In a world of giants, humans survive by using biotechnology to change themselves. But, as with any technology, it can be used for good and bad. Ana and Din, an investigative team for the Empire have a job to keep the bad in check.
The Shadow of the Leviathans / Ana & Din Mysteries
- The Tainted Cup
- A Drop of Corruption
- A Trade of Blood
- Related short story: The Lion’s Tusk
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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON FOR The Tainted Cup
HUGO AWARD WINNER • WORLD FANTASY AWARD WINNER • NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A Holmes and Watson–style detective duo take the stage in this fantasy with a mystery twist, from acclaimed author Robert Jackson Bennett
LOCUS AWARD FINALIST • EDGAR AWARD NOMINEE • A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, Elle, BookPage
In Daretana’s greatest mansion, a high imperial officer lies dead—killed, to all appearances, when a tree erupted from his body. Even here at the Empire’s borders, where contagions abound and the blood of the leviathans works strange magical changes, it’s a death both terrifying and impossible.
Assigned to investigate is Ana Dolabra, a detective whose reputation for brilliance is matched only by her eccentricities. Rumor has it that she wears a blindfold at all times, and that she can solve impossible cases without even stepping outside the walls of her home.
At her side is her new assistant, Dinios Kol, magically altered in ways that make him the perfect aide to Ana’s brilliance. Din is at turns scandalized, perplexed, and utterly infuriated by his new superior—but as the case unfolds and he watches Ana’s mind leap from one startling deduction to the next, he must admit that she is, indeed, the Empire’s greatest detective.
As the two close in on a mastermind and uncover a scheme that threatens the Empire itself, Din realizes he’s barely begun to assemble the puzzle that is Ana Dolabra—and wonders how long he’ll be able to keep his own secrets safe from her piercing intellect.
By an “endlessly inventive” (Vulture) author with a “wicked sense of humor” (NPR), The Tainted Cup mixes the charms of detective fiction with brilliant world-building to deliver a fiendishly clever mystery that’s at once instantly recognizable and thrillingly new.
MY REVIEW FOR The Tainted Cup
In a world of leviathans, a single blade of grass can kill. An investigator in this fantasy world must investigate a murder. The path starts at a rich house with secrets, travels to engineers with secrets, and housed within the miliary with secrets. How many secrets can an Empire hold before its walls are breached, letting the monsters in?
Rich worldbuilding, great characters, involved murder mystery. Everything keeps this story moving.
Read for a book club; checked out through the local library.
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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON FOR A Drop of Corruption
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • HUGO AWARD FINALIST • ONE OF BOOKPAGE’S TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR • AN ELLE BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
The eccentric detective Ana Dolabra matches wits with a seemingly omniscient adversary in this brilliant fantasy-mystery from the author of The Tainted Cup.
In the canton of Yarrowdale, at the very edge of the Empire’s reach, a Treasury officer has disappeared into thin air—vanishing from a room within a heavily guarded tower, its door and windows locked from the inside.
To solve the case, the Empire calls on its most brilliant and mercurial detective, the great Ana Dolabra. At her side, as always, is her bemused assistant Dinios Kol.
Ana soon discovers that they are investigating not a disappearance but a murder—and one of surpassing cunning, carried out by an opponent who can pass through warded doors like a ghost.
Worse still, the killer may be targeting the high-security compound known as the Shroud, where the Empire harvests fallen titans for the volatile magic found in their blood. Should it fall, the Empire itself will grind to a halt, robbed of the magic that allows its wheels of power to turn.
Din has seen his superior solve impossible cases before. But as the death toll grows and their quarry predicts each of Ana’s moves with uncanny foresight, he fears that she has at last met an enemy she can’t defeat.
MY REVIEW FOR A Drop of Corruption
Every bit as good as the first book of this series, the second of the fantasy-mystery of the Shadow of the Leviathan contains the complicated characters, the amazing worldbuilding, the twisty plots of politics and emotions and murder, and little drops of lore about our Sherlock-Watson-type duo: Ana and Din.
Now the long wait for the third book. Robert Jackson Bennett writes such wonderful stories, but complicated plots, mystery, and fantasy take time.
By the way, locked room murder mysteries are the best.
Book checked out through the local library (in support of the Summer Reading Program).
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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON FOR A Trade of Blood
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Detective Ana Dolabra must prove a condemned man’s innocence and confront a terrifying magical technology in this fantasy-mystery from the author of The Tainted Cup, winner of the Hugo and World Fantasy awards.
The heir to one of the Empire’s most powerful families sits in jail, accused of murder. His hands are covered in the victim’s blood, and he can neither deny his guilt nor explain his actions.
But if the great detective Ana Dolabra cannot save him from the noose, the farming canton of Sapirdad will explode into war, threatening to plunge the whole Empire into starvation and chaos.
As Ana investigates—her assistant Dinios Kol, as ever, acting as her eyes and ears—she fears her task is even more daunting than it seemed. For this murder is just the latest in a deeper, subtler web of death, woven by a mastermind with an ancient weapon at his disposal.
With their customary skill, Ana and Din pursue their adversary through the canton’s wild ranges, sprawling ranches, and reeking slaughterhouses. Yet even they are not prepared to learn the horrifying secret behind their opponent’s powers.
MY REVIEW FOR A Trade of Blood
In a world of twisted biology, it all comes down to family, money, and Empire. Plus a good steak.
Din and Ana are called to another investigation, simple and straightforward much to Ana’s disgust and annoyance. Young love gone wrong between warring houses, the ancient battle between farmer and cattlemen with water playing a roll. The only reason the semi-high-ranking governmental investigators are called in are the lovers were from semi-high-ranking noble houses. Because rich get special treatment. Ana grouses in the carriage, and Din works to keep her temper under control.
But in a world where a blade a grass can be a murder weapon, is anything ever straightforward?
When Ana gets the first whiff of something fascinating, Din is relieved (an annoyed Ana is REALLY hard to deal with) and dismayed (the open-and-shut case isn’t). The deeper they go, the more twisted the mysteries and the more rapid the deaths, because the young lovers weren’t the only thing crossing lines marked in the sand of familial history, cultural understanding, and Empire nobility.
Again, Robert Jackson Bennett expands the amazing world of the Levitations with its bio-technological base, adds to the culture of the Empire surviving in this world, and builds on Din’s personal experiences with the changes made to his body to serve his job’s purpose. The characters of Ana and Din are complicated, as are their relationship, while the mystery is accessible to a typical mystery reader unfamiliar with the fantasy and science fiction tropes. This book and series has something for every reader.
Bonus: It reads just fine as a stand-alone.
Extra Bonus: according to the Author note, this is changing from a trilogy to a longer series! We will be getting more Ana and Din in the future.
Final words of wisdom from a Tom Lehrer song: Don’t drink the water and don’t breathe the air.
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BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON FOR The Lion’s Tusk
An eccentric detective turns to the fantastical to solve a cold case in a short story by the Hugo Award–winning author of The Tainted Cup.
On a long carriage journey with her assistant Din, brilliant investigator Ana Dolabra ponders a solution to an impossible crime that has remained unsolved for centuries. A lavish wedding for two noble scions of the Empire descended into chaos when the newlyweds were found murdered in their marriage bed. But Ana—an expert in ancient myths, awakened beasts, and magic—knows that nothing is impossible, only unimaginable.
Robert Jackson Bennett’s The Lion’s Tusk is part of the Magic & Mystery collection, puzzle-box mysteries from top fantasy authors. They can be read or listened to in one enchanting sitting.
MY REVIEW FOR The Lion’s Tusk
An Amazon Exclusive Short Story
A short story from the Shadow of the Leviathan Universe, which most people know as Ana and Din Mysteries. This one is from Ana’s POV – just her telling a tale from her random research while the two travel together in a carriage (or more accurately, Ana traveling and Din locked in the carriage with her).
I loved the moment when Din stops her (implied by her reaction) to marvel at how she knew exactly what had been said so long ago; after all he has to relate ALL the details as accurately and completely as he can. He must of swallowed a can of sand-ants when she said she was taking literary liberties to tell a good story.
A fun little addition to the Universe and works as a complete standalone if you are not familiar with the Universe or the characters, but is much more amusing knowing the characters and marvelous knowing the Universe.
Be careful wielding the organic knife, its handle isn’t secure and might cut you.