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The Leopard by K.V. Johansen
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
THE LEOPARD left me conflicted. I tell my fellow NaNoWriMo writers to “start in the middle,” because it throws the reader into the plot, theoretically in an interesting place. This book certainly did that, though the caveat to the aforementioned writing advice is that you have to inform your readers later in the book so they know what was going on beforehand. I don’t feel like THE LEOPARD ever really explained very much, which affected my enjoyment of the book. It seemed like it could be part of a larger story, one that I wasn’t familiar with, and sometimes that shook me out of the story. It sounds like there is a book related to this world that possibly explains backstory for characters we see in THE LEOPARD, but I had no idea about that when I picked up the book from Edelweiss (it’s marked as book one in a series, after all!). I wish I had read that, honestly, because I think I would have liked the book more.
Also, I don’t feel the blurb does this book justice. True, the first part does deal with The Leopard, an assassin who carries a curse in his essentially-immortal life, and just wants to be rid of it. We also meet his servant/partner, a simple man who is more than he seems; but just what that more is, we don’t learn, which is really frustrating. Then the book delves into the lives of a completely different set of characters, again with hints at backstory which I feel I should know, but never do. This split makes the blurb seem odd, since it mainly focuses on the assassin, which a small bit about the other characters. I’ve read that this is really just part one of a two book series that really should just be one big book. I can’t fault the publishers for that too much–I understand printing costs and other things like that, but I feel like too much was left for book two.
Now, it sounds like I’m bashing the book. It’s actually very well written, and the world-building is stellar. It’s not just another medieval-esque setting as typical of most fantasy novels out there, but instead has an interesting Middle-Eastern desert vibe. The gods and goddesses of this world are real, if perhaps not directly involved in everyday life. And when one character has an up close and personal interaction with one of them (or does she?), the author depicts the crazy-making of such an event with loving detail. Indeed, there is plenty of loving detail for all sorts of things in the book, and this makes for lyrical passages that are quite nice, and action scenes that are punchy. I just feel like the characters needed more motives (why are half of them doing what they’re doing?).
I would highly recommend reading the previous related book for more backstory before reading this one, or wait until the next book comes out and read them together. It’s a good story, but it seems like something is missing.
Received as a free digital ARC via Edelweiss and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.