MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Hey!! Let's get some action going! What are we reading?

ATDrake · 08-09-2016, 02:19 PM

Finished The Princeling of Nanjing by Ian Hamilton, 8th in his Ava Lee, Intrepid Chinese-Canadian Ex-Catholic Lesbian Forensic Accountant, international (mostly) non-murder investigative mystery adventure series. I'd gotten this pretty much when it came out and started reading it then, but then got distracted by cramming stuff for the Hugo nominations and later voting, and then kind of forgot I had it until Kobo started recommending the upcoming 9th novel, The Couturier of Milan, as a pre-order to me. Not gonna lie, I'm kind of disappointed that since #7 was The King of Shanghai, the titles aren't continuing down the royalty/aristocracy naming theme, especially since IIRC, Italian designers IRL do tend to have aristocratic connections thanks to the old nobility system being both widespread and lingering.

Anyway, this was another solidly enjoyable outing for Ava, who's been switching over from deceptively simple (but actually rather complicated) debt collection to a more stable way of life with allies and investment partners. One of whom has been trying to shift to a more stable way of life himself, separating at least some of his business from its original criminal roots onto a more legitimate and sustainable manufacturing route. Unfortunately, he himself has shady past alliances who won't let go, and when they start to pressure him in a way that could jeopardize his investments with Ava's projects, she starts looking into them, and that's just the start of the ensuing problems.

From the beginning, Ava's adventures have kind of straddled that shadowy border between legal and extra-legal, considering that her job has basically been to recover legitimately-operating clients' money that was taken by solitary embezzlers and fraud schemes. This sort of kicks it up a notch by tackling more widespread organized (but technically non-criminal) civil corruption in China and the UK and is an interesting look onto the sort of large-scale stuff that operates on a higher, better-connected, better-protected, and more politicized level than the essentially fly-by-night solo operators who got lucky whom she's dealt with before. It's good to see the depiction of the changing tactics Ava needs to evolve to apply pressure when the old ways that worked for her no longer quite do the job, keeping her adventures feeling fresh.

And there's even less repetition of the standard boilerplate about her favourite Moleskine notebooks and French-cuffed button-down-shirts with the modified Italian collars than in previous books. (Brooks Brothers didn't even get a namedrop this time around!)

Recommended as another enjoyable entry in the series if you've been following it. As ever, these books build on what went on before, both personally and professionally, and Ava's budding business with her friends and her family/girlfriend issues and potential new ally connections are further developed in the B-plots as well, so this is not a good jumping-on point for the series. But the prequel novella is available to read for free on Wattpad, courtesy of the author himself, and the books go on deep-discount at Kobo semi-regularly during holiday weekend sales (I finally have all of them thanks to a recent one), if you think you might like to give it a try.

08-09-2016, 02:19 PM	#24384
ATDrake Wizzard Posts: 11,517 Karma: 33048258 Join Date: Mar 2010 Location: Roundworld Device: Kindle 2 International, Sony PRS-T1, BlackBerry PlayBook, Acer Iconia	Finished The Princeling of Nanjing by Ian Hamilton, 8th in his Ava Lee, Intrepid Chinese-Canadian Ex-Catholic Lesbian Forensic Accountant, international (mostly) non-murder investigative mystery adventure series. I'd gotten this pretty much when it came out and started reading it then, but then got distracted by cramming stuff for the Hugo nominations and later voting, and then kind of forgot I had it until Kobo started recommending the upcoming 9th novel, The Couturier of Milan, as a pre-order to me. Not gonna lie, I'm kind of disappointed that since #7 was The King of Shanghai, the titles aren't continuing down the royalty/aristocracy naming theme, especially since IIRC, Italian designers IRL do tend to have aristocratic connections thanks to the old nobility system being both widespread and lingering. Anyway, this was another solidly enjoyable outing for Ava, who's been switching over from deceptively simple (but actually rather complicated) debt collection to a more stable way of life with allies and investment partners. One of whom has been trying to shift to a more stable way of life himself, separating at least some of his business from its original criminal roots onto a more legitimate and sustainable manufacturing route. Unfortunately, he himself has shady past alliances who won't let go, and when they start to pressure him in a way that could jeopardize his investments with Ava's projects, she starts looking into them, and that's just the start of the ensuing problems. From the beginning, Ava's adventures have kind of straddled that shadowy border between legal and extra-legal, considering that her job has basically been to recover legitimately-operating clients' money that was taken by solitary embezzlers and fraud schemes. This sort of kicks it up a notch by tackling more widespread organized (but technically non-criminal) civil corruption in China and the UK and is an interesting look onto the sort of large-scale stuff that operates on a higher, better-connected, better-protected, and more politicized level than the essentially fly-by-night solo operators who got lucky whom she's dealt with before. It's good to see the depiction of the changing tactics Ava needs to evolve to apply pressure when the old ways that worked for her no longer quite do the job, keeping her adventures feeling fresh. And there's even less repetition of the standard boilerplate about her favourite Moleskine notebooks and French-cuffed button-down-shirts with the modified Italian collars than in previous books. (Brooks Brothers didn't even get a namedrop this time around!) Recommended as another enjoyable entry in the series if you've been following it. As ever, these books build on what went on before, both personally and professionally, and Ava's budding business with her friends and her family/girlfriend issues and potential new ally connections are further developed in the B-plots as well, so this is not a good jumping-on point for the series. But the prequel novella is available to read for free on Wattpad, courtesy of the author himself, and the books go on deep-discount at Kobo semi-regularly during holiday weekend sales (I finally have all of them thanks to a recent one), if you think you might like to give it a try. Last edited by ATDrake; 08-09-2016 at 02:23 PM.