The Shadow Queen is the latest of Anne Bishop’s Black Jewels series. Sometime in the past year I wrote about her last book, whose title I’ve completely forgotten.
This one was gripping as ever, though I deliberately started it during the morning on vacation so I wouldn’t have to stay up all night to finish it. And I managed to sleep all night (twice) before finishing it this morning. *proud of self*
This time we were focusing on new characters, descendants of those in The Invisible Ring, but we still spent quite a bit of time with the main characters from the original trilogy. It was an interesting balance, and it made sense, but it felt like Bishop was having to work at finding the main conflict. There was an interpersonal struggle which seemed guaranteed to work out, a small mystery to resolve, and a subplot that could’ve easily been taken out with no loss to the storyline. There was a story, and I wanted to see how it would turn out, but no major bad guy. Not a problem, but interesting to notice.
I wouldn’t bother recommending it to anyone who hasn’t read the trilogy, but if you have you’ll probably enjoy it.
(This is the one I read just before the end of the year. 
