There is a legend of the New World that has endured for centuries: the strange, tragic tale of a King, a Witch . . . and a blue gem of intoxicating beauty said to grant extraordinary power to whoever possesses it. Archaeologist Juana Sanchez, convinced that she's discovered the key to unlocking the mystery of the fabled Queen Jade, ventures into the Central American jungle alone—just ahead of the relentless pounding fury of Hurricane Mitch. When the terrible storm is over, Juana is gone, and an ancient, long-buried jade mine has been uncovered in the mountains of Guatemala, giving new hope to all obsessed seekers of the legendary stone. But it is a different obsession that plunges Juana's daughter—scholar and bookseller Lola Sanchez—into the remarkable adventure of a lifetime. For only by following the Queen Jade's perilous, cursed trail can Lola hope to find her vanished mother . . . if it isn't already too late.
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1 primary bookRed Lion is a 1-book series first released in 2005 with contributions by Yxta Maya Murray.
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This should be 3.5 stars. I would recommend the book generally to folks who like history and adventure, but I had a few issues with it myself.
On one hand, I enjoyed the premise of this book very much! It's a fun archaeological adventure, although it is set against some devastating history, so maybe “fun” isn't entirely the right word. [slight spoiler] I wasn't wholly satisfied with the way the riddle resolved in the end: it was clever, but it didn't click perfectly into place with the way the story had been told.
My main issue, though, was with the dialogue. It's snappy in some places, but too often it rehashes information we already know, or reads as the characters telling each other lots of facts they both already know. While I appreciate that all the main characters are very knowledgeable, I think the dialogue editing could have been tighter. In fact maybe having a main character who wasn't so knowledgeable would have made this flow of information more natural.
Also – and this is a small thing, but it alienated me personally as a reader – as a historian myself, I was a little baffled by the historical texts in the book. They read in a very modern way. I wasn't sure if this was a conscious choice by the author, or if in the world of “The Queen Jade” history is different than in our world, or if this was accidental. Despite the characters bantering about details of the documents, the issue of these modern voices was never fully dealt with. And while I do love those historical characters' stories in the book, I just needed their eccentricities (relative to their respective time periods) to be addressed (or written slightly more subtly) in order to keep myself immersed in the story.
