Masques (Sianim, #1) - Patricia Briggs

127 pages

When the peaceful kingdom of Reth is overrun by Geofrrey ae'Magi, the evil master of illusion, Aralorn, weaponsmistress of the shapechanging race, and her companion, Wolf, attempt to overthrow him.

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Funny thing about this book - hard to find it in libraries and book stores, there aren't many hard copies available - but you can find it for free online.

Lady Aralorn is a shapeshifter who works as a spy. She's charming, humourous, courageous and has a knack for folklore. Wolf is a powerful magician with a scarred tortured past where he wasn't on the good side. He prefers to avoid human contact and stays in wolf form - hence the name. However Aralorn helped him once and he finds he keeps returning for her company.

They're only friends for almost all of the book, and only towards the end do they voice their feelings out. There was one kiss somewhere in between, which you almost miss, so this is no romance book. What i liked was their understanding of each other - they knew what to say or do and what the other needed better than the person themselves. Aralorn uses her wit and simple gestures to show Wolf she cares or to calm him down - and that was one of the reason i read this till 4 this morning.

The villain in this book in an archimage who has everyone's affections and is described as charming and full of laughter. But behind closed doors he's creating new monsters and doing horrible things to children to increase his power - and not enough people know this to be able to stop him without reprisal.
The final showdown between the couple and the archimage was more a blip than a bang - but I've realised that Briggs usually does things subtly and while she's refined her style over the years, this book follows in the same pattern.

This is one of Patricia Briggs early works, and in a way it does show. A lot of things went unexplained, the characters aren't black and white, they don't have the depth of character that you see in her Mercy Thompson series for example. But its a great story nonetheless.

Favourite line:
"When I die of heart failure the next time you frighten me like that, you can put that on my gravestone—‘I didn’t mean to startle her'"