Tuesday 27 January 2015

Review: The Mime Order by Samantha Shannon


The Mime Order by Samantha Shannon
(The Bone Season #2)

Published: 27th January 2015
Genres: Fantasy, Science Fiction, Young Adult


Paige Mahoney has escaped the brutal prison camp of Sheol I, but her problems have only just begun: many of the survivors are missing and she is the most wanted person in London...

As Scion turns its all-seeing eye on the dreamwalker, the mime-lords and mime-queens of the city's gangs are invited to a rare meeting of the Unnatural Assembly. Jaxon Hall and his Seven Seals prepare to take centre stage, but there are bitter fault lines running through the clairvoyant community and dark secrets around every corner. Then the Rephaim begin crawling out from the shadows. But where is Warden? Paige must keep moving, from Seven Dials to Grub Street to the secret catacombs of Camden, until the fate of the underworld can be decided.



My Thoughts


I read & loved The Bone Season the first book in this series with my reading group last year. The verdict of the group was those that got to the end absolutely loved it but a few didn't even make it half way through. I totally got that at the time as the first book did take a while to get into, I remember being at 50% on my Kindle before I actually thought here we go. The trouble with The Bone Season is that Samantha Shannon is introducing us to a whole other world, a London & Oxford not as we know it & in order to do so there was a lot of scene setting & explanations so I would urge anyone who gave up with The Bone Season try again it will be worth it.

I was really pleased to be approved on NetGalley by Bloomsbury for an early copy of book two in the series The Mime Order, excited to be able to go back into Paige Mahoney's world again & to see what happened to her after she fled Sheol I. We are immediately thrown into the story with the survivors of the penal colony escape on a train back to London. Some are caught & some make their way undetected into London's underworld. Paige ends up back with her mime-lord Jaxon Hall & his Seven Seals but she has a price upon her head and is desperate to work out how to rise up against the Rephaim. The biggest question of all is what has happened to the Warden?

This book is really hard for me to review without giving away any spoilers and because it was really just so totally awesome so I am going to keep it short. Samantha Shannon has you hooked right from the start, with The Bone Season it was all about setting the scene but with The Mime Order we are propelled into a storm that is brewing in the underworld and with Paige not knowing who she can trust. 

The Mime Order is well paced, well plotted & full of action, Shannon was able to draw me into Paige's fictional world and when I got to the end of the book I wasn't quite ready to leave. I can't remember the last time I was so desperate to get to the end of a book to see what happens, at times I was holding my breath especially as the book neared it's conclusion with a bloody battle to the death.

Paige's character really develops in this book and we see just what a fighter she has become having had her eyes opened to her true potential as a dreamwalker. She has so many different sides to her and I am so looking forward to continuing her journey. And what can I say about the Warden? I just love the Warden and there is just something so endearing about his relationship with Paige. We are left with a major cliffhanger right at the end of the book that I guess I should have anticipated but it caught me totally off guard.

I love the use of so many interesting and intriguing secondary characters they really helped to build a fantastic picture and understanding of gangs & cohorts that make up London. As I am from London I also get a little bit of a kick out of seeing places I know & recognise mentioned and how they are portrayed in the story. I really am in total awe of Samantha Shannon's writing skills and her ability to create such a complex world out of somewhere that is so close to home. 

The Mime Order was both an exhilarating & consuming read, I was absorbed from start to finish, fighting sleep and being late for work just so I could get to the end us quickly as a possible. I will now be eagerly awaiting book 3 in the series and forming my own opinions on who should play who in the film franchise. This book gets a massive 5 stars from me & is a must for all fantasy fans. I urge you to add it to your to read piles, in fact I urge you to read it straight away only after reading The Bone Season of course.

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