Marked in Flesh

Marked in Flesh (2016) Anne Bishop

The fourth Others book.

The HFL (Humans First and Last) group has been striking against the Others, but now they want to start to take over the lands they believe rightfully belong to humans.

As far as the Others were concerned, not listening was a big reason why humans, as a species, ended up needing harsh lessons.

In Lakeside, the human pack has been growing–the humans who have attempted to work with the Others and have been ostracized by their friends, family, and co-workers.

The police have no leads as yet on the person or persons who broke windows and painted obscene suggestions on the buildings. One store owner said he was going to leave a dictionary on a public bench so the vandals could at least spell the obscenities correctly.

This book is when things come to a head, as they HFL makes their move, and the Others are completely unprepared, even with the warnings of the cassandra sangue. OK. That’s not entirely true. They do listen when things come to a head, but they are all but blind to what is happening right up until that point.

Which seems ridiculous to me, since many of the Others are very long lived, and you’d think someone would passed along the word of the perfidy of humans.

There were some bits of world building I found very interesting:

“I brought some bug lotion.” Merri Lee looked at Simon and made a face. “It probably smells really stinky to you, but we don’t know yet how Meg will react to a bug bite, so I brought some with me.”

It turns out bugs don’t like the cassandra sangue, but it’s an interesting thought.

I also liked the peeks as to how Hope and Jean were learning to cope with the world, especially Hope’s method of alternative prophecy.

I liked the attempts to portray the kids as kids, even if sometimes things felt a little off.

In his official capacity as a lieutenant in the Lakeside Police Department, Monty placed Robert, Sarah, Lizzy, and Grr Bear under house arrest. The girls insisted that Grr Bear was innocent and that he’d tried to tell them they were playing where they weren’t supposed to, but Robert wouldn’t listen.
…
When Eve Denby stormed in and demanded he arrest the children and take them to jail for reckless endangerment and being a pain in her ass, he’d thought she was playacting and went along, especially when Pete, as the children’s attorney, threw himself on the mercy of Mother Court and tried to plea-bargain.

In this book, it struck me as a bit odd that the Others took so long to respond to the Human attacks. It’s made quite clear that they are distinct from humans and don’t think to same, so I wasn’t quite sure I believed they would wait so long to respond to the HFL attack.

It was a nice plot point, but it didn’t feel particularly realistic, given that they didn’t seem particularly given to planning and plotting.

Publisher: Roc
Rating: 7/10

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