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Ink Exchange is darker, more complex, and more nuanced than Wicked Lovely. Marr ups the ante in this beautiful tale of love, addiction and choice. It's a companion novel rather than a sequel, focusing on other characters briefly introduced in Wicked Lovely. The plot has everything to do with the previous book, specifically it deals with the repercussions within the Dark Court of the cease fire between the Summer and Winter Courts. Just as in Wicked Lovely the intersection of worlds (faerie and human) revolves around relationships between a human girl and faerie male.
The novel remains as intense and tightly wound as the previous book. Marr has the marvelous ability to wind delicious threads of tension and inevitability into her novels despite all of the choices available. That's the thing that I love most about her books so far. The choices you think are available never are, but the characters still have to deal with issues and they do. They makes mistakes, poor decisions and there are repercussions. No one is all good or all evil, everyone, EVERYONE is a delicious shade of grey.
Ink Exchange is slightly divorced from the "human" reality in comparison to Wicked Lovely. Where Marr builds a great sense of space, here she re-treads old territory, adding a few new locations. She continues to have a deft hand at showing and not telling, weaving the tension and teasing the detail of plot out of the story itself without falling back on random exposition. A great sense of dialogue, character voice, and descriptive prose meld together into a beautifully fluid, tense and tragic narrative.
It's a more adult novel. Darker, grittier, more sexual, more violent and because we're dealing with the Dark Court it makes sense and is appropriate for the tone of the book. Some of the characterizations are a little off from the first book. Aislinn, who makes a very limited appearance, reads very differently in terms of age and personality. Some of that can be hand waved by the events that ended Wicked Lovely and the changes that Aislinn underwent, but it's jarring to read her in Ink Exchange. The ending is perfectly sad and bittersweet. Ink Exchange avoids the trite, pat close of Wicked Lovely and is all the better for giving us a sad, reflective ending that closes the book just as it should.
I am thoroughly in love with Melissa Marr and can't wait for the tentatively titled Fragile Eternity to be released next Spring. Her website and blog also promise an adult novel and I REALLY can't wait for that. Seeing what she can do without the YA restraints in place should be amazing.
The novel remains as intense and tightly wound as the previous book. Marr has the marvelous ability to wind delicious threads of tension and inevitability into her novels despite all of the choices available. That's the thing that I love most about her books so far. The choices you think are available never are, but the characters still have to deal with issues and they do. They makes mistakes, poor decisions and there are repercussions. No one is all good or all evil, everyone, EVERYONE is a delicious shade of grey.
Ink Exchange is slightly divorced from the "human" reality in comparison to Wicked Lovely. Where Marr builds a great sense of space, here she re-treads old territory, adding a few new locations. She continues to have a deft hand at showing and not telling, weaving the tension and teasing the detail of plot out of the story itself without falling back on random exposition. A great sense of dialogue, character voice, and descriptive prose meld together into a beautifully fluid, tense and tragic narrative.
It's a more adult novel. Darker, grittier, more sexual, more violent and because we're dealing with the Dark Court it makes sense and is appropriate for the tone of the book. Some of the characterizations are a little off from the first book. Aislinn, who makes a very limited appearance, reads very differently in terms of age and personality. Some of that can be hand waved by the events that ended Wicked Lovely and the changes that Aislinn underwent, but it's jarring to read her in Ink Exchange. The ending is perfectly sad and bittersweet. Ink Exchange avoids the trite, pat close of Wicked Lovely and is all the better for giving us a sad, reflective ending that closes the book just as it should.
I am thoroughly in love with Melissa Marr and can't wait for the tentatively titled Fragile Eternity to be released next Spring. Her website and blog also promise an adult novel and I REALLY can't wait for that. Seeing what she can do without the YA restraints in place should be amazing.
