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aliencatl0rd's review against another edition
3.0
Unfortunately this piece was not as entertaining as Rice's other works and is clearly influenced by her reintroduction to Christianity. However her style and eloquence remains strong so it's definitely worth a read if you're a fan of Rice or interested in Christian fiction.
erin_oriordan_is_reading_again's review against another edition
4.0
Even though this book is Anne Rice's return to the supernatural after her two Christ the Lord novels, and contains her signature attention to historical detail and passionate love of music and the arts, it reads more quickly - almost breezily - than her pre-Christ the Lord novels. Thematically, it's sort of a combination between the Jesus books (focusing on angels and a spiritual transformation) and [b:Violin|31333|Violin|Anne Rice|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1194197599s/31333.jpg|2925978]. Rice doesn't satisfactorily explain why things that happened in the past would still need resolution, but bear with this book. The attractive, blond hero, Toby O'Dare - an accomplished hitman when readers first meet him - is something like Lestat if he weren't already beyond redemption.
the_sassy_bookworm's review against another edition
3.0
I think I can safely say Anne Rice is one of my favorite authors of all time. The vampires, the witches...I read everything she wrote and loved it all. Then she found Religion, or God, doesn't matter. Bye bye went anything occult and in came God and the angels. This book was just OK for me, I don't think her novels since the conversion have had the same intensity, they have lost something in my opinion and that is a real shame. I enjoyed this one enough that I will check out the next in the series, but it is not anywhere near as good as her previous works. :(
sahdays's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Slow start amazing finish
tddonoso's review against another edition
3.0
It could have been better. The history of Meir and Fluria though it is interesting it makes the book slow down way too much. A great end, anyway.
skconaghan's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
informative
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
This dragged at times into religious discourse, though was painted as internal philosophising. Legit, as I’m sure it reflects much of the author’s own journey.
The assassin’s story is far from thrilling or suspenseful, and the really engaging material takes place during the time travel assignment. But this doesn’t last long.
I was expecting more of the suspense and drama offered in Rice’s previous repertoire, but it seems she lost her edge—or at least was not encouraged to let it show—with these religiously themed works. Shame.
Overall, a quick read and highly informative, if not rivetingly entertaining.
llkendrick's review against another edition
2.0
I was really excited to get this book because I was a big fan of Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles (Interview with the Vampire, etc). Recently Anne "found Jesus" and so she's writing a series about angels. The summary of the book sounded quite intriguing but for someone reason I just could not get into it. I'm afraid that I didn't even finish the book, which is really rare for me (I got about half-way through). It wasn't badly written, but I just wasn't taken in right away and because I have such a huge stack of books to read I was thinking of those instead. Anne, it's not you it's me.
If anyone else has read it, let me know how it ends! =)
If anyone else has read it, let me know how it ends! =)
eluse9's review against another edition
3.0
Certainly not her best. I got a little bored. Someone could easily edit this down to about half the page count and not loose a thing. The historical flashback story was interesting as per usual Rice
venusv's review against another edition
1.0
"These are the songs of earth, I thought, quiet consciously. And they are filled with sadness and need and worship and reverence, and awe."
Oh, man. This was bad, like, BAD BAD. I honestly feel extremely guilty that this was my first Anne Rice book because that was... truly terrible. For over eight hours I sat through the religious nonsense hoping an actual story would take form, but.... NOPE.
There are two parts of this book:
1. Toby's boring and grueling backstory. How he became an assassin, how he gets hard any time a lute is mentioned, etc. Someone needs to tell him that playing the lute and wanting to be a Dominican Friar isn't a personality trait. Should've joined a LARPing group instead of playing badass assassin. (Which is super unbelievable, by the way. Picturing Toby murdering innocents and not so innocents is laughable, he's soft af.)
2. WATCH OUT! ANGEL TIMEEEEEEE!!!!! Yeah, this guy goes back in time to the Middle Ages with the help of an angel and lives out his dream of being a Dominican Friar while helping some people with their issues I could not care less about. Some Christian / Jewish twin conflict that apparently Toby relates to his real life leaving us on a cliffhanger for the next book in the series... which, spoiler alert, I won't ever be reading.
All around not a great time. I fell asleep twice while listening to the audiobook because nothing ever exciting happened. Just boring Toby being boring and talking about his lute and being happy about going back in time. I'm actually going to rate this one a 1.5 stars simply because the guy who did the audiobook has a nice voice.
Can't help but think Anne Rice wrote this to mirror her own struggles with finding Christianity again after being an atheist for so long. Which is totally fine, but this was not the way to do it. I'm just going to pretend Toby had a psychotic break and go about my day.
Oh, man. This was bad, like, BAD BAD. I honestly feel extremely guilty that this was my first Anne Rice book because that was... truly terrible. For over eight hours I sat through the religious nonsense hoping an actual story would take form, but.... NOPE.
There are two parts of this book:
1. Toby's boring and grueling backstory. How he became an assassin, how he gets hard any time a lute is mentioned, etc. Someone needs to tell him that playing the lute and wanting to be a Dominican Friar isn't a personality trait. Should've joined a LARPing group instead of playing badass assassin. (Which is super unbelievable, by the way. Picturing Toby murdering innocents and not so innocents is laughable, he's soft af.)
2. WATCH OUT! ANGEL TIMEEEEEEE!!!!! Yeah, this guy goes back in time to the Middle Ages with the help of an angel and lives out his dream of being a Dominican Friar while helping some people with their issues I could not care less about. Some Christian / Jewish twin conflict that apparently Toby relates to his real life leaving us on a cliffhanger for the next book in the series... which, spoiler alert, I won't ever be reading.
All around not a great time. I fell asleep twice while listening to the audiobook because nothing ever exciting happened. Just boring Toby being boring and talking about his lute and being happy about going back in time. I'm actually going to rate this one a 1.5 stars simply because the guy who did the audiobook has a nice voice.
Can't help but think Anne Rice wrote this to mirror her own struggles with finding Christianity again after being an atheist for so long. Which is totally fine, but this was not the way to do it. I'm just going to pretend Toby had a psychotic break and go about my day.
stephrenaud's review against another edition
1.0
Didn't bother finishing it - it had all the tedium of her other novels with none of the spark to make it worthwhile. Don't think I'll be reading Anne Rice again.