Books like Lucifer, Vol. 6: Mansions of the Silence

I felt like this one is not on par with the previous volumes, but it’s definitely a fascinating read. It’s still chuck-full of interwoven mythologies—Norse, Japanese, Judeo-Christian—and it teems with life, with characters blown up to sheer fullness through good storytelling. The main backbone of The Mansions of Silence is the quest to find the soul of Elaine Belloc, God’s granddaughter (through Michael Demiurgos). In the previous volumes, we see how Elaine unwittingly sacrifices her own life just so Lucifer Morningstar will be able to live again, and the Lightbringer wants to return the favor now in the best possible way. Lucifer borrows the Naglfar, the trickster god Loki’s warship that was made from dead man’s nails, and assembles a crew that he trusts to return successfully. The Naglfar is to voyage to the Mansions of Silence, where apparently Elaine’s soul is in torment in the hands of a character keen on taking revenge on the Morningstar…Good premise and all, but the threads of the plot fell short of the mark I expected it to hit. Perhaps this is because it’s the beginning of a new storyline; after all, the stuff concerning Lucifer’s wings are already tied to a close in Inferno. The characters shine through though, especially Mazikeen. I like it when Maz and Lucifer are together—they complement each other, Maz being all brawn and brutality while Lucifer is all mind and manipulation. But I liked it more when Mazikeen is not standing as the Morningstar’s shadow, because she proves to be a butt-kicking soldier worthy of having storylines of her own. As for Loki’s half-brother Bergelmir, he is somewhat likable, which is a break for him because all this time he’s wearing this beware-of-me-I-may-betray-you veil. In fact he’s the only character onboard who has the guts to tell Lucifer how outraged he is to what the Lightbringer has done to the Mansions of Silence, making himself a subwoofer of conscience in a place where he is not likely to be heard. The fallen cherubim duo of Gaudium and Sera and the cuteness of their banters are reminiscent of Gaiman’s Matthew from The Sandman graphic novels. It’s always nice to have someone to stand as a comic relief to a story that’s all despair and fighting. The duo’s existence lies in stark juxtaposition with the nature of the whole story, and it’s magnificently successful in its balance. In this volume, Lucifer and his twin Michael are forced to act in concert because of Elaine. They trek to the place where Mazikeen’s ex-husband has built some kind of alchemical machinery containing God’s thoughts. I think it’s the epicenter of this tome’s letdown—the engine is deus ex machina in every sense of the word. If I were Carey, I would have saved these bits of storyline about the heart-to-heart talk between God and his twins, but I can feel that Carey has something more up his sleeve. That’s what I’m going to wait for.As I’ve said, this one’s an enchanting read.