29. Garment of Shadows

By:  Laurie L. King
Rated 4 1/2 Stars
Audio Book
Read by Jenny Stelin and some other dude*

I complained last time when she wrote the Pirate book, can't even remember the name of it now, and wrote a rather snippy review and posted it on both amazon and audible about how I thought it was all fluff and no bite.

Well folks, I guess the old adage "be careful what you wish for" is true because this one is certainly full of edges.  There is certainly a lot more Holmes in this one but the readers who are hoping for a heating up of the relationship between Holmes and Russell are still going to be disappointed.  Holmes does not wear his heart on his sleeve and neither does he allow readers to rummage through his private feelings to see if he has any.  If he does they are definitely private.  Actually I love this about him.  It's so true to the Holmes Canon.

Anyway, the book had so many edges, some of them convoluted  that it took me until the end of the book to really figure out was really going on and then I wasn't exactly sure I approved of them.  I got a real dose of middle eastern politics during 1924 and that helped me get a handle on some of what was going on.

I am going to give this book 4 1/2 stars in my journal not because I am downgrading the book it's self but because I'm not exactly sure that Holmes, Russell and the Hazar brothers should have been involved in this kind of "game".  Just me probably.

ps:  They have added some guy to read the Holmes voice!  What's with that?  This is the 12th book in the series for heaven's sake.  We don't need someone coming in and being a different voice for Holmes at this late date.  Bad idea whoever it was that had it.

Publisher Summary

Laurie R. King’s New York Times bestselling novels of suspense featuring Mary Russell and her husband, Sherlock Holmes, comprise one of today’s most acclaimed mystery series. Now, in their newest and most thrilling adventure, the couple is separated by a shocking circumstance in a perilous part of the world, each racing against time to prevent an explosive catastrophe that could clothe them both in shrouds. In a strange room in Morocco, Mary Russell is trying to solve a pressing mystery: Who am I? She has awakened with shadows in her mind, blood on her hands, and soldiers pounding on the door. Out in the hivelike streets, she discovers herself strangely adept in the skills of the underworld, escaping through alleys and rooftops, picking pockets and locks. She is clothed like a man, and armed only with her wits and a scrap of paper containing a mysterious Arabic phrase. Overhead, warplanes pass ominously north. Meanwhile, Holmes is pulled by two old friends and a distant relation into the growing war between France, Spain, and the Rif Revolt led by Emir Abd el-Krim—who may be a Robin Hood or a power mad tribesman. The shadows of war are drawing over the ancient city of Fez, and Holmes badly wants the wisdom and courage of his wife, whom he’s learned, to his horror, has gone missing. As Holmes searches for her, and Russell searches for herself, each tries to crack deadly parallel puzzles before it’s too late for them, for Africa, and for the peace of Europe. With the dazzling mix of period detail and contemporary pace that is her hallmark, Laurie R. King continues the stunningly suspenseful series that Lee Child called “the most sustained feat of imagination in mystery fiction today.”