Gallery of Mothers by J S Latshaw

 

This novel follows on a few years after the events of The Threat Below – you can find a review of that further down the blog. Icelyn has been living in the ruins of a city of the Apriori with her Anaghwin followers and has taken up the position as their God. When the whole of mountaintop faces a fertility crisis caused by the poisoning of their water supply by the Croathus in the first book, Adorane sets out to find her in hopes that as she has not drank from the contaminated supply she will be able to find a mate similarly unaffected and carry on the lineage of Mountaintop.

There is a discernible tension between Adorane and Icelyn when they reunite which I really disliked but I do admire the author for acknowledging the hurt they put each other through and that the passage of time does not always numb those wounds. I also felt a bit uncomfortable with how the people of Mountaintop reacted to Icelyn when she visited them but that again is appropriate for such a cloistered and judgemental community.

We get to see several flashbacks from various perspectives including Sean Brathius, Amperous and Omathis, all of which really helped to grow our understanding of these characters as well as why the Croathus chose to try and exterminate the humans in the way they did. These sections also helped to answer a lot of questions I had about Shai and the role she had to play in the creation of the Croathus.

What I felt was a really nice touch was how the characters we are following in the present are the direct descendants of the characters we are following in the flashbacks; this may have been something which was obvious in the first book but I just never picked up on it.

Latshaws writing style is the same throughout both books and there is plenty of action and drama to keep you hooked throughout. I especially enjoyed the ending of the book and am hoping he’s gearing up to write a third!


Comments