This was a five star book for me, right up until the end. I'll only talk about the ending in very general terms to avoid spoilers, but I'm still not sure whether I liked the ending or not. On one level, I can see why Mary Gentle wrote it that way. It fit with the structure of the operas within the novel, mirroring first one and then the other. It fits in with the main character's assessment of how an ending has to work.And yet... Okay, this is opera. Okay, we can have melodrama and weird stuff, yet there are parts of the ending that still feel like something of a cop out. Perhaps I wouldn't feel so strongly about it, except that the rest of the book is beautiful, complex and inventive on a level that seems to deserve something else from its ending. Read the book, certainly. Just don't be entirely surprised if you get through the last couple of chapters and then find yourself not quite knowing whether it's a brilliant reflection of the themes, or just slightly wrong. An incredibly tedious read, long-winded and dull. It's not a bad idea, per se (the magic of music, the shared joy of attending, singing or playing a particularly successful concert etc.), but the book is in dire need of an editor, preferably one with a heavy hand. The poor opera singers are all clichees, and I pity any orchestra with one single second violin, the poor sod. I just could not care less about the plot and only a small handful of the characters are interesting. By page 300-and-something one should really have captured one's reader's interest, but I am bored and eyeing my stack of unread books. I don't even care enough to look up a summary and spoilers of the plot.
What do You think about Black Opera (2012)?
I want to like this, I really do. But it is reading like an opera seria. Very slowly.
—lyddi
seemed silly, probably won't finish even though i only have about 100 pages to go.
—chwistee
Slow to start - very slow to start - but building to a very satisfying climax.
—Liz
