The West Passage

I thought The West Passage would be a fun romp through a world full of whimsy and intrigue. I was sorely mistaken. While the world was colorful, exotic, weird, and random, everything else fell short of its mark. The main characters, Kew and Pell, lack any real agency until close to the halfway mark. They are strung along by side characters that flit in and out of the narrative, and Pechaček shows little interest in building compelling relationships or interesting subplots. The main plot, if you could consider what unfolds a proper story arc (I wouldn't), is shallow enough not to matter at all. I fought with the book for weeks, hoping I could finish it before a book club discussion, but I ultimately stopped reading sixty pages from the end because I couldn't stand one more sentence of the pointless but odd adventure.

Though I didn't have luck with this novel, it might appeal to readers looking to lose themselves in a book made up almost entirely of strange settings and oddball encounters.

Thank you to Tor and NetGalley for the ARC.

great scenes and scenery, but strangely untouching characters still a fine read

This is eldritch horror without the Cthulhu. It is weird and obscure and extremely obsessed with architectural minutiae. It rambles quite a bit in the middle, but that's honestly consistent with the tone of the world.

This book is so visual and imaginative, and thrives when walking you through the surreal, psychedelic, illuminated manuscript of a world. But while it was always interesting, I found it hard to stay engaged with the story at times, particularly in the middle. The ending compelled me, and I wish I'd had more of that connection to the plot and characters through the rest of the book.