The Emperor's Agent Paperback – August 19, 2018

Jo Graham continues to weave an intricate tapestry of historical research and fantastical speculation into a ripping yarn about a woman exploring all the facets of experience through many lifetimes.They say that truth is stranger than fiction and Graham has her work cut out for her to make Ida St. Elme's astounding life into something plausible. She accomplishes this by exploring the constraints on women of the Napoleonic Era and how "Elza's" search for an authentic and rewarding life explodes them. Based on extensive research into Elza's life and time, The Emperor's Agent reveals a vital moment of history, moving beyond the battlefield and political infighting--though those are there, too--into the lives of the real people who strove for victory and hope against forces visible and invisible.The mystical, speculative aspects of the story serve to deepen its meanings and continue Graham's exploration of identity independent from time and personal circumstances. What part of you would remain if your soul were stripped of culture, language, gender and profession--not once, but again and again through the turning-points of history? What is the core of your self and how would you recognize it in another lifetime? This is the great work which Graham has undertaken in her Numinous World series.But not without playfulness and joy, despite the gritty aspects of the period in which she's writing. Elza's lust for life, for love and her honest enjoyment of lust itself make her one of the most original and exciting characters in modern fiction. The idea that a woman (much less many women) might enjoy sex should not be a revolutionary one and it adds another level of realism and resonance to this remarkable story.I can't wait for the next installment of Elza's adventures!

The story was good but not brilliant. It sort of felt like a single episode dragged out to fill an entire book. I think this could have been fixed by telling the story in chronological order rather than skipping forward at the beginning and then returning to the missed material as 2+ chapters of flashback in the middle of the book. It destroyed any sense of suspense and was confusing because the flashback chapters were not clearly marked.Another issue is that the kindle edition is subpar. There is no table of contents, no page numbers and quite a few editing mistakes. The book is still readable but the difference was notable from previous books in the series. Also, who is the random brunette on the cover? I would happily pay more than $1 to have a well transcribed kindle edition with nice cover art.Overall the kernels of a great story are still here but the author was definitely let down by her editor (who should have caught the structural issue) and publisher (who turned out a sloppy kindle edition).

If you've read any of Jo Graham's novels - from Black Ships to her Stargate novels - you know to expect one thing above all: strong women. Women who are powerful in their own right, women who can stand up for themselves. She writes women who feel real, mainly due to the fact she spends so much time researching them beforehand. Yes, that's right, the women in her novels are based on people who actually lived (well, not the Stargate novels of course). Jo takes the time to research exhaustively, piecing together the history bit by bit because, let's face it, historic women are rarely talked about in history class. They're relegated to footnotes or they have to be mentioned because they crossed paths with a male hero whose name everyone recognizes. Jo seeks to right that wrong by not only telling us about these amazing women, warts and all, but crafting their stories into unique and powerful stories.Jo is an author whose work I could easily read for free, but I always pay for the official release. There aren't enough books out there like this, books where a woman is unapologetically female and powerful in her own right rather than conforming to what society tells her to be. Elza is so far removed from the Bella Swans and whatever the 50-Shades-of-Gray-version-of-Bella-Swan's name is that they might as well be different species. I don't know what the Bellas are, but I know without a doubt that Elza in an adult, human woman.

Honestly, I really wanted to like this book as it had so many ingredients I love in a good historic fiction. A courtesan, spy and psychic working undercover as an agent for Napoleon Bonaparte in France. But it was a struggle to read through first part of the book that moved so slowly it was almost painful. I kept hoping the story would 'click' for me and finally about a quarter of the way into the book, our heroine Elza finally meets Napoleon and for a while, the story got interesting. Unfortunately, the interest didn't last. The story just became too unbelievable in so many ways. As one of my sisters once said, 'Life is too short to waste time on a bad book.'If you are interested in something similar and well written, I would highly recommend Kushiel's Legacy (five books) by Jacqueline Carey as it is an excellent fictional series with a courtesan spy as the main character, Phédre nó Delaunay. Phédre is described in the plot description as 'an exquisite courtesan, a talented spy and unlikely heroine.' Now that was a series of books which held my interest from the first paragraph until the end and I never wanted to put the books down. They kept me awake long into the wee hours of the morning.

First things first - this is not a stand alone book. It is the second book, following on from Graham's other novel The General's Mistress (and part of her loose series about the reincarnations of various souls). I didn't realise this at first and was therefore quite confused for the first 50 pages or so.The book is so much better than the blurb, and product description, would lead you to believe. It picks up 5 years from where the first left off and follows the story of Ida St Elme / Elza as she is enlisted as a spy for Napoleon Bonaparte.Very readable, greatly descriptive, and a must read for Graham fans.

I really liked this second volume of the series. Elza really comes into her own in this one.