Eh, I'd forgotten this volume. The ham-handed way in which every loose end from the previous five volumes get shoved onto the boat and sent after Elaine feels completely forced. The pool of God's thoughts is way too much of a (pardon the term) deus ex machina. And then there's the whole "hedgehog" thing. Of course, the fundamental problem is that, having set up Lucifer's conflict with God himself, anything else feels not just anticlimactic, but downright inconsequential. ( )

After the somewhat disappointing Inferno, Lucifer is back on form.  Lucifer himself is largely shunted to the side in this volume, as he assembles a crew for the Viking ship made of toenails he acquired last volume.  This ship will be journeying into the Mansions of the Silence, an area on the fringes of reality, where the soul of Elaine Belloc ended up after her death in The Divine Comedy.

I was doubly pleased by this setup: I really like Elaine, and her death was a big gut-punch, so her return would be welcome. (In some comics, I'd feel peeved that a death was being undone like this, but given all the crossing between Earth, Hell, the Silver City, and various other afterlives, death never had a whole lot of meaning in this series to begin with.) The other great part of this setup is the crew of the ship, basically every side character we've seen in Lucifer so far: Mazikeen, Lucifer's former consort and War Leader of the Lilim-in-Exile; Cal, who I'd actually forgotten about, but is Elaine's older brother and also half-angel; Jill Presto, the oft-scantily-clad invincible cabaret dancer/pop musician carrying the child of the Basanos; Bergelmir, half-brother of Loki and lover of Jill; David Easterman, a ghost who is one of many people who is not Elaine's father; Gaudium, the universe's most incompetent fallen cherub; and Spera, his long-suffering sister.  Lucifer himself cannot go because his presence is so large that it was destroy the Mansions of the Silence.

As you might imagine, the journey of this motley crew never ceases to entertain.  There's a lot of tension and conflict there, but when it comes down to it, they make an odd sort of team, even if one or two of them end up more dead than they were before.  The only part I didn't really like is that when they get in over their heads, Lucifer just shows up and solves all their problems, a return to the dull plotting of the earlier volumes.

While they journey, though, Lucifer isn't just sitting around relaxing; he and Michael have accessed the Mind of God through a backdoor created by Mazikeen's ex-husband. (To say that these books get complicated and weird sometimes would be an understatement.) What they discover there is another one of the series' shocking, clever, and fascinating revelations.

The volume wraps up with a one-part story where Elaine and her friend Mona, returned to life, discover that our universe isn't exactly what they'd hoped.  It's nicely illustrated by David Hahn, who also did some fill-ins on Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane back in the day.  It's also quite funny, though there's a great dramatic bit where Elaine confronts the demon who's taken her father's form.

Lucifer: « Previous in sequence | Next in sequence »

Mona Doyle is watching over hedgehogs, and Elaine Belloc over everything except hedgehogs. All is right with the world.

Oh, and Yahweh is a bastard. I was surpised by how strongly I felt about that. ( )

(Amy) My hiatus on this series has been long enough that the previous book was read before I started the booklog. Which makes it awkward, really - how to start reviewing a series with volume 6? Well, it's made tricky by the fact that I haven't booklogged the earlier volumes and it's been so long since I read them, as I don't entirely remember my impressions of the preceding installments - and there is obviously the issue of not being able to say much about this specific book without being utterly laden with spoilers for earlier ones. So I shall, I think, stick to general series-comments for the moment:

I recall being dubious about this series when I first heard about it. After all, Sandman was such an iconic work that it trips alarm bells all over when it spawns a spinoff - how could it possibly measure up? And the answer is, it really can't, quite. But falling short of a mark like that is by no means a condemnation of the quality of the Lucifer books to date. They really are quite good, and are telling a story with which I am entirely fascinated. I look forward to the five remaining volumes.
( http://weblog.siliconcerebrate.com/zenos-library/2008/07/lucifer_mansions_of_the... ) ( )

See Lucifer Vol 1 ( )