Labyrinth’s Heart

Narrator Nikki Massoud paints a richly textured audioscape enlivening the conclusion to M.A. Carrick’s (pseudonym of the team Marie Brennan and Alyc Helms) “Rook & Rose” trilogy. In a city suggestive of Venice, with politics mirroring those of a Renaissance Italian court, con artist Ren has attached herself to a noble house by pretending to be a long-lost relative. While attempting to secure a fortune for herself and her sister, she has become reluctantly entangled with a vigilante and a crime lord who enmesh her in aristocratic feuding, dangerous magic, and the violence of an underclass yearning to break free of the foreign nobility who rule the city. With shifting accents and tones, Massoud conveys the different personas Ren adopts during her long game. Massoud ably handles Carrick’s intricately built world, including the complex names and vocabulary relating to numinatria, the sacred numerology that underpins this magical society. The glossary and list of characters found in the print edition are not included in the recording, which is a loss.