Claire North is one of my favourite writers, but this book was dull. I really wanted to like it, but really didn’t and struggled to get through it.
Set in a distant future where society has rebuilt after an apocalyptic ‘burning age’ presumably caused by climate change the book follows a priest who is an expert in interpreting ancient texts (which is things from our times like WhatsApp threads and other internet type things) who becomes a spy.
There were different factions: ones who wanted to hide events from the past, ones who wanted to learn from the past so they could be better, and ones who wanted to learn techniques from the past for mining and warfare etc to exploit for money and power. These are interesting things, I guess, but I wasn’t engaged by the way they were presented.
There was a lot of the spy running away then getting caught and tortured then running away again then getting caught again etc. I was quite bored by it and didn’t care for any of the characters.
Sarah Wray Writer 