The Hills Have Spies by Mercedes Lackey

The Hills Have Spies was definitely a better start to a series than Closer to Home. I feel like I’ll enjoy Family Spies much more than Herald Spy just based on The Hills Have Spies alone. I feel like Perry is a much more interesting protagonist than Mags, though we do get more of him here. I was also pleasantly surprised that the antagonist wasn’t a last minute thing. He actually had menace.

Master Leandro is the dude Tuck was apparently retconned to be, at least as far as the artificing of Mags and Amily’s wedding clothes… and mixed with whatever Weaponsmaster worked with Mags. I find this change very odd, given the books were published in the order I’m reading them. Someone really should have caught this and fixed it.

I find it interesting that Mags had an issue with Larral “choosing” Perry. Kyree might not be Companions, but Dallen’s right: they’re pretty darn close as far as lasting friendship. Considering what ends up happening, I’m a little more understanding, because there’s no way a Companion would have either dragged or allowed his Chosen to drag them into the situation Perry and Larral get themselves into. I also feel liked Perry choosing to go off on his own is a consequence of how he was raised. Mags and Amily essentially raised their kids to be little spies and therefore more apt to be sure of their decisions to run off on their own to do spy things. I’m happy that’s acknowledged, too. Perry and Larral still should consulted with Mags about the whole thing… but they didn’t, so joy.

The inclusion of dyheli is nice. Previously, they’ve been mentioned but not actually appeared in any of the books. I do kind of question why they were created at all, being one of the species Urtho did create. They’re basically telepathic deer… and still pretty much act like deer so… yeah. I feel like even the “trampling our enemies” thing wouldn’t even be all that effective, except against something like the slytha. Overall, the dyheli aren’t incredibly interesting as a sentient species. I like Roya, though, he’s an amusing character. I almost always like the snarky ones and he’s definitely snarky.

I am both surprised and not that Mags is still having flashbacks to his time in the mine. He’s nothing if not predictable that way.

I’m not sure how I feel about this “Master” person. His description kind of left me with an image of a taller version of the “Dobby Doctor” from the end of Season 3 of Doctor Who. He’s also a cannibal, so that’s… gross. And he’s cruel, to boot. He was somewhat menacing, though mostly just because his powers were so strong and he was really paranoid.

Oh, now we’re at liberty to just discuss vrondi. Could barely discuss magic in the last eight books and now we’re making plans involving vrondi. Because apparently Vanyel made it next to impossible to discuss magic inside Valdemar… which I still think is colossally stupid. Most, if not all, of Valdemar’s neighbors use magic and mage potential is still around in Valdemar. I’m still super frustrated by this. Especially since apparently Mags has special Valdemar-Heartstone privileges… like what? Why? That makes zero sense.

So I think the ending was alright. Guardian honestly reminds me of the earth spirits from the Foundation series. The amount of raw magical ability on display was amazing. I feel like Perry’s pretty well set up for the rest of the series and I’m looking forward to it. Just hope we don’t go back to focusing on Haven-centric stuff. That was boring.