Flood Tide (Merovingen Nights) ebook

I just love Cherryh and this series with contributions from other writers lives up to her high standards. The stories told from different point of views keeps to the same storyline.

Imagine, if you will, Mercedes Lackey's character development in a world created by C.J. Cherryh. Add a number of other talented authors, simmer until well-blended, then bring to a rapid boil. Now it boils over, but wait -- it was supposed to do that!
The Merovingen Nights anthology series is one of my all-time favorites. The city of Merovingen is created with incredible depth (no pun intended; like Venice, it sits on canals and is gradually sinking), the characters are deep and sympathetic (even the "villains," who are mostly real people stuck in very stressful circumstances), and the plot is twisty and turney without being confusing (much). The Merovingen Nights books do need to be read in some semblence of order, however, or you can miss a LOT of subtle details important to later character development.
In the early Merovingen Nights books, stories and characters created by individual authors are fairly self-contained. As the series continues, not only are the stories "braided" together for better continuity, but the characters move freely from author to author and writing styles mesh extremely well. By #6, Flood Tide, you can barely tell who is writing what or about whom.
In Flood Tide, the situation in Merovingen is coming to a head. Tensions are building from hightown to canalside, and something is going to blow. Character relations are straining, cracking, and occasionally breaking. Excellent lead-in the the final book in the series.
If you like fantasy, science fiction, and filk music, Merovingen Nights is not to be missed.
Just wish they'd reprint them...

perfect series