Bright Empires #2 : The Bone House By Stephen R. Lawhead

ONE PIECE OF THE SKIN MAP HAS BEEN FOUND. NOW THE RACE TO UNRAVEL THE FUTURE OF THE FUTURE TURNS DEADLY.

An avenue of Egyptian sphinxes, an Etruscan tufa tomb, a Bohemian coffee shop, and a Stone Age landscape where universes collide …

Kit Livingstone met his great grandfather Cosimo in a rainy alley in London where he discovered the reality of alternate realities.

Now he’s on the run – and on a quest, trying to understand the impossible mission he inherited from Cosimo: to restore a map that charts the hidden dimensions of the multiverse while staying one step ahead of the savage Burley Men.

The key is the Skin Map – but where it leads and what it means, Kit has no idea. The pieces have been scattered throughout this universe and beyond.

Mina, from her outpost in seventeenth-century Prague, is quickly gaining both the experience and the means to succeed in the quest. Yet so are those with evil intent, who from the shadows are manipulating great minds of history for their own malign purposes.

Across time and space, through manifest and hidden worlds, those who know how to use ley lines to travel through astral planes have left their own world behind in this, the second quest: to unlock the mystery of The Bone House. 

This is the second book in the Bright Empires Series by S. Lawhead and like the first (read my review of book one here) I read this book voraciously.  The wonderful Mr. Lawhead never fails to entertain.  The "characters of the BRIGHT EMPIRES SERIES" are not time-traveling explorers, a la H.G. Wells....Rather [they] are bouncing around a multidimensional universe in the equivalent of a helicopter that can travel in any of a thousand different directions...with a dose of time slippage thrown in for good measure"  That description will get you close to understanding what this story is about.  What sets Mr. Lawhead apart from so many authors is the absolute authority with which he plies his craft.  The details are rich and evocative,  the characters are extremely well thought out and realized, the intricacies of the plot are flawless.  This tale, in the hands of a master, is nothing short of enthralling.  I wholly enjoyed this book.  I would rate this book ten...no fifteen big, fat fabulous stars.
The third book in the "BRIGHT EMPIRES SERIES" is slated for release in September 2012.

Stephen R. Lawhead

Stephen R. Lawhead is an internationally acclaimed author of mythic history and imaginative fiction. He is the author of such epics as The Skin Map; The King Raven, Song of Albion, and Dragon King Trilogies. Lawhead makes his home in Oxford, England, with his wife. Twitter @StephenLawhead, facebook.com/StephenRLawhead