Review: Surprisingly disappointing
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 05 28, 2011
I can't really review this sequel to the superbTatterdemalion (Foundations of Magic)without spoiling it, so please don't read on if you don't wish to be spoiled.I enjoyedTatterdemalion (Foundations of Magic). I'm a huge fan of Anah Crow's Uneven. While I wasn't exactly hanging out for the sequel to 'Tatterdemalion', I was pretty sure when I bought it, I was in for a treat.Which is why - apart from the fact that the authors are lovely, talented people whom I follow on Twitter - I was surprised and more than a little disappointed thatTrammeljust didn't work for me. I even went back after I read it, to rereadTatterdemalion (Foundations of Magic), just to make sure memory wasn't  making the former book rosier than it was, but no - if anything, I enjoyed the previous story more.'Trammel' just missed the emotional sweetspot entirely.Of the things I liked about this, I can list Dane's interactions with Cyrus, Dane and Lindsay, Dane, Noah, and the high writing standard (though I was surprised at the number of comma splices the editor let through, and the strange decision to spell the multiple of `bus' as `busses' - a known variant to be sure, but one I've never encountered in well over forty years of reading.)On the non-spoilery bad side of the scale, I would have to say the confusing plot, the introduction of new characters without much explanation, the diversity of POVs which dissipated the emotional impact of the plot far too much, and the treatment of female characters were definitely real downers for me.[And this is as much spoiler space as you're getting, guys. After this, you can be sure to find out stuff about the plot.]On the spoilery bad side...I wouldn't have bought this if I had known it would introduce a new sexual partner for Lindsay. Threesomes are really, really tricky little things to make work (though this is a V rather than a triangle relationship), and I've yet to find one that really did - even my own. But the way this was handled felt particularly off to me - Noah is so bowed down by grief and guilt over the death of his wife in a car accident, that he refuses to let his horribly body be healed fully. Yet as soon as Cyrus `gives' Noah to Lindsay, they start sexing each other up almost immediately. Even though it's with Dane's explicit permission, it still felt wrong. This is Noah, by the way, who set Kristen on fire for coming onto him too strong when he was still so griefstricken. The implicit message is that girl touching is evil, but boy touching is healthy and healing and so Noah can want Lindsay like a fat kid wants cake, while Kristen is treated like vermin for having sexual urges at all. I really didn't care for the nasty jibes sent her way at all. I was really surprised at these authors in particular coming out with this kind of stuff.It gets worse. Dane goes missing, is possibly even dead - and Lindsay is getting BJs from and having sex with Noah without even a pause to stop and be angry and sad at Dane's disappearance? There's a sex scene, another sex scene, a brief pause to say "Oh Cyrus is dead, how sad", more sex, "Oh Dane is missing, I am sad", more sex.... It was incredibly jarring. This was not the Lindsay I'd grown to love in the first book. And it wasn't the Noah we had been given up to that point. Dane is an afterthought for both of them for far too long.And Noah's tortured state is cured pretty much "just like that", as Tommy Cooper would say. One minute he's crippled and damaged almost beyond repair, refusing help, then he's fixed...to perfection. Along with, apparently, all his mental issues about his dead wife, which barely intrude after that as he becomes Mr Magical Fixit.Then there's the plot - not only is it confusing, it's basically a rerun of the first book with slight variations. Evil doers capture the good guys, do hateful things to them, and awesome magic saves the day. Sure, it sets up the third book nicely, and was compelling in its own way, but really, the magical world is so big and awesome, there must be more than one bugaboo to explore?The individual elements in 'Trammel' have a lot of promise, and taken on their own, are enjoyable. But the mixture doesn't work for me the way 'Tatterdemalion' did. I'm afraid the authors have only themselves to blame that they set the bar so high the first time around.I think this will have to be a "suck it and see" experience for readers. I can't recommend it because I personally didn't enjoy it much, but I can see that there's a lot to enjoy. I would certainly read the sequel to 'Trammel' because the world is so fascinating and the authors have set up so many dangling threads, darn them. I just hope that sequel manages to return to the excellence of the first book, and the intensity that Dane and Lindsay's relationship brought to the story.