This Eternity of Masks and Shadows

In a city of gods and mortals, secrets never die.

The gods walk among us. Some lurk in the shadows, masquerading as mortals; others embrace their celebrity status, launching careers from Hollywood to Capitol Hill.

One of them just murdered Cairn Delacroix's mother.

As Cairn sifts through the rubble, she uncovers a conspiracy two decades in the making: a cursed island, the fellowship of gods who journeyed there, and the unspeakable act that intertwined their fates. One by one, the members of that voyage are dying, and Cairn's investigations land her in the crosshairs of the rogue goddess responsible.

With the help of Nanook, a polar bear god turned detective, Cairn descends into Boston's underworld of supernatural crime and political aspiration. To avenge her mother and unmask her assassin, she’ll first have to reckon with a gut-wrenching secret that will rewrite the life she thought she knew.

Many thanks to the author and RockStar Books for an eARC in exchange for an honest, unbiased review. Quotes are taken from an unfinished version and may differ from the final product.

Did you read that blurb? If you didn’t, go back up and read it. I’ll wait. *twiddles thumbs* Yeah. How could I not pick this up? Which part of that sounds like something I wouldn’t knock your grandma down to read if she got in my way?

This Eternity of Masks and Shadows is an action-packed mystery, stuffed to the brim full of diverse gods, big personalities, and plenty of murder and intrigue.

I’ve seen some reviews mention the diversity in a negative way, because the diverse ethnicities of the characters don’t play a huge role in the story, and I’ll say that’s true. You can do what you want with that information. For me, that wasn’t the focus. I loved reading about the diverse pantheons and was so excited that some gods that I love made it in and their characters were done justice.

I think it’s going to take a special sort of person to fall in love with the protagonist, Cairn, but I liked her.

She’s not a sympathetic protagonist, so if you’re looking for that, this is probably going to be a pass for you. She’s 18 and just lost her mother and reeling from the truths she’s suddenly uncovering. She’s loud and abrasive and sarcastic, often at inappropriate times. Oh yes, she’s got a very dark, very dry sense of humor, and she uses it almost as a defense mechanism (which is something I can totally get behind because helloooo, totally my schtick, too).

I will admit that it sometimes comes across hit or miss, like this section:

The sarcastic dialogue doesn’t quite match up with her reaction, especially since the text doesn’t actually describe what the god looks like. It probably would’ve been stronger if Cairn had seen the picture, thought about how handsome he was, then seen all the atrocities he’d committed and made that statement. That would’ve made much more sense and not seem like such a random inappropriate comment.

Cairn also has to grapple with some pretty big issues, like the loss of her mother and the survivor’s guilt that surrounds her mother’s apparent suicide.

It’s a lot for a teenager to have to deal with, and I appreciated the way Knight approached the raw, emotional feels. It’s ugly and it’s bitter and grieving people do awful things. Especially grieving teenagers. Emotionally, it was hard to read, but I enjoyed the realness of it.

The premise behind this world is absolutely delightful, and I can’t tell you how much I loved seeing all the gods come to life on the pages.

I squeed. More than once. Because who wouldn’t when their favorite loa appears and is every bit as badass as he should be?! This feels a bit like superheroes books meet Avengers … which, come to think of it, is a superhero movie, so maybe that’s a bad comp. Wow. Well, it’s a Monday, what do you expect? At least it’s a superhero movie with gods, which was the point.

The gods in this book are extremely mortal … with the small caveat that they’re reborn every time they die. Except they can’t really remember their past lives. They’re just a new person with these cool powers that they eventually learn they have and realize who they are. I really would’ve loved a little more depth on this part, because I love the idea and I’m buying the whole world, but I also have so many freaking questions.

I can’t even begin to tell you how much I learned from this book about various pantheons, too! There were quite a few figures I knew (being the mythology geek I am), but even I eagerly ran to Google for every unfamiliar name I saw, and I loved discovering their mythology (some of which is shared in the book itself).

In case you couldn’t tell, I’m kind of a big fan of diverse mythology, and it was so freaking nice to see gods other than just the Roman or Greek ones. Yes, of course there were some of those, too, but there were also Inuit gods, loa, Egyptian, Mesoamerican, etc. I want more non-Western European pantheons in fantasy, please!

This book has a little bit of everything in it, from the supernatural to a mystery to a whole ton of action, so it moves at a pretty fast clip.

Except the beginning. Okay, I’m going to through that exception out there. When I read the beginning, I originally thought there was some cheesy romance, it felt like contemporary, ehhh. About 10%, things hit the fan, and I was on board. As far as book beginnings go, that’s some pretty early action, and it held my attention through.

The mystery was pretty easy to solve, and I had pretty much guessed it about midway through the book, so if you’re here for a major twist, this book probably ain’t it. Where it really shines is the action.

Even though I thought I’d figured out the mystery (and I mostly had), it was still just fun journeying with the characters and seeing their powers and exploring the world, so it wasn’t like I was bored after I figured it out. I was content to just sit back and wait for the characters to catch up.

Every one of these characters (or the best ones, anyway) are solidly gray and entirely sarcastic, and I wouldn’t have them any other way.

I’ll say this right now: if you want a character you can empathize with and root for and by a typical hero figure … you won’t find that here. Antiheroes, the lot of them. Because life is hard, and what’s the point if you can’t kill a few people? What? Psh, most of them deserved it.

The humor in this is very dry and dark, so if that’s not your thing, you’ll probably struggle here. I, however, loved it. Mostly because I’m 83% dark humor and 7% dry humor and 10% stabby murder machine. Allegedly.

These characters have been through things, and Cairn’s concerns about her mother’s death in the beginning pale in comparison to what some of the other characters have gone through, so I wouldn’t say this is necessarily for the faint of heart.

The humor does a great job offsetting the darker aspects, but make no mistake, there are downright gory and troubling things discussed. You see those tags up there? I’m pretty sure that’s probably the most I’ve ever had to tag a book. Do not take those tags lightly.

That being said, if you like any sort of darker fiction, this one really delivers on that!

I loved this world so much, but I definitely felt like it could do with a little more shoring up.

There are parts that I didn’t need explanations for, like why deities are reborn, their powers, etc. I can just fill those gaps with my imagination, and that’s fine. I don’t need the hows or the whys, for the most part. But there are several times where something bigger and deeper about the world is mentioned and it’s never explored.

Are gods above the laws? There’s an awful lot of gods committing crimes in this book, and no one seems to be holding anyone accountable. Then there’s also mention of bigger, darker gods from before, and this idea so totally captured my imagination … but it plays no role in this book. I thought for sure it would after such a blatant hint about them was dropped, but nope.

This book stands alone just fine, but I would for sure love to see more of this world and have the chance to explore it more, just to get some more answers.

The romance in this book felt entirely unnecessary to me, and I think it would’ve actually been stronger had the women just been best friends.

Normally, yes, I’d be all here for LGBTQ+ relationships, but a meh relationship is a meh relationship. At no point did I feel the chemistry between these women, and Cairn repeatedly betrayed Delphine’s confidence. There were some touching scenes where they made up (because of course they did), but again, these could’ve just been friends making up from fighting, and it would’ve probably had a stronger impact.

As I’ve said repeatedly, not every book, not even every YA, needs a romance subplot, and this was a great example of that. I didn’t feel like it added anything. In fact, it pretty much stagnated the action, and these were my least favorite scenes of the book because the romance itself was so hard to root for.

The stakes were never quite there, as Cairn moves fluidly from one lead to another without much resistance.

Horrible things happen throughout this book, yes, but never to Cairn, and not once did I ever truly worry about her well-being or whether she would accomplish her mission, because she just somehow knew how to do everything and was super adept at everything she tried. She didn’t make a mistake. She didn’t particularly struggle with things.