Maybe it's because I wasn't able to read immediately after the first book....or just because this one didn't stand up to the awesomeness that was book 1, I just didn't enjoy this book as much as Wake of Vultures. Disappointing.

The second novel in the Shadow series.

If you've read the first novel in the series - WAKE OF VULTURES - then you'll have a good idea of what to expect from this fun and engaging series. CONSPIRACY OF RAVENS is a great continuation of Nettie's story, once again coupling the fantastical with a real-world grounding. Good writing, characters, and a good plot. I enjoyed this.

The third and fourth books - MALICE OF CROWS and TREASON OF HAWKS - are also out now, and also recommended.

I loved almost everything about <em>Wake of Vultures</em>, the first book in The Shadow series by Lila Bowen. I loved the protagonist, the world it was set in, and the side characters. With the cliffhanger ending I knew I needed to read the next one as quickly as possible. When I got an early copy of<em> Conspiracy of Ravens</em>, the second book of the series, I was initially ecstatic. So why, then did it sit at a measly 7% read on my kindle for months and months on end?

Because Conspiracy of Ravens in no way holds up to Wake of Vultures.

Before I begin lamenting over a very unsatisfying part two of a story which once was wonderful, let me tell you a bit of the plot.

The story picks up pretty much where the first book left off. Rhett (née Nettie) had transformed into a giant bird of prey, larger than any usual vulture, and is lost among the desert sands with a mind that isn’t entirely her own. With the help of Earl O’Bannon, Rhett gains a better hold over his powers, learns more about himself. In return, he’ll accompany Earl to the Rangers so they can go and take down the man Earl escaped from, a terrifying man who tortures and murders the men building an unmapped railroad.

Before I begin spilling gripe after gripe, lets talk about the this the book did well, shall we?

The one thing that stands out is when Rhett comes to terms with who he is. The prose shifts from the use of feminine pronouns to describe Rhett, who, while externally calling herself Rhett still internally refers to herself as Nettie, to using male pronouns. This distinction marked a change that no beautifully written prose nor any number of paragraphs could hope to achieve. As this was early in the book, I had high hopes. But something wasn’t clicking for me, though I couldn’t see it quite yet.

But I dug back into the book some months later. I liked Earl, one of the side characters introduced in this book. Even if he was snippy and rude at times, I liked him. I understood him. And, towards the end, he was the character I sympathized with and connected with the most. Why? Like me, he couldn’t understand why Rhett was screwing around (literally and figuratively) for the last several hundred pages when his brother and hundreds of others were being worked to death, maimed, and killed at the hands of a literal monster that needed to be destroyed.

This is one of my largest gripes with the book. It isn’t an interesting story. This is a story about walking. The vast majority of the book is Rhett and the others walking or riding to where the action is while getting distracted by what I can only call RPG side quests along the way. One of which wasn’t needed at all, did nothing to further the story, and set up the most convoluted, stupid closing pages I may have ever read.

Speaking of this section, the book does some things that I really can’t stand at all. It touched on a pet peeve I can’t stand, one that’s festered for so long I’m not sure calling it a mere pet peeve is the right words anymore. I have hated the ‘lets make everyone forget the last several chapters with magic because dealing is hard’ thing since I read Silver on the Tree by Susan Cooper when I was about nine years old. Almost twenty years later it’s almost enough to me a drop a book. The entire section was completely unnecessary. Because everyone forgot the events, complicated things are never dealt with. Important turn of events are swept under the rug (because no one remembers them but for Rhett and Dan) and what could possibly lead to decent character development only leads to a convoluted, unnecessary mess.

The other major side quest Rhett rushes off on was, much like the first, also almost completely unnecessary. The only thing that was relevant plot wise was the Deus Ex Machina like magic dust. That’s right, magic dust. It’s completely necessary for the actual plot part of the book (when we finally meander there), it’s never explained, and we never really think about it again. The most disappointing thing about this section is that it could have been a much more poignant moment. There could have been much more than the halfhearted attempt at character development that we got.

Now, I loved the first book. And I loved the first book mostly because of Nettie. I like that Rhett knows himself better. I like that he really has an identity, that he feels more himself, that he understands himself better. What I don’t like (and don’t understand) is the complete personality change. If someone unfamiliar with the series read a passage using Nettie and she pronouns from the first book and a passage using Rhett and male pronouns from the second, I find it hard to believe that they would identify them as passages about the same character. The vast majority of the time Rhett is a complete asshole. Why? I mean, yes, the events of the last book may have been a bit traumatic for him. But Rhett wasn’t the only one to suffer. Surely Winifred, Dan, and Sam have gone through a lot as well. Most of the time Rhett came off as mean, surly, and generally becoming something akin to the men he hated the most in the first book.

As much as Rhett is hard headed and stubborn, he really needed more character growth. Or, at the bare minimum, more consistency with the prior book. At one point Sam, completely frustrated after one of Rhett’s totally unnecessary escapades, asks if Rhett realizes that he can trust them. And I understand Sam’s pain. After everything they’ve gone through, all the times where Rhett did trust them, the times he put his life in their hands, and now he runs off on his own, makes rash decisions with out them and only ever has a ‘I just have, my gut made me do it’ explanation?

The thing I disliked the most about Rhett’s personality flip? All the sleeping around.

First, it doesn’t feel at all consistent with Rhett’s views in the first book. I understand he feels more himself, understands himself better, but that doesn’t mean a sudden and complete flip of his views on love and being comfortable with other people like that make any kind of sense. I do not understand in the slightest how Rhett can claim to love one character and sleep around with two others. I mean, there are only five or so other characters who factor in heavily in the narrative in the first place. At this point Rhett’s been with more of his friends than not.

It just pisses me off. That’s all.

In the end, this book left me bitterly disappointed. I came to hate a character I previously adored. The plot was barely there, instead leaving a slow, rambling mess that didn’t even attempt to make up for the books poor handling of characters. The series could have very easily been tied up neatly at the end of book one – a couple of extra chapters would have been all it took. If you haven’t guessed, I’m not going to be continuing with the series. Not unless a miracle happens. If you don't mind trope-y books or really want to see where this series leads, maybe check this one out. If you don’t like unexplained personality shifts, love triangle (quadrangles?), and lots of book with little plot, do yourself a favor and don’t pick this one up.

Wow. Just … wow. I was so glad to be able to go straight into this after <i>Wake of Vultures</i>. The game changed entirely at the end of that first book – is it still a cliffhanger if the main character jumps off the cliff? And here the times they just keep a–changing. Nettie determines once and for all to shed the parts of her she despises, insofar as she can, and adapts to this whole new part of her which I never saw coming.

Once again, the writing is intimate, gritty, and completely believable. Nettie's – or rather <I>Rhett's</i> loyalties are tested, his abilities are stretched and expanded, and his affections are tested. As if there hadn't been enough changes in his life, the realization that hit him – and hit him hard – at the end of <I>Wake of Vultures</i> turns into the biggest change at all. It leads him to a new friend – or, well, a new companion, anyway, both reluctant mentor and counter-irritant, and to a new quest – there's trouble surrounding a moving camp, laying track across the country – big trouble, and no one to deal with it but Rhett and his companions. So Rhett basically goes undercover to try to start its destruction from the inside.

There is at least as much action as in the first book – probably more, actually – but this is even more character-driven than that first book. Here Rhett has left behind any vestiges of femininity, as though the first shape-shifting burned it away. But he still carries a torch for his friend, and keeps finding himself in strange conjunctions with the sister of his other friend, and like other reviewers I found this a weak spot, a distraction in the plot.

But when all's said and done it's still a truly remarkable bit of world-building and character-building. I look forward to more.

The usual disclaimer: I received this book via Netgalley for review.

I reviewed WAKE OF VULTURES back in December. Click the title to see to the review, but--spoiler--I loved it. I jumped into CONSPIRACY OF RAVENS expecting more of the same, and I got more of the same--yay!--but the much slower version.
Whereas Book 1 was a mile-a-minute thrill ride, Book 2 was a driving-behind-an-old-person not-so-thrilling ride. Book 1 was plot all the way. Book 2 is more of a character-driven story. There is plot, but it plods--literally, through the desert. The first 3/4 of this book is traveling to get to where the action happens, which leads to a lot of planning and explaining and not much doing. The last quarter of the book is fast and exciting, but I had to work to get there. I love the voice in this and still adore Rhett, so I will follow him into Book 3.

If the phrase “weird western” makes your ears perk up, or if you’re interested in reading SF/F featuring a trans character, then Lila Bowen’s The Shadow series is for you. While I didn’t love CONSPIRACY OF RAVENS nearly as much as I loved WAKE OF VULTURES, I still enjoyed the story and I think it provides an important, underrepresented perspective for readers.

The story in CONSPIRACY OF RAVENS picks up right where the first book left off – which was a vicious cliffhanger – with Rhett having just used his magical ability for the first time. A lot of this story focuses on him coming to terms with his destiny as The Shadow, a monster tasked with tracking down other monsters who need killing for one reason or another. It’s some old-school frontier justice, monster style. For Rhett, no matter what he truly wants to do and where he wants to go, his life isn’t his own. There’s a call he needs to answer…even if it means leaving some of his friends behind. But have no fear, fans of the series will be pleased that Sam, Coyote Dan, and Winifred all accompany Rhett on his next mission: taking down a corrupt rail boss who enslaves his workers with magic.

Despite the potential for another fast-paced and action-packed read, much of the plot in CONSPIRACY OF RAVENS is predicated upon a journey from one part of the desert to another. So don’t expect too much in the way of plot-related thrills and chills, because the pacing was rather slow and uneven. During the middle of the book I actually found it difficult to muster much interest in the storyline at all, but I persisted (heh) and things did eventually pick up from there…although admittedly not quite as much as I would’ve liked.

Part of the reason this book is so light on plot is because of the in-depth examination of Rhett as a character, which is an absolutely necessary component of a CONSPIRACY OF RAVENS. Unlike the first book where we read from the perspective of Nettie/Rhett, here Rhett has fully transitioned and is now grappling with the mental and emotional labour that comes along with that. Personally, I think Bowen does a very good job representing how difficult it is for Rhett, especially the cognitive dissonance that comes with the biological issues that FTM trans people may need to deal with. But despite all this, Rhett is empowered to be himself fully now that he’s transitioned and that’s been great to read about.

Rhett’s romantic and sexual relationships are also explored, with considerably less success in my opinion. In one scene, Rhett and another character have sex under the influence of magic and while Rhett remembers it and is pleased, his partner does not remember…and Rhett consciously chooses not to tell them. That’s really messed up. Unfortunately, Rhett’s also extra self-absorbed this time around, and doesn’t think about how his actions (or inaction) will harm the people he ostensibly cares about. I realize that the dude’s seventeen, but come on buddy. You can do better.

Even though I struggled with the slow pacing and some of Rhett’s choices, I still think that this is a strong series and I plan to continue on with it. Here’s hoping that CONSPIRACY OF RAVENS simply had a case of the sophomore slump, and the third book is stronger!

Sorry, the archive date wasn't posted until a week before it was due, I did not have a chance to read.

I gave this book 2.5 stars! So well-written and interesting, but the main character was annoying as hell. I enjoyed the first book enough to pick up the sequel, and while this book was engaging and entertaining enough, I just couldn't deal with Nettie. Plus the romance got a big no for me. I wasn't a fan.