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One of the many great things about going to Comic-Con is that you get stuff for free that you might not have purchased otherwise, and some of that stuff even turns out to be awesome. Case in point: this book. I kept seeing it at the bookstore and thinking "That looks interesting, but it's probably one of those books with a lot of smut wrapped in a paper-thin plot." While I enjoy a fluffy, smutty book every now and then - usually when I'm too feverish to keep up with a complex plot - I don't like to spend full price for it. In fact, usually I just borrow it from other people.
So anyway, when I walked by one of the publisher booths and they had stacks of Snake Agent for free, I picked one up and put it in my increasingly heavy bag o' swag. And then when I had a road trip to go on, I took it with me, figuring that if it was too bad, well, I'd just watch stupid hotel TV to pass the time.
I was pleasantly surprised to find that not only does Snake Agent have a decent plot which only gets predictable in a few spots, but it doesn't take the easy route by padding the book with sex scenes. In fact, despite a set-up that would have lent itself well to lots of smut, there's not a single love scene, just some suggestive narrative and characters thinking - non-graphic - naughty thoughts.
Snake Agent has a lot going for it, in fact. Liz Williams writes with an easy to read voice, using clear, crisp language and not getting too caught up in literary devices or bad writing mistakes. She presents the reader with an interesting view of the future reminiscent of the cyberpunk genre, while throwing in elements of mystery, horror, fantasy, and Chinese mysticism. A lot of things I like, and all blended together almost seamlessly.
A book really loses me if the characters are dull, underdeveloped, or unlikable. Thankfully, Snake Agent is populated by well-rounded and interesting individuals. Detective Inspected Wei Chen (or Chen Wei, depending on which naming convention you adhere to) is a cop who handles cases dealing with Hell. He's torn between his devotion to the goddess Quan Yin and his love of his wife. Chen's wife Inari is a woman with a complicated past and a badger guardian. Seneschal Zhu Irzh is a demon on Hell's Vice Squad who is perturbed by his almost human-like sense of morality. And that's not even getting into the secondary characters, who are almost as developed.
I found that the plot moved along pretty briskly and kept me turning the pages. My only real complaint is that a central element of the mystery felt really telegraphed early on in the book. It really stood out to me as something important, so that when its part in the goings-on was revealed, I was not as surprised as I was probably meant to be.
Over all, I enjoyed Snake Agent enough that I'll be picking up the other books in the series, and I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good genre-bending story.
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