4.75 stars!

At first sight, this world was incredibly complicated and I felt a bit lost. I felt much the same way when I started The Founders Trilogy, so I knew I just had to stick with it and roll with the complex world and I would be rewarded with a well-written and fantastic story. (Spoiler alert, I was right!)

You're dropped into a world that feels completely foreign. There's a hierarchy of government roles that you don't understand. There are leviathans, a huge wall, human augmentations, and in the midst of it all I was greatly wishing for some background information. However, as I kept reading, all of the pieces fell into place and I was swept into the mystery of it all.

The story starts out with Din, a recently appointed assistant to a very eccentric investigator (Ana) who rarely leaves her home. Din serves as her eyes and ears at a grisly death scene. He is an engraver, someone who has been augmented to be able to recall every minute detail that they have seen or heard. He uses specific scents to anchor the memories, and he is able to recount an exact representation of the scene- including any conversations he had with suspects. Din is a small town kid, and as he evaluates the murder, he realizes that this goes beyond a run of the mill murder. The victim died by a giant plant sprouting from his chest, and he was found in the home of an infamous corrupt family as a guest. As the investigation continues, they find more officials have been killed in the same manner. Multiple killers, corruption, greed, revenge- and Ana seems to be the only one who can put the pieces together. (With the invaluable help of Din of course.)

As this is occurring, the people of the empire are experiencing wet season. This is the time of year where unbelievably large monsters (leviathans) try to breach the large outer rim wall. As the story progresses, the tension ratchets. The wall is damaged, so Din and Ana have a short amount of time to solve the murder(s) before their town is overrun by leviathans. They find that there are more individuals who have suffered the same fate as their victim and find themselves embroiled in a much larger plot than Din ever planned for.

This was an absolute blast to read. There were mysteries within mysteries. Murders and murderers galore, and underpinning it all a fantastically unique world. RJB has once again crafted a spectacular fantasy that combines multiple genres into a truly thrilling read.

I need some art of Din and Ana ASAP!! I would have loved to be able to see them as I read, but that is the blessing and curse of being able to read a story early.

I loved the story, the world building and meeting the different characters. I felt completely immersed in the story and couldn't stop reading it.

Before I begin this review, I want to thank Net Galley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for allowing me to access The Tainted Cup before publication. Check out this book on its release date of February 6th, 2024.

Robert Jackson Bennett knew what he was doing when writing this book. There is an intriguing Sherlock Holmes murder mystery mixed in with the threat of an impending attack from sea creatures called the Leviathans. This story is captivating and potentially one of the best books I have ever read.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. There is a mystery, then a bit of action, and lots of sci-fi and magic. I will say that this book is a lot to take in. I couldn't fully comprehend some things, but something about this book was mesmerizing enough to keep me coming back.

At first, the characters are a bit annoying and boring. But, as the story unravels, they are thrust into a world of unknowns and uncomfortable situations, which really helps give the characters some personality and shine. The main character Din is sort of an underdog. While it is evident that he bears some form of intelligence, Din doesn't see that in himself. As the story goes on, we see Din come more into his own. Ana is quite an anomaly. She seems to fit together any information swiftly and does it in a humorous fashion.

The plot really shines in this book. There are excellent twists and turns as the characters dig deeper and deeper into a murder that uncovers something more significant than they can imagine. There is action, the uncovering of dead bodies, and scattered clues everywhere. It all accumulates and makes for an excellent plot.

In truth, I couldn't fully grasp everything this world had to offer. Some of it was pretty hard to follow. Yet, this book has some of the best worldbuilding I have seen. In this world, there are varying races of people, and among them are those who are modified. These modifications range from being able to have an impeccable memory to being able to see in the dark or even having excellent strength. On top of this, a wall lies between these people and dangerous sea creatures that threaten to break loose every wet season. Tension builds with a growing fear that the people won't make it to see the next wet season.

The writing is compelling and detailed. If you dislike descriptive books, this book may not be for you, but note the writing style fits the story exceptionally well. Some of these details are important to the plot of the story, plus they make a lot of sense considering Din's abilities as an engraver.

Overall, I would definitely recommend this book! The plot and worldbuilding are challenging to keep up with, but it is well worth the read if you are into murder mysteries with a splash of magic.

I cannot explain enough how perfect a fit me and a fantasy murder mystery are. The only downside to this book is that I've read it while it's still 80 degrees outside and this books requires atmosphere. RJB is the absolute master at unique world building and characterization, but the way he builds intrigue alone would be enough to make this a must read. If for some strange reason you're on the fence- read the first chapter. There's no way you're putting this down before it's done!

Um... UM. WOW. I loved every single second of this book. I read slowly to be able to savor it for as long as possible. I don't even know what to say! I like to write at a least a few paragraphs per review but honestly what do I say?! How I'm going to be able to wait until February 2024 to talk about this on my platform I do not know.

If you love mysteries with a Sherlock-esque vibe with a fantasy flare, this is your book. So well written, so well tied together, such a delight. I hope to God that there are more of these to come.

Everyone loves a murder mystery. Unique world building, augmented characters, Sherlock Holmes like investigations, Titans and murder!
The story and plots where great!
Thank you to the publishers for the Netgalley Arc!

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing for the opportunity to read and review this title. I'm a big Christa and Doyle fan, so I was very excited about a fantasy take on the classic whodunnit. There were a lot of things I liked about this book, but my biggest complaint was the lack of world building and confusing magic system. I think my overall enjoyment of the book would have been improved if the world building was stronger and the magic system clearer. If I had a better understanding of how the magic/enhancement system worked, I think the revelations would have been more profound. With that said, the writing was clever and was easy to read. The narrator felt real and relatable. I enjoyed how things started with a seemingly small, isolated murder and evolved into a much larger web revenge. There was a great mix of predictability and surprise. Very cool body horror, that was well described creating a visceral reaction from the reader. I loved the Sherlock/Watson feel. There was great witty banter and I loved how irritated Ana often was with how slow everyone else was to pick up on things. As someone who struggles with sensory integration, I loved that Ana required modifications to adjust to her environment and took no shame in that. She knows how highly intelligent she is and knows how to adjust her environment to ensure she reaches her maximum potential. She was also vulgar and not afraid to speak her mind. I loved her. I'm interested in where any future entries go, as long as they provide more detail into the world itself and how things work.
3.5/5 stars

I received a free ARC from NetGalley.

An Agatha Christie-style murder mystery set in a fantasy world sounded good to me but just did not end up working for me. I liked the mystery aspect but the world-building was kind of confusing and vague. There are giant "leviathans" that come out of the sea and will destroy the realm, if the Empire didn't defend against them. But these beasts are practically mountain sized, and if they get past the sea walls it seems they just wander onto the plains and then... what? The author didn't seem to assign malice or even thought to the leviathans. Maybe just move out of the way instead of spending all the effort on walls and cannons?
And the people/races. They have various alterations due to plant compounds that give them greater memory or strength or vision or whatever, but the descriptions of the races etc. just didn't build much of a picture in my mind. All I can visualize is that some of them have gray skin because that got mentioned a lot.

This was such an intriguing read. I really enjoyed the mystery and the world. Ana Dolabra is strange and insightful. Her new apprentice must deal with her eccentricities as they are pulled into the world of politics and murder. In a world with leviathans and killer plants, murder may be the thing that destroys their world.

Robert Jackson Bennett creates worlds that draw you in. From his dedication you know that he was influenced by his mother and grandmother to write a murder mystery. Of course, if it's a novel by Bennett then his world will include magic and some very unusual way of looking at the world. Even the murder is very different: in this case, the victim was killed by a tree growing throughout his body.
Dinios Kol is a new engraver, a magical enhancement which gives him total recall of what he is looking at (or hearing or smelling). Assigned to the Empire's greatest detective, Ana Dolabra, he is just getting used to her. Ana prefers to send her engraver out to crime scenes and then have him tell her all about it. She often blindfolds herself so that she can concentrate better, and it doesn't take long before she (and Din) realizes that there is a lot more going on than just one particular murder.
The Empire they inhabit is divided into rings, the farther away from the capital (and closest to the sea) you are, the less safe you are from Leviathans which have been known to breach the defenses and bring destruction to the land. Complications ensue when there is a major break in the sea wall and every mystery that is solved seems to lead to another mystery. This seems to be the beginning of a series and after this first volume, readers will eagerly look forward to the next book.

Anything Robert Jackson Bennett writes is an auto-buy from me, and even though I know to expect his typically stellar mix of action, characterization, and canny plotting, I’m always delightfully surprised by his ability to innovate within the fantasy genre. Previously in his Founders Trilogy, he managed to make computer and software engineering work in a fantasy setting. Now with The Tainted Cup, he’s working with biohacking and genetic engineering, all set within a world of swords, carriages—and leviathans lurking in the seas.

The world is vaguely Roman, with plenty of references to legions and a emperor (and an appropriate refusal to use the letter J), but Bennett wisely let us fill in the blanks, letting the color seep in naturally. He’s more interested in the divergent elements, most notably the bio-magic and the threat of kaiju-like attacks, and lets those take a central role in the unfolding murder mystery.

We begin with one death, that of a high-ranked official visiting a home of one of the empire’s wealthiest families. An assassination within the inner corridors of the highly-guarded compound is bad enough, but the murder weapon is even more unsettling: some kind of spore or cutting made it past the wards, and then erupted through the official’s body, its hyper-accelerated growth tearing him to bits.

Dinios Kol seems, at first, like an ordinary bureaucrat, inexperienced but eager to prove himself when he begins investigating this bizarre crime. He is given this task not because of any great skill on his part, but because he is an engraver, a magically-enhanced individual who is incapable of forgetting any detail. Once he observes it, Din can perfectly recall the details of any scene, conversation, or other experience.

There’s never a convenient time for murder, but these murders may not only have come at the worst possible time, they may have caused it. The sudden deaths of multiple engineers causes a breach in the empire-encircling wall, the first and main line of defense against the leviathans, and therefore puts the entire empire at risk. Solving this potential case of sabotage is paramount, and Din and his superior Ana race to investigate even as the legions race to enact last-ditch defenses.

The foulmouthed, irrepressible Ana is certainly a Holmesian character in the sense that she is a keen observer and ardent proponent of deductive reasoning—and has a penchant for big reveals. But whereas Sherlock Holmes is devoted to criminology and gets all grumpy and cocaine-y when deprived of murder-puzzles, Ana is not so narrow in her obsessions. She is interested in absolutely everything: the angle of gradation of the road, the mercantile trends of previous centuries, the exact way Din makes tea. Ana wants all available data, and there is some question whether her indiscriminate pursuit of knowledge is actively useful, relatively harmless, or a problematic sign of apophenia.

Pointing toward the problematic are Ana’s ample flaws: she’s profoundly anti-social, hypersensitive to stimuli, and has about as much tact as a drunk toddler. (NB: Geekly Inc. does not condone underage drinking.) In other words, she’s delightful. I love her, and I love her dynamic with the long-suffering Din, who is by turns exasperated and awed by her abilities.

Din, too, is a delight, though it takes a bit longer for his natural reserve to become endearing. He’s an avatar of the plot before he asserts his own idiosyncrasies, perhaps a necessary delay since Bennett crams a lot of detail into this book. There’s a significant cast in terms of both breadth and depth of characters, multiple locations, multiple lines of inquiry, and maybe even multiple perpetrators. It’s a hugely complex undertaking that Bennett works hard to keep contained for us, and he succeeds admirably. Once I had a handle on the world itself, I had no trouble following the complexities and twists.

The prose was at times a bit teeter-tottery, vacillating between a slightly stilted formality circa the 1930s and a modern cadence. It felt like Bennett had absorbed the entire classic mystery genre (especially the Nero Wolfe cannon, according to the afterward) as research, and was veering into it now and then by accident. But it’s a very small thing, really. The mystery carries the narrative swiftly along, as twisting and layered as you could ask for.

With great characters and a breathless narrative pace, I couldn’t help myself from racing through The Tainted Cup in a few short days. I loved being immersed in its fully-realized, intricate world and the nested mysteries that encompassed everything from imperial machinations to intimate moments of connection, and I was despondent when I finished it and had no sequels to jump into (yet!). This is—no surprise—another stellar novel to add to my—and hopefully your—RJB shelf.

What if, Robert Jackson Bennett proposes, Attack on Titan existed with Pacific Rim-esque Kaiju's in place of man-eating Titans? And Sherlock Holmes was also there? Let your imagine run wild with this, and you've basically got the backdrop for RJB's sensational new murder mystery novel. In a world where massive terrifying seabeasts threaten the coasts and humans shelter within concentric walls, buildings are constructed from ferns and vines that poison intruders, and alluring flowers allow for fantastical human augments, RJB unrolls an unexpectedly classic murder mystery in the style of Conan Doyle and Christie.

The world-building is classic RJB, which is to say bar none, packed with detail and style and intrigue. I was especially fascinated by his system of grafts, in which humans known as Sublimes allow themselves to be poisoned in order to develop certain abilities - some seek strength by growing into massive, shambling "Cracklers", while others buy sixty seconds of speed to become incomparable assassins, or "Twitches". My favorite augment was also the most well-developed: our protagonist is an Engraver, someone who uses certain scents to encode and recall information eidetically. As a psychology grad student, I was obsessed with this fun take on a real psychological phenomenon, in which sense of smell is the strongest evoker of memory due to being located very near certain memory centers in the brain.

The characters being great fun was almost a bonus after the ingenuity of the world-building, but RJB has found an incomparable duo in Ana and Din, a pseudo Holmes and Watson, the former being a slightly kooky and utterly infamous investigator, and the latter a wide-eyed everyman thrust into a throughly unfamiliar world through being her assistant. Together, they are fantastic guides to a brilliant work of genre-bending fiction, which will surely evolve into a series worthy of note.

Okay this was not at all what I expected.. With words in the lede like eccentric, magic, sparkling, fantasy, and classic crime novel I was lots of exciting world building and action and early engagement. What I found was none of those things. The writing style just didn't work for me here and I never felt drawn into the story in the way that I wanted to. Ultimately I was unable to finish...

Please, please, please read this! It's just so incredibly fun and engaging. Robert Jackson Bennett crafts such clever stories. And his characters!! How could I come to love our heroes Din and Ana so much in such a short time? Din's voice and perspective guide us through the downright alien empire full of augmentations and monstrous leviathans. Meanwhile, Ana is a genius who's quirks and mysterious past make for a compelling mentor. The whole murder/assassination plot was the perfect spring board. It stayed completely central to the plot but revealed so many other threads that I can see will have their own stories throughout the rest of the series. The magic system was utterly fascinating and unique but also fairly unsettling (at least in terms of body horror.) I read this book in about a day and I didn't want it to end. This one will definitely end up in my top 3 or 5 books read this year.
Thank you so much to Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group/Ballantine/Del Rey for the opportunity to get an early reader copy of this book! It was such a lovely surprise and has gone a long way to getting me out of a minor reading slump I was experiencing.

This definitely sucked me in and I am looking forward to the full series!
Especially since the book does not come out for a long while yet, I'll try to focus just on the vibes and why you should want to pick this up.

<b>What is this book like?:</b>
The most clear and present inspiration is a detective series with a Sherlock/Watson sort of partnership where the Sherlock is manic (but genius) and a bit of a recluse and therefore depends upon the Watson to be their eyes and ears in the world, as well as occasionally ask questions so that the Sherlock can convey their deductions to the reader.

There are elements that reminded me of Scott Wesserfeld's Leviathan series (particularly the name of this series, the large beasts, and the scientific~magical alterations to organic lifeforms) and elements akin to something more like Attack on Titan or even season 2 of Heroes.

As the first book in the series, it certainly seeds suggestions of the great world and its history and corruption and secrets and wonders. But as a Sherlock/Watson based story first and foremost, it focuses on the murder mystery.

<b>The Mystery:</b>
I read a lot of murder mysteries as a child-- so many that I got too good at picking up the clues and solving them from the moment a throwaway detail was mentioned; which made me largely grow bored and give up on the genre. What I liked about this is that it had a series of clues conveyed to the reader that I could conjecture from, but also a lot of instances where the reader doesn't have time to know/unravel... however we get to watch the characters being clever.

And I <i>love</i> to read a character being clever. The way that they're able to observe the scene (giving me more and more world-building details) but also compile a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts is delicious to me.

<b>Characters:</b>
While oftentimes the characters seem over-powered, Bennett has also introduced a number of weaknesses-- some that came up here, some that are seeded to come up in future books to further limit their powers.

I will say that Ana is the weakest character to me. While she curses often and is prone to excitable outbursts, her character was the most incongruous and could use a little further refining to give me a clearer picture of who she is instead of just a larger than life caricature.

<b>The Themes:</b>
This is my third series by Robert Jackson Bennett and especially as we got to the end and more and more things were coming together, I could clearly see that this is the same author. There are details from page 1 that are very similar to his other books, but the themes in particular are ones that come up often in his work. Luckily they're themes that I like! But if it's something you've found you didn't get on with in his past works, I don't think this will be a huge departure.

<b>Overall:</b>
The novel kept my intrigue levels up, gave me lots of suspects and clues, explained a lot of the magic system, started growing my understanding of the Empire, and gave a satisfying resolution to all that had been built up. I was able to visualize the action scenes and a lot of the investigation, and there were a few moments of horrific ick thrown in as well.

Meanwhile there were several scenes that honestly had me laughing out loud and then I'd recount the whole or specific dialogue to my partner. And that, to me, is always a sign of a damn good book.

Now I just need to convince someone else with an arc to read it so I have somebody to talk about it with...

<i>I was granted an ARC by Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine, Del Rey in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.</i>

What struck me most about "The Tainted Cup", was the world that we are immediately thrust into from the very first page. The relationships are quite obviously why we want to stick around, but the odd, strange, relatable world is something that kept me coming back for more. The small details being played to word workers, the looming threats in the distance, the social hierarchies. This is a book that feels like stepping onto an entirely different planet, while also understanding that their problems are problems that we still have right here under our own two feet.

In The Tainted Cup, our narrator, Din, finds himself at the center of a murder investigation, as he assists the eccentric and brilliant Ana Dolabra. The murder in question is particularly gruesome- death by rapidly sprouting tree through the body- and all eyes might have been on the investigation if it weren't for the other problem of encroaching leviathans. Din and Ana travel to the frontlines to investigate similar murders, revealing a bigger conspiracy, using Din's memory enhancement and Ana's remarkable powers of observation.

The Tainted Cup does not sound like the kind of book I would have chosen for myself, though the Holmes and Watson comparison always piques my interest. However, when I had the chance to read the ARC of this book, I found so much to love.

The characters are interesting and unique. All too often, I read a book where characters could be interchangeable and I find it difficult to distinguish between them. That is not the case for the characters in The Tainted Cup. Not only are they clearly distinguishable from each other, but they are also unique among characters from other books (even Watson and Holmes). The mystery itself is compelling and though clues are laid throughout, it takes a particularly astute observer to catch them all. The worldbuilding is seamlessly intertwined with the mystery, laying out the elements that push this story into fantasy without distracting from the mystery at its heart.

A commentary on power, society, and belonging, The Tainted Cup is a great introduction to a new world and (hopefully) long series of mysteries to come. I can't wait to read more.

Din is a newly apprenticed assistant to Ana Dolabra, an investigator with highly eccentric habits. Din has been magicked to have a perfect recall, which he uses to serve his investigator’s eyes and ears out in the world. But when his first job involves a highly unusual murder, even in a world with bio-engineered magic and rampaging Leviathans, Din and Ana are packed up and sent to solve a series of remarkably similar murders. But can they solve it before they’re next?

RJB cheekily described this as A Game of Thrones and Knives Out, which is not untrue. We have a political fantasy with a fair amount of body horror combined with a detective story. There are obviously some Holmes-Watson vibes as well along with Attack on Titan.

I really enjoyed the unusual setting combined with a layered mystery, so much so that I stayed up late to read it. It strikes an unusual but welcome balance where we get a full story arc in this first volume but a really interesting world and cast of characters that obviously have more stories. I honestly can’t wait to read the next.

And that cover– gorgeous!

A delightful and intriguing mystery that keeps expanding and unfolding until the very end. The Tainted Cup is a fun and absorbing read!

It took me a few chapters to really get into it, understand the world and the main characters, and follow along as brilliant detective Ana and her equally brilliant (in different and complementary ways) assistant Din try to solve a murder...and then more murders. The have great (platonic) chemistry and their scenes together are some of the best in the book.

Recommended to anyone looking for an exciting and compelling fantasy/murder mystery mash-up. Thank you very much to Ballantine and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advance copy. I'm already looking forward to the next book in this series.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Murder, bribery, deception, corruption and above all, the comedy that is Ana Dolabra.

In a world where individuals receive alterations to their mind and body to further their careers, we meet Din, an Engraver which means he remembers everything around him, down to every last detail or tone of voice. He is newly an assistant to Ana - an odd genius investigator in the Empire, known for her quirky and abnormal ways of doing things. Imagine Sherlock Holmes in female form. Din is investigating his first murder case and possibly one of the most gruesome he will see, as a tree has sprouted from inside the body of an officer tearing him in pieces extended on the branches. The deeper Ana and Din get into this case, they discover that more may be involved, including those higher up in the Empire.

I’ve read Robert Jackson Bennett previously, and truly enjoy his writing. It is easy to read and Ana as the comedic relief had me audibly laughing throughout the book. The way Ana put together the clues was so much fun to follow, I imagine writing this took a lot of brain power because I was always shocked with all of the reveals and the explanations Ana would give on how she got there. This was such a fun read and may be one of the best books I’ve read this year. I can’t wait for this series to continue!

Thank you NetGalley and Random House Publishing for an ARC of this book!