Please consider yourself warned.
Still with me? OK...
I wasn't 100% sure what book I was going to read next. The bookshelf supplied me with book three in the Sister Fidelma mystery series by Peter Tremayne, "Suffer Little Children", which took me 8 days to read. I was looking forward to reading a relatively light Celtic mystery with murderous monks and nuns, full of neat little historical notes, with a heavy dose of Irish flavour. I was not expecting the medieval equivalent of Sandy Hook. Literally, 20 small children and 4 adults. Just unlucky timing on my part. If I had read the book a year or two ago I would still have been sad, but it probably wouldn't have resulted in me wanting to 'put the book in the freezer', if you know what I mean. I rarely cry over books but, yeah, this one got me bawling. Absolutely heart wrenching. Here's me returning to genre fiction to escape, and Fidelma gives me a sucker punch to the gut. Ugh.
I was already slightly irritated by this novel. This is the first novel in the series that is set in Ireland (book one is in England, book two in Rome) and Tremayne takes advantage of the locale to introduce the use of the Irish language, which is fantastic. I love Irish, it's a gorgeous language. My problem with it's use in this novel is that whenever a character uses an Irish term in conversation with another Irish speaker they follow it up with an explanation! I can accept the 'term, definition' style in non-dialogue narrative, but within dialogue it's ridiculous. No one talks like that! There's a list of character names and descriptions, and a historical note (although my copy seems to have been printed without the noted map, which was also annoying) so there should be no issue with adding footnotes or a glossary if a character uses a non-English word. I would prefer to be flipping pages than dealing with clunky, fake dialogue. It takes me right out of the story.
I complain, but I did enjoy this novel. For one thing, the mystery itself did not disappoint. This series is great for political and religious intrigue, in addition to the regular human foibles which can supply motive. I did figure out who the killer was before the reveal, which was cool for me. I never actually try to 'solve' the mystery, I rather enjoy that 'aha!' moment when the detective reveals the identity of the murderer, but in this case it did pick my spirits up a bit. So it has that going for it. Also, I really enjoy the historical aspects of the stories. Fidelma's Ireland is a place of equality for women, and a place of great scholarship. Tremayne is the pseudonym of Celtic historian Peter Berresford Ellis, so all the historical laws and details are accurate. It really adds a lovely depth to the story. I just wish the story didn't include children being hacked to death.
Moving on. My next read is one I've been looking forward to for nearly a year, Caitlin Kittredge's "The Iron Thorn", the first novel in her Iron Codex young adult / alternative history / steam punk series. The third volume is due out on February 12th, so I think maybe a marathon read is in order! I'm expecting darkness from this series, but hopefully no scenes involve the mass murder of children. I'm so over that.
Happy reading!
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