The Darksteel Eye

by Jess Lebow

Reviewed by Coral

This book starts with Glissa, Slobad, Bosh and Bruenna fleeing the Vedelken by running straight into Memnarch's underground lair. Um, okay. A new form of running away I've never heard of. I mean, this is the Memnarch who's been trying to capture Glissa, right? Right. But this completely stupid move works for them because, of course, Memnarch's troops are horrifically incompetent, as all bad guys are.

Memnarch, we learn, is becoming fleshy and more than a little bit insane as a result of the infection from way back in the first few pages of The Moons of Mirrodin. Also, the infection has spread to Mirrodin itself. But Memnarch has a plan to cure everything. Glissa is, somehow, key to this whole plan.

Glissa continues to bring death everywhere she runs to; an old and tired plot device, designed to make you feel sorry for the character in question. Doesn't work for me. Anyways, she's now chasing after a magical artifact the Trolls only now tell her about - she's just proved herself worthy, you see. I see it as just another tired plot device, used by the second author in a series like this to escape the constraints placed upon them by the first author.

I find I'm less willing to forgive the second book in the series. The first book, I try to give some leeway to. It has to introduce the characters, set up some of the back-story and get you moving into the plot. But the second book, of a trilogy at least, should be hitting its stride, building up to the big conclusion of the last book. This book just didn't feel like that.

I mean, sure the plot moves along, but it's bogged down by the constantly quarreling bad guys, bad guys protected by indestructible armor who are still knocked over as easily as pylons in a harsh wind, Glissa and Slobad running beside Bosh in the middle of a desperate escape attempt, when having Bosh carry them would have been so much quicker, and characters who, for no apparent reason, change their whole life's philosophy because of Glissa.

This is not a series hitting its stride. This is a book missing its mark.

Grade: D