More Books than Time

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

The Monster Hunter Files Anthology of Fun Short Stories by 18 Fantasy Authors

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I had never heard of Larry Coreia or the Monster Hunter International novels before finding this anthology, The Monster Hunter Files, by chance in our library’s New Book section.  The cover is lurid, with a lady spiffed up in a typical ridiculous costume of bare midriff with cleavage and lots of black and red, slashing a nasty looking scaly creature with two long swords.  Anyone who reads fantasy knows the covers often feature midriffs and cleavage, so we overlook that and check out the author list and theme.  Hmm.  Two authors that I often like, Jim Butcher and John Ringo.  Why not give it a try?

Thistle, by Larry Correia (original Monster Hunter International author) is excellent, albeit with a twist ending.  The story has plenty of action and delivers a real sense of the desert Southwest, its dusty heat, beat up barely-making-ends-meet homes, the sun, the dry vegetation.  We meet Owen Pitt, main character in the first Monster Hunter novel, and see him risk his life to save a little girl.  Thistle is pretty good, enough that I requested a few more books in the series from our library.

Small Problems by Jim Butcher was one of my favorites.  We have the slightly askew character with unexpected depths of humanity and heroism, a unique set of challenges, plus plenty of danger.  In other words, classic Jim Butcher.  I hope we meet up with Sid again in other Monster Hunter books.

Darkness Under the Mountain by Mike Kupari felt a little uneven although enjoyable.  I felt it ended just when it needed to start.

A Knight of the Enchanted Forest is a real treat, picking up on the Monster Hunter universe’s version of “elves” and introducing Glad, a young girl who likes Twinkies and Ho Hos and wins at Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune.  Glad is also a hard-nosed realist who can’t help it that no one believes that her science teacher really is a werewolf.  That’s OK because she’s willing to tackle the gnomes infesting the Enchanted Forest trailer park.  The author, Jessica Day George, combines a light-hearted feeling with a true sense of mission – those gnomes really are repulsive – and brings Glad, her father Winston and Her Majesty to life.

The story was good enough that I looked for novels by George; however she writes mostly YA fantasy, one of which I tried and did not care for, and Silver In The Blood, a fantasy meant for adults and older teens, which is quite good.

Another author who is new to me is Quincy J. Allen, writer of Sons of the Father.  This particular story is intense plot with fast action, not a lot of characterization or setting, an enjoyable read.

John Ringo’s The Case of the Ghastly Spectre reminds me a bit of his Hot Gate series and The Last Centurion, a good story, well written, some pontificating, a main character who wins with his head, not just his fists or his gun.

Hunter Born by Sarah A Hoyt is another story with a young lady heroine, this time Julie Shackleford age 16 and going to her first prom.  Sadly her date is an incubus who has other things in mind than dancing.

The other stories are also pretty good.  Unlike many anthologies all the contributors deliver at least a decent tale, some good and a few very good to excellent.  All the authors kept to the feel of the Monster Hunter International universe; several picked up on characters that got tiny mentions in other novels and built full stories around them.  The Jessica Day George is a good example of this.

The editors are to be commended for delivering a consistent good quality product in an anthology where the unifying factor is the underlying theme and background story.  Overall excellent job.

4 Stars

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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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Hunting in Bruges – Flat Fantasy

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Hunting in Bruges by E. J. Stevens is set in the old Belgium city of Bruges and features Jenna, a young lady who takes herself and her job very seriously.  She is a Hunter, one of a guild that protects us normal folks from nasty predators like vampires, ghouls, grindylow.

Lots of authors use the fantasy niche of protectors protecting humanity from supernatural predators; some, like Jim Butcher, successfully merge fantasy with human emotions and characters, fast plots, compelling narratives, funny and on-tune dialogue to create excellent novels.  Others leave me flat.

I wanted to like this book.  The author was a finalist for a fantasy award and the book had flashes of a real story with interesting characters, enough that I kept reading, hoping the story would improve.  Main character Jenna was obnoxious, arrogant and bossy, dedicated to getting rid of supernatural creepy crawlies, unlikeable.  Dialogue, plot and secondary characters also left me glad to finish and put the book aside.

The author did a nice job describing Bruges and the 1299 wars between Guy of Dampierre, count of Flanders and  Phillip Capet of France that were caused the problems Jenna faces in the story.  E. J. Stevens got me interested enough to look up the history, which makes me wonder why the story and characters in Hunting in Bruges are so dull.

Overall 2 Stars

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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Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman Retell Ancient Myths and Stories

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Neil Gaimon wrote Norse Mythology using the ancient stories of the Aesir and Vanir gods, giants, huge wolves, world trees.  His characters include our familar Thor, Odin, Frey and Loki, and the less-familiar Kvasir and Aenir and still more.  Gaiman does an excellent job merging his own style into the narrative flow of the legends and is faithful to the overall feeling that these stories are oral tales.

If you’ve read any of the old myths you know that Thor and Odin and the rest are nothing like the brave and clever heroes in the movies.  Instead they are rather stupid, gullible and greedy, easy pickings for someone like Loki or the dwarf craftsmen.  Gaiman shows us these folk as they were in the legends.

The book includes 15 stories spanning from the creation of the world to Ragnarok and the world that comes after.  It includes some of my favorites featuring Loki and his genius for manipulating and deceiving the other gods.

Relationship Between Loki and Thor

All the movies and books stress the love/distrust between Thor and Loki.  Loki can’t help scheme; it is what he does and Thor can’t help getting mixed up in Loki’s maneuvers.  Gaiman keeps their relationship central to the stories.

My favorite was Freya’s Unusual Wedding.  One of the best passages is “There were things Thor did when something went wrong.  The first thing…was ask himself if what had happened was Loki’s fault.  … So he did the next thing he did when something went wrong, and he went to ask Loki for advice.  Loki was crafty.  Loki would tell him what to do.”

Loki discovers the ogre Thrym stole Thor’s hammer and wants Freya to marry him in exchange.   After several lively discussions Thor dresses up like Freya and goes with Loki to marry Thrym.  Of course Loki and Thor trick Thrym and manage to kill the ogres and escape with virtue intact and hammer in hand.

Finally Loki goes too far.  He causes Hod to kill his brother Balder; he refuses to go along with Hermod when she requests Balder back from Hel; he murders Fimafeng at one feast and gets drunk and insults every god at the next.  Thor captures him in the form of a salmon and takes him back to be punished.  The other gods imprison him with a giant serpent to drip venom onto his face unless faithful Sigyn catches the venom as it drips.  Gaiman added detail and color to this tale, including Loki congratulating himself on hiding so well.

Overall

Norse Mythology is easy to read because the individual tales are all short, making it easy to pick up for a few minutes before dinner or read before bed.  The stories themselves are true to the original which makes them a little hard to read.  We can see the train wreck coming and watch the gods’ cupidity destroy their world.

4 Stars

 

Once Upon a Dream by Liz Braswell – Sleeping Beauty What If? Fairy Tale Retelling

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I wasn’t expecting much from Once Upon A Dream by Liz Braswell.   I didn’t care for her take off on Aladdin in A Whole New World, and Disney published both books, and they are marked YA.  Still I had a 5th borrow available from Hoopla, was sick and Dream sounded OK, so why not?

Let’s be clear.  Once Upon A Dream is not stellar fiction for adults and it’s not going to go on teachers’ lists of books their students must read.  Once Upon A Dream is basically a fast, easy read that is pretty entertaining.  Don’t pick it up if you are hungry for deep thoughts but do read it if you are in the mood for a light story with some engaging characters and interesting plot lines about reality and dreaming.

Once Upon A Dream retells the original Sleeping Beauty story and Disney movie with a twist.  The princess does not wake up and the prince falls asleep.  In Dream, Maleficent tells Aurora that her parents destroyed the country and everything surrounding it, and that Maleficent protected the people and castle behind the rose briars.  Of course this is not true.

Aurora must struggle to wake up; each time she thinks she is awake she realizes that in fact she is not.  In this book she meets Prince Phillip in the woods who travels with her and works to confound the enchantment.

Characters

Don’t look for depth and you’ll be fine.  Braswell portrays Aurora and Phillip as basically what teens think happens when you fall in love, with plenty of drama and not much common sense.  Both have more screen time in this retelling than in the movie but are still rather flat, 2-dimensional.  Aurora does get one good lick in when she tells off Maleficent for cursing a baby just because she felt slighted.  Note that Aurora complains about what Maleficent did to her, not what she did to the kingdom.

Braawell changes the three good fairies the most.  In her retelling we don’t see much to admire:  They are weak, foolish, manipulative.  I thought the sections with the three fairies were the weakest.

Overall

Once Upon A Dream was a pleasant way to spend a couple days while I recovered from an illness.  I wouldn’t seek out more of Braswell’s books, but if I have a free borrow available again and don’t feel good enough to think, well, why not?

3 Stars

Excalibur Rising – Book 4 – Denouement for King Arthur’s Heirs

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Eileen Enwright Hodges developed a unique twist on the Arthurian legend with her 4-volume Excalibur Rising fantasy.  We see modern Americans and British, thugs and historians, chase after Excalibur, chase all the way into Albion where two of them, Marcus Ryan and Violet, are present when Arthur reclaims Camelot.  Of course it is not to last as Mordred’s descendants have maintained their antipathy and violent ambition and are determined to rule Albion.

The first book was excellent, introducing us to the characters and the fascinating back story Hodges develops that explains the enduring legend despite little historical evidence.   Book 2 was weaker although still enjoyable.  We find Arthur has a legitimate heir, in fact an heir who has a better claim to the throne than Arthur himself.  Given this is a fantasy the claimant is a kid so we have the usual teen angst and drama.  Book 3 disappointed me because all we did was rush from Albion to England, then seek to rush back to Albion, this time with a few more people also fleeing mob retribution.

I wanted to like Book 4.  The writing style is sound and Hodges does a good job building the characters.  Unfortunately the novel has plot holes, situations where stuff just happens and the story problems detract from what should be a solid 4 star story.  Instead of focusing on the people I get annoyed with the situations and that’s not what the author intends.

Book 4 has several “oh brother” moments, with improbable coincidences.  (For example, do we really believe Captain Hannon would just happen to land his runaway ballon next to Marcus?)  Plus we still have a few fundamental problems that paint Hodges into a corner.

  • Is it really likely that Mordred’s family would maintain their obsession for 800 years?  That is 40 generations!  Few families have father-to-son direct lineage for 40 generations, not to mention that the obsession doesn’t make a lot of sense.  Modern Mordred can live here, in modern England, complete with running water, indoor plumbing, comfortable clothing, and he’s educated and familiar with our world.  If I were Mordred I’d have stayed here.  Forget about Albion and make a life here.
  • As Book 4 opens Mordred has been king for 6 years.  He’s rebuilt part of Camelot and levied taxes, a lot of taxes.  But he’s done nothing to modernize his new kingdom, built no roads, established no trade, no patronage of skilled artisans, encouraged no learning.  Granted Mordred is nasty, but why leave a kingdom in ruins when you know how to improve things.
  • Dristan is still 16 on the inside although he looks 22.  Some medieval monarchs succeeded at 16 but they usually had benefits such as training, wise counselors, familiarity with the world.  Dristan is the blacksmith’s son, intelligent but uneducated.  Do we think he’s up to ruling a land torn by dissension and facing invasion from far more modern (and ruthless) neighbors?
  • Merlin tells Dristan to toss away Excalibur, which he does.  We don’t get much explanation.

On the plus side Hodges wraps up the story rather neatly.  Everyone ends up more or less where they should and the good guys mostly win.

Hodges reintroduces Meleanore, the noble woman Mordred intends to marry.  In Book 2 Meleanore sailed away through the mists to claim her family’s birthright, the Far Isles.  She’s back in Book 4 with romantic entanglements; in fact Hodges asked her ARC readers to comment which of two possible suitors Meleanore should choose.  I didn’t like Meleanore in Book 2 and like her even less in Book 4.

Hodges states Book 4 is the last in this series but that leaves us with a kingdom in Dristan’s inexperienced and ignorant hands, an implacable enemy-to-be on the European continent, people and trade and religion in disarray.  Merlin hides Albion once again but it will last only 4 generations, enough that Albion could prepare if it dedicated itself.  How will Dristan prepare the land for the coming conflicts?  Hodges has many more stories to tell should she wish to do so.

3 Stars