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City of Stairs, City of Blades, City of Miracles
4/5. Trilogy spanning twenty years of spies and intrigue and divine plotting in the century after an enslaved nation rose up and killed the gods of their enslavers, tumbling an entire civilization into ruins as the miracles on which it ran disappeared.
I tell you what is miraculous: these are fantasy novels written by a man, and I really enjoyed them. They are complex and creative, with a rich constructed history. And equal streaks of adventuring (funicular battle! Spy nonsense!) and deep melancholy over wrongs done and wars lost and won. Thematically, they are asking questions about the value of suffering, and answering very decisively that there is none, thank you very much.
Also, there are women in these books. Just being there and doing things and, for the most part, driving these books forward. I do get now why some people ding them for a particular treatment of queerness but eh, it didn't ruin these for me.
4/5. Trilogy spanning twenty years of spies and intrigue and divine plotting in the century after an enslaved nation rose up and killed the gods of their enslavers, tumbling an entire civilization into ruins as the miracles on which it ran disappeared.
I tell you what is miraculous: these are fantasy novels written by a man, and I really enjoyed them. They are complex and creative, with a rich constructed history. And equal streaks of adventuring (funicular battle! Spy nonsense!) and deep melancholy over wrongs done and wars lost and won. Thematically, they are asking questions about the value of suffering, and answering very decisively that there is none, thank you very much.
Also, there are women in these books. Just being there and doing things and, for the most part, driving these books forward. I do get now why some people ding them for a particular treatment of queerness but eh, it didn't ruin these for me.