately tries to find Marko- first she wanted to kill him, now she wants him to save Will. Lying Cat is great as always. Two more sidestories- of the TV-head robots whom I still neither like nor care about (nobody else in this book seems to like them either) their prince/soldier is also trying to find our happy couple. And a new set of characters, a team of reporters from some other alien species, who have something in common with Alana/Marko- they’re also a forbidden couple, homosexuality being unacceptable on their home planet. These two are traveling all over trying to get details on Alana/Marko for a tabloid, but nobody wants to talk to them (of course). So there’s all kinds of weirdness and fantastic artwork like before, but really my favorite scenes were those with the Lying Cat, and in the tower of books those philosophical, down-to-earth conversations with the writer. I could have done without some of the rest of it all, but I am curious to see how the threads come together in the end.
Borrowed from the public library. Previous book in this series. Next book.
