#The Tainted Cup

[bangbangwhoa]

books I’ve read in 2024 📖 no. 036

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett

“That’s the problem with figuring shit out — eventually you run into someone who’d prefer all their shit remain unfigured.”

[rizeam]

why is it that whenever i read a good book it has no fanbase :(

PLEASE WHY HAS NOBODY ELSE READ THE TAINTED CUP???

[space-blue]

Warm up sketch... This is Ana Dolabra, the fem Sherlock the world has been waiting on (at least tumblr). If I can make even just ONE moot read The Tainted Cup, then I'll be happy!!

Fun fact, Robert Jackson Bennett is the person responsible for my overwhelming preference for 1st person writing. It's not otherwise very popular in SFF, but he CRUSHES it in City of Stairs, which was an influencial series to me when I was starting out as a writer. I decided 'why not, let's try some present tense', and the rest is history.

Anyway his books are always mental. I love his worldbuilding. I wish I could rent a condo in his brains for a while, study him like a bug in my petri dish.

IDK how to dress Ana, but I might make a full length of her in am ao dai...

[alcyoneusgalaxy]

hello din/strovi nation how are we feeling about book 2

got the arc last friday! so here's a sketch compilation from the past week or so in celebration

[jspinkmills]

This fantasy murder mystery was my last read of 2024 and what a book to end the year on! Clever, captivating, and gripping, The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett is a fantastic opener for his new series and I absolutely can’t wait to read more!

[shioriseryu]

Sen sez imperiya.

[danganronpa2]

[literary-illuminati]

300 pages in now and The Tainted Cup is easily one of my favorite reads so far this year. 'Sherlock Holmes with all the dials cranked up several degrees in a biopunk fantasy empire organized around fighting regular kaiju attacks' turns out to be quite the page turner.

Between this and Foundryside now I'm kind of curious if Bennet just makes a habit of writing protagonists with magically-induced sensory issues, though.

[thenomadicquill]

The Books I Read in February. I honestly had a really good reading month, and most of the books I read were outstanding. Here is what I thought about them.

The Light of the Jedi by Charles Soule - Giving this a 9/10. It is action packed and cinematic. It is an amazing high adrenaline Star Wars book!

The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake - This is the first DNF book of the year for me. I got 7 chapters in and just couldn't take the writing style or any of the characters. Nothing grabbed my attention or my interest.

The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman - This is a 10/10 book for me. It has the right amount of mystery, action, and the plot grabbed me right away. The world building was amazing, and I wanted to leap into the pages myself.

The Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy - This is a solid 8.5. The story telling, the descriptions and characters were so visceral and real that I had a hard time putting down this book. I wanted to see what happened next. However, there were moments where the book slowed down to a crawl and it was difficult not to get bored.

The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett - This is again, a solid 9/10 for me. I didn't have high hopes for this book, but I was genuinely surprised by it. It mixed the high fantasy elements into the story well, the humor was great, the world building was fantastic. It did have some of the issues that plague the murder mystery genre but that was to be expected.

The Rising Storm by Cavan Scott - I give this a 7.5. It is the second book in the Star Wars High Republic Era series, and it just didn't grab me like The Light of the Jedi did. It was less cinematic and more introspective. Also slowing down a lot in some parts. But it up for everything toward the end when everything ramped up to 11. Still a solid book.

[teapotfullofink]

Just finished The Tainted Cup and safe to say, I'm obsessed. I am living for the crazy old lady and her barely-keeping-up assistant dynamic. I need this fandom to be alive so I can be delusional about thissssss.

[anyagee]

New book crab approved.

🦀

[terapsina]

So I read The Tainted Cup (amazing book, totally recommend) and there's one unresolved thing that is going to be driving me nuts until I finally get my hands on the next book years from now.

(spoilers for book under the cut, people-who-have-finished-the-book eyes only)

Excerpt nr. 1

---

Excerpt nr. 2

---

And.

No. That is NOT all that needs to be said of it. WHAT WAS THE LEVIATHAN TRYING TO SAY? PRETTY SURE WE REALLY NEED TO KNOW WHAT THE LEVIATHAN WAS TRYING TO SAY.

What is the empire trying to hide?

[rizeam]

Okay, dear mutual of mine. I need a new audiobook to read sooo should I read the holy, the grand, the famed "THE TAINTED CUP"? Is it worth it? 👀

im going to tell you EVERY SINGLE THING i love about this book:

pathetic-looking empire: almost every setting in this setting is described so vividly about COMPLETELY washed up. There is mud everywhere. Every single citizen is in a consistent state of anxiety because of the eldritch monsters in the ocean.

the characters: we have the bisexual mistreated target employee and his outrageously rude (by that i mean iconic) boss. It's like watching Watson be half impressed and half terrified of Sherlock.

the magic system: it's very cool :D the powers some characters control has a cost. the powers are somewhat unnatural and not that glamorized

the mystery itself: the way the case goes is very satisfying, the evidence and answers don't come out of nowhere

the dialogue: reading this book's dialogue is the absolutely HIGHLIGHT of the entire book. listening to the audiobook version will be hilarious. It's a novacaine level of crack but with a different ✨flavor ✨

the names: they're really unique like---Dinios? Strovi? Fayazi? have you ever heard any of these anywhere else?

In conclusion, you should 100% read it :D. It was a ton of fun the entire time!

Also, thank you for asking me about this mutualll 🎀

[happygoosebird]

[kazz-brekker]

i finished reading the tainted cup and one of the things i really liked about it is that the main character has the magically enhanced ability to perfectly recall anything he's seen and also has dyslexia, and gaining his cool magical ability didn't fix that. i just thought it was cool, i haven't seen fantasy deal with learning disabilities in that way.

[wideeyedreader]

Recently Read: The Tainted Cup by Robert Jackson Bennett

5 stars!