Review: A Matter of Death and Life

A Matter of Death and Life by Simon R. Green
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I described the first in this series as "a quick read, pacey," and this is another quick read, but didn't work quite so well for me. It's one of those heists that relies on a large number of things going right, and the plot feels linear and too easy. The plan isn't especially sophisticated to start with, and the twists almost all consist of exactly the same thing: someone who has done bad things now wants to atone, and so transforms from an antagonist into an ally. Of the several people who might have betrayed the crew, some did not, and the one who did was the most obvious candidate. Magical artefacts occasionally develop unforeshadowed plot-convenient extra abilities at key moments.

It's Simon R. Green, so there are plenty of violent, nasty people getting their comeuppance, as well as other violent, nasty people who are trying to be better than that. In this alternate version of our world, not only is the supernatural everywhere, but it's apparently much easier to get away with killing someone, even if you don't make the body disappear.

There are a couple of odd spellings, one of them being "masque" for a mask (the usual English spelling is also used for another mask, and a "masque" in English is usually a masked ball, so I'm not sure what the point of the variant spelling is). The editing is very good, though, even in the pre-publication copy I received from Netgalley for review.

I didn't enjoy it as much as the first book, which I thought was more clever, but I did enjoy it enough that I would read future books in the series.

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