Review: Comeuppance Served Cold

Comeuppance Served Cold by Marion Deeds
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Marion Deeds is a reviewer for Fantasy Literature, which occasionally (by arrangement) republishes some of my reviews, and I've appreciated reading her thoughtful and thorough reviews, even where our tastes obviously differed. So when I saw a novel by her on Netgalley, I was immediately interested, and when I saw that it was a heist novel I was instantly sold.

It's unusually, but effectively, structured, in that the prologue (briefly) shows us the heist, and most of the rest of the book (apart from the wrap-up at the very end) is told in flashback, with headings indicating how long before the heist each scene takes place. This kind of thing is tricky to pull off, but the author makes it work, building some nice tension, introducing a number of subplots and additional characters, and performing a masterful slow reveal about the protagonist's background and abilities. All of this in competent prose with very few errors, even in the pre-publication version from Netgalley.

It's not completely without flaws. There are a few things that conveniently line up for the protagonist. (view spoiler)[The most obvious being that there's a spare body lying around, that has been magically preserved for no obvious good reason, at some cost, by someone who the protagonist would go to for help in any case, who has a grudge against her mark. There are also plenty of opportunities for things to unravel, with multiple not-necessarily-reliable people - including someone just coming off drugs - knowingly being part of the heist, but somehow none of them let her down. (hide spoiler)] Even this, though, is subtly handled; it's not like the author is obviously manipulating events in the protagonist's favour at every turn. Given the setup - the mark is involved in harassing the smaller and more vulnerable members of the magical community - the fact that everyone's interests are aligned against him is plausible, and there are no sudden reveals of convenient get-out-of-jail-free cards at critical plot moments.

This is one of those heists where we, the audience, don't understand the whole plan until it's completed, and then we look back down the trail of all the events and see them fit together in a new light. It's a satisfying fiction experience to have, and the author pulls it off well.

I would very much like to read the further (or, for that matter, the fascinatingly hinted-at prior) adventures of this character, and will be keeping an eye out for them.

Recommended.

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