Storm Glass by Maria V. Snyder

Opal Cowen was a glassmaker's daughter, whose sister, Tula, was a mage and died at the hands of a blood-mage, Opal herself was kidnapped by the same mage, but was saved by Yelena Zaltana, the Sitian Magician who is now Ambassador to Ixia, the country where she was raised after being kidnapped from her family. Now Ambassador, she is gone and Opal has followed in her sister's footsteps to become a Mage at the Academy in Sitia.

But as a mage, she's only able to do one thing- to infuse her blown glass sculptures with magic, and while she was able to use her glass animals to help the mages achieve instantaneous communication, she feels that she is a "one-trick wonder", a notion that is reinforced by the attitudes of many of her classmates- who also dislike her for her fame in being involved with the evil blood mage, because she caved into his torture and told him where to find her sister again after Yelena had freed her sister from the mage and his control. Because of her capitulation to torture, her sister died, and Opal feels she is only a second-best replacement from the Mage Academy for her sister.

Her torture also made it hard for her to open up to others, and so many of the other students believe she is a snob, or standoffish. And even though she goes through the same training as the others, so far all she can do is put magic into glass, so she feels she really is just a one-trick wonder. But then she is summoned to see the Mage Council in charge of the school. She thinks she is going to be sent home, but instead, she is sent on a desperate mission.

The Stormdancers protect the coast of Sitia from the storms that batter the coast, and they do this by taking the energy of the storm and trapping it in glass balls. But now, the balls they make are breaking, killing the mages who try to use them, and they have asked the Mage Council for help. The Mage Council sends not only Opal, but also Zitora, the third most powerful mage at the school, along with her. They travel to the coast, but along the way are ambushed by a group of men who make it most clear that they do not want the Mage's Council to help the Stormdancers. Opal is frightened of being made a captive again, but manages to work through her panic and help Zitora overcome their attackers.

After tying the men up and leaving them for the authorities, they continue on to the Stormdancer lands, where they discover the problem. Opal knows glass well and is able to figure out the percentages of the ingredients they are using for the glass for the balls, which frightens the Stormdancers in charge of making them, as this is sacred clan knowledge. Opal wants to see how they make the balls, and finds out that it is true- for some reason, the recipe they have been using is no longer working. The glass is simply not dense enough to hold the energy of the storms.

During her time there, she meets Kade, a morose Stormdancer who is desperate to find an answer to what is happening with the glass-one of the victims of the new glass balls was his sister, and the leader of the clan. Now he is leader, and he's chafing under the new responsibilities, as well as missing his sister. When Opal asks to see one of the old glass balls, she gets a shock when he gives her one- because this one holds his sister's soul inside! Somehow, when he imprisoned the storm's energy inside the ball, his sister's spirit was also trapped.

Since the storms will soon be starting for the year, Opal takes the problem to her father, a master glassmaker. He is able to track down the problem to one of the ingredients used in the glass, a false additive called "Brittle Talc" in place of real Talc. This first showed up in glass many years ago, and it nearly ruined glassmaking in Booruby until it was found out how to tell if it is in real talc, and the Master Glassmakers agreed to stop using it- with fines and imprisonment as a consequence. As Opal tries to find out if anyone in Booruby knows who might have sold Brittle Talc to the Stormdancer glassmakers, she has another encounter with the leader of the men who tried to abduct her, a man she knows only as Blue Eyes. But she manages to get out of that confrontation and encounters Ulrick, the son of another Booruby glassmaker who is experimenting with brittle glass to make sculpures which are beautiful.

But his family considers him a disappointment, and they won't allow him to sell his pieces at their shop. Opal, however, feels the magical power contained within the glass he makes and gets him to come back to the Mage Academy with her to be trained in his magic- a magic which only she seems to feel. As he heads to the school ahead of her, Opal travels back to the Stormdancer lands with the proper supplies to help them make newer globes that will not break, and is able to see Kade in action. But when Kade runs out of magic power partway through the storm, It is Opal who aids him by joining her magic with his to enable him to keep going. When she does, their souls seem to touch, but although Opal finds him very attractive, he makes it clear he isn't interested in her.

Disappointed, she sets out to return to the Magic Academy, but on the way, she is accused of a crime, stealing a vase, and thrown in jail until her mentor can free her. But later that night, her mentor appears at the door to her cell and tells Opal to run away, that the guards aren't listening and want to hurt her. But it's only a day or so later that Opal realizes that she's been tricked. The person she's with isn't Zitora, but the blue-eyed man. He knows that she knows the percentages for making the glass globes the Stormdancers use and wants her to replicate it. She pretends to do so, and tries to run away. but when a mage in the party tries to conjure up illusionary spiders to frighten her with. she grabs the spell and stuffs it into one of the globes she made.

When she's done, the globe is filled with glass spiders, and she does manage to get away. Back at the Academy, the mages are intrigued by the expansion of her powers and give her leave to build her own glassworks on the school ground so that she can explore her expanded powers. Ulrick is there, too, and getting lots of attention from the other students, especially the girls. He helps Opal set up her new shop, and suggests getting some of the other students to help her so that they can understand what she is doing. But he's concerned about all the times she's been abducted and takes to sticking to her like a limpet, determined to be her bodyguard and take care of her.

Meanwhile, she set on another task by the Mage Council, to track down where a number of fake diamonds are coming from. The diamonds look real, but are actually glass fakes, and Opal, with her magic, is one of the few who can tell the difference. She is paired with Pazia, another student, one who has been a thorn in her side and the one most likely to think of Opal as a "One Trick Wonder". But after they have tracked down the source of the gems, Opal tries to test her abilities with another globe, and Pazia is the one who offers to cast the spell. She conjures up poisonous green bees to sting Opal, but Opal still manages to stuff the magic into the ball. Soon, Pazia collapses, and the glass ball is full of bees.

But when they take Pazia to the infirmary, they find out she is unharmed, but all her magic is gone. Somehow , Opal and her globe have stolen all of Pazia's magic. Now the Mage Council is frightened of Opal's abilities, and some of them want to put her under house arrest, until Zitora points out that they were asking Opal to find out what she could do with her magic. It would be stupid for them to punish her for doing what she was asked to do. Look at how well that had worked with Yelena! The Council reluctantly agrees, and when Yelena contacts the Council and asks for Opal, they send her to meet her friend. Along the way, Ulrick and Opal also get to meet his sister, the hope of his family when it comes to glassware. But she's an arrogant woman, and also the one behind the glass Diamonds that merchants have been selling. While she claims not to know what happens to the gems she sells, Opal isn't sure that she can believe her.

Having once again encountered Kade and been rebuffed when she tried to express how deeply she cares about him, and seeing that Ulrick also loves her, and she does feel great affection for him, Yelena begins a relationship with Ulrick- and has another encounter with part of the soul of the mage who kidnapped her. But then a shocking betrayal leaves her wondering who to trust, and another kidnapping leaves her stranded in the north of Ixia in the midst of winter's cold. Can Opal find a way to free herself with the magic she possesses, and free two men she loves, one more than death, from the threat of a worse imprisonment than she has ever experienced?

My one problem with Maria V. Snyder's characters is that they can never seem to travel anywhere without bad things happening to them. Kidnapping, death traps. rape- Yelena had this problem, but now Opal seems not only to have it, too, but to even have it worse than Yelena. No sooner is she ahorse than something bad happens. Now< i can see one character having this trait, but two of them? I honestly hope Ms. Snyder comes up with a new gimmick soon, because I started to roll my eyes about this halfway through the book. And no matter what Opal seems to do, she ends up captured. Ulrick seems annoying about protecting Opal- but I very soon came to the conclusion that he was right- she *does* need a protector if all she does it get captured and dragged all over the place willy-nilly.

I also felt that neither male character that she was fleshed out all that well. This is partly because the story is told all from Opal's perspective, but both Ulrick and Kade seem to be rather pale and washed out as characters. Yes, we know that both of them are interested in her, and she is interested in them, but what are they beside that? Much of it, we never know. Kade loved his sister and is the strongest Stormdancer left in his village. Ulrick is passionate about glassmaking and has some magic with glass and he's protective of Opal- and he has a very arrogant sister. Aside from this, we really don't know them well, and that's all pretty much surface stuff, so both men are less compelling than Yelena's lover, Valek.

Despite all this, I did end up enjoying the book, as the action cracks along admirably and despite the numerous and tiresome attacks every time Opal got in the saddle, I still enjoyed reading and wondered what would happen next. This book does have some flaws, but it's still enjoyable, and I do plan to read the next one out, Sea Glass. Recommended.