Review: The Mime Order (The Bone Season #2) by Samantha Shannon

Title: The Mime Order
Author: Samantha Shannon
Series: The Bone Season
Book #: 2
Pages: 510
Reading Level: Adult
Book Rating: 
Goodreads Rating: 4.24
Published: January 27th, 2015

Paige Mahoney has escaped the brutal prison camp of Sheol I, but her problems have only just begun: many of the survivors are missing and she is the most wanted person in London...

As Scion turns its all-seeing eye on the dreamwalker, the mime-lords and mime-queens of the city's gangs are invited to a rare meeting of the Unnatural Assembly. Jaxon Hall and his Seven Seals prepare to take centre stage, but there are bitter fault lines running through the clairvoyant community and dark secrets around every corner. Then the Rephaim begin crawling out from the shadows. But where is Warden? Paige must keep moving, from Seven Dials to Grub Street to the secret catacombs of Camden, until the fate of the underworld can be decided.

Taschima's POV:

"Until next time, Paige Mahoney.
Next time would be now."

I went through the Mime Order as slowly as I could because I knew that once it was over I would be devastated. And I was, because I have to wait a WHOLE other year in order to read the sequel. The Bone Season was fantastic, but if anything Mime Order is twice as complicated and even better for it. A lot of the decisions Paige has to take in this novel... Well, I don't envy the girl. I am so very glad we still have five more titles in the series! The possibilities are endless.

"He wanted me to forget. The Rephaim were dangerous and they were out there, lying in wait, and I seemed to be the only one who gave a damn about it."

We picked up right where we left off on The Bone Season. Paige managed to raise a rebellion and escape Scion with some of her fellow voyants. Once in London she has to make a choice, go back to Jaxon and act as his mollisher or try to make it on her own. Paige is pretty much stuck between a shit situation and a shittier one still. She has to play her cards right if she wants to accomplish her goals, and fight back. No one will listen to her because of how little power she possesses, so her only option is to find a way to make herself heard. Even if she has to go against people she has known and loved for the better part of her life.

Sometimes a lot of information was provided, and I just felt as confused as Paige did. It turns out Paige doesn't know just HOW corrupted her city is, but soon enough she will learn just how fucked up her syndicate is. Sometimes the war between Rephaim and humans seems too huge, it is like humans going agaisnt Kryptonians, and the only thing they have to defend themselves is a pretty flower. The flower is their kryptonite. Mass produce that shit and then they wont have an issue.

"His eyes were growing brighter. They flooded me with the stranger memories of my imprisonment. A gramophone's black-listed music, telling lovers' stories to the gloom. A butterfly held out inside caged fingers. His lips on mine in the Guildhall, hands gliding over my hips, my waist."

I love the romance in The Mime Order, the intimate moments are so few and far between. You really get the sense that in the next five books anything could happen between Paige and Warden, I wouldn't put it past Samantha Shannon to kill him off (or even both of them). He is immortal, and she is not. This is not a vampire situation, where Paige can just turn and have her HEA. You get the real sense that things might not actually turn out for the best with them, they know it, and yet they are still going for it. Eeeks!!

 When you get past the halfway mark in the book so many things are happening that it is almost impossible to put down the book. A lot of things change, friends become enemies, and all goes to shit. It is intense, and the fight scene by the very end kept me on the edge of my seat (much like when Paige pulled off the rebellion). The book is a solid 500 pages of awesomeness.

"Isn't hope just another form of naivete?""Hope is the lifeblood of revolution. Without it, we are nothing but ash, waiting for the wind to take us."

I do not quite know what will happen in the third book, which is something Samantha Shannon probably worked hard to do. Anything can happen, everyone is in danger, and the stakes will be higher than ever. This is the kind of author you pay the full price of a hard back for on the first release day. Without discounts. Definite must read.

ENDING: [spoiler] The guy with the gloves has GOT to be Jaxon, I bet everything it is him. I believe he is one of the two people who managed to escape the colony 20 years back and that is why he didnt want to get involved with the Rephaim, also the reason why he spent almost the whole book drunk off his ass.[/spoiler]

PS; There are a LOT of characters in The Mime Order, a lot of leaders and voyants, and sometimes I just couldn't remember who this or that person was. It would have been nice if the glossary would have included a list of the most important characters from the last book, just as a reminder. I found that the glossary wasn't really helpful in that when I actually needed to look for something I forgot it wasn't provided. A hierarchy of the people was provided, but not who they were and what role they played. For a series with as many characters as this one (and side characters, etc) a list with description would help (much like the Black Dagger Brotherhood series does); who are they, what is their power, etc.