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Book Reviews - Romance, Fantasy, Science Fiction - By an Adult for Adults

Disappointing Novel – Deadly Cargo Jake Mudd Adventures Book 1 by Hal Archer

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I’m going to do what I hate doing, write a negative review on a book that the author labored to create.  I dislike writing stinky reviews even more than reading the book that spawned the dislike.

Deadly Cargo (Jake Mudd Adventures Book 1) features small-time cargo ship owner, Jake Mudd, and his adventures trying to deliver a million-credit package.  Of course the delivery goes wrong, he meets a girl, he saves the planet and he escapes just ahead of a deadly enemy.  Good authors can make Space ship owners who live on the fringe or the underside of society into enjoyable stories and I hoped to get that with the Jake Mudd book.

The author, Hal Archer, writes such a good newsletter that I bumped Jake up to the top of my overflowing to-read pile.  The novel is also fairly well written, in the sense of good use of language, good sentence structure.  What I didn’t care for in the story were a few too many plot holes, an overall ridiculous plot, and a dearth of characterization.

One plot hole is that Jake needs the million credit chip the villain has, but shoves the villain into a pot of bio goop.  I doubt it would have taken more than a few seconds to pull the now-dead villain out and retrieve the chip, but Jake doesn’t.  He knows an old enemy is coming for him, thus his ostensible reason to skedaddle but I don’t buy it.  Not for someone as desperate for cash as he.

Another hole in the plot and setting is that Archer repeatedly tells us the landscape is barren, as in no vegetation.  None.  Plus the daily storms are strong enough to wipe out almost any plants if there were some.  Yet the planet has large predators.  (This is the same puzzle as with the ice planet of Hoth that just so happened to have large animals.)

The book has some good points.  There is no swearing or foul language and no sex scene.  It is a fast read.  The relationship between Jake and his AI star ship, Sarah, seems interesting and likely explored more in sequels.

Reviewers on Amazon liked the book more than I, with average 4 stars, most complimenting the plot and fast, entertaining readability.  I didn’t like it very much at all and am rating it 2 stars since I managed to finish but didn’t enjoy and do not intend to read any sequels.

2 Stars

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Assassin’s Price by L. E. Modesitt, Jr., Imager Series, Finally a Different Hero

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If you read any of L. E. Modesitt, Jr.’s novels you are familiar with the basic plot and characters in his books.  We have the quintessential hero, a man (or woman in the Soprano Sorceress series) who has unusual talents, sees deeper and farther than anyone else, is self-controlled and emotionally disciplined, struggles to right deep-seated wrongs despite some amount of suffering.  The hero is always the person with the talent, the person who grins and ruefully shakes his head at the unfairness and how other don’t understand.  The hero is never the actual political leader.

In fact, most of Modesitt’s rulers and leaders are obsessed with power and money and seem to care little for the health of their people.  It’s the talented hero who cares and who forces the leader/ruler into governing wisely.  The other books in the third Imager series, Madness in Solidar and Treachery’s Tools, fit this formula.  Alastar is the enormously powerful imager who leads the collegium to once again serve Solidar and who pushes ruler Rex Lorien to act.

Assassin’s Price is refreshingly different as to the hero.  Alastar and the imagers play supporting roles and the lead is young Charyn, heir to Lorien.  The novel opens with Charyn acting as do most of Modesitt’s young heirs, petulantly demanding better pistols to overcome his inability to hit targets when he shoots.  We don’t see what exactly causes it, but Charyn grows up, matures to take responsible interest in commerce, innovation, people, the country’s finances, legal matters.

Charyn’s father doesn’t want him involved in much, seemingly resents his son’s interest, so Charyn does some of his work quietly.  For example, he opens a trading account at the new exchange so he can learn about the factoring businesses that seem to be growing ever larger and richer.

Villains in the past novels play returning roles in Assassin’s Price and we see new, different threats and conspiracies.  We get hints at the end that Charyn may increase council involvement in governing Solidar, which may eventually cause the Rex to fade out.  (From the first Imager novels set several hundred years after Assassin’s Price we know the Rex institution does not last.)  It will be interesting to see how this plays out in sequels.

Pacing

I’ve complained about Modesitt’s glacial pacing in past novels, books that go on and on without telling us anything new about the people or that have odd scenes that do nothing to advance the plot.  People walk and armies march for pages and pages, never really doing much in several Recluce novels, notably Heritage of Cyador and The Mongrel Mage.  (The bird attack in Antiagon Fire is a good example of an odd scene that adds bulk without content.)

Assassin’s Price moves along well.  There are a few slow spots and a few scenes that move a little too quickly.  The confrontations with Ryel and with his wife just happen, blink, and you miss them.  But overall this novel has the quality I enjoyed so much with Imager and Scholar.  It is by far the best of this new series.

Overall

I enjoyed Assassin’s Price considerably more than most of Modesitt’s recent work.   He has a story to tell, an interesting and likable character, decent writing, his usual solid world building.

4 Stars

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Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge by John Ringo in Larry Correia MHI Universe

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I enjoyed Monster Hunter Files short stories (see review here) and requested several more in the series from our library.  First one up was Monster Hunter Memoirs:  Grunge, written by John Ringo using the backstory and characters that Larry Correia created for his Monster Hunter International series.

John Ringo writes well-crafted, fast-paced near future science fiction and fantasy novels, many excellent and a few (Ghost) that are unreadable if you aren’t into smutty violence.  He is generous to fault sharing his thoughts about society and politics.  The other thing Ringo novels have is bad language, lots and lots of cussing and vulgarities.  Grunge has cussing and violence and sociology and it also has a good story with interesting, likable characters.

Synopsis

Our lead character, Chad, has two professors for parents, mom an unrepentant hippy type and dad a womanizer who hunts coeds.  Chad dislikes his mother – it is mutual, in fact she hates him – and for spite decides to get a perfect C average, 2.00000, in high school.  That is harder than it sounds since you have to know the right answers in order to get half of them wrong.  He joins the Marines and dies in the Beirut barracks bombing.

The story picks up when St. Peter asks Chad to forego heaven in favor of a mission on Earth.  Chad agrees, wakes up into a shattered, agonizing body, heals in Bethseda and looks for the sign God promised him, 57.  The 57 eventually leads him to a zombie outbreak where he meets the Monster Control Bureau (FBI) and MHI (Monster Hunter International, a for-profit eradication company).  The story goes on from there, through his training and first many missions.

Grunge has some excellent, funny moments that highlight the dead serious situation that Chad is tasks to resolve.  The Old Ones are waking up and causing mischief – think vampires, werewolves, giant blood-sucking spiders, zombies, ghouls etc. and etc.  The Fae are not pretty Disney creatures but powerful creatures who do not like humans.  The vampires do not sparkle and do not seduce nice young ladies.  To quote Chad, if an Old One or Fae got into the world the whole world would scream for decades until there is no one left.

Characters

Thus Chad justifies his life.  He hunts monsters for a living, plays violin as a hobby, studies languages for two PhDs and is a lounge lizard the rest of the time.  He looks at cute coeds the way the rest of us look at spaghetti (or chocolate).  He becomes a Catholic but somehow doesn’t quite get the 6th commandment and thinks fornication is a Sunday-Saturday avocation.

Chad makes the novel work.  Ringo did a great job on him; he feels like a real person with virtues and failings, odd habits and quirks. Ringo doesn’t spend as much time on the other characters, enough that they too feel like real people, although with less detail.

Now for the less pleasant parts.  Chad talks about girls but we do not have sex scenes, more lust scenes.  There are a couple blasphemies, F bombs and other vulgarities, lots of violence.  Chad talks about his guns, but nowhere near as much or as annoyingly, as Larry Correia did in Monster Hunter International.  (I’ve not figured out why, but a lot of science fiction authors bore the heck out of me by describing space ships and lasers in overabundant detail, and it seems we can’t get away from it even with books like this with not a space ship in sight.  All I need to know is that 1., it’s a gun; 2., it’s big; and 3., it kills things.  I do not care what type and how big it is and what type of ammunition it uses, but apparently a lot of science fiction readers enjoy that stuff.  Me, I skim through those sections if the story is good and toss the book if it’s not.)

I recommend Monster Hunter Memoirs:  Grunge if you enjoy fast-paced science fiction-y fantasy or lots of action or a complex character.

4 Stars

Review: A Plague of Giants by Kevin Hearne Early Pacing Issues, Otherwise Excellent

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A Plague of Giants is the first book in Kevin Hearne’s new series, The Seven Kennings.  I enjoyed Hearne’s Iron Druid series and was glad to get a copy of this new novel from NetGalley.  The good news is, NetGalley expects one to 1) Finish and 2) Review each book.  The bad news?  We have to 1) Finish and 2) Review.  I almost didn’t make it through #1.

A Plague of Giants begins with a bang.  A tidal mariner sees an invasion force, scuttles many ships and warns her country’s leaders in time to repel the invaders.  Right away this gets us interested.  What is a tidal mariner, who are these invaders, what is going on here?  We get hints of the magic system with this tidal mariner’s story:  She expends part of her life each time she uses her kenning (magical gift, in her case water-related), and large tasks cost her years.  That sounds intriguing!

I settled in to read the rest…only the next section bogged down.  And it got worse.  Slower, and slower until the only things keeping me reading were a guilty sense of duty and a dim memory that thee Iron Druid novels have slow spots that are not too long.

By 25% of the way through (thank you Kindle for telling me how much more to endure) I thought seriously about skimming the rest and writing a short, negative review.  By 30% through the book starts to pick up.  Some of the disparate strands of story start to come together, book has more action than politics, we learn about a few new characters with interesting stories.

The Good Points

Hearne uses the device of a bard recreating and retelling first-person stories to show snippets from 10 characters in 6 countries.  Not all the character have kennings and of those who do, they differ.  This method gives us a plausible sense of in-person viewpoint.

Some of the characters are fascinating.  We are supposed to dislike the viceroy Melishev Lohmet, although I find him quite interesting.  He is conniving, sneaky, sly, dedicated to himself first, last and always. He is despicable – but interesting and I enjoy his sections.  Gondel the scholar and Nel Kit ben Sah are also well done.

Plague of Giants has a plethora of plot, big, little, over-arching, tiny subs, enough that it is challenging to keep the characters and their plot involvements straight.  I wasn’t sure at first whether the two giant invasions were connected, and if not, which was the main plot.  Hearne hints at some plots; for example, one narrator’s house guest seems more than she appears on the surface.  On the good side he wraps up the main subplot by the end.

The Not So Good Points

It seemed to take Hearne several iterations to get the bard-telling-the-story method working well.  I wouldn’t say the first few viewpoints were confusing – it was always clear who was talking – but it wasn’t clear how they worked together, or even if they were supposed to connect.

After a few character sequences the bard starts each new session by introducing the character and sketching the background, how the little vignette fit in time compared to other events.  This is helpful to keep us focused and helps the pacing.

Characterization is uneven.  Some of the characters stari out as semi-reasonable folk, then slide down to nasty, murderous thugs, notably Garin Mogen.  Mogen is lava-born, controls fire, leads his people to escape the volcano eruption that destroys their home.  He is quick tempered and won’t let soft considerations stop him from settling where he wants. Mogen views things like ownership, permission, unauthorized forestry as soft, simply unimportant.  That part makes sense.  What doesn’t make much sense is that Mogen not only has no qualms about killing people with fire, he relishes it.  He wants to kill, to burn everyone who stands in his way.  At first Mogen was one of the most interesting people, but we readers quickly decide he needs to go, just as fast as someone can get him gone.

I don’t recall reading it in the novel, but it is as though one becomes the element one controls and it takes the kenning bearer over.  If that’s the case then it’s hard to see how Mogen had kept his people together as long as he did.

We are supposed to like Abhinava Khose (Abi) but I find him tedious, overly dramatic, in fact a typical older teen who thinks they are important.  This is not a flaw in the writer, but my reaction to a spoiled brat who later makes good, solely by accident.  In fact I think it’s to Hearne’s credit that he creates characters that are so realistic.

Some of the plot points were hinted.  Refugee Elynea lives with Dervan, the main POV character and a close friend of his country’s elected ruler.  She wants a job but when Dervan finds her one she is angry.  Supposedly she is angry because she didn’t need his help, but I feel her response to situations is slightly off all the way.  No doubt we’ll see more of Elynea in sequels.

The book does not have an ending.  Hearne stops telling the story at a point where a couple sub-plots finish and the main plot takes a breather, but it is clear that the story will continue in sequels.  I prefer books like The Iron Druid novels that flow sequentially, but one can enjoy reading them out of order.

There is no map and we readers need one.

Did I mention pace?  The excruciating slow start nearly swamps out the good points.  I don’t know whether a little more editing would help, or staying with one character longer at the beginning would make it more readable.

The pacing problems make A Plague of Giants hard to rate.  Do I base it on the last half, 4 stars?  The first quarter, 1 star?  Let’s say overall 3 stars.  Good story, interesting characters but a pace that derails the reader.

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Daughters of the Storm by Kay Wilkins Character-Driven Fantasy

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This book should have been great, featuring five sisters, daughters of the King of Thyrsland, each different.  One is the warrior queen-to-be, one a seflish romantic, one almost overwhelmed with her gift of foretelling, one an immoral tart and one drowning in religion and madness.  The king is ill and his wife, Gudrun, fears and hates Bluebell, her oldest stepdaughter, and distrusts and dislikes the other sisters.  She clings to her son from her first marriage and hopes to maneuver him into eventually ruling in place of warrior Bluebell.  Doesn’t that sound like an enticing novel?

The setting and back story should be great too.  Thyrsland follows the old religion, which doesn’t differentiate between men and women for ruling; the romantic sister is married to Thyrsland’s old enemy who calculates that switching to the Trimartyr religion will push his son to the fore as Thyrsland’s eventual ruler.

Unfortunately the story doesn’t jell.  The plot has many strands and parallel stories that don’t make full use of the inherent conflicts.  It felt like an extended set up instead of a story.  It didn’t hold my interest after the first fifth or so.

Plus, as a book that relies on characters, there is no sister to like, none is the eventual heroine.  All the sisters are flawed and Willow, Ivy and Rose are despicable.  I like Bluebell the best.  She cares for her country more than herself and is smart, cagey, realizes the religious threat.  On the other hand she has a genius for making people hate her (mostly deserved) and doesn’t seem to care that she exacerbates the threat from raiders, step mother, step brother and her erstwhile brother-in-law.

This novel did not work for me.   I got it from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  Had it not been for that I would have deleted it after the first fifth, as it was I managed to skim the last half.  I won’t look for the sequels.

2 Stars

The Girl In The Tower Katherine Arden Sequel to The Bear and The Nightingale Russian Fantasy

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The Girl in the Tower by Katherine Arden already has garnered high praise and (to date) solid 5 star reviews on Amazon, just as did its predecessor The Bear and the Nightingale.  The books are set in early medieval Muscovy ruled by princes under Tatar overlords.  The people are deeply religious, superstitious, uneducated, yet as Arden shows us, admirable.

I enjoyed reading about early  medieval Rus/Muscovy in both novels as it is an era and locale we seldom see in fiction.  The people must be fierce and hardy to survive the long cold winters, muddy springs and falls.  As the author noted, Vasya knows nothing of luxury.  To her being warm, having enough to eat, having dry socks are luxurious.  Ideas of beautiful furniture, wall hangings that are as much decoration as aids to warmth, of good food all winter, these are as fantastical as snowdrops in January.

We are meant to admire and identify with main character Vasya, the girl who found the snowdrops in winter, but I didn’t find her likable.

Vasya has dilemmas:

  • She can see the small household spirits, the ones in the bathhouse, the oven, the stable that almost no one else can, which in a superstitious age marked her as horribly different, a witch.
  • Vasya is a girl in an era when a high-born girl either married or entered the convent.  Vasya wants neither of these; she wants adventure, she wants to travel.
  • She refuses to compromise or to decide what to do.

Reading the first half of the novel was like wading through icy cold water.  We know nothing good can come of Vasya’s determination, there is no good ending possible.  Once Vasya meets Prince Dmitrii and she and her brother Sasha lie to him that she is a young man, she has even fewer options and none are palatable.

Prince Dmitrii grows in this sequel.  He had a small role in The Bear and the Nighingale, portrayed as young, somewhat self-indulgent.  In this sequel Dmitrii acts as a prince.  He routs bandits, tries to protect his people from avaricious Tatars, abhors lies.

The relationship between frost demon Morosko and Vasya is frustrating to read.  It’s obvious something is going on with Vasya’s sapphire and that Morosko feels more for Vasya than he admits or that he believes he should.  Vasya too has strong feelings but is confused as to what those are exactly.  She is intrigued by Morosko, is grateful to him, enjoys his company but finds him difficult and opaque and she does not love him.

I don’t care for teen fantasy novels where the 16 year old idiot girl captivates the 2000 year old vampire/godlet/demon/what-have-you because it’s just stupid.  To Arden’s credit the Vasya/Morosko semi relationship is believable – it has a quid pro quo at its heart although Vasya doesn’t know it – but the relationship still suffers from the underlying problems that Vasya is young and naive and doesn’t know her own heart.

My overall problem with The Girl in the Tower is that it is not enjoyable reading.  Every page brings the characters closer to doom.  We know there is no happy ending, that nothing will be resolved – because the underlying problem cannot be solved – and that makes it difficult to read.  Every page brought Vasya into more tanglements, more lies, more risk.

Vasya can not control herself while in Moscow, cannot follow her sister’s and brother’s commands to be quiet, to stay in the background.  She takes a bad situation and made it far worse for herself and those she claims to love, just because she cannot control her curiosity, her bravado.  I liked her less and less as the novel progressed.

This novel will get many accolades and probably awards, but I do not like it.  The writing is excellent; the setting is unusual and intriguing, but the unlikable heroine Vasya and miserable options she makes for herself make it heavy going.  In fact, had this not been a NetGalley where I’m obliged to write a review, I would have put the book aside and not finished.

If you are familiar with The Two Towers, the second book in the Lord of the Rings trilogy by J. R. R. Tolkein, you know that it too has a sense of doom, of bad choices and no good options, of happy endings seemingly out of reach.  Yet Tolkein manages to create a sense of hope, with excellent characters and a plot that moves along enough to keep us happy, reading despite the overarching feeling of menace.  Arden’s novel lacks those elements, leaving only the feeling of menace, of doom, of a foreboding future.  Had I liked Vasya no doubt I’d like the novel, but as it stands, I do not.

How do I rate this?  Do I give it high marks for the excellent writing, originality, strong sense of mood, great setting?  Or rate lower because I do not enjoy it, do not like the character?

3 Stars.  2 Stars because I had to force myself to finish, 4 stars because of high quality writing

The Scarab’s Curse (The Savage and Sorcerer, Book 1) by Craig Halloran

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The Scarab’s Curse (The Savage and Sorcerer, Book 1) by Craig Halloran is not deep.  It is light entertainment.  The first scene has the sorcerer Finster sitting in his office, the balcony over a small town bar, giving love (lust) tokens to a client – along with the bad news that the man’s wife has been unfaithful.  This scene is richly detailed, the setting is carefully drawn so we feel the fire’s warmth and see the steep stairs to the balcony.  Soldiers rudely interrupt, arrest Finster and drag him off to the Wizard Haven.

This first scene got me hooked.  I appreciate an author’s skill who is able to create a mood and setting without lots of boring telling, who keeps the narrative alive and moving while filling us in on the back story.  It is not easy to do.  Halloran did a good job on about the first third of the novel, carefully illuminating setting, mood and character.

The last two thirds or so feel rushed, all plot, minimal background or setting or mood and little character development.  Halloran’s writing style is good and he still tells a good story; he kept me reading.  Halloran says in the afterward that he wrote the story in 8 days, two of which were Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, so he drafted and finished a reasonably entertaining read in 6 days.  Impressive.

It would have been more impressive had he taking his time and made the last part as good and as enticing as the first third; he would have had a very good novel.  Instead it’s a decent story, but not as good as it could have been.

There is a sequel, The Scarab’s Power, but it’s $2.99 on Amazon, a little pricey if it’s the same overall decent-but-not-great quality as this first novel.   I may look for other books by this author since he is able to tell a good story.

3 Stars

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Well That Was Fun… We Are Legion (We Are Bob) (Bobiverse Book 1)

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We are Legion (We are Bob) (Bobiverse Book 1) is a lot of fun but read the caveats before you buy.

Plot and World Building

Bob sells his software company and signs up to be frozen for eventual resuscitation just before he dies in a traffic accident.  He wakes up about 100 years later, this time as a “replicant”, a personality and mind uploaded into a computer program.  He learns he has zero rights and has the opportunity to become an interstellar probe pilot – or be turned off.  To add challenge, there are 5 other replicants who have the same opportunity.

Bob’s a competitive guy and decides to win.

Bob’s new world is grimmer than ours.  The US no longer exists and is now a theocracy centered in the Pacific Northwest.  Brazil among other countries is also building probes using artificially recreated personalities and the world is in an arms race.  Bob manages to get off the planet and launch towards Epsilon Eridanni just ahead of Brazil’s attack.

Here’s where Bob’s software background gets handy.  Bob is able to weed through his programming and remove several backdoor control points and rebuild himself as autonomous.  He decides to go ahead with the mission anyway.

Bob gets to his target system and explores a bit, encounters the murderous Brazilian probe, fights the Brazilian off.  Bob clones himself and puts his copies – who are also autonomous individuals – into their own spaceships.  Howard and Will return to Earth.  Good thing too, because one of the Brazilian software clones is slinging asteroids – big ones, planet killer types – at Earth.  Over 95% of humanity has died off from the prior wars and now the Brazilian’s asteroid attack will kill everyone left.

Much of the plot after this point turns on how to rescue the remaining people on Earth:  Where to move them to, how to get them there, who first, so on.

Parallel plots center around Bob and the main clone characters.

Characters

Bob is the main character in this novel of course, but he also clones himself and makes Bill and Homer, then many more generations.  Each has slightly different interests but all are quirky, nerdy types, the ones you figure will keep their teen senses of humor forever.

Bob discovers the Deltans, a race of primitive folks just beginning their stone age and is fascinated with the culture.

Will aka Riker (one of too many Star Trek jokes) and Howard  go back to Earth and spend their time helping the folks left, and eventually to evacuate them.

Bill is actually a more interesting character than Bob.  Bill tinkers and explores and develops faster-than-light communication in this first book and later develops other neat whiz-bang things.  Bill also acts as the hub for the Bobiverse as it grows to include about 100 Bobs.

Dennis Taylor does a decent job showing us the different Bob variants although he also does a fair amount of telling.  It seemed like he created so many variants mostly to have a lot of names around; we have 3 or 4 main Bobs in this first book and a few more in each of the sequels that play noticeable roles.

I suspect it’s kind of hard to have a lot of character development when your character is a computer program.  The basic premise is that the program is scanned from Bob’s brain and contains his personality along with generic computer capabilities and this personality can adapt and change.  Still, character development is somewhat thin in this and successive books in the series.

Caveat

As I said in the title of this post, We are Legion (We are Bob) and its sequels are a lot of fun.  The Bobs explore our tiny neighborhood in the galaxy; they meet new civilizations and peoples; they rescue humanity from death.  The book is fast-paced and overall most enjoyable.

However.  The author apparently believes that religious belief is ridiculous and that there are enough Christian nutcases to go create a theocracy.  It reminded me of some of the more fervid nightmares people foamed about during Bush’s presidency. Taylor inserts Trump into the story a bit too.

I don’t know whether the author is an atheist; to me this attitude was just a backdrop for the story.

There is also a lot of gee-whiz going on.  Bob tells us that the basic prerequisites for interstellar work are the 3-D printer and intelligent software.

The 3-D printer is souped up version, able to layer individual atoms to build anything from elaborate computer cores sufficient to hold a Bob clone, to new spacecraft, to bombs.  About the only thing it can’t print is something alive or food.  (I think its problem with food may be more because it would be grossly inefficient rather than technically impossible.)  Now years ago I was a research chemist.  Just because you stick two atoms next to each other, even if aligned just exactly right, Mother Nature is stubborn and you might not get the chemical reaction you want.  I don’t see how a 3-D printer could assemble atoms into plastic, for example.  (Today’s printers today use plastic as raw material.)

Even if you believe the 3-D printer could assemble mining robots, etc., etc., to go build a new spacecraft with computer core, I think the timescale is off.  In the book Bob/Bill/Howard are independent within a few years.   That brings me to the final point, the idea of copying someone into a computer.  Frankly I don’t believe it.  Perhaps it might be possible to load memories into non-brain storage, but I don’t see how copying memories will create a personality, one that is inherently a person, not a program.

If you can ignore the gosh-darn technological wonder doings and don’t take the idiotic anti-Christian backdrop personally then it’s a blast.  Don’t look for outstanding writing or subtle character building; this isn’t literature.  Instead enjoy for what this novel is, entertainment.

5 Stars for entertainment.

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Legends of the First Empire: Age of Myth by Michael J. Sullivan Sequel Doldrums

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Michael J. Sullivan, best known for his Riyria novels, started a new series The Legends of the First Empire with book 1, Age of Myth.  I enjoyed this first novel (reviewed here) and had high hopes for the sequel, Age of Swords.  Unfortunately this second book was hard to read, glum, boring for the first two thirds before speeding into high gear for the last third.  Had I not gotten it through NetGalley I’d have tossed it aside well before the half-way mark.  (I had the same problem with the Riyria Revelations, thoroughly enjoyed book 1, then floundered about half way through book 2.)

Why is the first half of the book hard to read?

Little Character Development and Action

The characters are the same but we don’t see anything new with them.  Persephone is still leading her people despite feeling like a fraud; Raithe is still hanging around but doesn’t quite know why.  We don’t see these people doing anything except packing up to evacuate their old home.  Sullivan doesn’t show us anything new about any of these people, no character development, no witty dialogue.

Mawyndule has a small role that is interesting at first.  A Miralyith young lady plays with his ego and hormones to get Mawyndule to flirt a bit with a Miralyith-supremacy group that manipulates events for a coup attempt.  Any reader can see what the young lady is doing but Mawyndule falls for it.  This episode is important because it frames the reason why Lothian will decide to war against the Rhune.

Women Power

I’m all for strong female leads in fantasy novels and Persephone is a great character.  But Sullivan really went all out in The Age of Swords with smart ladies inventing clever solutions while the men stayed home and boasted and got drunk.  It got a little tedious.

Technological Advancement, Or How to Invent Wheels, Writing and Archery in a Week

Rhune lacked the wheel, knew nothing of iron or even bronze, were unaware of writing and no one had bows and arrows.

Brin developed writing for her own use, a beautiful accomplishment.  Somehow, a week later she was able to decipher tablets worth of texts that she didn’t write.  Moreover, the author of these tablets was an ancient being, alien, not a Fhrey or a dwarf or a Rhune.  I’m sorry.  Literacy is magic, but not that magic.  Look at how we still cannot decipher Linear B which ordinary humans wrote within the last 3500 years.

Roan developed wheels and bows and arrows the same month Brin developed writing.  The real problem is that archery is tricky; you can learn the rudiments of sticking an arrow on a bow and shooting in some general direction but it is difficult to do well.  I doubt anyone could first figure out the bow, then realize arrows need fletching to stabilize, then give to a friend who can master shooting in a few days.  Not going to happen.

Rhune Society and the Fhrey Tribes

We learned a lot about the Rhune society in Age of Myth.  It’s a typical tribal/family system with a chieftan (male) supported by his wife and his trusted lieutenant First Sword.  Each tribal group has a mystic and a Keeper of the Ways, likely female, who keep the tribe centered on its heritage and past knowledge.  The individual tribes vary in terms of how civilized they are, whether they use agriculture or rely on hunting, trade, wealth, so on.

We don’t learn anything more about the Rhunes in Age of Swords that we didn’t know from Age of Myth.

The Fhrey tribes are mostly based on family except for the Miralyith who use magic.  Knowing how societies work when one group has special powers that others lack, we can expect infighting between the Miralyith and the rest, and some does show its ugly head in Age of Myth and now in Age of Swords.  I think Sullivan can do much more with this although he will need a careful hand to keep it interesting and not polemic.

Mystery Character

Trilos, an older Fhrey (at least looks like a Fhrey) sits in front of the Door every day.  Trilos has a suggestion for Imaly, the Fhrey Curator, to avoid tearing the Fhrey apart in a Miralyith vs. everyone else civil war:  Blame the Rhunes.  This could work despite having so many holes and such leaky logic that no one could seriously believe it.  At best it gives Lothian an excuse to avoid a bloodbath at home and instead go kill some negligible folks.

The interesting question is why this mystery person does this.  Does he simply want to avoid Fhrey vs. Fhrey war?  Or does he want the Rhune to war against the Fhrey?  Or something else?

Overall

The Age of Myth set up a detailed fantasy world using characters and its action-filled plot to tell a story and build the world.  Age of Swords spent about 60% of itself re-setting up the same world, characters and plot.  Sullivan could have avoided all this set up, edited out much of the first half, and had a tight, moving novel.

One star for the first two thirds and four stars for the finale.  Let’s say 3 stars.

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Wow! Humor at Its Best – P. G. Wodehouse on Hoopla

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There is no one like P. G. Wodehouse.  No one has his combination of humor, plot, characters and language.  Not to mention the fun of reading about house parties in old castles, valets and butlers, ocean trips across the Atlantic, girls on the make, dressing for dinner, mad coincidences, traveling on the train (leaving just ahead of a wrathful aunt).

Our old library had about 50 Wodehouse novels and I read every one and bought more and read those too.  For years it seemed as if Barnes & Noble or Amazon stocked the same 50 or 60 novels that everyone has – Jeeves and Wooster stories, a few trips to Blandings Castle, Galahad Threepwood and his buddy Uncle Fred – but neglected many of his less well-known stories.

I’m so glad to see Hoopla offers many of these novels that weren’t readily available.  I’m borrowing one a month for now, such a treat.  Both Amazon and Barnes and Noble have many more Wodehouse masterpieces now.

The Gem Collector

Jimmy Pitt, once a distinguished safe cracker and jewel thief, now a distinguished rich baronet, is dining alone at the Savoy Hotel when he notices a young man at a nearby table who shows all the signs of not having his wallet.  Jimmy helps the fellow out.  This is how Jimmy meets Spencer Blunt, who just happens to be the son of Lady Jane Blunt, now married to Mr. McEachern, formerly a New York policeman.

Of course Lady Jane and her society don’t know that Mr. McEarchern was a policeman and believe his money came from Wall Street, which is only partially true, as he certainly got some bribes while on that exciting street.  McEarchern and Jimmy know each other (of course) and both know the other had been as crooked as could be, and both want to present reformed faces to the world.

Jimmy goes with Spencer to his mom’s and McEarchern’s home for an extended house party where he again meets Molly, McEarchern’s daughter.  As usual with Wodehouse we have assorted nasty characters, love interests and naturally, Spencer’s obnoxious aunt who owns a pearl collar supposedly worth 40,000 pounds, or $200,000 at the exchange rate of those days.  (This is roughly several million in today’s money.)

If you can see the plot thicken from here, then congratulations, you are a Wodehouse reader.

I thought The Gem Collector was a little more serious than some Wodehouse.  For example, Lady Jane is “drawn to Mr. McEarchern.  Whatever his faults, he had strength; and after her experience of married life with a weak man, Lady Jane had come to the conclusion that strength was the only male quality worth consideration.”  “She suspected no one.  She liked and trusted everybody, which was the reason why she was so popular, and so often taken in.”  McEarchern “had an excellent effect upon him (Spencer) but it had not been pleasant.”

Another character is a card shark who lives from house party to house party and preys on young men.

Both Jimmy and McEearchen are interesting people, as is Spike, Jimmy’s former sidekick now masquerading as his valet.  Will Jimmy restrain his love of fine jewels or will he once more give in and steal the pearls?  Will McEarchern manage to act the gentleman or will he get the horsewhip out for Jimmy?  Will Spike lose his accent?  (I wish.  Spike’s accent was the one negative in the story.)

5 Stars

A Damsel in Distress or No Good Deed Goes Unpunished

This is another romantic comedy with plenty of mistaken identities, meddlesome aunts and love triangles.  Our leading man, George Bevan, is an American playwright currently in London for his hit musical.  He meets Maud when she jumps in his taxi and things go sideways from there.

A Damsel in Distress is also a little bit more serious than most of Wodehouse’s books with all three romances a bit out of the ordinary.  Wodehouse shows real feelings with these characters.  People don’t spend the entire novel ducking aunts or getting clever or hiding behind the sofa; instead we see self-sacrifice and men risking social opprobrium to marry the ladies they love.

The story is still Wodehouse funny, but a bit less fluffy than the Jeeves stories.

Amazon offers A Damsel in Distress; currently the Kindle version is free.

4 Stars