Helpful Score: 4
This is a weirdly fascinating and repugnant book. If one gets past the ponderous and overwrought writing--rife with ridiculous multisyllabic names mostly beginning with 'A', sometimes uncomfortably detailed scenery coupled with discordant simplistic passages of casual cruelty, and constant political intrigue from unlikable characters--after the first 100 pages it really starts to pick up the pace and become a compelling, if difficult (for moral reasons), read. In one sense I'm fascinated by the almost Tolkien-esque quality of the narrative. By this I mean the meticulous attention to detail in world-building, the expansive cast of characters, and the epic proportions of the story. I'm even impressed that a passably decent, fully realized romance was integral to the plot. But there the similarities end, unless Tolkien was a graphic novelist who enjoyed making people read or see inventive forms of violence.
Perhaps this kind of book is wrong for me because I lack a religious fascination with hell and heaven? I wanted to read this story because I like stories of redemption and I have a 'thing' for winged angelic creatures, but the latter can most likely be attributed to my early education in Greek mythology and my subsequent adulation of the story of Eros and Psyche. I kind of find fallen angels sexy in the kind of way that I find Anne Rice's vampires much more preferable to the idea of the far more disturbing nosforatu. I suppose I was really hoping that this book would be more romanticized insomuch as the violence and horror would be more implied than spelled out in grotesque detail. Regardless, I really gain no pleasure from reading or watching people indiscriminately torture each other, even the damned. And I certainly can't imagine what kind of mind could write such creative, disturbing, and truly awful forms of torture and ways of being that exist in this version of Hell. And I am, by no means, a squeamish person. I won't lose sleep from this book but I do find most of what transpired in it distasteful enough to really want to forget I read it. And, yet, I imagine I will remember it in vivid detail for some time because it was that powerful.
In a nutshell the experience of reading this novel can be likened to a trip to the dungeon at the Renaissance faire, full of wax dummies being inventively tortured in bizarre, horrific, yet strangely mesmerizing, ways only the medieval mind could have thought up. Now imagine supplanting people you love, even if they are just beloved imaginary characters, into the wax dummies' places knowing that the torment is forever and you will gain a vague impression of why this novel affected me so much.
I'm glad I read it and yet even more pleased to pass it along to the next person for whom I hope the experience is more pleasurable than mine. Fans of Milton and Dante might enjoy this story to a greater degree than I as well.
**Spoiler** (So don't read past this point if you don't want to know specifics about the book)
One of the compelling reasons I kept reading this novel after I had long figured it to not be to my tastes, was because I was interested in knowing more about the enigmatic Lucifer who disappeared from hell almost immediately upon arriving and left his lieutenant Beezelbub in charge. I kept expecting his reappearance to be an integral part of the plot, but ultimately his withdrawal from the machinations of hell remains unexplained, nor does he make any last minute appearance. I was disappointed by this. I like to think he ascended with Sargatanas and Valefar, but not knowing makes me irritated.
Another irksome quality in this book is the lack of powerful women. Lilith is semi-powerful, but only as an object of lust it would seem. The other women in the book are mere casualties of violence.
Perhaps this kind of book is wrong for me because I lack a religious fascination with hell and heaven? I wanted to read this story because I like stories of redemption and I have a 'thing' for winged angelic creatures, but the latter can most likely be attributed to my early education in Greek mythology and my subsequent adulation of the story of Eros and Psyche. I kind of find fallen angels sexy in the kind of way that I find Anne Rice's vampires much more preferable to the idea of the far more disturbing nosforatu. I suppose I was really hoping that this book would be more romanticized insomuch as the violence and horror would be more implied than spelled out in grotesque detail. Regardless, I really gain no pleasure from reading or watching people indiscriminately torture each other, even the damned. And I certainly can't imagine what kind of mind could write such creative, disturbing, and truly awful forms of torture and ways of being that exist in this version of Hell. And I am, by no means, a squeamish person. I won't lose sleep from this book but I do find most of what transpired in it distasteful enough to really want to forget I read it. And, yet, I imagine I will remember it in vivid detail for some time because it was that powerful.
In a nutshell the experience of reading this novel can be likened to a trip to the dungeon at the Renaissance faire, full of wax dummies being inventively tortured in bizarre, horrific, yet strangely mesmerizing, ways only the medieval mind could have thought up. Now imagine supplanting people you love, even if they are just beloved imaginary characters, into the wax dummies' places knowing that the torment is forever and you will gain a vague impression of why this novel affected me so much.
I'm glad I read it and yet even more pleased to pass it along to the next person for whom I hope the experience is more pleasurable than mine. Fans of Milton and Dante might enjoy this story to a greater degree than I as well.
**Spoiler** (So don't read past this point if you don't want to know specifics about the book)
One of the compelling reasons I kept reading this novel after I had long figured it to not be to my tastes, was because I was interested in knowing more about the enigmatic Lucifer who disappeared from hell almost immediately upon arriving and left his lieutenant Beezelbub in charge. I kept expecting his reappearance to be an integral part of the plot, but ultimately his withdrawal from the machinations of hell remains unexplained, nor does he make any last minute appearance. I was disappointed by this. I like to think he ascended with Sargatanas and Valefar, but not knowing makes me irritated.
Another irksome quality in this book is the lack of powerful women. Lilith is semi-powerful, but only as an object of lust it would seem. The other women in the book are mere casualties of violence.
