We’ve reached the fourth book in the Demon Cycle, and I can’t really tell if I’m really enjoying it anymore. It certainly didn’t help that, despite there actually being some moving forward of plot and some deaths of people that actually matter to the book, The Skull Throne felt to me like a bit of a retread of The Daylight War.
It picks up exactly where it left off, after one of our potential delivers threw himself and his rival off a cliff, and while the outcome to that deed may not be what one would normally expect in those circumstances, we then spend the rest of the book dealing with the effects of there being two Deliverer-shaped vacuums in their respective communities (and the book).
We meet another couple of POV characters which doesn’t really add a huge amount to the story (Briar’s main traits seem to be sneaking around and smelling awful, while Ashia is Krasian which basically means that she does exactly the same thing as every other Krasian that we’ve ever met – goes into training and gets her head kicked in every day by her peers until the day she delivers her own smackdown and then becomes the best person at doing whatever it is she does in the world.)
Meanwhile Leesha’s still attempting to hide her pregnancy while boffing Thamos, Rojer is in negotiations to add a third wife to his collection, and Jardir’s sons Jayan and Asome continue to vie for the vacated Skull Throne while their mother tries to retain control.
All of which has resulted in me still wanting to know how the story is going to end, but annoyed at how much it’s dragged getting there.