Killashandra - Anne McCaffrey

Killashandra
Anne McCaffrey
Del Rey
Copyright: 1986
978-0345316004

The amazon.com product description:

At first Killashandra Ree's ambitions to become a Crystal Singer, get rich, and forget her past, were going just as she had hoped. But after she grew wealthy, a devastating storm turned her claim to useless rock. In short order she was broke, she had crystal sickness so bad she thought she was going to die, and the only way she could be true to the man she loved was to leave him....

Killashandra is the sequel to Crystal Singer and is followed by the book Crystal Line. Where the first book was mostly set on Ballybran, and set up the world for this series, this one is set off-world, on the world of Opthera. A world of two different life styles. There's the city life-style, which appears to be very controlled and regimented, and then there's the lives lived by the islanders. But not everything is as it seems. There's definitely some strong undercurrents going on in this story and a lot of deception. Will Killashandra be up to sorting everything out while at the same time fulfilling her contracted duties of repairing the famed Optheran organ - on top of her own personal problems?

Where some middle books show that they are middle books by leaving everything unresolved for the third book of the series, this is most definitely not the case in Killashandra. Frankly, this book is even better than Crystal Singer, given the levels of excitement and adventure going on in the story - and the two completely different worlds of the planet. Honestly, I think this one is my favourite of the three books.

Anne McCaffrey has a knack for building intriguing worlds, and she's succeeded here, with a universe of variety. No two worlds are alike. There's Opthera of the sense organ, Ballybran, the world of singing crystal - which would be incredible to experience, and music weaves through all of the worlds, though I think I'll take the rest of this thought train and make it its' own post before it completely hijacks this book review.

As I noted in my review of Crystal Singer, this series is one that's stood up to the years quite well. From 1985-1987 to now, and the books are just as good reading now as they were back in the '90's. There doesn't seem to be anything too dated - and the various quotations and musical pieces mentioned rather make sense that they'd last as long as they have.