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Friday, March 11th, 2022 09:42 am
book: crowbones by anne bishop
So it's been a while since I posted and also a while since I posted a book review. Between school and work and moving my brain noped out on anything new, so getting this pre-order this week combined exciting--NEW BOOK--with wary, as Anne Bishop took a turn for the wtf in the Black Jewels series to the point I didn't even buy the latest book in that series.
Crowbones is the third book from her series The World of the Others, which is an offshoot of her series The Others.
The Others
Written in Red
Murder of Crows
Vision in Silver
Marked in Flesh
Etched in Bone
Summary: Urban Fantasy/AU Earth - Meg, a cassandra sangue (prophet whose prophecies are triggered when her skin is cut) escapes the equivalent of slavery to basically hide in a city's enclave of terra indigene, who are both a single species made up of many subspecies, the least terrifying of which are vampires, werewolves, werecrows, werebears, werepanthers, weresharks, etc; Elementals (Winter, Summer, Spring, Fall, Water, Air, Atlantica (yes, the Atlantic Ocean), etc); and ponies that are horses that are also Tornado, Hurricane, Fog, Tsumani...you see where this is going
Those are the less terrifying terra indigene; the Elders are worse. And then there is plot, disaster, predation, and a surprising amount of found family/mixed species family. I reviewed the first and third books (I am annoyed I didn't do the fifth; i could have sworn that I did), so you can check under the tag on the first to see if ti's your speed. I recommend; it's multiple pov, with primary povs from the protagonist, Meg, Simon, a very cranky werewolf/bookstore owner (all Anne Bishop's characters are voracious readers so book store owners really come into their own in the two Others series), Vlad, a vampire, and Monty, a cop sent to the city of Lakeside for punishment after saving a teenage female werewolf from a rapist (humans are generally going to suck). The cast will grow, so be prepared.
World of the Others
Lake Silence
Wild Country
Crowbones
Summary: This series is set after the first series and follows up on some tertiary characters and towns mentioned in the wake of the Great Predation (spoilers but the word 'predation' probably gives you a hint of something going terribly sideways).
Book 1 and 3 are about Victoria Devine, a recently divorced woman and DV (extreme emotional abuse/gaslighting/etc) survivor who gets a rustic hotel in her divorce settlement that is located near a terra indigene controlled village and is basically the border between human-occupied (but not human-controlled) land and wild country, where the most powerful and dangerous terra indigene called the Elders--who don't have human forms and sometimes don't have much of a form at all--live. Book 2 is about Jana Paniccia, who wants to be a cop but sexism, so gets her chance in a small town that's occupied by both humans and terra indigene (shapeshifters, vampires, basically the kind of terra indigene that both have a human form and also hold down jobs. Yeah) to be deputy to a werewolf who doesn't really like humans. It's great.
Link to my review of Lake Silence, but you can find everything Anne Bishop's done in the tags.
So Vicky is probably my favorite Bishop protagonist and the kind of character she writes best: ordinary (for value of), just out there trying to live her life as best she can. In a sense, she's the rough equivalent of Cassie from The Shadow Queen/Shalador's Lady, who was unlike literally every goddamn other major character before, a very low-powered Queen (aka as far as the Blood go, did not have superpowers or an Epic Destiny or anything, just normalish Blood).
In Lake Silence, Vicky is freshly divorced from a terrible, abusive marriage to a genuinely stupid, evil, husband: ordinary human-evil, which in some ways is the worst kind. In her divorce settlement, she gets a family property near the village of Sproing (name: important!!!!) that has a rustic hotel, the Jumble, with a group of cabins near a small village; this was done, btw, to fuck her over because seriously, fuck this guy. Vicky also has PTSD related to trauma and psychological abuse from her husband, panic attacks, anxiety attacks, and a fear of men and any kind of intimacy, which yeah, totally justified. The story opens with her discovering a.) a human eyeball in her microwave that b.) her employee put in there because she's not human but actually a werecrow that c.) came from a dead body on Vicky's property. And the plot begins!
Things happen and by the end of the book, Vicky's hotel is up and running, her enemies vanquished, and under the (benevolent?) protection/oversight of both the vampires who basically own the town as well as the Elders, as her hotel is a way for the terra indigene to have a safe, controlled, protected way to evaluate (hang out with kind of?) humans and she also hosts weekly storytimes as the Reader (that's a title) for the terra indigene who don't have a humanish form or don't really like humans but really are interested in the latest bestsellers. This apparently includes the Elders, which every single voracious reader who reads this book will instinctively understand because of course everyone loves to read or be read to.
Note: book-buying is a plot point and acts to move the plot around, it's great. Booksellers save lives, dude.
Our Other Major Cast:
Human
Julian Farrow, bookseller, owner of the bookstore Lettuce Read (yes, that's the name), an Intuit (they are the genetic foundation line of blood prophets and have 'feelings' about weather, the land, atmosphere, weather, etc) and ex-cop who has PTSD from how he became an ex-cop and settled in Sproing for feeling reasons. He may or may not be Vicky's love interest one day but it's kind of a slow thing of maybe.
Wayne Grimshaw - former highway patrolman now chief of police in Sproing, which wasn't a job he wanted but here he is. Also knew Julian back in the Academy; they're bffs who pretend they're not.
Ineke Xavier - owns a boarding house near Sproing, friend and business advisor for Vicky. Has no fucks to give anyone, ever; I love her.
Terra Indigene
Ilya Sanguinati, a lawyer, vampire and leader of both the terra indigene (the ones who aren't Elders) in Sproing and surrounding area as well as his shadow, which is what you call a enclave of vampires (a herd of deer, a shadow of vampires. Yes, a shadow: I love it.) Does not have any interest in being bffs with any humans; ends up playing pool with Julian and Wayne and hanging out like one of the guys. How the mighty have fallen.
Natasha Sanguinati, a CPA, vampire, and Ilya's new mate.
Stavros Sanguinati, leader of the Tallulah Falls Sanguinati and a problem solver and read into that exactly what you think it means
Agatha (Aggie) Crowgard - a teenage werecrow who comes to work at the Jumble for Vicky, chosen by the Elders specifically to see what kind of person Vicky is now that she owns the Jungle Vicky is the kind of person that hires Aggie because she's worried she's a teenager who's in trouble, pays her well, and secretly gives her a very big discount on the rent that Aggie insists on paying. Aggie super adores Vicky and it's just cute shit here, no lie.
Jozi and Eddie Crowgard - teenage werecrows, also employees at the Jumble
Conan Beargard (werebear) and Robert "Cougar" Panthera (Panthergard, werepanther) - employees at The Jumble
Aiden - a fire Elemental who presents as male and likes Vicky but is deeply uncomfortable at the idea of saying they are friends because terra indigene really should consider seeing a goddamn therapist already
Our Locations
Sproing - the name of the village this all takes place in and near which is named after adorable terra indigene that have smiley face (???) may look like rats, and are called sproings because they sproing (verb?) everywhere. Everyone feeds them carrots.
The Jumble - Vicky's hotel and the cabins attached to it
Now to Crowbones
It's Trickster Night (Halloween) and as usual, shit gets serious. Someone shows up looking like Crowbones, who is a terrifying werecrow boogeyman who kills werecrows for betraying their own kind. The same night, a dead body is found on Vicky's property (this happens) and now we're off to the races.
Crowbones does an excellent job of picking up perfectly in tone and progress of the characters where Lake Silence left off. Vicky's hotel is doing well; she's an established member of the community and Reader to the terra indigene. This book also finally gives us an idea of why the terra indigene find Vicky so interesting and genuinely seem to like her. And related, Anne Bishop finally gets around to admitting there are actually also bad terra indigene, just like there are bad humans, which honestly, thank you; the ultra pure and beyond reproach kindred in the Black Jewels books were grating as fuck after a while. The difference between humans and terra indigene is that the terra indigene don't fuck around with courts; when evil is identified, they kill it dead right now and that's at any age.
To avoid spoilers but give you some meat to chew: our cast of maybe villains/maybe victims/maybe red herrings include: a.) weirdly and stupidly menacing human teenage boys, b.) weird visiting academics, c.) weird visiting professors, d.) a 'newly married' couple, e.) Intuits (one a bestselling author, of course), f.) a woman with a super annoying voice who tries to scam the local businesses, g.) vampire children (!!!!!), h.) crowgard teenagers (!!!!!), and i.) a mythological (even to the local terra indigene) monster who may or may not be an assassin for the Elders sent to root out bad terra indigene called Crowbones. You just don't know.
Overview of Human-Terra Indigene Relations
It cannot be said enough: the relationship between humans and terra indigenes is both ridiculously bad and frankly weird. Bishop tends to imply it's mostly the fault of humans, but she also goes out of her way to try and make the superpowered, terrifying terra indigene actually a sad oppressed population cruelly and unjustly oppressed by humans which--well, you have to read the first five books to see how she juggles this one, it's pretty fucking surreal (you cannot be institutionally oppressed when you are the institution, come on). Mostly, it seems a fifty-fifty on this one; humans and terra indigene consider themselves superior to each other and bitterly resentful of each other as well (humans because the terra indigene own all the land and water, charge them for both, and can randomly cut off access to anywhere and also bury any given city literally underground or underwater if they feel like it, and actually do that sometimes; terra indigene because humans can be assholes, make contracts they won't keep, and are sometimes mean to them in school. Yeah, roll with it).
At this point, it's basically millennia of spite on both sides, plus a not unjustified dose of outright terror on the human side since the terra indigene go out of their way to get that reaction from humans, which is partially self-protective (they are a little tired of humans murdering them, though it must be said humans might be a bit tired of terra indigene eating them, but that is not addressed in the books and you really would think it would be).
In general, the terra indigene are actually not random killers; you actually do need to do something either fairly bad or something forbidden for a good reason for a terra indigene to kill and eat you. The problem is, the terra indigene make a very concerted effort not to let humans know that (I...don't know why) but just threaten to eat them for existing, it's just so ridiculous. This incredibly shortsighted attitude does not, in any sense, help relations at all; for the most part, it makes people who already hate terra indigenes hate them more, gives racist humans incredibly good and literally true fodder for anti-terra indigene rhetoric, and assures there is a real lack of openly friendly humans because the terra indigene scare them too badly for them to risk it (being eaten is inhibiting).
And the part that just brings all the stupidity together in a glorious tapestry: the terra indigene don't actually enjoy random humans expressing fear and terror around them. It hurts their feelings. This is true even when they are deliberately trying to invoke that response from said random human (they enjoy it when it's an evil human, of course). And they resent the fuck out of humans not wanting them around/not wanting to deliver packages/pizza/interact with them even though they just threatened to eat them. It's just a clusterfuck.
Which is where Vicky (and Meg and Jana) come in.
Human-Terra Indigene Relations - The Exceptions
The lack of soul-numbing fear in their presence--wariness, sure, but rarely if any active terror (and the terror that does happen is very circumstantial to a very specific event that honestly has nothing to do with the terra indigene being terra indigene but are being assholes in text)--is one that all three protagonists share: Meg, Jana, and Vicky. However, all of them have that response for entirely different reasons: in Meg's case, as a cassandra sangue who was raised in legalized slavery (due to being a blood prophet) in very, very weird and very sterile conditions to prepare her for being a blood prophet, she's both not very well human socialized and her abilities make her in some ways close to terra indigene due to being othered very hard by humans. Also, she really doesn't like or trust humans, but trusts terra indigene for the same reason Vicky does; the rules of interaction (be courteous, be kind, don't be stupid) are simple and if you follow them, everything's fine. Humans--in both their experience--are fucking random, unpredictable, and untrustworthy.
Jana, while she doesn't have any of Vicky's or Meg's trauma in her background, is familiar with terra indigene due to her brother and her own interactions, so knows all this, though admittedly some only in theory. Her personality is also very different; while Meg shows some of the characteristics of autism and OCD (which could either be a learned behavior due to her environment or a characteristic of blood prophets) and Vicky, aside from her PTSD and emotional trauma seems more naturally introverted, Jana is very much a mild extrovert, outgoing and verrryyy confrontational.
(Note: this actually impressed me; while all three women do share some characteristics, they're very, very, very different people when it comes to personality and background, and their interactions with the terra indigene follow their personalities. All three are huge readers, tho.)
Adding: the terra indigene relationship with Intuits actually came out of the same fear of other humans that both Meg and Vicky display as the Intuits, whose bloodline created the blood prophets, were oppressed and victimized by humans. That the terra indigene haven't built a closer and more equalized relationships with the Intuits is 100% on the terra indigene a.) habit of deliberately attempting to elicit fear and b.) resenting the fuck out of humans for feeling it and hurting their feels.
Truthfully, I don't think even they know exactly what they wanted from humans--just that they hated all the ones they were getting--until they met Meg, Vicky, and Jana.
Developments in Human-Terra Indigene Relations - Vicky
Now we come to Vicky.
The first book established that a.) Vicky strictly followed all the rules laid out by the terra indigene contract with humans for use of the land that the Jumble sits on and went out of her way to do it letter and spirit when she arrived, which you would think humans would always do for sheer self-preservation but nope; the terra indigene were warily impressed (that's such a sad commentary on humans in general in this world you have no idea) and b.) Vicky not only has good intentions in general, she also takes the time to verify the path she's taking is not leading straight to hell (really goddamn rare).
Part of this is likely due to hyper vigilance; Vicky has PTSD from her marriage as well as frequent panic and anxiety attacks buuuuttt...part of this comes from her attitude toward the Others, which also probably is contributed to by how her husband treated her. Vicky isn't terrified by the terra indigene; at best, she's the ordinary, boring kind of afraid--I'd actually say just 'wary'--the way people are of easily avoidable danger like 'do not pet a strange dog' or 'do not swim in the deep water alone'. The terra indigene don't scare her unduly because she--unlike most humans--pays very close attention to what they do and how they treat her and so knows that actually, provided you follow some fairly simple rules--be courteous, be kind, don't be a dick--that's pretty much it; she's safe. Life with her husband had no rules; he abused her for fun no matter what the hell she did. With the terra indigene, she didn't have that problem, and bonus, a real lack of anyone telling her she was worthless, ugly, and useless; honestly, the terra indigene probably were the nicest people she'd met in her life (her childhood was not exactly great either).
So outside anything that triggers her PTSD (human men or human-seeming men yelling at her, emotionally or verbally abusing her), Vicky's general attitude toward anything weird, super (like super) unexpected, or outright beyond her frame of reference is 'roll with it', which is another reason that I think the terra indigene are fascinated by her. (This is not a common trait of humans in this universe, which again, says really depressing things about humanity.)
(This is both like and unlike Meg: Meg's upbringing left her so poorly socialized in literally anything that she has no idea what a frame of reference even was so took everything that happened to or around her at face value and normal for whatever value. Vicky's frame of reference, on the other hand, does exist, but it's considerably fucked up by emotional abuse by her ex-husband for years, so as long as the situation isn't triggering her on that level (or isn't immediate physical danger of being outright murdered), she can deal with it. Which really really says some horrific things about what she went through during her marriage.)
Employee microwaving eyeball and is actually a werecrow: okay. Elemental pony rummaging through the fridge? Lead him away sternly and cut him some carrots. Lady of the Lake shows up? Heya, mind if we swim here? Ultra-hot vampire? Barely avoids throwing self bodily at him (who wouldn't?) Werecougar and werebear show up and say they're now you're employees? Add Carnivore special to pizza and TV night. Five Terrifying Nameless Elders Who Are Not to Be Seen By Human Eyes show up to exchange some books and ask about your reading preferences? Cool, let me show you my favorites (if you're a reader, logical response). Fire elemental lights your stove and is vaguely menacing? Might be a new friend (maybe?).
A human male (or human-sounding male) raises his voice at her? Panic attack.
It's not that Vicky doesn't also have the normal 'wtf' and 'holy shit' and 'Dear God what' and 'fuck my life' and 'so I'm going to die in like five seconds' and 'oh god is that a dead body'; she just feels it while rolling with it. And unlike any other human (Meg in this case doesn't count since she literally lives in a settlement of terra indigene), she's perfectly comfortable asking to speak to, calling on, or yelling for help from either a specific or any random terra indigene in the vicinity. Again, she was emotionally and verbally terrorized and abused; the worst the terra indigene in her experience will do is ignore her.
Noticeably, they never do.
Developments in Human-Terra Indigene Relations - A Possible Theory
So why would the terra indigene both deliberately try to invoke fear from humans and then super resent humans being afraid? I have a theory, and it's kind of both obvious and also not really.
The terra indigene are actually one giant species split into multiple subspecies; humans are an entirely different species. That's the obvious part; the non-obvious part is the terra indigene don't actually fully grasp humans are an entirely different species and therefore not the same. At all. Completely different lines.
Many of the subspecies of terra indigene have developed human forms in addition to their first form and original form (yes, three forms). Along the way, they developed human characteristics, attributes, interests, so they assumed at some point--God knows why--that this meant they understood humans.
Worse, they assumed--dear God why--that humans now understood them.
Friends, they were wrong.
Their human-adjacent selves are grafted onto their first form selves (animals, whatever the fuck the Sanguinati first form is, fish, birds, oceans, earth, spring, etc) that are grafted onto their true form self--the true form self is the terra indigene as they were created and before they decided to be oceans and rivers and sharks and lakes and crows and vampires and way before they decided to try out this human form for kicks.
And the terra indigene who are crows and wolves and vampires know that the Elementals and Oceans and probably Mountains, and the Elders are also their species--in original form, they're all the same. They're terra indigene: earth natives. Good so far.
But. There's also the undeniable fact a Crow gets nervous around wolves; they're a stronger predator. Wolves are very much aware that Bears or a Tiger or Panther could maybe take them down. The wolves and crows and anything with a working circulatory system know that they can be considered prey by the vampires. All the shifters and the vampires are very wary of the human-looking Tessa who hunts by looking at you and absorbing your life force (and she can even almost do it by accident if she's in a bad mood). And everyone listed here is incredibly wary of the Elementals because come the fuck on, they're scary.
And everyone in that paragraph--everything with a human form--is fucking terrified of the Elders (who may or may not have one or if they do, may or may not use it or care). And as we find out in this book, the fucking Elders come in multiple flavors of terror; the terra indigene basically exist in a hierarchy in which anyone lower than you could be considered prey under the right circumstances if you act badly/break the rules/are evil.
But: they can still be friends (mostly). It's not something you resent; it's just nature. This is the hierarchy; that's how it is.
So: having met humans, who by their standards were weaker, and having taken on their form and got a feel for them, they introduced humans to the obvious pecking order but probably not with like, a full explanation or in fact a heads-up on how the world (to terra indigene) worked; they were on bottom and they should just know as every other terra indigene did what their place was in the hierarchy.
Narrator: humans did not, in fact, just know.
A terra indigene acts menacing, yes, but they're expecting a very specific response to that: fear/respect and acknowledgement of their higher place and then everyone moves on, done. This is extremely consistent among the terra indigene, and then also is the fact everyone later bonds over their fear of those higher than them (or the Elders, who unite all human-shapes in comfortable shared fear).
Humans, though, did not react as expected (to be fair, even if it had been explained to them, it might not have helped much).
When a terra indigene acted menacing to display their place (totally standard hi how are you behavior), humans did not react with the expected fear/respect/acknowledgement/move the fuck on. They did not move on; they freaked the fuck out. They got mean. They sulked. They threatened them and meant it. They went running to invent weapons and got dramatic. They took it personally.
It was all very, very baffling, and not a little insulting. And it just escalated from there to basically a constant state of near-wartime conditions.
Which is where Meg, Vicky, and Jana come in; for various personality combined with their past related reasons--and possibly because they're women and used to having to deal with sexism and having to still get their shit done--actually do seem to react appropriately.
Terra indigene enacts routine menacing "I am above you in the hierarchy"; they display the appropriate fear/respect, and outside times when they're specifically personally terrorized (aka terra indigene being dicks), they then brush it off and move on. As is the terra indigene way. Which may or may not be evidence to the terra indigene that humans are just being overdramatic dicks instead of this being a huge species and culture-related miscommunication, no idea, but here we are.
This has been an essay that went on much longer than expected.
Crowbones is the third book from her series The World of the Others, which is an offshoot of her series The Others.
The Others
Written in Red
Murder of Crows
Vision in Silver
Marked in Flesh
Etched in Bone
Summary: Urban Fantasy/AU Earth - Meg, a cassandra sangue (prophet whose prophecies are triggered when her skin is cut) escapes the equivalent of slavery to basically hide in a city's enclave of terra indigene, who are both a single species made up of many subspecies, the least terrifying of which are vampires, werewolves, werecrows, werebears, werepanthers, weresharks, etc; Elementals (Winter, Summer, Spring, Fall, Water, Air, Atlantica (yes, the Atlantic Ocean), etc); and ponies that are horses that are also Tornado, Hurricane, Fog, Tsumani...you see where this is going
Those are the less terrifying terra indigene; the Elders are worse. And then there is plot, disaster, predation, and a surprising amount of found family/mixed species family. I reviewed the first and third books (I am annoyed I didn't do the fifth; i could have sworn that I did), so you can check under the tag on the first to see if ti's your speed. I recommend; it's multiple pov, with primary povs from the protagonist, Meg, Simon, a very cranky werewolf/bookstore owner (all Anne Bishop's characters are voracious readers so book store owners really come into their own in the two Others series), Vlad, a vampire, and Monty, a cop sent to the city of Lakeside for punishment after saving a teenage female werewolf from a rapist (humans are generally going to suck). The cast will grow, so be prepared.
World of the Others
Lake Silence
Wild Country
Crowbones
Summary: This series is set after the first series and follows up on some tertiary characters and towns mentioned in the wake of the Great Predation (spoilers but the word 'predation' probably gives you a hint of something going terribly sideways).
Book 1 and 3 are about Victoria Devine, a recently divorced woman and DV (extreme emotional abuse/gaslighting/etc) survivor who gets a rustic hotel in her divorce settlement that is located near a terra indigene controlled village and is basically the border between human-occupied (but not human-controlled) land and wild country, where the most powerful and dangerous terra indigene called the Elders--who don't have human forms and sometimes don't have much of a form at all--live. Book 2 is about Jana Paniccia, who wants to be a cop but sexism, so gets her chance in a small town that's occupied by both humans and terra indigene (shapeshifters, vampires, basically the kind of terra indigene that both have a human form and also hold down jobs. Yeah) to be deputy to a werewolf who doesn't really like humans. It's great.
Link to my review of Lake Silence, but you can find everything Anne Bishop's done in the tags.
So Vicky is probably my favorite Bishop protagonist and the kind of character she writes best: ordinary (for value of), just out there trying to live her life as best she can. In a sense, she's the rough equivalent of Cassie from The Shadow Queen/Shalador's Lady, who was unlike literally every goddamn other major character before, a very low-powered Queen (aka as far as the Blood go, did not have superpowers or an Epic Destiny or anything, just normalish Blood).
In Lake Silence, Vicky is freshly divorced from a terrible, abusive marriage to a genuinely stupid, evil, husband: ordinary human-evil, which in some ways is the worst kind. In her divorce settlement, she gets a family property near the village of Sproing (name: important!!!!) that has a rustic hotel, the Jumble, with a group of cabins near a small village; this was done, btw, to fuck her over because seriously, fuck this guy. Vicky also has PTSD related to trauma and psychological abuse from her husband, panic attacks, anxiety attacks, and a fear of men and any kind of intimacy, which yeah, totally justified. The story opens with her discovering a.) a human eyeball in her microwave that b.) her employee put in there because she's not human but actually a werecrow that c.) came from a dead body on Vicky's property. And the plot begins!
Things happen and by the end of the book, Vicky's hotel is up and running, her enemies vanquished, and under the (benevolent?) protection/oversight of both the vampires who basically own the town as well as the Elders, as her hotel is a way for the terra indigene to have a safe, controlled, protected way to evaluate (hang out with kind of?) humans and she also hosts weekly storytimes as the Reader (that's a title) for the terra indigene who don't have a humanish form or don't really like humans but really are interested in the latest bestsellers. This apparently includes the Elders, which every single voracious reader who reads this book will instinctively understand because of course everyone loves to read or be read to.
Note: book-buying is a plot point and acts to move the plot around, it's great. Booksellers save lives, dude.
Our Other Major Cast:
Human
Julian Farrow, bookseller, owner of the bookstore Lettuce Read (yes, that's the name), an Intuit (they are the genetic foundation line of blood prophets and have 'feelings' about weather, the land, atmosphere, weather, etc) and ex-cop who has PTSD from how he became an ex-cop and settled in Sproing for feeling reasons. He may or may not be Vicky's love interest one day but it's kind of a slow thing of maybe.
Wayne Grimshaw - former highway patrolman now chief of police in Sproing, which wasn't a job he wanted but here he is. Also knew Julian back in the Academy; they're bffs who pretend they're not.
Ineke Xavier - owns a boarding house near Sproing, friend and business advisor for Vicky. Has no fucks to give anyone, ever; I love her.
Terra Indigene
Ilya Sanguinati, a lawyer, vampire and leader of both the terra indigene (the ones who aren't Elders) in Sproing and surrounding area as well as his shadow, which is what you call a enclave of vampires (a herd of deer, a shadow of vampires. Yes, a shadow: I love it.) Does not have any interest in being bffs with any humans; ends up playing pool with Julian and Wayne and hanging out like one of the guys. How the mighty have fallen.
Natasha Sanguinati, a CPA, vampire, and Ilya's new mate.
Stavros Sanguinati, leader of the Tallulah Falls Sanguinati and a problem solver and read into that exactly what you think it means
Agatha (Aggie) Crowgard - a teenage werecrow who comes to work at the Jumble for Vicky, chosen by the Elders specifically to see what kind of person Vicky is now that she owns the Jungle Vicky is the kind of person that hires Aggie because she's worried she's a teenager who's in trouble, pays her well, and secretly gives her a very big discount on the rent that Aggie insists on paying. Aggie super adores Vicky and it's just cute shit here, no lie.
Jozi and Eddie Crowgard - teenage werecrows, also employees at the Jumble
Conan Beargard (werebear) and Robert "Cougar" Panthera (Panthergard, werepanther) - employees at The Jumble
Aiden - a fire Elemental who presents as male and likes Vicky but is deeply uncomfortable at the idea of saying they are friends because terra indigene really should consider seeing a goddamn therapist already
Our Locations
Sproing - the name of the village this all takes place in and near which is named after adorable terra indigene that have smiley face (???) may look like rats, and are called sproings because they sproing (verb?) everywhere. Everyone feeds them carrots.
The Jumble - Vicky's hotel and the cabins attached to it
Now to Crowbones
It's Trickster Night (Halloween) and as usual, shit gets serious. Someone shows up looking like Crowbones, who is a terrifying werecrow boogeyman who kills werecrows for betraying their own kind. The same night, a dead body is found on Vicky's property (this happens) and now we're off to the races.
Crowbones does an excellent job of picking up perfectly in tone and progress of the characters where Lake Silence left off. Vicky's hotel is doing well; she's an established member of the community and Reader to the terra indigene. This book also finally gives us an idea of why the terra indigene find Vicky so interesting and genuinely seem to like her. And related, Anne Bishop finally gets around to admitting there are actually also bad terra indigene, just like there are bad humans, which honestly, thank you; the ultra pure and beyond reproach kindred in the Black Jewels books were grating as fuck after a while. The difference between humans and terra indigene is that the terra indigene don't fuck around with courts; when evil is identified, they kill it dead right now and that's at any age.
To avoid spoilers but give you some meat to chew: our cast of maybe villains/maybe victims/maybe red herrings include: a.) weirdly and stupidly menacing human teenage boys, b.) weird visiting academics, c.) weird visiting professors, d.) a 'newly married' couple, e.) Intuits (one a bestselling author, of course), f.) a woman with a super annoying voice who tries to scam the local businesses, g.) vampire children (!!!!!), h.) crowgard teenagers (!!!!!), and i.) a mythological (even to the local terra indigene) monster who may or may not be an assassin for the Elders sent to root out bad terra indigene called Crowbones. You just don't know.
Overview of Human-Terra Indigene Relations
It cannot be said enough: the relationship between humans and terra indigenes is both ridiculously bad and frankly weird. Bishop tends to imply it's mostly the fault of humans, but she also goes out of her way to try and make the superpowered, terrifying terra indigene actually a sad oppressed population cruelly and unjustly oppressed by humans which--well, you have to read the first five books to see how she juggles this one, it's pretty fucking surreal (you cannot be institutionally oppressed when you are the institution, come on). Mostly, it seems a fifty-fifty on this one; humans and terra indigene consider themselves superior to each other and bitterly resentful of each other as well (humans because the terra indigene own all the land and water, charge them for both, and can randomly cut off access to anywhere and also bury any given city literally underground or underwater if they feel like it, and actually do that sometimes; terra indigene because humans can be assholes, make contracts they won't keep, and are sometimes mean to them in school. Yeah, roll with it).
At this point, it's basically millennia of spite on both sides, plus a not unjustified dose of outright terror on the human side since the terra indigene go out of their way to get that reaction from humans, which is partially self-protective (they are a little tired of humans murdering them, though it must be said humans might be a bit tired of terra indigene eating them, but that is not addressed in the books and you really would think it would be).
In general, the terra indigene are actually not random killers; you actually do need to do something either fairly bad or something forbidden for a good reason for a terra indigene to kill and eat you. The problem is, the terra indigene make a very concerted effort not to let humans know that (I...don't know why) but just threaten to eat them for existing, it's just so ridiculous. This incredibly shortsighted attitude does not, in any sense, help relations at all; for the most part, it makes people who already hate terra indigenes hate them more, gives racist humans incredibly good and literally true fodder for anti-terra indigene rhetoric, and assures there is a real lack of openly friendly humans because the terra indigene scare them too badly for them to risk it (being eaten is inhibiting).
And the part that just brings all the stupidity together in a glorious tapestry: the terra indigene don't actually enjoy random humans expressing fear and terror around them. It hurts their feelings. This is true even when they are deliberately trying to invoke that response from said random human (they enjoy it when it's an evil human, of course). And they resent the fuck out of humans not wanting them around/not wanting to deliver packages/pizza/interact with them even though they just threatened to eat them. It's just a clusterfuck.
Which is where Vicky (and Meg and Jana) come in.
Human-Terra Indigene Relations - The Exceptions
The lack of soul-numbing fear in their presence--wariness, sure, but rarely if any active terror (and the terror that does happen is very circumstantial to a very specific event that honestly has nothing to do with the terra indigene being terra indigene but are being assholes in text)--is one that all three protagonists share: Meg, Jana, and Vicky. However, all of them have that response for entirely different reasons: in Meg's case, as a cassandra sangue who was raised in legalized slavery (due to being a blood prophet) in very, very weird and very sterile conditions to prepare her for being a blood prophet, she's both not very well human socialized and her abilities make her in some ways close to terra indigene due to being othered very hard by humans. Also, she really doesn't like or trust humans, but trusts terra indigene for the same reason Vicky does; the rules of interaction (be courteous, be kind, don't be stupid) are simple and if you follow them, everything's fine. Humans--in both their experience--are fucking random, unpredictable, and untrustworthy.
Jana, while she doesn't have any of Vicky's or Meg's trauma in her background, is familiar with terra indigene due to her brother and her own interactions, so knows all this, though admittedly some only in theory. Her personality is also very different; while Meg shows some of the characteristics of autism and OCD (which could either be a learned behavior due to her environment or a characteristic of blood prophets) and Vicky, aside from her PTSD and emotional trauma seems more naturally introverted, Jana is very much a mild extrovert, outgoing and verrryyy confrontational.
(Note: this actually impressed me; while all three women do share some characteristics, they're very, very, very different people when it comes to personality and background, and their interactions with the terra indigene follow their personalities. All three are huge readers, tho.)
Adding: the terra indigene relationship with Intuits actually came out of the same fear of other humans that both Meg and Vicky display as the Intuits, whose bloodline created the blood prophets, were oppressed and victimized by humans. That the terra indigene haven't built a closer and more equalized relationships with the Intuits is 100% on the terra indigene a.) habit of deliberately attempting to elicit fear and b.) resenting the fuck out of humans for feeling it and hurting their feels.
Truthfully, I don't think even they know exactly what they wanted from humans--just that they hated all the ones they were getting--until they met Meg, Vicky, and Jana.
Developments in Human-Terra Indigene Relations - Vicky
Now we come to Vicky.
The first book established that a.) Vicky strictly followed all the rules laid out by the terra indigene contract with humans for use of the land that the Jumble sits on and went out of her way to do it letter and spirit when she arrived, which you would think humans would always do for sheer self-preservation but nope; the terra indigene were warily impressed (that's such a sad commentary on humans in general in this world you have no idea) and b.) Vicky not only has good intentions in general, she also takes the time to verify the path she's taking is not leading straight to hell (really goddamn rare).
Part of this is likely due to hyper vigilance; Vicky has PTSD from her marriage as well as frequent panic and anxiety attacks buuuuttt...part of this comes from her attitude toward the Others, which also probably is contributed to by how her husband treated her. Vicky isn't terrified by the terra indigene; at best, she's the ordinary, boring kind of afraid--I'd actually say just 'wary'--the way people are of easily avoidable danger like 'do not pet a strange dog' or 'do not swim in the deep water alone'. The terra indigene don't scare her unduly because she--unlike most humans--pays very close attention to what they do and how they treat her and so knows that actually, provided you follow some fairly simple rules--be courteous, be kind, don't be a dick--that's pretty much it; she's safe. Life with her husband had no rules; he abused her for fun no matter what the hell she did. With the terra indigene, she didn't have that problem, and bonus, a real lack of anyone telling her she was worthless, ugly, and useless; honestly, the terra indigene probably were the nicest people she'd met in her life (her childhood was not exactly great either).
So outside anything that triggers her PTSD (human men or human-seeming men yelling at her, emotionally or verbally abusing her), Vicky's general attitude toward anything weird, super (like super) unexpected, or outright beyond her frame of reference is 'roll with it', which is another reason that I think the terra indigene are fascinated by her. (This is not a common trait of humans in this universe, which again, says really depressing things about humanity.)
(This is both like and unlike Meg: Meg's upbringing left her so poorly socialized in literally anything that she has no idea what a frame of reference even was so took everything that happened to or around her at face value and normal for whatever value. Vicky's frame of reference, on the other hand, does exist, but it's considerably fucked up by emotional abuse by her ex-husband for years, so as long as the situation isn't triggering her on that level (or isn't immediate physical danger of being outright murdered), she can deal with it. Which really really says some horrific things about what she went through during her marriage.)
Employee microwaving eyeball and is actually a werecrow: okay. Elemental pony rummaging through the fridge? Lead him away sternly and cut him some carrots. Lady of the Lake shows up? Heya, mind if we swim here? Ultra-hot vampire? Barely avoids throwing self bodily at him (who wouldn't?) Werecougar and werebear show up and say they're now you're employees? Add Carnivore special to pizza and TV night. Five Terrifying Nameless Elders Who Are Not to Be Seen By Human Eyes show up to exchange some books and ask about your reading preferences? Cool, let me show you my favorites (if you're a reader, logical response). Fire elemental lights your stove and is vaguely menacing? Might be a new friend (maybe?).
A human male (or human-sounding male) raises his voice at her? Panic attack.
It's not that Vicky doesn't also have the normal 'wtf' and 'holy shit' and 'Dear God what' and 'fuck my life' and 'so I'm going to die in like five seconds' and 'oh god is that a dead body'; she just feels it while rolling with it. And unlike any other human (Meg in this case doesn't count since she literally lives in a settlement of terra indigene), she's perfectly comfortable asking to speak to, calling on, or yelling for help from either a specific or any random terra indigene in the vicinity. Again, she was emotionally and verbally terrorized and abused; the worst the terra indigene in her experience will do is ignore her.
Noticeably, they never do.
Developments in Human-Terra Indigene Relations - A Possible Theory
So why would the terra indigene both deliberately try to invoke fear from humans and then super resent humans being afraid? I have a theory, and it's kind of both obvious and also not really.
The terra indigene are actually one giant species split into multiple subspecies; humans are an entirely different species. That's the obvious part; the non-obvious part is the terra indigene don't actually fully grasp humans are an entirely different species and therefore not the same. At all. Completely different lines.
Many of the subspecies of terra indigene have developed human forms in addition to their first form and original form (yes, three forms). Along the way, they developed human characteristics, attributes, interests, so they assumed at some point--God knows why--that this meant they understood humans.
Worse, they assumed--dear God why--that humans now understood them.
Friends, they were wrong.
Their human-adjacent selves are grafted onto their first form selves (animals, whatever the fuck the Sanguinati first form is, fish, birds, oceans, earth, spring, etc) that are grafted onto their true form self--the true form self is the terra indigene as they were created and before they decided to be oceans and rivers and sharks and lakes and crows and vampires and way before they decided to try out this human form for kicks.
And the terra indigene who are crows and wolves and vampires know that the Elementals and Oceans and probably Mountains, and the Elders are also their species--in original form, they're all the same. They're terra indigene: earth natives. Good so far.
But. There's also the undeniable fact a Crow gets nervous around wolves; they're a stronger predator. Wolves are very much aware that Bears or a Tiger or Panther could maybe take them down. The wolves and crows and anything with a working circulatory system know that they can be considered prey by the vampires. All the shifters and the vampires are very wary of the human-looking Tessa who hunts by looking at you and absorbing your life force (and she can even almost do it by accident if she's in a bad mood). And everyone listed here is incredibly wary of the Elementals because come the fuck on, they're scary.
And everyone in that paragraph--everything with a human form--is fucking terrified of the Elders (who may or may not have one or if they do, may or may not use it or care). And as we find out in this book, the fucking Elders come in multiple flavors of terror; the terra indigene basically exist in a hierarchy in which anyone lower than you could be considered prey under the right circumstances if you act badly/break the rules/are evil.
But: they can still be friends (mostly). It's not something you resent; it's just nature. This is the hierarchy; that's how it is.
So: having met humans, who by their standards were weaker, and having taken on their form and got a feel for them, they introduced humans to the obvious pecking order but probably not with like, a full explanation or in fact a heads-up on how the world (to terra indigene) worked; they were on bottom and they should just know as every other terra indigene did what their place was in the hierarchy.
Narrator: humans did not, in fact, just know.
A terra indigene acts menacing, yes, but they're expecting a very specific response to that: fear/respect and acknowledgement of their higher place and then everyone moves on, done. This is extremely consistent among the terra indigene, and then also is the fact everyone later bonds over their fear of those higher than them (or the Elders, who unite all human-shapes in comfortable shared fear).
Humans, though, did not react as expected (to be fair, even if it had been explained to them, it might not have helped much).
When a terra indigene acted menacing to display their place (totally standard hi how are you behavior), humans did not react with the expected fear/respect/acknowledgement/move the fuck on. They did not move on; they freaked the fuck out. They got mean. They sulked. They threatened them and meant it. They went running to invent weapons and got dramatic. They took it personally.
It was all very, very baffling, and not a little insulting. And it just escalated from there to basically a constant state of near-wartime conditions.
Which is where Meg, Vicky, and Jana come in; for various personality combined with their past related reasons--and possibly because they're women and used to having to deal with sexism and having to still get their shit done--actually do seem to react appropriately.
Terra indigene enacts routine menacing "I am above you in the hierarchy"; they display the appropriate fear/respect, and outside times when they're specifically personally terrorized (aka terra indigene being dicks), they then brush it off and move on. As is the terra indigene way. Which may or may not be evidence to the terra indigene that humans are just being overdramatic dicks instead of this being a huge species and culture-related miscommunication, no idea, but here we are.
This has been an essay that went on much longer than expected.
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