SEARCH

Subscribe

RSS Feed

Sub by Email

Twitter Me

INTERVIEWS

Peter Higgins, author of Wolfhound Century

Myke Cole, author of Shadow Ops Series

John Brown John, translator of the Zamonia Novels

Jim C. Hines author of Libriomancer

Nick Harkaway author of Angelmaker (review here)

Martha Wells author of The Cloud Roads

David Tallerman author of Giant Thief

Mazarkis Williams author of The Emperor's Knife

Rob Ziegler author of Seed

Steven Gould author of 7th Sigma

Douglas Hulick author of Among Thieves (review here)

Mark Charan Newton author of Nights of Villjamur (review here)

Kameron Hurley author of God's War (review here)

Brent Weeks author of The Black Prism (review here)

Anthony Huso author of The Last Page (review here)

Brandon Sanderson author of The Way of Kings (review here)

Lou Anders Editor of Pyr Books

Ian Tregillis author of Bitter Seeds (review here)

Sam Sykes author of Tome of the Undergates (review here)

Benjamin Parzybok author of Couch (review here)

Kristine Kathryn Rusch author of Diving Into the Wreck (review here)

Ken Scholes author of Lamentation

Cherie Priest author of Boneshaker (review here)

Lev Grossman author of The Magicians (review here)

Character Interviews

Alexia and Lord Maccon from Gail Carriger's Soulless

Lord Akeldama from Gail Carriger's Soulless

Eva Forge from Tim Akers's The Horns of Ruin

Atticus from Kevin Hearne's Hounded

RECENT REVIEWS

The Daylight War by Peter V. Brett

A Memory of Light by Robert Jordan & Brandon Sanderson

Scoundrels by Timothy Zahn

Cold Days by Jim Butcher

Year Zero by Rob Reid

Alif: The Unseen by G. Willow Wilson

Scourge of the Betrayer by Jeff Salyards

Redshirts by John Scalzi

Control Point by Myke Cole

Angelmaker by Nick Harkaway
My BlogCatalog BlogRank Wikio - Top Blogs - Literature

REVIEW | Dancing on the Head of a Pin: A Remy Chandler Novel by Thomas E. Sniegoski (Roc)

This is the second Remy Chandler novel which is the follow-up to the great series opener A Kiss Before the Apocalyse. Sniegoski is still a fairly new writer to me even though he has been around for more than a decade, although the Remy books are his first solo foray into adult books as he is very well known for his YA Fallen series.

Dancing on the Head of a Pin sees Remy Chandler, also known as Remial of the angel host Seraphim, getting sucked into more of the heavenly host's business. After losing his human wife Remy is still going through a lot of grief. He is struggling to hold on to his humanity as his great link has left him. I love the Remy character and how Sniegoski has built him up with a better sense of humanity than most people posses. Marlowe, Remy's always lovable dog, does a great job of keeping Remy connected to the human world, but after releasing his angelic nature Remy is finding it harder and harder to keep his thoughts in the human world.

Remy starts off by investigating the selling of angel organs by a group of the Fallen. Remy eventually finds the angel in question and witnesses him dying. Remy feels obligated to tell the group of Nomads the angel came from about his demise. The Nomads are another sect of Angels who sat out the Morningstar's war with heaven, while the Fallen are the angels who fought on the Morningstar's (Devil) side. They have no place in heaven nor hell and have lived on the earth for a millennia contemplating what they should have done during the great war.

Remy is soon hired by an old wealthy collector of antique weapons to recover a special group of weapons recently stolen from him. Remy learns the weapons are the legendary pitiless weapons. These are weapons of great strength more than equal to any other ever created. Remy uncovers the first of the pitiless weapons, which leads him into the deeper and darker mysteries of why the weapons were stolen and what their true purpose is. The weapons don’t get much play until the end of the book are used very swiftly and could have easily been over done given their strength.

Dealings with the Fallen and a Nephlim bring out more players in the game including Hellions. Hellions are kind of like giant evil hyenas who keep things inline over Hell and its inhabitants. Sniegoski keeps surprising me with the myriad of angelic creatures and sects involved. Hopefully he can keep this up in further books. Remy eventually uncovers who is behind all of the happenings and what they are planning The ending wasn't quite what I expected, but it worked really well, especially in setting up bigger events for future books. Sniegoski almost makes we want to go back and read the bible for pure entertainment given the cast of characters and creatures he employs. I give Dancing on the Head of a Pin 8 out of 10 hats.

It is definitely advisable to read A Kiss Before the Apocalypse first, which was just released in Mass Market format, although Dancing could be enjoyed on its own.


I'll definitely be keeping my eye out for the next Remy book and I'll probably check out some of the author's older offerings as well. Also worth reading is Mean Streets the novella compliation that includes a Remy story about solving the murder of Noah and a good Dresden Files story.

You Might Also Like:
REVIEW | Turn Coat by Jim Butcher
REVIEW | Ghost Ocean by S.M. Peters
REVIEW | Sandman Slim by Richard Kadrey

0 comments: