Burn me deadly by

14 May 2010


Call no:
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Burn me deadly - Alex Bledsoe

ISBN: 9780765322210 Author’s site ; Extract
An Eddie LaCrosse novel #2

The blonde dashed out of the darkness into the moonlight, right in front of me.

This book takes place around a year, maybe more I can’t recall, after the first one, The sword-edged blonde and since then Eddie and Liz have become a couple. Apart from that nothing much has changed for Eddie. He is still a sword-jockey for hire, and returning one night from a job he almost runs over a blonde woman who is about to mess up his life.

Like the first book this is a good fun read. Quick and with flashes of humour it would fit within the noir/detective genre pretty well apart from the fact that it is set in a fantasy world, in a medieval, of sorts, culture. While looking for reviews of the last book to link to I noticed that a few people seemed to be thrown by the names used; Eddie, Liz, Nicky etc., they aren’t exactly the usual for fantasy fiction. And also the modern-feeling dialogue didn’t suit everyone’s taste. I liked it. While I’m not sure about a hero called Eddie I can handle that, and I liked the pretty realistic-modern attitudes of the characters. Sure it might not be totally authentic for medieval times, but this isn’t an historical novel, it is fantasy fiction crossed with a hardboiled detective story. And it works.

But just as in the first book all the women in Eddie’s life exist only because of how they affect him. And many end up dead, purely because that will provide impetus to the story. On the one hand it is understandable, the story is from Eddie’s POV. And of course he would react to the deaths of people close to him. But at the same time it does seem a little like none of them are characters in their own right. They exist to provide Eddie with something to do and feel.

the same kind of man who let his childhood sweetheart be raped and murdered in front of him because he wasn’t strong enough to defend her … The soft flesh she’d entrusted to me was now being obscenely used by strangers mere yards away, and hands touched her and threatened to carve her up and did carve her up right in front of me.

But maybe I’m being too harsh, it could very easily be an attitude to guilt and self-loathing rather than a women matter only in how they affect me attitude. As a matter of fact it is that, but the author should be able to do that without making the murder of various women be all about Eddie rather than the actual dead people.

Of course the fact that I’ve gone on after having the same issues with the first book means that you should realise that there are positives about these books too, and I do really enjoy them. This one I sped through, despite knowing I had a train journey ahead of me and no other book. So they are extremely readable and I know I’ll be looking out for more by Bledsoe in the future.

Other reviews: Stainless steel droppings ; Only the best sci/fantasy ; Pandora’s longbox ; The friends of Mr. Cairo

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6 Responses

  1. I had problems with the first book, not of the same nature as yours; it wasn't just the women who were pretty cardboard figures, but everyone. In places he book felt like it was being written by a 12 year old, not a good thing for what's supposedly an adult level novel. So unlike you, I didn't proceed to this, the next book.

    • Fence says:

      Hi Richard,

      I suppose everyone was more sketched than developed, I just noticed the dead women more.

      I don't think I'd say it was written by a 12 year old, simply that it was pulp/quick reading. I still liked it though, despite my fault-finding.

  2. Fair enough, perhaps I'm getting too picky. I like your term "pulp/quick". I may have to borrow that one sometime.

  3. Carl V. says:

    And see I didn't have these problems with the book at all, especially not the 12 year old writing part. Ha! I absolutely love them. Of course maybe I still exist on a 12 year old level somehow! Not that I think you are wrong about the women issues, I just don't come at the story from that angle so I had never even considered it. I find them both quite fun and look forward to the next in the series. Wish he would quit writing vampire books and write more of these.

    • Fence says:

      Well, even with those flaws I still really enjoyed the books so Bledsoe is obviously doing something right :)

      Have you tried any of his vampire books? I'm sorta interested in picking them up