Product Description

From the magical mysteries of India to the gaslit streets of Victorian London, Mercedes Lackey's unique departure from her Valdemar series follows a young woman doctor as she searches for the secret behind the sorcery in her blood.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #77350 in Books
• Published on: 2002-03-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 400 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780756400613
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Amazon.com Review
Mercedes Lackey returns to form in The Serpent's Shadow, the fourth in her sequence of reimagined fairy tales. This story takes place in the London of 1909, and is based on "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs." Lackey creates echoes of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, pays affectionate homage to Dorothy Sayers's Lord Peter Wimsey (who plays an important role under a thin disguise), and turns the dwarves into seven animal avatars who masquerade as pets of her Eurasian heroine, Maya.

Some of Maya's challenges come from the fact that she is not "snow white," and she has fled India for her father's English homeland after the suspicious deaths of her parents. Establishing her household in London, she returns to her profession as a physician, working among the poor. Her "pets" and loyal servants stand guard, and Maya herself uses what bits of magic she managed to pick up in childhood to weave otherworldly defenses as well. But the implacable enemy who killed her parents has come to London to search for her; if Maya can be enslaved, her enormous potential powers can be used to the enemy's ends. Fortunately, English magicians of the White Lodge have also noted a new, powerful presence in their midst, though they're having trouble locating her, too. They send Peter Scott, a Water Master, to track her down. He finds Maya beautiful and benign, and is determined to teach her to use the Western magic she is heir to, before her enemy discovers her.

Some will find the author's Kiplingesque descriptions of India and Hindustani culture offensive. Lackey describes Maya's enemy as a powerful devotee of the goddess Kali-Durga, though she carefully shows that the avatars of the other deities will not attack her, and has Kali-Durga repudiate her servant in the climactic confrontation. And, though the story is layered, its surface is as glossy and brightly colored as an action comic. But readers who enjoy late Victorian London, Sayers, Sherlock Holmes stories, and a page-turning tale will want to take this one home. --Nona Vero

From Library Journal
As a physician operating among London's poor in the early years of the 20th century, Dr. Maya Witherspoon has two strikes against her her gender and her status as the half-breed daughter of an Englishman and a Hindu woman. The magic she possesses, however, assists her not only in her work but also in fighting off an assassin bent on destroying her through the use of dark powers. The author of the popular "Valdemar" series turns her hand to historical fantasy in this intriguing and compelling re-creation of England in the waning days of its imperial glory. (This is also the first volume in a new three-book series inspired by classic fairy tales.) A good choice for Lackey's large readership as well as fans of period fiction.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
To an alternative Victorian London Dr. Maya Witherspoon, son of a Brahmin lady and an English physician, comes to practice. Besides standard Western medicine, Maya knows the magic of India, where she grew up. Maya's aunt Shivani has also come to England, but as a devotee of Kali, she hates her sister's marriage and is determined to wreak havoc on the English. Maya must seek the aid of British magical masters before the powers of Kali devastate London. And meanwhile she has to maintain her practice in the face of the ignorance, sexism, and insularity of the British medical establishment. This is rather a departure from recent form for Lackey, which her characteristic carefulness, narrative gifts, and attention to detail shape into an altogether superior fantasy. Roland Green
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Customer Reviews

Brilliant writing-a great tale
When the sun never set on Britannia, many disgruntled natives living in India turn to the dark side by worshipping the evil Goddess Kali-Purga. Most of the followers joined the deadly thugee cult, a group that used force to obtain their demands. Shivani is a high priestess who loathes the English. She uses her powers to kill her sister who had the audacity to marry a British doctor and to make matters worse, she had a daughter with the foreigner.

When Shivani murders her father, Maya flees India for the relative safety of London where she tends to the medical needs of the poor. Shivani follows her to London, planning to cause mass chaos, trepidation, and death in order to force the infidel English from her country. Shivani also plans to kill Maya, but that proves difficult as she is closely guarded and has own powers.

THE SERPENT'S SHADOW is a beautiful fantasy tale that leaves the audience believing in a happily ever after. Mercedes Lackey's latest novel will please romance fans as well. This adult fairy tale is brilliantly crafted just as the previous tale in this series, THE SUMMER RISE is. A secondary character deserves his story be told in a future edition. Recapture the innocence and pleasures of youth with this fabulous novel.

Harriet Klausner

Not This Misty Fan's Cup of Tea
The Serpent's Shadow is, disappointingly, a jumbled rehash of Ms. Lackey's past work, material that has already been stretched thin. Where The Fire Rose (the first of her attempts to rewrite classic fairy tales) is fresh in its approach and stands as one of my all-time favorite books, The Serpent's Shadow struggles through a pale, undeveloped plot, see-through characters, and a villain that's absolutely ridiculous in her motivations and mannerisms. There's no element of surprise in this book whatsoever, and while Ms. Lackey's prose occasionally shines, it's all in a scene of a kind we've seen before from her.

(Example, from The Serpent's Shadow: "She liked his handshake; strong without being over-bearing, a warm, dry hand, neither too familiar nor too distant." And from The Fire Rose: "His grip was firm and quite strong, and she had the feeling that if she had not been wearing gloves, she would have found his hand to be warm, the skin of his palm dry.")

Ms. Lackey seems to be running out of steam and interest in her own topic throughout The Serpent's Shadow. The 400-page book leads up to a climax that is resolved in two pages, as if the author is as anxious to get to the book's end as the reader. While her characters are not completely devoid of personality, they're too one-sided -- the good guys are Beautiful People, kind, thoughtful, intelligent, witty, caring, etc, while the villains are motivated purely by greed or "evil"; after years of reading and admiring Ms. Lackey's work, I would very much like to see a villain that doesn't scowl and rely on "sex and blood magic" for his/her power. The book's primary villain, Shivani, is a pathetic caricature of a bad guy who brings the story to a lower, often eye-rolling level ("Then the campaign of terror would begin," we are told in one of Shivani's more melodramatic scenes; her reasons for playing a �chess game of power and death� are weak at best).

Coming after the brilliance of The Fire Rose, The Serpent's Shadow isn't much. Ms. Lackey contradicts the rules of Elemental magic that she herself set in the first book, where it had been established that Masters of the same element could not stay in the same vicinity without rivalries and difficulties. In London, where The Serpent's Shadow takes place, there is a whole club of Elemental Masters, who all seem to be living in the same city without any difficulty whatsoever.

The characters and plotline of this book leave much to be desired. Maya Witherspoon, the heroine, is basically flawless -- beautiful, an accomplished doctor and surgeon at twenty-five, a powerful mage, and of course, selfless and liberal-minded. Ms. Lackey often goes off on tirades, via her characters, about the cruel and repressive upper class and especially the malevolence of men, as well as the never-ending struggling of the downtrodden poor, and while these are valid and important points, after a while it feels like we're being preached at. Not to mention that she can't seem to think of any new male names (there are two Peters, a Paul like in The Fire Rose, and a Simon -- again used in The Fire Rose).

Maya's romantic interest is a Water Master (her Element is Earth; in The Fire Rose, the focus was on Air and Fire Masters), and from the moment we see him, it's obvious that they're intended to become romantically involved. There isn't any element of surprise whatsoever in The Serpent's Shadow, and from start to incredibly predictable ending, there isn�t a moment that leaves one anxiously turning pages to see what will happen. Maya�s story is supposed to be a retelling of Snow White, and Ms. Lackey throws in a few elements of the classic fairy tale -- magic mirror, seven guardians, poison, a life-saving kiss -- but never fully develops the parallel between the two stories. Her early twentieth-century London is never given much detail, though she will occasionally toss in a few British slang words as if to proudly prove that yes, she did her research, despite the fact that some readers might have no idea what she�s talking about. And Maya�s seven guardians -- the dwarf substitute -- are bound to offend some followers of Hinduism, as they are supposed to be the major Hindu gods -- given the form of pets. The gods� dazzling histories and personalities, which might have added some spark to the book, are never explored at all; they�re used only as a convenient names to throw around.

The Serpent�s Shadow has a few well-written, fun scenes, and Elemental magic is an interesting topic in Ms. Lackey�s hands. But the crumbling, transparent plot and pointless, shallowly crafted characters detract from what could have been a good book. For long-time Misty fans, The Serpent�s Shadow comes as a disappointment. Those seeking a masterful, magical retelling of a well-known fairy tale should look to Ms. Lackey�s The Fire Rose, and not to this uninspired imitation.

a wonderful read
I found Mercedes Lackey's "The Serpent's Shadow" to be a really fun read. The best way to encapsulate this novel is to describe is as Dr. Bramwell (a PBS Masterpiece Theatre series about a female doctor in the early 1900s) meets Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The characters were all well developed and portrayed, and the whole plot premise, while it is an old one, and much used, came alive in a new and fresh manner under Ms Lackey's skilled hands. I read this novel in one go -- I just couldn't put this novel down. And while I'm quite a science fantasy fan, what I really liked about "The Serpent's Shadow" was the bits that dwelt with Maya's struggle to be a good doctor in the face of gender and racial prejudice. I think that Ms Lackey handled this theme very well, and very realistically. I also liked the subplot involving the Exeter Lodge, and their fastidious and rigid attitudes about 'aliens' -- i.e. women & foreigners. The frustration that Peter Cook, the Water Master, felt at the stubborn prejudices of the older and more aristocratic members, and their short sighted views on how to deal with the threat that Shrivani posed, was masterly portrayed. I'd also like to counter what a previous reviewer wrote about Ms Lackey and her negative depiction of Hinduism. I don't think that she did this at all. In all cultures and religions, there is good and evil. Ms Lackey depicted both aspects of this in this novel. The thing is the wicked stepmother in this novel is an Indian woman who is a practioner of one of the more destructive forms of Hinduism. And what I saw was how hate and the thirst for absolute power can pervert an individual's soul, in this case Shrivani's soul, rather than a indictmnet about the entire religion. And anyway it was Eastern forces that defeated Shrivani in the end, not Western one. So that you could sat that everything balanced out in the end.

"The Serpent's Shadow" is an excellent read and well worth recommending.