Some time after Ratha made peace with the face-tail hunter tribe, she's still finding it difficult to live along these felines that are so different. When one of True-of-voice's sons breaks free from the tribe with some bachelor males and starts wreaking havoc among the Named, Ratha must now lead her clan to victory against this New Singer.
Oh dear. Yeah, okay, so the first two thirds of this book were good. About on par with book four, worth four stars. But then...came the last third. Fucking yikes, man. Okay, let's break this down.
Oh dear. Yeah, okay, so the first two thirds of this book were good. About on par with book four, worth four stars. But then...came the last third. Fucking yikes, man. Okay, let's break this down.
The first two thirds are, like said above, pretty much a direct continuation from book four. Ratha and the Named are carefully making peaceful relations with the hunter tribe, True-of-voice doesn't truly understand them but appreciates them all the same, standard fare. But when New Singer enters the picture, that's where everything goes downhill.
First of all, he comes right the fuck out of nowhere. We didn't even know True-of-voice had any sons, yet when New Singer is introduced they're suddenly like "Oh, he's a son of True". Where did this come from? He wasn't ever mentioned until he became plot-relevant. This isn't like how Bell usually does things, establishing something books ahead of it becoming relevant (Thistle's shattered relationship with Ratha, Ratha's creature having an unforeseen impact on the lives of the Named). It's like she invented New Singer on the spot when the book needed a final conflict, because despite how good the rest was, there wasn't really much intense action since book three.
So what does this New Singer do? He takes the bachelor males of the face-tail hunters and establishes his own tribe. Okay, that's fine. They wreak some havoc among the Named. That can happen, he's young and inexperienced, after all. Then they launch an assault on the Named and try to kill their cubs. Okay, yikes. Then they kidnap all the females in breeding season in order to mate with them because they don't have any females of their own. What. The. Fuck.
The Named books so far have had a more mature tone than average animal xenofiction, yes, but I wasn't at all prepared for the horror that is this en-masse would-be rape of literally all females of age of our Named tribe. What makes things worse is that, due to instincts, the females even end up being somewhat into the idea of mating with these males, while they're desperately trying to fight these urges because they know they really don't want to. Even young, scarred Thistle isn't spared this almost-threatment.
In case you didn't pick up on it yet, the Named books so far have had a very strong theme of feminism. Females are just as capable as males, strong female protagonist who happens to be leader, etc. Then there's this absolutely insulting last third of this book where all of them are rendered helpless and into the idea of being taken advantage of by these hunter males due to instincts. Do they end up saving themselves, to at least stay true to the theme of feminism and capable females? Nope, literally all the Named males have to come and rescue them by sending a stampede of herd animals their way.
I'm just at a loss for words for how absolutely fucked up and insulting this ending is. Not just because of the concept itself, but also because how it actively goes against one of the main themes of this series. And then in the end Ratha is still willing to let her clan live alongside the bachelor males after they rejoin True-of-voice's tribe and forgives them? Look, I know things are definitely deep with them not being fully conscious, but there's a line you can draw that should not be crossed. The hunter males are also not like the witless Unnamed. They may be intelligent differently, but they still understand to a certain extent, and Ratha doesn't even try to go to them and be like "Hey, what you just did was incredibly fucked up". She just forgives and moves on, which is said to be her titular courage by the end. Honestly, this last third of this book makes me so unreasonably angry.
Okay, I'm going to try to calm down here to talk about the rest of the book. The first two thirds like I said were good. A bit dragging again, with the constant discussions about whether True's tribe should be taken care of or not, but at least it was less slow and uneventful than in book four. I also liked some of the characters, still. Ratha is great, Thistle is great, I appreciate Thakur, Fessran is great, and, heck, even Mishanti finally gets some pagetime like he should've gotten last book.
I did also, much like with the last book, spot at least one typo in this one.
We're also introduced to another one of Ratha's children, Night-who-eats-stars, who does some fucked up shit but ends up somewhat redeeming himself by the end. I honestly didn't care for this character, I'd much rather spend more time with Thistle if we needed to have more time with Ratha-offspring.
But that's just all I can give this book. Two parts decent, one part all sorts of fucked up and lazily written. I want to give this one star more than anything, but that just wouldn't be fair mathematically, since the rest was good enough. So, albeit reluctantly, I'll give this two. However, I still do not recommend it in the slightest. You're better off having stopped reading at book four. I wish I could unread this book.
But that's just all I can give this book. Two parts decent, one part all sorts of fucked up and lazily written. I want to give this one star more than anything, but that just wouldn't be fair mathematically, since the rest was good enough. So, albeit reluctantly, I'll give this two. However, I still do not recommend it in the slightest. You're better off having stopped reading at book four. I wish I could unread this book.
Rating: 2/5
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