Archive for the ‘Review’ Category
Prince of Thorns, by Mark Lawrence
Posted on: August 3, 2011
- In: epic fantasy | fantasy | Mark Lawrence | Review
- 19 Comments
Prince of Thorns, by Mark Lawrence
Published August 2011
Where I got it: rec’d review copy from Harper Collins/Voyager
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With an epic, empire-shattering sprawl that brings George R R Martin to mind, and a quick and snarky narrative style reminiscent of Scott Lynch, yet with a twist unlike anything I’vecome across, Mark Lawrence’s Prince of Thorns is easily the most incredible epic fantasy I have ever read. To drop yet another name, this is a novel that practically vibrates with deliberateness, making me think of Patrick Rothfuss at times.
Showing a true mastery of foreshadowing, Lawrence drops hints both overt and subtle that creep up on the reader like a path of breadcrumbs that twists and turns through the forest. I don’t care if this path leads to a witch’s house, Lawrence has completely seduced me to the point where I can do naught but follow. I knew from the first chapter this was a book I’d be devouring. The plot set-up is fast and clean, the prose and dialog alive with “show me”, and long before the first twist hits you’ll realize this is nothing at all like your typical epic fantasy.
Review: Forest Mage, by Robin Hobb
Posted on: July 1, 2011
- In: fantasy | Review | Robin Hobb
- 13 Comments
Forest Mage (Soldier Son Trilogy: book 2), by Robin Hobb
published in 2006
where I got it: purchased new
why I read it: enjoyed the first book, Shaman’s Crossing
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Picking up shortly after the end of the first book in the trilogy, Shaman’s Crossing, Forest Mage was mostly what I’ve come to expect from Robin Hobb – a powerful character driven fantasy that starts out “traditional”, and then, quite suddenly, most certainly isn’t.
As the military academy recovers from the Plague, life slowly goes back to normal. Noble families are coming to grips with the fact that their third son (destined for the priesthood) may now be their second son (destined for the military) and so forth. Nevare is readying to head home to his brother’s wedding and to see Carsina, his betrothed. While most people who survive the plague become weakened and skeletal, Nevare is having the opposite reaction to his brush with death: he can’t stop gaining weight. He becomes heavy. Then fat. Then obese. Hobb takes every possible opportunity to remind us that Nevare is supposed to be a fit, trim soldier, and “letting yourself go” simply isn’t accepted in this society (I’ll just assume that every woman in this world always loses the baby fat, and thyroid problems are nonexistent). Due only to his size, Nevare is in turn spurned by his father, his siblings, his friends and his betrothed. And then he is given a medical discharge from the academy. Everything he was destined to be, the military life his father trained him for, is over.
Humiliated and disowned by his father, Nevare sets out for the eastern frontier determined to join up with a military post far from home. Everywhere he stops it seems, people don’t want anything to do with him because of his girth. People assume he is homeless, or a thief, or a murderer, or all of the above, and only because he’s fat. Hobb belabors this point, often.
Along the King’s Road, Nevare learns first hand the folly of building a road with chain gangs, of building frontier towns just to abandon them when the road passes through and the guards leave. Puts me in the mood to track down some American history about the transcontinental railroads and the natives who were “in the way”.
The Orphans Tales: In the Night Garden by Catherynne M. Valente
published in 2006
where I got it: library
why I read it: have really, really enjoyed other novels by this author
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A cross between a book of Grimm’s fairy tales and 1001 Arabian Nights, The Orphans Tales: In the Night Garden, winner of the 2006 Tiptree Award, is unlike anything you have ever read.
At the very beginning, a unnamed girl who lives in a garden tells a boy she must tell her stories backwards, and that was always in the back of my mind as I read. Not only did everything come together at the end, but so did the magical sentence “Stories are like prayers. It does not matter when you begin, or when you end. . . “ Have truer words every been spoken? Does it matter where you crack open your book of fairy tales? the witch always shows up eventually, right?
And this book does have a witch, and a wizard, and pirates and monsters and griffins and eggs and firebirds and a tree-woman and a ship-tree and Stars that are Gods. Nested tale by nested tale, the mythology of the world grows and breathes to the point where you don’t know where reality ends, nor does it matter. This is a book that should be hoarded, should be meted out slowly, like Chocolate during a time of rationing. I read this as fast as I could (which wasn’t very), treating it like a plot based story. Too much chocolate on an empty stomach makes anyone feel yucky. Learn from my mistake: don’t read this book fast. Savor it.
- In: Jack Chalker | Review
- 13 Comments
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Midnight at the Well of Souls, by Jack Chalker
published in 1977
where I got it: husband’s collection
why I read it: cuz it’s damn fun!
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The far flung future of humanity isn’t a pretty place. Having colonized over 500 planets, many governments have turned to utopian totalitarianism, extreme forms of socialism, cloning, and forced equality through genetic engineering. Nathan Brazil isn’t the only freighter pilot who’d rather live alone on his ship than ever settle on one of those hellholes, where everyone is exactly the same. Wonderfully antisocial, Nathan happily goes decades without speaking to another human. Old enough to remember the good old days before the stagnation of humanity, these days it’s just freight, freight, more freight, and the occasional passenger run.
While ferrying a few passengers, he makes an unplanned detour, and hears a distress call from the non-inhabited planet of Dalgonia. One of the original planets of the Markovian race, Dalgonia is nothing but ruins these days, a favorite dig spot for archaeologists. The Markovians, an ancient race, possible the first race to populate our universe, left no writings behind, no artwork, nothing to identify what they might have looked like. The planets they colonized spanned the universe and all had massive, planet-wide computers living just under the surface. Nathan and his passengers investigate the impossible distress signal, only to fall through a gateway that shouldn’t exist.
No one will be reaching their destination. except for Nathan, who might just finally be at the right place.
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- In: fantasy | Pierre Pevel | Review
- 4 Comments
The Cardinal’s Blades, by Pierre Pevel
Published in 2010
Where I got it: library
Why I read it: I like historical fantasy, and how can you say no to that beautiful cover art?
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Over the last few days, Pierre Pevel’s The Cardinal’s Blades has proven very difficult to review. I think I will make my life a lot easier if I divide The Cardinal’s Blades in half: beginning, and end. To be succinct, the beginning was a mess that suffered from severe putdownability and lack of focus. And the end? well, the end more than made up for the problem-addled start to the point where I am actually quite excited to read Pevel’s recently released The Alchemist in the Shadows which I’m assuming is the 2nd book in this series.
The premise of the story is as other reviewers have been saying: Three Musketeers (swashbuckling, duels, blackmail, intrigue, secret societies, and more duels and blackmail) plus dragons (humanoid dragons, half breeds and their not as bright cousins used as pets and messengers) More alt history than historical fantasy, I wish Pevel had done more with the dragon aspects, and I hope he does in future books.
Paris, 1633 and Cardinal Richelieu has called back his favorite dirty jobber – Captain LaFargue, the leader of an elite group of swordsmen (and women!) known as The Cardinal’s Blades. A man of unshakeable honor, LaFargue will do any task to protect the French crown, even those unsavory kinds of tasks that caused The Blades to be dishonorably disbanded five years ago. Tasked with “getting the band back together”, so to speak, LaFargue must find his Blades, and convince them by force, if necessary, to join him in doing Richelieu’s bidding once more. He may be a man of honor, but his blades are a different story. They have their own demons and debts to pay.
It’s time to be afraid again.
Posted on: February 16, 2011
Twelve, by Jasper Kent
Published in 2010
Where did I get it: Library, but plan to purchase a copy
I’ve been waiting a long time to read a book like this. A book that puts the horror back in supernatural myths. Although it’s somewhat spoiled on the back of the book, I won’t even tell you which supernatural myth I’m talking about, just know that it’s one you are supposed to be afraid of.
To risk sounding cliche, Jasper Kent’s writing is just damn good. Every sentence, every word moves the plot forward. There isn’t a slow moment in this book. Kent brings us to early 19th century Moscow, where the people are proud yet afraid of invasion. Talk of republic is in the air, along with the early snows of autumn.
Don’t know anything about Russia, 1812 or Napoleon? Don’t worry, the main character, Aleksei will walk you through everything you need to know. My historical education is so lacking as to be embarassing, and not once did I feel lost. Twelve takes place during a war, and Aleksei and his friends are soldiers, but this is not a war book.
As Napoleon’s Grande Armee marches towards Moscow, Dmitry offers to bring in some mercenaries to help with the effort. Aleksei, Dmitry, Maksim and their commanding officer Vadim aren’t on the front lines, per say, they are beyond the front lines. Their mission is to cross enemy lines and cause disruptions and problems for the invaders. In modern jargon I’m sure the French would call them terrorists.
The Habitation of the Blessed, by Catherynne Valente
Published:Nov 2010
where I got it: library, but I’ll be purchasing a copy shortly
why I read it: heard it was very good, although I admit, at first I was apprehensive.
Two Vignettes, to set the scene.
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During mystical conversations with friends and lovers, I used to quip that I’d like, one day, to be reincarnated as a tree. To me, a tree has always been a thing of beauty. Home and resource to birds and animals, immortal via its seeds that are carried far and wide. After reading Catherynne M. Valente’s The Habitation of the Blessed, I will still joke around that I’d very much like to one day be reincarnated as a tree, but to me the punchline will taste heavier with meaning.
Everyone knows the story of the Garden of Eden. but do you remember the end? where Adam and Eve are told if they leave the garden “they shall surely die”? Would they have been immortal, had they stayed?
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I don’t feel qualified to review this book. I don’t have the education, the experience with religious history, or the vocabulary. I come at The Habitation of the Blessed as an innocent. In the words of a shy emo pop singer who has gone on to better things – “these words are all I have so I write them, so you need them just to get by. . . “ No words I say can do this book justice, but I’ll do the best I can.
Catherynne Valente’s The Habitation of the Blessed is in a word, sublime. I have never read anything like this before. Intimate and evocative and powerful, the price paid to experience it is that one can never again come to it with innocence, never again read it for the first time.
Blood of Ambrose, by James Enge
Posted on: January 11, 2011
- In: fantasy | James Enge | Review
- 8 Comments
The super quick version of this review is “last 100 pages more than makes up for first 100 pages”.
the beginning of Blood of Ambrose didn’t do a damn thing for me, but the end knocked my socks off in a most supercalifragalistic away.
We start off with young King Lathmar, who at age eleven has already been orphaned and thus inherited a small kingdom and a regent known as The Protector. Raised to be a figurehead and nothing more, Lathmar is naive, sheltered, and rather whiny and annoying. The Protector, Urdhven, has more ambitions than brains and figures taking the kingdom from Lathmar will be like taking candy from a baby. Urdhven’s got some special help, as well. Luckily, Lathmar’s true protector is his great so many times grandmother (who he just calls Grandmother), Ambrosia Viviana. In their time of need, Ambrosia tasks the frightened Lathmar with calling to her brother, knowing he will come and save them.
Enge flounders with worldbuilding and characterization at the beginning, and this will be a turn off to a lot of readers. Unless you’ve already read Enge’s short fiction, you don’t know who any of these people are, you don’t know why you should care, and worst of all you have no idea where any of this is heading. But trust me, you need to keep reading, because it gets better. much better.
Ambrosia Viviana’s brother is Morlock Ambrose, sorcerer, master maker, drunkard, child of Merlin. Morlock the exile, the Crooked Man whose magic has destroyed cities and empires. One must truly be in dire straights to call on his twisted help. There’s a reason he’s the star attraction stories parents tell to frighten their children.
- In: aliens | Review | science fiction | scifi | Scifi / Fantasy | Ursula K Leguin
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I originally reviewed this book here for SFRevu.
The Ashtheans have never known hatred, they have never known murder, they have never known distrust. The Earthlings bring them all these things, and such gifts can never be taken back.
On the edges of human colonized space, lies the planet Ashthe, or as the humans call it, New Tahiti. Soldiers, most ill equipped to be ambassadors to another race, are put in charge on a local level, told they have so many years until the colonists arrive, and told to make the island ready for human habitation. Far away from their central government, the soldiers can pretty much do whatever they want with no repercussions. And they do.
When the Ashtheans fight back with violence, the invaders are flabbergasted. They’ve brought civilization to these pathetic creatures, these creechies, how dare they fight back? What’s their problem? The problem is that the Earthlings refuse to believe this diminutive, undomesticated race could possibly be their equals in sentience or intelligence.
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Need to get caught up on the story? Check out my review of the first three volumes of the hilariously wonderful Girl Genius here.
So far, volumes four and five are my favorites. The main plot line moves forward, Agatha gets some insanely fabulous character development, we get to meet the mythical Geisterdamen, broad brushstrokes of worldbuilding help set everything up for what’s coming, we get some hints about the not so good deeds of the Heterodyne family, and my most favorite minor character of the whole story is introduced. And yes, he’s a Jagerkin. Don’t judge me!
Where the first few volumes of Girl Genius were character and world introduction, sex comedy and shooting down out of control clanks with home made laser guns, volumes four and five are more subtlety, foreshadowing, character and world development, math jokes, sex comedy, and shooting down out of control clanks with home made laser guns. Tis good stuff.
the Little Red Reviewer 
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