The White Road

I fell in love with this series because of Alec and Seregil's swashbuckling antics. I adored the thievery, the spying, the disguises, and of course, the romantic tension. I felt I lost some of that in the previous book, Shadows Return. The White Road was exactly what I wanted, yet nothing what I expected. I blazed through this book during a weekend family vacation. Every moment was full of tension. There were enemies at every turn. Of course, there were plenty of laughs and cuteness to go around. I finally fell in love with Sebrahn, who confused and annoyed me in the previous book. Not only that, but I have an obsession with owls, and there prevalence in the book made me squeal to exhaustion. Fans of the series will be delighted. It is different from her previous books, but it definitely has that Flewelling flavor. It is a short read, but not dissatisfying. I couldn't ask for anything more.

The White Road returns to the feel of Luck in the Shadows, the first book in the Nightrunner series. It still has the dark tinge and bitter aftertaste that colored Shadows Return (the previous installment and book four in the series), but with more of the skulduggery and and outright shenanigans that made the first book so memorable. This is the perfect blend of the both, a series that is maturing as it goes, growing and adding something new to both characters and setting with each page turned. Ms Flewelling's prose is beautiful, as always. She has a way with words that pulls you through every scintillating description and quirky exchange. There is a real life to her books that makes you care about the characters, no matter how minor. The world is rich and believable, and the cultures that people it are unique. Her two protagonists are endearing and infuriating, all at once, and it is wonderful. Action, angst, adventure, and betrayal. This series has it all. If you have not, pick up a copy of Luck in the Shadows (and you might as well snag book two and three while you are at it. Trust me.) If you are already familiar with the Nightrunner books, do yourself a favor and pick up The White Road.

White Road is the fifth in the Nightrunner series. Like the others of the series, it's well-written and tastefully done. It's been a little while since I read the rest of the series, but I found White Road easy to jump back into. The beginning was a bit rocky, I think, but it quickly (within a chapter or two) redeemed itself. Most of the difficulty was simply that there is little "recap" of previous books, but I found myself remembering everything as the pages blew by. Seregil and Alec are great characters who continue to develop and face new struggles. This book, in particular, has Alec wrestling with a very difficult choice (which I won't get into, because it will spoil part of the story!). One of my favorite things about this series is how Flewelling ties elements of her universe together; Nightrunner flows very well with the Tamir trilogy, and the history of the world is nicely packaged. As I read this book, I felt as if I really understood the geography of the lands the characters travel through and had a firm grasp of the customs of various people groups. In short, the Nightrunner books continue to be excellent, and I highly recommend them.

I agree with the others who have reviewed White Road so far that this felt much more like a Nightrunner book that Shadows Return did. I was so happy to see Shadows Return after the break that Flewelling took from her Nightrunner series that I gave it a lot of leeway in terms of it's weaknesses and White Road proves me right in my faith to the series. Flewelling once again brings her beloved characters to life and picks up the pace in terms of actions, plotting, twists and turns. I enjoyed the new characters she introduced us to, though I hope that there will be a sixth book to take us back to some of our old favorites such as Theo, Klia and Becca. In that respect I don't mind that Alec and Seregil have come full circle and are back in their proper home as I believe there are a lot of questions still to be answered in Skala. The partnership between Alec and Seregil has been a joy to read about from the beginning with Luck in the Shadows to now with White Road, they definitely make a well balanced pair and it was lovely to see them working together again in White Road.

The fifth novel in the Nightrunner series picks up right where Shadows Return left off, with spies and lovers Seregil and Alec narrowly escaped from slavery and wondering what to do with Sebrahn, the strange and magical creature they've acquired. As the satisfyingly smaller and more closely spaced print compared to Shadows Return suggests, this is a longer and wider story, and it improves on several aspects of the (for the most part excellent) Nightrunner books. It's fast-paced, always suspenseful, and never weighed down by exposition as occasionally happened at the beginning of the series, but the rapid pace of the story is balanced by quiet moments and humor, and especially by brief but lovely and evocative descriptions of nature that bring the mountains and rocky coastlines where much of the story takes place to life. It's clear that Flewelling has a deep and close appreciation of the natural world. The scope of the story is considerably wider than Shadows Return, both in physical location and in character, and this gives the book a richness that the close quarters of Shadows Return didn't always allow. The new characters are a particular strength; every one is complex and well-drawn, with understandable and conflicting motivations. This is a story of shades of grey, not the good and evil duality of Stalking Darkness or Shadows Return. It's probably inevitable that the fifth book in a series featuring well-established characters doesn't spend as much time on character development as the earlier books, and anyone who hasn't read the first three books will definitely be missing out on that. But the White Road is ultimately a story about love, family, and sacrifice, and as such I think it has enough emotional resonance to offer opportunities for even the now well-established characters of our heroes to evolve. Alec must decide what matters most and what kind of life he wants and needs, and Seregil, while as clever and irreverent as ever, also seems to have grown a bit more philosophical, perhaps even with some new consideration for fate. And although it's usually in the background, perhaps more so than in the previous books, it's really the strong undercurrent of their love that holds the story together.