#bookreview: The Illusory Prophet | @susankayequinn

The Illusory Prophet by Susan Kaye Quinn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

TBH, I'm just sitting here going what? Whaaaatttt? over and over again. (But which doesn't give you a coherent overview of the book.)

So, I spent the first half of the book being annoyed at Elijah Brighton because I hate waffly main characters who can't decide who they are and what they want. Like GET ON WITH IT. And I was getting a little upset with Quinn because WHYYYYY are you doing this. I thought you're better than this!

But then Eli finally finds a purpose (I hesitate to say 'his' - it's a purpose, but it might not be exactly what he wants) and starts putting things together, so I'm like yay! Things are happening! This looks good! And then I'm starting to get worried because THERE ARE 6 MINUTES LEFT IN THE BOOK THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING (although I know there's a book 4, but still) and then *BOOM*. ARGH Susan Kaye Quinn WHERE IS BOOK FOUR I NEED BOOK FOUR NAAAAOOOOOO.

Yeah.
So that's my entirely incoherent review of The Illusory Prophet.
Minus one star because. Waffle.

Also, if you haven't read Augment yet, now would be a good time, because Miriam and the Makers appear in this one.

---

Emotions aside, besides being very entertaining, the Singularity series does study rather deep questions for a science fiction novel. The question of the soul appeared very strongly in the first book of the series (The Legacy Human) and seemed to be skimmed over rather quickly in the second book (The Duality Bridge) but is back in full force here again.

It's actually a very thoughtful book because of the waffling, if you get what I mean. 'Cause if things are just happening boom-boom-boom, you wouldn't have time to think, right? And Eli does it a lot. He questions his purpose. He questions his humanity. He soul-searches. He asks unanswerable questions (and he also does ridiculously stupid things, but that's beside the point).

It would seem that Quinn is quite against organised religion - this isn't the first time she's made religious groups in the book seem extremely cultish and bad - but she's also building Eli into something of a religion of his own. I'm not sure if I'm entirely okay with the symbolism she uses (saviours, prophets, resurrection, miracles, three days) but I guess there's nothing to complain about (and I usually don't really care that much but it seemed a bit in-your-face.)

---

*Note: I received a free copy of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.

View all my reviews