Bijou, wizard in the court of her sponsor's father, is happy with her life but disengaged with her necromancer lover. Enter Salamander in an adventuring party with an ageless witch and a dead bard on whom Bijou focuses as a potential non-romantic friend. I found that the adventure didn't jell with the development of the friendship, but that the short adventure had good features. ( )

Originally posted at FanLit:

The novella Book of Iron is Elizabeth Bearƒ??s prequel to her novella Bone and Jewel Creatures about Bijou the artificer. Bijou creates beautiful jeweled creatures by animating bones. I havenƒ??t read Bone and Jewel Creatures but Terry and Stefan loved it, and the publisher promises that Book of Iron can stand alone, so there was no way I was passing on my review copy to Terry without reading it first.

Bijou works for her friend Salih, the second prince of Messaline. Another wizard, a necromancer named Kaulas, rounds out the trio of friends and adventurers and, at least for the moment, is Bijouƒ??s lover. When another group of wizard adventurers comes to Messaline on a quest, Bijou, Prince Salih and Kaulas insist on accompanying them, partly for the excitement and partly to ... Read More: http://www.fantasyliterature.com/reviews/book-of-iron/ ( )

...Book of Iron could easily have turned into a fairly straightforward adventure but Bear works in a lot of hints about the relationships between the characters that add a deeper layer to the text. There is mistrust in the story but also friendship, a sense of loneliness and regret but also hope and attraction. All of this is shrouded in just enough mystery to keep the reader trying to read between the lines. It's very cleverly written really. I'm fairly certain she is not done with Bijou yet, or at least she is leaving herself more than enough room to add to the story of this character. I guess I'm going to have to see about getting my hands on Bone and Jewel Creatures one of these days.

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