Readers are introduced to Scholes world with a very powerful and destructive display of magical power. A city is destroyed completely by a single massive attack. Yet, what do we know about magic in this world by the end of the novel?

Scholes delineates a few types of magic, earth magic and blood magic for example. We get several examples of earth magic being practiced. The Scout Magics are earth magic, while the Marsher's voice magic, is blood magic. We are told that blood magics where outlawed by the Order and all allied nations, and it is mentioned that a terrible and 'evil' price was paid to access the powers of blood magic.

I find the earth magics that show up in LAMENTATION to be pretty well integrated into the story, and plausible enough. The voice magic, unexplained, still worked for me. It's when I think about that major spell, the The Seven Polyphonic Deaths (or whatever it's called), where I start having questions. Earth magic is derived from properties of the earth, and blood magic... from elements of ritual surrounding the blood. Still, the spell the Isaak sings is words and he is a robot. We are told that this is a most terrible of blood magics, but my question is how? There probably isn't an answer to that one, perhaps a story hole, but it's something to think about.

The elements of dreaming and mysticism fit well with in the story style, and again were well utilized by Scholes in the narrative.

Anyway, what do you think? What did you enjoy about the 'magic' of LAMENTATION? What did you find lacking?