Monday 17 March 2014

Magic Study by Maria V. Snyder


Last year I read Snyder's Poison Study, the story of a young woman given a reprieve from a death sentence in order to become a food taster.  I thought it was a well written lighter fantasy novel with good world building, an interesting plot and a romance that didn't dominate the whole book.  Therefore I was keen to pick up the second book in the trilogy, Magic Study, but unfortunately it was a bit of a let down.

At the start of Magic Study, Yelena is taken to meet her family in Sitia, where magic is still valued, and she can be guided to develop her potential.  But meeting her family isn't all she imagined it to be; Yelena struggles to feel a connection with the unfamiliar lifestyle of her parents and her brother is outwardly resentful and hostile.  Even though her life in Ixia was fraught with danger, she starts to miss the comfort of a structured and ordered society, in which all of the rules are clear. When she journeys to the citadel to be taught magic, her feelings of disconnection grow.  To make matters worse, a rogue magician starts capturing and torturing young women with magic skill, and Yelena is drawn into the attempt to stop him.

Ultimately, I didn't enjoy Magic Study, especially compared to Poison Study.  The main character, Yelena, had seemed to become a completely different person.  In Poison Study she was somewhat headstrong and reckless, but her actions were always thought through.  In Magic Study, she seems to delight in blundering from one horrible situation to another, sometimes on purpose, never thinking about what she is doing.  Most of the book is taken up with her either moping around missing Ixia (where they want to kill her!) or recklessly plunging head-first into a dangerous situation despite her being warned against doing so by every single responsible person in the novel, including a talking horse!  There's a lot of her being kidnapped and then miraculously using her magic to escape, which felt convenient and like lazy plotting.  I was also uncomfortable with the way that rape and rape threats were used in the novel.

Unforutunately, Yelena wasn't the only character who had become a completely different person.  Valek, her love interest from the first novel, and the master of spies in Ixia, is now basically reduced to being a love-sick puppy.  In the first novel, he is morally ambiguous, cold and calculating, but in Magic Study, all this has gone and it seems like the only thing he cares about is Yelena, which is completely out of character.  I found this frustrating and annoying, as why go to all the trouble of developing a more complicated relationship if you are only going to simplify it in this way in the sequel?

As you can tell, I wasn't a fan of Magic Study. I will say that it was easy to read and contained some interesting action sequences, but this wasn't enough to redeem it for me.  I definitely won't be continuing on with the trilogy.

Source: Personal copy
First Published: 2006
Score: 2 out of 5

11 comments:

  1. Well, they say that we do become a different person every ten years or so, so maybe they were all on the cusp? ;-)

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  2. I haven't read either of these books, but definitely hate when characters become unrecognizable from one book to the next -- I'm all for growth and change, but it's definitely no fun when they take a big step backwards and act completely out of character :( I certainly don't *need* any more series to read though, so sometimes it's good to rule a few out, lol

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    1. I hate leaving a series unfinished, but don't think I will be able to finish this one...

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  3. Yep, I had the same experience with this. I got frustrated as well with how Yelena was the specialest of flowers and just picked up everything super fast with near-magical speed and accuracy. I didn't finish the trilogy either.

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    1. Yelena is a specialist at everything apart from common sense!

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  4. I kept hearing the same thing about Magic Study, so as much as I enjoyed Poison Study, I heeded the warnings I heard and haven't tried the later books. Such a shame, since it was a promising start.

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    1. Unfortunately, I didn't hear any warnings. I think you did the right thing stopping at Poison Study.

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  5. Oh, what a disappointment! I know many who adore Poison Study, so maybe I'll just read it and stop there.

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    1. Poison Study was a good, light read. Just make sure you stop there!

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  6. I read Poison Study, too, and wasn't excited enough about it to continue on. Glad to know I'm not really missing out! It was interesting to hear about the character Yelena, because I was kind of curious about what would happen to her.

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