For me, this is a book about dread. After the Great War, the Ringmaster and her circus of marvels spend most of the book fleeing from the black tents of the Circus King and in fear of the war to come. The circus is a haven for those with the Spark – magical powers that started appearing during the War. Like the X-Men, those with the Spark are feared and hated, shunned by the majority. The Ringmaster gathers Sparks and her circus travels the US, helping those who need it. But the fear of the Circus King is always in the back of her mind. Her own Spark is the ability to travel through space and time. And now powers have grown such that she travels forward far enough to see that the War that’s just been fought isn’t the “war to end all wars”, but that they’re in the eye of the hurricane and there’s worse to come.
That’s a new time travel idea that I’ve not seen before. That someone in that interwar period knows that there’s a new war coming, and that despite their best efforts, they can’t prevent it. And won’t be able to save the family they’ve put together. That those people will taken by the upcoming war and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. And if that’s not enough, the bogeyman you’ve been running from for years has found you and is taunting you. So yes, dread. It was a difficult book to read. I dislike chase stories anyway, where our heroes are being pursued for the length of the story. I find them stressful to read, and this was no different.
Although most of the book is told from the point of view of The Ringmaster (who just goes by that name, like she’s a Time Lord), there are some flashbacks to someone whose Spark is mind control, allowing them to compel other people to do as they say. It becomes clear how Edward is related to the Ringmaster fairly early on, and I hated those chapters. Edward is a terrible person, no matter how much he tries to convince himself otherwise. He sometimes tries to not use his powers, but always ends up giving in, to get what he wants. And what he wants is Ruth. He compels her to run away with him, and does horrible things to her mother who tries to stop him, and later he marries her. It’s never made explicit, but the implication of rape in that situation is inevitable and I shuddered through every one of those chapters.
The other thread in the book is the dread that underlies the future and the upcoming war and the fact that they can’t stop it. In this sense, all they’ve got is to live in the present and make the post of the time they’ve got. This is something that the Ringmaster and her family (especially her wife Odette and best friend Mauve) have to learn to do.
In the end, I’m left with a difficult rating. I would say that I appreciated this book more than I enjoyed it. How much of that is down to the book, and how much is just down to the fact that I’ve been reading very lightweight stuff over the last while is unclear. I loved the found family, but found the chase followed by cat and mouse, and the mind control stuff difficult and uncomfortable. It’s good, but I probably wouldn’t read it again.
