55. Mélusine by Sarah Monette (Fantasy) 421 p.

I’ve been wanting to read this for a long time, so when I saw it for sale at my favourite discount bookstore, I had to buy it. I loved the name, and the summaries and reviews I’d read made it sound really good…I was just afraid it wouldn’t live up to my expectations. Luckily for me, Mélusine did that and more.

At the beginning of the book, Felix Harrowgate is an aristocrat, one of the elite of the city of Mélusine, but it’s not long before his safe world begins to crumble around him. Abused, maligned, deprived of friends and allies, he is quickly on the brink of madness and despair. Mildmay the Fox, a cat-burglar for hire in the Lower City, is the only person willing to help him or believe in him.

I love books that confound my expectations, and present me with turns in the plot that are better than anything I could have thought of on my own. Mélusine is one of those books. I love the characters, and I can’t wait to see what happens next in the series (the next book, The Virtu, is already out, with The Mirador scheduled for release August 7, 2007, and Summerdown to be published sometime in 2008.)

Books read: 55/100 (55%)
Pages read: 16,166/25,000 (65%)
Days passed: 163/365 (45%)

Tags: 50 Book Challenge 2007, Doctrine of Labyrinths, Sarah Monette