A Matter of Death and Life (Gideon Sable, #2) by Simon R. Green

​Gideon Sable is back. I don’t care for urban fantasy, at all. Despite that, the first book in the series was surprisingly enjoyable. Like entire-opinion-change-on-genre enjoyable. I liked Green’s writing, word building and all that business and found the book to be very entertaining. So, naturally, I checked out book two. And lo, and behold, exactly in the way the first book did its best to change my ideas on the genre, the second book did its best to galvanize them.
Weird, right? Same author, same characters, same series and yet…But then again, that’s the right way of doing things, suck the readers in with the appetizer and then feed them dregs for the main entry.
Ok, dregs is way too harsh. Sorry. Not dregs, just…lesser than. All things about the sophomore entry into Gideon Sable series are lesser than. Plus, it has that sequel thing where the thrill and the freshness of the original just isn’t there. So, what you get is a very typical genre entry with quirky characters existing in the world just outside our world, the shadow world with its own rules and regulations.
Since we already know most of the cast, no real excitement there outside of the addition of Gideon’s ex, a tediously (and unnaturally) cheery switch’em artist who uses darling way too much. But whose skills prove invaluable to Gideon’s latest height plan.
Working once again for the same disgruntled widow (since he goofed up on the deal in book one), this time Gideon sets off to steal a precious Ancient Egyptian artifact from a Vegas casino.
Yes, not very original, a Vegas casino heist. See, that’s exactly what we were talking about earlier. The characters don’t even get to Vegas until about halfway through the book, but at least they do it on a magic train with an awesome name and some interesting passengers.
So, yeah, it’s still pretty fun, quirky, quick, still has entertaining characters, especially the legendary Johnny Wild Card, but, much like Vegas itself, it’s all superficial. The awesome appeal of book one is barely to be found here. Looks like the author blew all his wad on book one and is now merely relying on the pre-established charm to carry the series forward. Which is certainly a way of doing things, just not the optimal way.
Overall, it’s an entertaining quick read and genre fans would likely delight in it, but for non-genre fans who found book one to be an unexpected delight, there might be some disappointment. It’s still quite clever at times with its magic inventions/tools/ideas, but the general casino heist thing is just such an overdone theme. Thanks Netgalley.