The Laughter of Dead Kings by Elizabeth Peters

This is Elizabeth Peters’s first Vicky Bliss book in I think 14 years. Since I only discovered Peters in 2001/2002 (I forget exactly which) and binged on every book she had written under that name within six months, I haven’t been waiting quite as long as other fans of the series.

Vicky Bliss is an art historian who looks like your stereotypical blonde bombshell. Obviously, she isn’t, and is actually incredibly intelligent, successful, and more than happy to turn people’s preconceived notions on their ears. She also, naturally, has a habit of getting caught up in murders and conspiracies. As one does, when one is the heroine of a mystery series. Usually, she’s accompanied by her boss, Schmidt, who never met a stranger because everyone is his best friend. As a general rule, his sheer force of personality takes care of any objections to this. She’s also accompanied by John Tregarth, her significant other, and an art thief. Among other things.

John has supposedly gone as straight as straight can go in recent years, and is even a respectable businessman. But when King Tut’s mummy is stolen, their old friend, Feisal, “The Inspector of Antiquities for All Upper Egypt,” comes to ask John to please give it back before word gets out, as the theft perfectly mirrors his own schemes. John, of course, claims to have nothing to do with it, and he and Vicky soon set off to prove his innocence.

In many ways, this is Elizabeth Peters-Vicky and otherwise- at her best. An indomitable heroine, amazing dialogue, a fun caper, and exotic locales where she goes out of her way to show respect to the people and culture of said locales. That said, it also shows at times that Peters hasn’t written a “modern” book since the mid-90s. It’s a minor thing, but in the first half, I almost wanted to start a drinking game over how many times it was mentioned that a character texted another, or was ignoring a text.

This, however, is a minor complaint, and in no way diminishes the overall enjoyability of the book. I’m not sure how well the book would hold up without having read the other Vicky Bliss books, but I think it would stand on it’s own pretty decently.

( spoilers )

A Taste of Crimson by Marjorie M. Liu

This is the second book in the multi-author Crimson City series. I’ve read the first, but I think you can read this one ok without it. While Liz Maverick’s Crimson City focused on the vampires of the city, Liu’s book focuses on the werewolves.

Keeli “Mad Dog” Maddox is the granddaughter and heir apparent of the Grand Dame Alpha of one of the city’s most powerful werewolf clans, but prefers to work as a waitress in a human restaurant. When she sees a woman attacked by a gang of humans, she saves the woman, but is stopped from killing one of the humans by Michael, a vampire called the Ventix who hunts his own kind when they break the law. Any werewolf who attacks humans is supposed to do jailtime, but Michael put in a good word for her, and she’s allowed out on bail the next morning, provided she helps Michael find a serial killer who appears to be a werewolf, and has been killing vampires.

Liu seems to like to do some partial reversals in typical traits for heroes and heroines, and this is no exception. Keeli is the violent one with anger management problems, and Michael the one who has to keep calming her down. And while it may just be a coincidence of the first two books, I can’t help but notice that the series seems to be systematically putting the heroines in charge of the city’s various factions. Both books are also big on the “ZOMG! Our love is forbidden because our people kinda hate each other!” though that may also be coincidence. As both pulled it off well, I’m not complaining. Since this is Liu, there’s lots of plotting and factions and conspiracies, but since it’s a multi-author series, it’s a little more controlled. I’m not comfortable, though, with the racial allegory that seems to be in the series (vampires are the rich white people, werewolves are the downtrodden minorities, complete with segregation laws that claim not to be, but everyone knows that they are) but that seems to be the norm for most worlds with a focus on vampires and werewolves.