tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-63341015915721841802024-03-13T11:53:39.939-04:00Brian's Book BlogWherein I write about anything and everything related to books.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.comBlogger25125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-17832896242608571722014-05-06T16:46:00.000-04:002014-05-06T16:46:08.741-04:00Books Adapted Into Film: The Good and the Meh.<a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2014/05/books-adapted-into-film.html">In my last post</a> I talked about the main things I think are necessary for a book-to-film adaptation to be successful. To summarize, they were as follows: remaining faithful to the core parts and principles of the source material even if you have to make some changes; having a large enough budget to put all the 'fantasy' elements from the book onto a screen; using a book that is less 'epic' and smaller in scope, so it's easier to adapt with a lesser budget.<br /><br />Obviously there will be exceptions to every one of those rules, which are more like guidelines anyways. A show or movie adaptation <b><i>can</i></b> succeed despite making fairly radical changes from the books, or having little to no budget, or using a massively ambitious fantasy world/novel/series. Then again, an adaptation that sticks to the source material, has a big budget, and has a less ambitious novel from which to adapt can also still fail. Hell, some of the examples I'm going to give here will be proof of that in both ways.<br />
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It's also worth noting that I don't think each book-film adaptation <i style="font-weight: bold;">needs</i> all three of those elements to work. In fact, the second and third points are kind of a balancing act between them. If the show doesn't have that much of a budget, it can have a smaller scope.<br />
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Now, let's talk about some books and movies and books, and the adaptations where I've both read the book and seen the film adaptation and liked (to varying extents) the end result.<br />
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The Lord of the Rings: God</h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/271/b/9/balrog_lord_of_the_rings_by_graemefazakerley-d5g4n4m.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs71/f/2012/271/b/9/balrog_lord_of_the_rings_by_graemefazakerley-d5g4n4m.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://graemefazakerley.deviantart.com/art/balrog-lord-of-the-rings-329421334">graemefazakerley via deviantart</a></td></tr>
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The source material saw some pretty large changes or omissions from the books, though the largest examples of those came in the first and last book and on the outside edges of when the plot really began to get significant. First, the whole journey the Hobbits took through the forest where they met Tom Bombadil was cut out entirely. Second, the whole War of the Shire at the end of the books was also cut out. In terms of the amount of ink Tolkien spilled writing those two parts, those are two very large omissions.</div>
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However, in terms of their overall significance to the main plot of the trilogy cutting those sections out meant very little. The part with Bombadil in the books did not add much to the plot that other parts didn't also cover, but did add to the world building. The same holds true for the War of the Shire. All keeping those parts would do is either make the movies longer than they already were, or would mean other parts would have to be abbreviated or removed. World building is great and all, but of all the ways Peter Jackson could have tried to cram each book into a three-ish hour movie, those were actually two great decisions on his part. It also meant that he could remain faithful in other, more important ways so the movie still held the same heart and soul that the books did. </div>
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The budget? It was big. Which was helpful because the books were not exactly what one would call small in scope. It was a very ambitious project, and thankfully Jackson had the budget to pull it off as it deserved.</div>
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Game of Thrones: Hells Yes!</h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7039/6855051531_5aab68eb90_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7039/6855051531_5aab68eb90_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/59087292@N07/6855051531/">mezclaconfusa via Flickr</a></td></tr>
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<a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2013/12/more-like-game-of-waiting-amirite.html">One of the first things I wrote on this blog</a> was a review of the book series. To summarize: the scope of the book that Martin increasingly enlarges as the series progresses ruined my enjoyment when reading them. He added in too many characters, too many story lines, and fell too much in love with world building chapters and passages. The main plot lines were delayed and diluted, and the whole thing suffers from an agonizingly slow pace to the point that it seemed to lose its way.<br />
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For all of those reasons, I think the show is better than the books. By a lot. To put that in perspective, that is the first and only time I have ever considered a TV/Movie adaptation to be better than the book(s).<br />
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Faithfulness? Remember how, above, I mentioned that Peter Jackson cut out two large parts of the books that weren't all that necessary? The show basically cut out all of the extra stuff I complain about and stick to the important parts. The show has, at least so far, kept its focus. It has also increasingly changed some things in mostly small ways, but the feel of the show still matches that from the books. Except, again, that it feels better.<br />
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Budget? <a href="http://seriousfacts.com/each-episode-of-game-of-thrones-costs-6-million-to-produce/">Each episode of the show costs $6 million to make</a>, and HBO keeps paying it so... yes. Scope? Each episode of the show costs $6 million to make, so... big.<br />
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<h3>
Anything by Neil Gaiman Ever: Good</h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2f/Gaiman,_Neil_(2007).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2f/Gaiman,_Neil_(2007).jpg" height="320" width="213" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_Gaiman">via wikipedia</a></td></tr>
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Seriously, the man writes fantastic fantasy books in a way few (if any) can even come close to matching, and they also are always great options for film adaptations. <i>Stardust </i>and <i>Coraline </i>have already been made into good movies, and American Gods is in production (as a show or a movie I can't remember). I've heard that Neverwhere was made into a British show but I haven't seen it to know how good it is.</div>
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Faithfulness? The feel or spirit of the books of <i>Stardust </i>and <i>Coraline </i>were both aptly maintained, even if there were some alterations and omissions here and there. Budget? Not nearly as large as some of the other movies/shows that will make this list, but because the scope of the books is also far less ambitious the budgets wound up suiting the scale. </div>
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It's a shame that for many years there hasn't been many fantasy books similar to Gaiman's, because they could make for some great adaptations.</div>
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Harry Potter: Thumbs Up</h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/colinzhu/49684002/">Colin Zhu via Flickr</a></td></tr>
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Faithfulness to the source material? Very similar to that of <i>Lord of the Rings</i>. I was actually disappointed that each movie wasn't as long as each LotR movie, so they could fit in more of the stuff that went on in the classes and Quidditch and the like. Instead, the movies pretty much just stuck to the parts of the book that were relevant to the main plot and cut out all the extra little "neat" stuff from in between. The classes where they (and we the readers) learn more about how magic works, the various spells and potions and devices that exist, how wizarding society operates, and so on took a back seat in the movies, much like Tom Bombadil did with <i>Lord of the Rings</i>.<br />
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So while I would have liked more from each movie, the direction they took wound up creating a successful adaptation. More importantly, the spirit of the books was maintained quite spectacularly.<br />
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Budget? Check. Scope? The first few books started out much smaller and got progressively larger in scale and ambition. I thought it was interesting that they seemed to try and keep the scale of the movies relative to that of the books, so the first few movies were shorter compared to the later ones just like the books were. One thing I think probably contributed to that was the relative youth and inexperience of the main actors when the movies started.<br />
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The Hobbit: Meh</h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c7/The_Hobbit_at_San_Diego_Comic_Con_2012.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c7/The_Hobbit_at_San_Diego_Comic_Con_2012.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c7/The_Hobbit_at_San_Diego_Comic_Con_2012.jpg">via wikimedia</a></td></tr>
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<span id="goog_1285718991"></span><span id="goog_1285718992"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a>Faithful to the source material? Not as much, especially as far as only what is in the actual, original book. A lot of extra source material from annotations and Tolkien's notes of what took place around the same time as the events of the book took place has been added in, in order to stretch it over three movies instead of one. A bunch of extra scenes and characters were added for... reasons, and the feel of the movies is more like that of <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> movies rather than a more light-hearted adventure tale for young adults that the book represented. </div>
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Overall I still like the movies (though not nearly as much as LotR) even if some of the action scenes invented reeeaaally drag on at times. Jackson really took a lot of risk adding so much new lore, scenes, characters and the overall "feel" of the movie, but it wound up better than I would have thought considering all of that.</div>
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Budget? In spades. Scope? Actually <i>The Hobbit</i> is far less ambitious than T<i>he Lord of the Rings</i> was, but Jackson actually made it moreso by adding so much extra stuff. But I do think it's easier to make a film adaptation more ambitious than the source material than it is to do it the other way around. </div>
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Chronicles of Narnia: Meh 2 - Meh Harder</h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2791/4050002677_2f49e2e94f_z.jpg?zz=1" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="212" src="https://c1.staticflickr.com/3/2791/4050002677_2f49e2e94f_z.jpg?zz=1" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/cstreetus/4050002677/">Calvin Dellinger via Flickr</a></td></tr>
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Faithfulness? It was a long time since I had read the books even when I saw the movie, and <i>that</i> was several years ago now. The impression that I still have was that it was kind of similar to <i>The Hobbit </i>adaptation mentioned above. It tried to make things more epic in some ways, though not nearly to the same extent. In the end, though, watching the movie felt more or less like reading the books did. To me anyways.</div>
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Budget? Not necessarily on the scale of <i>The Lord of the Rings</i> but still pretty damn large. Scope? The book had a similar scale to <i>The Hobbit, </i>while the movie tried to make it a bit bigger. Which, again, I think helped the final movie product.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-31632734977154869702014-05-05T18:41:00.003-04:002014-05-06T00:29:56.364-04:00Books Adapted Into Film<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A note to start, this
post will be about books that I've read that were turned into a TV show or
movie that I've also seen. I won't include those where I've only read the book
or only seen the show/movie, so this list will be incomplete compared to that
many of you might have.<br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">
So what do I think makes a movie or show adapted from a book good? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Onwards to revelations!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Faithfulness to the
source material</span></b></h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8515/8458051641_8563c83111.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8515/8458051641_8563c83111.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Themeplus via Flickr</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Because I'm a nerd, I
might as well get this out of the way first though I don't necessarily consider
this to be the most important element. Unlike the stereotypical nitpicky nerds
that will consider an adaptation to be a mortal sin if it omits or alters even
the slightest detail from the book, I'm willing to give more leeway to the
movie makers. The two are fundamentally different, and this often necessitates
that some parts be changed. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For starters, we read
books but we watch movies. Where books leave a lot to the imagination, movies
have to show us everything. Second, fantasy books tend to be very long. Books
that are hundreds of pages long that are also part of a trilogy or series clash
with the budgets that restrain the ambitions of most shows and movies. Third,
one of the reasons why fantasy books are so long is the world building that
usually goes into them, which involves information/explanations in the form of
an 'info dump'. These are usually completely aside from the scene taking place,
and movies/shows just can't do that. At best they can use a narrator, but
having a voice say anything longer than a couple of sentences long would
suck... quite a lot. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Those are just some
differences that will require the adaptation to do things differently. What I
hope for, then, is that certain key parts of the book(s) are maintained at
least in spirit: the characters seem the same, even if they don't do the same
things; the world has the same tone to it, even if parts of its history is
altered; the story has all the biggest moments, even if they get there from a
different angle. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's all about the
Benjamins...</span></b></h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7039/6855051531_5aab68eb90_z.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="https://c2.staticflickr.com/8/7039/6855051531_5aab68eb90_z.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mezclaconfusa via Flickr</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span id="goog_103243046"></span><span id="goog_103243047"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/"></a>Fantasy has magic, and
mythical creatures, and entirely different landscapes and cities to show. To
show them well costs money and time, and time costs even more in money. Not
every book can get the budget of Game of Thrones or Lord of the Rings to
sustain the project for so long. Most shows or movies will have to make do with
budgets far lower than that. Some fantasy/sci-fi shows can do so rather well
(Doctor Who, Firefly), but a lot just can't... and trying to do so while
adapting a script from a book is even harder. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is why trying to
adapt a book with a much smaller scope is far easier. Books that take place,
more or less, in the same place where that place is a simple village or city is
a lot easier to replicate with a lower budget than having a book take place all
over an epic world with massive castles made of diamonds that's also carved out
of an entire mountain, or something. Similarly, a book that doesn't have a lot
in the way of magic or magic creatures, or epic battles, also makes the job
easier.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is one of the
reasons why I think Game of Thrones has been adapted so well. It has some epic
settings and a large world, but not much in the way of fireballs and conjured
lightning or massive Balrogs. There are some dragons, but they're pretty low
key so far through the series. The books are also more about intrigue than they
are about epic battles, and even in the book some battles are mentioned only in
passing and not told over the span of multiple chapters. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Epic Is Bad, Small Is
Good</span></b></h3>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://farm2.staticflickr.com/1222/1350479977_0581f51697_o.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://farm2.staticflickr.com/1222/1350479977_0581f51697_o.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Torre.elena via Flickr</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The same holds true for the nature of the story. Epic fantasy
needs epic investments in time and money from studios, and trying to make an
adaptation without those investments will doom the project to mediocrity at
best and more likely something far worse. So to increase the chances at success
for most attempts at adaptation, having a smaller scoped, more low-key novel is
best. See: Gaiman, Neil. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The problem is that
without the scale and budget to go with it, a lot of adaptations will
inevitably get a "campy" feel to it that will ruin the way the book
feels to read. However, the good news is that in recent years there's been far
more fantasy books written that have a scope more suited to adaptation. It
helps that most of them have a darker, grittier tone that people love in TV and
movies now (Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Most of the books I'll
list in a future post will be those kinds of books. But next up, I'll list some
examples of good and bad adaptations using the above criteria as reasons for
their success or failure.</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-45859535559381084372014-04-29T13:28:00.003-04:002014-04-29T13:31:01.937-04:00Catching Up<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yeah, I haven't written a blog entry here in a while. Rather than writing a bunch of reviews, here's a quick rundown of what I've read since my last blog and how much I liked them. No spoilers, so no worries!</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Burial Rites by Hannah Kent</span></h3>
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<a href="https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1384207446l/17333319.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1384207446l/17333319.jpg" width="210" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Taking place in Iceland
in the 1800's, this is a fictionalized tale of an actual recorded event. A
woman is convicted of murdering a man she worked for, and is awaiting the final
order for her execution. In the meantime, because Iceland doesn't have a prison/holding
system, she is given over to a farm to do manual labour and speak with a priest
to repent her sins. Over the course of the book she slowly reveals more about
her history leading up to the event in question, and you find out exactly what
happened.<br />
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The neat part is that the author apparently got a lot of details from the oral
history of that part of Iceland: stories told by the locals through the years
about what happened and the lives/history of the key characters involved. For
the rest, the author did a fair amount of research digging up written reports
from the church and the legal system of the time. It was an interesting read,
with well thought out and developed characters. It could become a little too
melodramatic at times, but overall I'd give it 8 out of 10.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Barrow by Mark Smylie</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A fantasy book about
treasure hunters seeking a famous sword in a legendary barrow. The world
building was fairly large and mostly interesting, the characters were pretty
diverse and decently developed, and the writing style had good pacing. The plot
was very interesting, and it was of the dark, gritty style that's becoming more
popular in fantasy right now. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But the book was
seemingly obsessed with sex. Every religion, and there were a few different
ones, was centered on sexual rituals and orgies. Everyone had magic spells,
alchemical concoctions, and natural herb remedies designed to give men and
women a superhuman sex drive. Every chapter had at least one scene with someone
masturbating, having sex or even an orgy, getting an erection/wet/hard nipples,
or something to that effect. It got to the point where each chapter became
incredibly repetitive and cyclical.<br />
<br />
Every. Single. Chapter.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now, for the sake of
being gritty and realistic, I don't mind books using sex in even the most crude
way to set the tone of a scene, or the world in general. George R.R. Martin
does a pretty good job with that. But this book just got intolerable at times,
it became so absurd that it really ruined my ability to enjoy the book as much
as I could have. Overall, I'd give it a 5 out of 10.</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Traitor's Blade by Sebastian de Castell</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another fantasy book, this
might be the best fantasy book I've read this year. It's about three men who
used to be part of a legal-order called Greatcoats, who were trained in law and
soldiering to act as officers of the king against corrupt nobles. Unfortunately
those nobles revolted and executed that king, and the Greatcoats disbanded.
Everyone, from the nobility to the peasants, now hate the Greatcoats with a
passion.<br />
<br />
The three men who are at the center of the tale still cling to their past, and
do their best to maintain the honour and pride that they felt. Unfortunately
they wind up getting wrapped up in the schemes of the most vile of the
nobility, who are trying to increase their power by creating a puppet monarch.
That's as far as we're shown in this book, but there's obviously even more
going on.<br />
<br />
The writing was excellent, the characters and their interactions with each
other were great, and the world was compelling. There wasn't much magic to
speak of, at least not yet, and I know this book did a great job because when I
finished it I was annoyed that there wasn't more to it. I wanted to know more
about the world, about some of the characters, and about the general back story.
Not annoyed to the point where it took away from my enjoyment, mind you.
Overall, I'd give this book a 9 out of 10.</span></div>
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A Crucible of Souls by Mitchell Hogan</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Let's get the good out
of the way. I view the world in a similar way to what I thought of Traitor's
Blade above, in that I thought it was well thought out and compelling but I
wished I could have seen more of it. As the first book in the series, I'm sure
I'll get to see more in subsequent books. The plot and characters were pretty
good too, even though there was about half a dozen different POVs and plot
lines that took until the very end to hold any relevance to each other. The
magic system reminded me a bit of what Rothfuss uses in his trilogy, though
without the same depth to it. I liked all of these things.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But... now the bad. It's
kind of frustrating that one or two bad things can detract so much from the
many good things in a book. The dialogue, both between different characters and
any internal dialogue a character has with themselves, was incredibly bland.
Nothing seemed to reach any level deeper than basic small talk, even for
important conversations or between people who have long established relationships
- or a relationship that's growing. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Related to the dialogue
is the mindset of the main character. Despite all the bad that happens, and
some bad stuff does happen especially early in the book, his attitude is that
of: *shrug* what're you going to do? Things will look up. There's no real depth
to him either, even as the main character. Everything about him doesn't seem to
scratch the surface and is pretty clichéd too, and I couldn't tell if it was on
purpose for just the first book and subsequent books will delve into it more
deeply. Heck, a lot of the minor, supporting characters seemed to have more
depth to their thought and behaviour than the main one did. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Still, it was a pretty good debut.
I'd give it 7 out of 10. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Scourge of the Betrayer by Jeff Salyards</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another debut book in a
fantasy series. This was rather short for a fantasy novel, even compared to
Traitor's Blade above, and it showed in various ways. The characters didn't
have that much back story provided, and only two or three had any back story
given at all. The world wasn't really delved into that much either, nor was the
magic. All that said, what was actually included was very enjoyable.<br />
<br />
What really suffered, to me, was the plot. Too much of the first part of the
book was taken up with hinting at and slowly revealing/explaining the nature of
the main character's weapon, which is also the namesake of this book. By the
time that's finally resolved, the climax of the book is suddenly upon you. A
couple of battles happen, the resolution of it and the events leading up to
them is sort of wrapped up, and then... the book's over. I can't help but think
that this would have been better if the first and second books were combined
into one, but I'll have to wait for the second book to see how that bears out.<br />
<br />
Still, it was an enjoyable read. Overall I'd give it 7 out of 10. </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<h3>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Rest: New Books in Series</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There was a couple of other books I read that were new releases to series that I already read.</span></div>
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<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21079502-the-crimson-vault">The Crimson Vault by Will Wight </a>was the second book to House of Blades, a book I've reviewed on this blog. It was just as good, if not better, than the first. I'd give it an 8.5 out of 10.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11470277-infidel">Infidel by Kameron Hurley</a> is the follow up to God's War, which I also reviewed here. It was very good, but didn't quite measure up to the first one. However, I can't help but think that's because it's really just filling in the gap between the first and third books. I'd give it an 8.5 out of 10 as well.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I also finished the Low Town trilogy by Daniel Polansky. The second book, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15768369-tomorrow-the-killing">Tomorrow the Killing</a>, wasn't as good as the first book but was still enjoyable. I'd give it 7 out of 10. The third book, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18428210-she-who-waits">She Who Waits</a>, was absolutely fantastic. I'd give it 9 out of 10.</span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-25265979063819509932014-03-04T20:02:00.000-05:002014-03-06T23:35:40.325-05:00That Moment When... New Book EditionSo today <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11543195-words-of-radiance?from_search=true">Brandon Sanderson's new Stormlight Archive book, Words of Radiance,</a> came out. You might have heard.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-one-list-to-rule-them-all.html">I have it as my favourite all-time fantasy series that's out there</a>, and that was before the second book even came out. It was that good. Was the second book as good? Hell yes it was, and it cemented its place as the top of my personal rankings.<br />
<br />
And I'm sure many people have gone through this, with books or movies or music albums where something that you've been waiting for a long time FINALLY comes out, and then you finish digesting it for the first time. I had a lot of fun doing the same thing <a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2014/02/that-moment-when-book-that-you-ordered.html">documenting the moment when you realize you bought a book that you already own</a>. So without further ado...<br />
<br />
<h3>
That moment when you finish a book you've long been waiting for...</h3>
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<br /></div>
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You finish the last page of the book you've wanted for years, and it's as good if not better than you could have hoped.</div>
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You close the book, set it in your lap, and let yourself bask in the pure joy that courses through your mind.</div>
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<br /></div>
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But eventually that high fades, and you set in for that long wait until the next book comes out. But first, you check the internet to see if there's any news, status updates, or a release date for the next book.</div>
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Then you play the waiting game...</div>
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Check the time on your phone...</div>
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You take a nap, since you want to stay fresh for when the new book comes out!</div>
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Sometimes you might grow a little impatient.</div>
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And you have no time to lose your patience for long, you still have the next book to wait for!</div>
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You pass the time by re-reading the book two (or ten) times.</div>
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And sometimes you lose a little more than your patience...</div>
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But don't worry! You have plenty of time to pull it together, with time to spare to keep waiting.</div>
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And waiting...</div>
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And waiting...</div>
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And waiting...</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/leandrociuffo/358880474/">Image source: Leandro Neumann Cuiffo via Flickr</a></td></tr>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-2762538157644851572014-02-18T23:11:00.001-05:002014-02-18T23:23:47.934-05:00Review: House Of Blades By Will Wight<div class="tr_bq">
<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i></div>
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I'll say it straight off the bat: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18047306-house-of-blades"><i>House of Blades</i> by Will Wight</a> was an incredibly surprising book. I don't say that because I expected it to be bad or even mediocre, because I had seen one or two favourable (albeit not glowing) reviews and the concept really intrigued me. I say it was incredibly surprising because it was very good. Not necessarily something I would consider up there with the best in the fantasy genre, mind you, but it was precisely the kind of fantasy book I like. Here's the blurb from Goodreads:<br />
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<blockquote>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;"><i>Simon can only watch, helpless, as his family is killed and his friends captured by enemy Travelers—men and women who can summon mystical powers from otherworldly Territories. To top it off, another young man from Simon's village discovers that he's a savior prophesied to destroy evil and save the realm.</i></span></blockquote>
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<i><span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">Prophecy has nothing to say about Simon. He has no special powers, no magical weapons, and no guarantee that he'll survive. But he sets off anyway, alone, to gain the power he needs to oppose the Travelers and topple their ruthless Overlord. It may not be his destiny, but Simon's determined to rescue his fellow villagers from certain death.</span> </i></blockquote>
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<i> <span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.31999969482422px;">Because who cares about prophecy, really?</span></i></blockquote>
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Now let me tell you what, from this blurb, grabbed my attention and why it made this book so good.<br />
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<h3>
How Many Surrealists Does It Take To Screw In A Lightbulb? Fish.</h3>
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First, the plot. It starts on familiar ground: a village is attacked, many are killed and a several others are taken away to be "sacrifices" by their own Overlord (who serve essentially as Dukes, ruling territories of a larger kingdom in the name of their king). One young man manifests magical powers to save the rest, and a pair of mysterious travelers arrive to pronounce him as a great hero spoken of in prophecy. They take him away to learn how to master his power so he can lead them to victory over the evil Overlords and save his people from being sacrifices, including the beautiful young woman (named Leah) he vows in particular to save.<br />
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This is where the subversion of expectations begins. That prophesied hero is named Alin, and he is NOT the main character. That role falls to Simon, who as the synopsis above says was not mentioned in prophecy at all. His mother is killed, but Alin and the other magic users leave him behind to help rebuild the village. Instead, he seeks out the mysterious figure who haunts the nearby forest and who also saved his life as a child years before. This weird figure, who speaks to dolls, wields a MASSIVE sword, has the strength of giants and can move faster than the blink of an eye, reluctantly agrees to teach Simon. Simon is taken to a strange and magical realm, inside a house that constantly attacks and tries to kill him. The baths heal him almost instantly of any wound, but contains strange imps that attack him if he lingers too long. Black robes ambush him as he sleeps, a huge figure made entirely of blades and leather guards the only food and drinking water and Simon has to fight and impress him enough to be allowed to eat. He has to fight animated armour, and a metal skeleton.<br />
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The parts of the book where Simon learns how to become a Traveler – the magic users in the book – are surreal and compelling. The notion of a characters being trained with strange methods by quirky teachers is not new, nor is the use of strange and magical places where normal rules of time and being don't apply. But the make up and execution of this part of the book really drew me in, it was done so well. All the constant tests and trials Simon faces were very creatively conceived.<br />
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When Simon and Alin are both ready to test their new powers to save Leah and the other villagers from the wicked Overlord and set out into the world, Will Wight really begins to turn everything on its head.<br />
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<h3>
To Know The Rules, You Know How Best To Break Them</h3>
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Now it's time to dig a bit more deeply into the characters. There are three main characters: Simon, the un-prophesied young man who is the main character; Alin, the prophesied hero who patently <i>isn't</i> the main character, but is still significant; and Leah, the young woman who acts like the damsel in distress but in her first POV establishes that as a ruse but only hints at her true purpose.<br />
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Simon, since he's the prophesied hero, starts the book out being utterly defenseless whenever his loved ones are attacked. Alin, the prophesied hero, has his seemingly innate powers to help him protect the villagers (a bit late for some of them, mind you). Leah, who seems like a typical damsel in distress, very quickly establishes herself as anything but, and despite her strong magical power goes along with being a sacrifice as part of her father's plan. Oh right... her father is the King, and the King's Overlord is the one who was responsible for the village being attacked in the first place, all because he needed his annual sacrifice.<br />
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By the end of the book, Simon emerges as being decidedly more heroic than Alin. Alin's heart is in the right place, and he certainly wields tremendous power. But Simon earned all of his power through blood, sweat, and tears... mostly blood, mind you. Alin, meanwhile, did work hard to master his abilities as much as possible, but when this book's plot comes to a climax he rushes headlong into danger despite not being ready, and winds up having some new power given to him (despite him being warned that its dangerous for him without earning it properly first). Simon also winds up being the one who starts to see the situation as being far less straightforward than it is. Where Alin is dead-set on revenge against the Overlord, Simon is exposed to the war between his kingdom and those that see Alin as their saviour. He is forced to save people who are supposed to be his enemies from his own friends and villagers. He saves his Overlord's family in the middle of the climactic battle between Alin and the Overlord.<br />
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And Leah gives the perspective of her kingdom and her father. There might be a good reason why those sacrifices, as brutal as they are, are conducted. It might actually be saving everyone from something worse. Precisely what is going on is only hinted at or glimpsed, but it is obvious that there's more going on than we're being shown.<br />
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Conclusions: Sanderson-esque Subversion, </h3>
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The world is fairly creative, though there isn't much depth to it. The book has a nice pace to it, but the book is fairly short and some parts feel rushed – the magic system and the world building could have used more elaboration for my tastes. The quality of the prose ranges at times between passable to kind of very good, but the construction of the story overall is good to very good. What I love about the book, in the end, is the creativity. The subversion of tropes and expectations reminds me of Brandon Sanderson's <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/68428.Mistborn?from_search=true">Mistborn: The Final Empire</a>.</i> The quality of writing isn't quite up to that standard, however.<br />
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On one hand I'm not very surprised, because <i>House of Blades</i> was published by a publisher I hadn't heard of before – rather appropriately called Hidden Gnome Publishing. I can't help but think that if this book was given to an editor from a bigger publisher, it would have been given a more thorough and higher quality edit. I'm disappointed that it didn't, because I think it could have been made as good as <i>Mistborn</i> otherwise. </div>
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None the less, you can see on Goodreads that 960 readers have given <i>House of Blades</i> an average score of 4.24 out of 5. I'd give it about the same, if a bit lower because of the quality of prose: it's a solid 8 out of 10, and a great debut book for a fantasy trilogy.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-60711540086942320972014-02-16T17:28:00.001-05:002014-02-16T17:38:07.238-05:00That Moment When A Book That You Ordered Arrives...This is something that all book lovers, or indeed any zealous collector of wondrous things, will experience at some point in their lives if they haven't already experienced it.<br />
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Here's the situation...<br />
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You ordered a book or two (or five) in the mail a while back, and promptly forgot about it (or them) because life is very good at keeping your mind focused on other things. So you're sitting at home one day, and it might be the best or the worst day in the world already when you see that a package has arrived. Instantly, the best/worst day in the world has been rendered irrelevant because HOLY CRAP A PACKAGE THIS IS EXCITING WHAT IS IT WHAT IS IT WHAT IS IT?????<br />
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You open said package with a dignified curiosity, and you begin to see the treasure (or treasures) within...<br />
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Hmmm, it appears to be some sort of book (or five). I <b><i>love </i></b>books! Why, it's the third book in that series I've been trying to collect, the only one I hadn't managed to get my hands on yet. Even better!<br />
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You celebrate in a manner that is conducive to the situation. Namely, the fact that you're alone and no one can see or hear you.<br />
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You might even shout out a "Woo!" (or five) and do a fist pump in glee, something you would never do around anyone else lest they discover that you're one of those people who actually shouts "Woo!" when you're excited.<br />
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Then comes the most glorious moment of all... when you put the new book (or five) in its new home, on the neatly organized shelf, in its proper place according to its number in the series and the series' arranged according to the series title, because you're slightly anal about that sort of thing and SHUT UP that's why.<br />
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But then THAT moment comes...<br />
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When you go to put it on the shelf, in its proper spot within the series, you notice a sliiiiiiiiight problem...<br />
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It's that moment when you realize: "Oh crap... I already got that book (or five) and I completely forgot about it and now I wasted my money when I could have spent it on that other book (or five) that I wanted!"<br />
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But you're a grown adult. You're used to disappointments in life, even of the most disappointing sort such as this, and so you handle it in a dignified manner befitting of your wisdom and maturity...<br />
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-46070933445716994202014-02-05T20:22:00.001-05:002014-02-05T20:23:21.245-05:00Review: God's War By Kameron Hurley<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><br />
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Like a lot of books that I pick up these days, <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9359818-god-s-war">God's War by Kameron Hurley</a> is a book that I had seen come up on numerous book blogs and review websites. She received some awards for things like "best new author" or "best debut book", and was shortlisted for more major literary awards like the Nebula and the Locus.<br />
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Despite that this was a book that I constantly forgot about and so never got around to reading until recently. Maybe because it's sci-fi and I tend to prefer fantasy, or maybe it's because the bookstore I worked at never really had the book until recently. In fact, the first time I saw the book in the store was earlier this week, and I bought it straight away.<br />
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Short And Sweet. And By Sweet I Mean Coarse. </h3>
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The world in which this story takes place is not Earth. That's never explicitly said, but implied heavily enough that the reader would figure it out pretty quickly. It isn't, however, ever explained where this planet is or what the history of its colonization is. Other planets are mentioned, you're told that colonists from off-world were cut off centuries before, and there are a few 'alien' humans who visit that become sort of important to the main plot. But that's it, this book doesn't have any real info dumps or asides to explain the history of something, or how something works. Some things are implied, and the rest you just pick up as you go along. </div>
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Quite frankly, I really liked the way Kameron Hurley pulled it off. It kept the book shorter (only 288 pages) and the pace moving along briskly, even when she had to put various pieces for the plot in place before moving along. In fact Hurley's entire writing style can be described as very spartan: she describes people, places, things, and events as concisely as possible.</div>
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And oh what a world. </div>
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What's Old Is New, What's New Is Old</h3>
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It seems like the planet was populated by Islamic, or Islamic-like, colonists. Though there were different ethnic groups, factions, and sects that developed into distinct regional-political entities, they all worked together despite any tensions that might have existed between then. Eventually, however, a religious war erupted between two of the larger kingdoms that has lasted three hundred years. As a result, almost all men are legally required to fight in the war (and women can volunteer to serve), and this has a profound effect on the society of both kingdoms. The Nasheen (which is the main setting for the book) men are <b style="font-style: italic;">extremely</b> rare, and so women govern the kingdom through various groups: the monarchy, the Bel Dame Council, and the Magicians. The other is more like a very orthodox Islamic state: men retain more power, because they're more rare, and stick to their religious principles more devoutly. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Author Kameron Hurley</td></tr>
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'Magic' in this world has two forms: bug-users and shifters. Both have mysterious origins, and a few times it's implied that the harsh environment of the planet is what caused people on the planet to wield both abilities - the 'aliens' that visit mention that people on planets they know of do not have them. The bug-users, simply called 'Magicians', are much more significant in this book. Basically, they can manipulate all the bugs of the planet. They can use them to attack (swarms of poisonous wasps), send communications long distance, they work them into the machinery as parts and fuel, and most importantly they use them to heal people... even people who are dead. The bugs cure the cancers that everyone gets, they reconstitute people who were set on fire, had their head blasted half-off by a shotgun, or had various limbs lopped or blasted off.<br />
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All for a price, of course.<br />
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Despite this curative technology/magic, people don't live very long. The world is harsh, apparently full of lots of radiation poisons and cancers from the burning sun(s). You need to be inoculated at birth with magic/technology, for a fee of course, or you'll be physically underdeveloped and weak and would be lucky to live into your 20's. As a result of this short life span, it is a prominent job for a woman to just churn out babies. They have them in bunches, aided by magic/science. Even so, by age 12-13 it seems you're basically an adult, and turning 30 seems to be the equivalent of being in your 50's or even 60's in real life. By law, anyone drafted into the war has to serve until they're 40 years old, so it's very rare for anyone to survive that long. Enemies are vaporized by bombs, burnt into ash by fire, cut up into tons of pieces, and contaminated by poisons and radioactive bugs in order to prevent them from being reconstituted. So unsurprisingly, a lot of young men try and dodge the draft or flee from the front. </div>
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This is where the bel dames, and as a result our heroine, comes into the picture.</div>
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<h3>
Bel Dame Apparently Means Badass Or Psycho</h3>
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The main character is Nyx, a woman who volunteered to serve at the war front for a couple of years, and since became a bel dame - a group of women who hunt down and kill anyone who tries to draft dodge or escape from the front. On the side, she works as a bounty hunter. This is something VERY frowned upon for a bel dame to do. Bel dame's are noble and crucial to victory, and dabbling in bounty hunting and working with gene pirates (yes it's apparently a thing) is thought to sabotage the war effort. </div>
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On the first page of this book Nyx sells her womb off to gene pirates as a spare body part to avoid being tracked by her sister bel dames, she gets drunk and high on whisky and morphine chasers, she loses all the money she made selling her womb betting on an underground boxing match, then goes home and sleeps with the woman who lost the boxing match. And she did it all to bring in a mark - the boxer's brother. </div>
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Nyx is coarse, she's an addict and a drunk, she's a rogue in her own society, she's an atheist among fierce religious groups, she has sex with men and woman for both pleasure and business, and she cut off the wang of the man who introduced her to the bounty hunting business. She's also a badass, she's a survivor, a fierce and dirty fighter, loyal to her fellow bounty hunting crew (though she doesn't always allow herself to show it), and less cynical and selfish than she lets on. </div>
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Conclusions</h3>
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It's fast paced, it's interesting and refreshing, the characters are compelling, the plot has various interconnected twists, and overall it was a great foundation for the rest of the trilogy. I easily give it an 8 out of 10, maybe an 8.5.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-84718411116452138352014-02-01T17:05:00.000-05:002014-02-01T17:05:57.897-05:00Review: Doctor... wait... Jonathan Strange And Mr Norrell<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><br />
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Dr. Stra—crap—<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14201.Jonathan_Strange_Mr_Norrell"><b><i>Jonathan</i> </b><i>Strange and Mr Norrell</i> by Susanna Clarke</a> is a book that I had known about for at least a couple of years. A co-worker of mine, who has very similar tastes to mine, absolutely gushed about it whenever it came up (and sometimes when it didn't). I knew that it won some awards (Hugo Award, World Fantasy Award, Mythopoeic Award, Locus Award for Best First Novel, and British Book Award for Best Newcomer), what I didn't know that it was also longlisted for the Man Booker and shortlisted for a few others.</div>
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So yeah, this book had some hype to it.<br />
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Despite that, it took me a long time to get to reading it. I can't really say why. I was told it had magic and fairy tales in a historical setting, and I like ALL of those things. Mind you it doesn't really matter how long it took me to read it, because I've read it now.<br />
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First, It's A Masterpiece Of Literature</h3>
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I'm a bit weird, in that I can get through a book solely on the writing. It can have boring characters, poor plot, dull setting, and be written in a dry tone, but if the author can construct sentences using clever (to me) syntax, language, and rhythm I'll still read through the whole thing with a smile on my face. Dr Strange—dammit!—<i style="font-weight: bold;">Jonathan</i> Strange and Mr Norrell was not boring or dull or dry, and it was masterfully written. </div>
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It's set in Britain during the Napoleonic Wars, and finishes some years after it. Two magicians, first Mr Norrell and then Doct... <b style="font-style: italic;">Jonathan</b> Strange, reveal themselves to Britain as 'practical' magicians (not to be confused with the 'theoretical' magicians that study the theory and history of magic for its own pleasure), ready and willing to restore magic to Britain. For in this book, magic has a long and proud history in Britain, and the book cleverly adds all kinds of footnotes feeding extra information on that history, rather than filling the book with awkward info dumps.<br />
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As part of their efforts, they help the British government as much as they can. Doctor (fuck!) <i style="font-weight: bold;">Jonathan</i> Strange serves under the Duke of Wellington as he makes war in Spain against the invading French. Norrell conjures phantoms to harass and scare the French Navy, scries out the location of enemy fleets and armies, and brings a prominent politician's wife back from the dead. They also come to deal with the Fairies, some of whom threaten them, their loved ones, and the King of Britain himself. </div>
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Last, there is the tension between Dr Jonathan—<i style="font-weight: bold;">just</i> Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, who acts as the former's tutor in magic. The two have much different views on magic, how it should be wielded, how to view it's history, and actually about everything related to magic. Norrell wants magic to be studied solely from books, specifically books he approves of, and he most certainly does not approve of older, wilder styles of magic that are related to the semi-mythical Raven King (Britain's most famous, powerful magician) and the Fairies. Doct-Jonathan Strange, on the other hand, craves adventure, experimentation, and the glory from Britain's historical magicians and what/how they practiced. </div>
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It's Definitely A Good Book, But...</h3>
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Everything I mentioned above constitute the main elements of the book: Norrell and Strange (from now on he's just 'Strange') bringing magic back, feud that erupts between the two, the Fairies interfering in the affairs of humans, the war in Continental Europe against Napoleon, and all the history/backstory/nature of magic in Britain. All of them are in their own way interesting, and I enjoyed them all to varying degrees. The problem I had is that none of those elements ever seemed to have any depth to them in the book. </div>
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Strange being part of the army under Wellington, for the two different stages in the Napoleonic Wars, comprised only one small part of the book, and what got the most treatment was the different spells and magic Strange did at Wellington's behest. And those scenes were pretty brief: Wellington would present some problem he and the army were having, Strange would mull it over for a while, have some epiphany while reading through books about what spell might work, he'd do it, people would be some mixture of amazed/horrified... rinse, repeat until the war is over.<br />
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The magic itself was not at the level of other fantasy books, like Sanderson or Rothfuss. Basically, you had to read books and recite some spells. There was no internal logic or restrictions - as long as you had the book in front of you, or someone to tell it to you, you could do the spell. Except, of course, those occasions when Fairies or Strange (and some others at the end) seem to be able to use magic without any spells, but in a manner that's never explained at all. </div>
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Norrell and Strange, and indeed all of the characters, are very repetitive in their behaviours and dialogues, without any real development. The most development, and it isn't much, is seen in some of the minor characters. In fact a lot of the characters were very similar, they all acted in that stereotypical way we all imagine the British to have acted and spoken "back in the day". </div>
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Conclusion: I Wanted More Of It All</h3>
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This was a very large book. The mass market edition is more than 1000 pages, and with all of the little footnotes in tiny writing, it crams a lot into the book. I almost wish that Susanna Clarke diminished one or more of those main elements, cut some minor ones out entirely, and gave more focus and depth to the others. After finishing the book, despite really liking it, I didn't feel satisfied. It's like whenever I eat fish for a meal... I could eat an entire, large fish and afterwards I'd still want to eat a whole pizza, it just isn't filling. Everything just brushed the surface, and we never got to really dive in to her characters or story.<br />
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And on those consecutive metaphors, I grant this book a 7.5 out of 10. Worth the read, and I know a lot of people love this book. I think the lack of depth is something that's a personal preference of mine that made me feel slightly disappointed that the book wasn't better.<br />
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I might have given it a higher ranking, but I'm annoyed by the fact I always want to call it Dr. Strange and Mr Norrell, not Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-76564777625042552852014-01-21T15:19:00.002-05:002014-03-08T11:46:49.246-05:00Women In Fantasy: Part TwoIn my previous post I began looking into the issue of women in fantasy literature, <a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2014/01/women-in-fantasy-part-one.html">specifically about women as authors of fantasy novels</a>. In this post I will look into female characters within the books themselves, written by both male and female authors. The issue is the same—just as there has been a shortage of female authors relative to male ones in fantasy, historically and currently, there has also been a shortage of good female characters.<br />
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This issue has taken me longer to write about, because it's not as straight forward to me. There are a lot of different issues that I could bring up, but for the sake of brevity I'm going to try and confine it to a couple of the bigger ones I've identified.<br />
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First, A Rant About "Strong Women"</h3>
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I was at a CFL game a few months ago, and during the half-time show they had a quick concert with a Juno Award-winning rapper with current and former cheerleaders as his dance posse. The PA announcer, when the former cheerleaders were introduced, said something to the effect of "come on fans, let's hear it for these strong women!" Now don't get me wrong, I'm sure there were some strong women among them. I'm also equally sure there were some not-so-strong women among them.<br />
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Two things annoyed me about that statement. First, when have you ever heard someone say about an all-male band, or sports team, or any group or even individual, "those are some strong men". You don't, because men are all supposed to be inherently "strong" in the first place. Second, what exactly is that statement supposed to mean? In fact, right after the PA guy made that statement I turned to my friend and asked "what, as a woman, do you consider to be a strong woman?". </div>
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The answer I got was pretty straight-forward: a 'strong woman' is confident, resilient, and well-adjusted. To me, what this meant was that a strong woman is basically a human being. In fact the term is one that by itself annoys me, and has been used a lot in the past decade or so when speaking about some female characters in fantasy novels.</div>
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A Quick History Of Female Characters In Fantasy</h3>
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The earlier fantasy books were basically male wish-fulfillment. I like to make the joke that fantasy is basically romance books for men. The main character(s) are the men who learn they have hidden powers and/or are really heir to a kingdom or empire and have to save it, and possibly the whole world. On top of which, they get the hottie, who is treated more as a reward for his quest than an actual partner in a relationship. </div>
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The other kind of female character that arose, and this seems to be where the "strong woman" trope in fantasy began, is that of the female barbarian. She's a badass, wields a big sword or axe and is as good if not better at fighting as men are. Basically, a "strong woman" had to act as a man—and not just a man, but a man's man, she has to out-man even the manliest man. Yet, if this same female character was also the love interest of the main male character, she would inevitably still wind up being a damsel in distress in constant need of rescue by her man.</div>
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One example of that kind of character is Kahlan from <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=sword+of+truth+terry+goodkind&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Terry Goodkind's <i>Sword of Truth</i> series</a> or related books. She has some magical powers and also is very capable as a fighter, and yet Richard (the main hero and her love interest) is <i style="font-weight: bold;">constantly</i> rescuing her from being captured, kidnapped, attacked, and near-raped. Yet whenever Richard is in trouble, Kahlan rarely if ever returns the favour. The sad part of this is Goodkind writes good female characters, including Kahlan. But the taint of those bad male wish fulfillment tropes still lingers in them.</div>
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What Can We Learn From Good Female Characters?</h3>
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Bad female characters are objects, not people. They're in the books to further the tropes of male wish fulfillment. They don't have fleshed out personalities, back story, or development—what 'air time' they get is what is required for their relevancy as the damsel in distress, the hot badass warrior to be tamed, and so on. Good female characters are written as actual human beings, with all of the emotions, behaviours, motivations, strengths and weaknesses. They're flawed, they make mistakes, they get into trouble quite a lot... but they're also resourceful, resilient, and capable so they can get themselves out of those situations. They learn from mistakes, they develop as characters and, more importantly, as people.</div>
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Vin from <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/68428.Mistborn?from_search=true">Brandon Sanderson's <i>Mistborn</i></a> is "strong" in that she is resilient, even if she is self-conscious, lacks confidence at times, and mistrustful of people. Look at the cover art that depicts her to the left: she looks cute and slight, not very intimidating but resolved. She is not unrealistically attractive with huge boobs and ridiculous clothing. Sanderson also wrote Shallan and Jasnah, brilliant scholars who are overly shy and arrogant respectively, from his book <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7235533-the-way-of-kings?from_search=true">Way of Kings</a>. </i>In fact, all of the books he has written contains at least a couple of women among the protagonists who are great characters.</div>
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Winter from <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15810910-the-thousand-names?from_search=true">Django Wexler's <i>The Thousand Names</i></a> is pretending to be a man in order to serve in the army, and she is actually a terrible fighter and not ultra-smart. But she's tough as nails mentally and has enough common sense to see her through the greatest of perils she might face. She's leads by example, even when she doesn't really mean to. I mentioned in another post that I love heroes who win people over simply by being who they are, and Winter fits that billing.</div>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=david+hair+moontide+quartet">David Hair's <i>Moontide Quartet</i></a> has four great female characters in his series, and they're all different and unique: one is a (originally) meek young woman raised to be a good wife and has a heart of gold; one is a mage who constantly struggles to be a tough as nails warrior among men; one is a young princess who by the laws of her people cannot rule but fills in as a capable regent for her child-brother when their parents are assassinated; and one is a cruel and conniving empress who is probably the most feared person in the world.</div>
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Conclusions To Be Drawn</h3>
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I had a much longer list drawn up, then I realized I was basically writing down the entire cast of female characters from all of the fantasy books that I like. Considering how I can like good, well written characters in a book before anything else, I suppose that can't be a coincidence. </div>
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It only makes sense for authors to put the time and effort into writing good female characters. They can be good and evil, young and old, or strong and weak, as long as they're conceived of and written as real people, just as you would do to write good male characters. You allow yourself a much more diverse and interesting pool of people to draw from, whereas to focus only on the men you cut that down by half. </div>
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It also needs to be said, that even from the beginning of fantasy literature as a genre there have been good female characters. In my previous post about female authors, I created a long list of examples that reached back to the earliest days of the genre as proof that women can be the best fantasy authors. I could make a similar list of female character in some of the earliest fantasy books to make a similar point. The bad types that I ranted about and condemned above come from the type of books that have given fantasy a bad reputation still to this day. Truth to tell, those types of books will probably always exist, just as bad novels in general will always exist. </div>
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Just as great women will always exist in fantasy, in every single way.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-79465901573727046942014-01-14T22:13:00.001-05:002014-01-15T12:13:47.743-05:00Women In Fantasy: Part OneThis is a subject that I've read, thought, and talked about fairly often over the past few years, as it's become a more prominent issue within the fantasy community. The discussion seems to center around two issues: women as authors of fantasy, and women as characters within fantasy books. For the sake of length, I will divide my thoughts on the subject into two according to those two aspects. This first post will be about women as authors of fantasy novels.<br />
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There are two main questions that can most summarize the debating points.<br />
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#1 Can Women Write Fantasy Novels?</h3>
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As far as I'm concerned, the question of whether women can write fantasy novels is very easy to answer:<br />
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Abso-freaking-lutely.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Perhaps an inspiration for new female authors?</td></tr>
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Try these names on for size: Elizabeth Bear, Robin Hobb, Elspeth Cooper, N.K. Jemisin, J.K. Rowling, Susanna Clarke, and Mary Stewart are all female authors of fantasy novels that I've personally read and love. And I love them for different reasons: some are just beautifully written, some are epic tales that pulled me in, some have marvelous characters that I fell in love with... kind of like with male authors that I like, actually.<br />
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And that doesn't take into account other popular female fantasy authors that I haven't read (yet): Tamora Pierce, Kristain Britain, Trudi Canavan, Ursula Le Guin, Marion Zimmer Bradley, Anne McCaffrey, Margaret Weis, Patricia Briggs, Elizabeth Moon, and so on. I'm sure there are at least a few authors I'm forgetting in that list as well. Some are newer, some have been publishing fantasy books as early as the 1960's. </div>
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Not only that, but they can write fantasy just as good as male authors. Elizabeth Bear has some of the most beautifully written books I've ever read, Robin Hobb has one of my favourite characters, and J.K. Rowling has one of the best selling, most widely read books (among kids and adults) of all time. I'm not sure what the figures are, when it comes to the gender ratio of authors of fictional novels in general, but I wonder how close the ratio within fantasy comes to matching it. The popular assumption is that male authors in fantasy greatly outnumber female authors, and despite all of those names that I mentioned (and all of the ones I didn't) I still assume the same.<br />
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Which begs the second question: if women can write fantasy novels as well as men can, and those who do are not exceptions to the rule, why is there such an imbalance? Why are there so few woman authors in fantasy, compared to men?<br />
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#2 That Question I Just Asked</h3>
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This is a much more difficult question to answer, because it more than likely includes a number of factors.</div>
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In recent years there's been something of a civil war, or perhaps Renaissance is a more appropriate term, in the greater world of Geek-dom. After some small circle of men launched vitriol against "nerd girls" and tried to argue for the exclusion of women from nerdy hobbies, the much larger population have fired back. This is about the same time, probably not mere coincidence, that the debate about women in fantasy heated up.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Author N.K. Jemisin</td></tr>
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What the issue focused on is the... erm... exclusivity that some nerds tried to maintain. Google things like "fake geek girl" and you'll find things like <a href="http://www.dailydot.com/news/tony-harris-peacock-fake-geek-girls-cosplayers/">comic book artist Tony Harris' sexist rant</a>. Do another search for "#1 reason why" and you'll find a whole slew of tweets and articles where women in the tech and gaming industry report numerous <a href="http://www.dailydot.com/news/tony-harris-peacock-fake-geek-girls-cosplayers/">cases of sexism and even sexual assault they have to deal with</a>. So I think its safe to assume that some women who might have had an interest in fantasy literature had to face, at the very least, active discouragement from men in the industry if not in their personal lives.<br />
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But that's historically, and while I'm not naive enough to claim that such issues are completely gone I have already pointed out that there has been a lot of female fantasy authors in the industry in recent years. That said, there are still a good deal more male authors than there are women. The good news is that more and more we're seeing women writing fantasy novels, which will mean there will be more and more creative minds churning out fantasy books.<br />
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As a fan of fantasy, I'm very excited to see this trend continue. We could very well see the beginning of a Golden Age in fantasy literature, as more diverse minds from all genders, races, sexualities, religions, and cultures contribute to its evolution.<br />
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In Conclusion...</h3>
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Women can and do write fantasy novels as well as men do, and despite a historical gender imbalance there has been a surge of new female fantasy authors. This is a good thing, and all fantasy fans should hope that the trend continues.<br />
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Profound stuff, right?</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-87118559633548677942014-01-09T13:58:00.001-05:002014-01-09T15:08:42.717-05:00Review: Shadow Of The Wind By Carlos Ruiz Zafon.<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><br />
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The review for<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1232.The_Shadow_of_the_Wind?from_search=true">Shadow of the Wind</a></i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1232.The_Shadow_of_the_Wind?from_search=true"> by Carlos Ruiz Zafon</a> could be very short. It would go something like this...<br />
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"This is without a shadow of a doubt the best all-round book I've ever read. It's easily a 10 out of 10 for me, and anyone who likes books at all should read it."<br />
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End scene.<br />
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If I could describe the overall feel of this book, it's like it strikes a near perfect balance between literary, artistic fiction (like <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/811.Yann_Martel">Yann Martel</a> or <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4030.Michael_Ondaatje?from_search=true">Michael Ondaatje</a>) with formulaic, mass appeal fiction (like <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/3892.Tom_Clancy?from_search=true">Tom Clancy</a> or <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/630.Dan_Brown?from_search=true">Dan Brown</a>). It is both easy to read and accessible like the latter, but with the depth and complexity of the former. It's a book lover's book, but also a book for everyone. I could gush about this book for a long time. But for the sake of every sane person's attention span, I'll keep this shorter.<br />
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<h3>
Do You Remember Your First Love?</h3>
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The book is set in Barcelona, Spain in 1945. The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Civil_War">Spanish Civil War</a> just ended, though the aftermath is still felt occasionally throughout the book. A young boy named Daniel still mourns the death of his mother, and to try and cheer him up his father – who works as an antiquarian book dealer – takes him to a secret bunker called the Graveyard of Books, which served to protect thousands of books from destruction during the war. Daniel is told to pick any one book and become its guardian, and he chooses Shadow of the Wind by Julian Carax.<br />
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What happens next is what sold me on this book before I ever got into the main plot line: you have a young boy falling in love with a book for the first time. He stays up until the wee hours of the night... or morning, really... reading his book under the bed sheets by candlelight. The way in which Zafon describes Daniel's adoration of the book, the way he is so captivated and pulled into its world, touches very close to home with me. You can tell that Zafon is not only a book lover who knows (as I and many others do) what it feels like to truly lose oneself in a good story, but also has the ability to express in writing those sensations in breathtaking detail. That isn't all there is to this book either, because the same superb writing that painted such a charming and evocative scene here was present through to the last page.<br />
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<h3>
Michelangelo Had His Brush, Zafon His Pen</h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">He consumes ink for its power!</td></tr>
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What helps make this book so great is Zafon's ability to paint beautiful scenes and settings, but he does it quickly and without bloated descriptions. I used the word 'evocative' above, and that's the best word I can think of to describe his style. He always uses the right words and phrases that can seize on the reader's imagination and use it to fill in the rest. It's similar to those artists who can craft an ultra-realistic scene with only a few quick and accurate strokes of their brush. </div>
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This ability allows him to establish beautiful settings that captures the reader's imagination quickly, so he can move on to the development of his plot and characters. And because he is able to handle those with the same crisp efficiency, the book manages to avoid lulls and slow pacing that you might see in other books. Zafon's writing style is what allows him to add in elements of every kind of literature imaginable: it has mystery, romance, suspense, comedy, tragedy, action, and probably other things I can't remember off the top of my head.</div>
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<h3>
In Conclusion</h3>
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This is without a shadow of a doubt the best all-round novel I've ever read. It's easily a 10 out of 10 for me, and anyone who likes books at all should read it.<br />
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End scene.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-73845535511989212712014-01-07T17:23:00.001-05:002014-01-07T17:24:18.970-05:00My Top 5 Fantasy CoversI'll preface this post with a quick explanation on styles of art that I prefer, and not just for cover art on books. I attended a high school for a specialized visual arts program, and I mention this not to drop some cred card about my 'expertise' on art but to explain my preferences. While in this program, I wasn't a particularly good 'artist'. I wasn't very good at capturing realism in my drawings or paintings, and I held a fair amount of disdain for the type of modern art where realism is the opposite of what artists are after. But the people who accepted me into the program must have thought I had some strengths as a prospective artist, and I can't help but think that it is my love of colour.<br />
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I love vibrant colours, especially in nature – sunsets and sunrises, trees in the spring and autumn, glacial water with the sun's reflection glittering on the surface, and so on. It's why I love landscapes, and artists like Monet. It's not just using vibrant and natural colours for the sake of it that appeal to me, it's using a scheme of colours that work together and suit the concepts you're trying to convey.<br />
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With all of that in mind, here are my five favourite fantasy covers.<br />
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13538816-stormdancer"><i>Stormdancer</i> by Jay Kristoff</a></h3>
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I absolutely love the colour scheme. There is a sharp and vibrant contrast between red and black, but a whole slew of subtle tones to each. The red of the lotus flowers with what I assume to be the implication of blood stains, the woman's tattoos, and the accent in the clouds work so well together. Then there's the blacks and greys of the woman's hair and clothing, and the dark grey mixed with, I think, a bit of blue for the clouds in the background. The style seems to mix Japanese art with modern, western fantasy art (not that I'm an expert on either, so I could be flat wrong on both accounts) and it does so superbly. </div>
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The absolutely absurd thing about this book is that there is an alternative cover art that is much different, but even more gorgeous. It is the cover art for the UK edition, and considering other differences between North American and British covers I'm starting to feel like I get shafted here in Canada. See for yourself...<br />
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The use of colour here is much different. Everything is far more subtle and more natural, but feels so natural and appropriate that I absolutely adore it.</div>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/186074.The_Name_of_the_Wind?from_search=true"><i>Name of the Wind</i> by Patrick Rothfuss</a></h3>
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This is a perfect example of a cover that, to me, suits the book itself. The relief of the mythical creature's head, the slightly darker tones to the colouring of the leaves, and the appearance that the leaves are being scattered by a gust of wind – possibly from the mouth of the creature – it all works for me. The colour of the background, that is either stone or wood, also really suits the contents of the book, and especially the third-person parts that take place in a small village tavern.<br />
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And, of course, like with <i>Stormdancer </i>there is an alternate cover style that was used in the Brazilian edition of The <i>Name of the Wind.</i> To me, it best reflects the nature of the series: the epic scale, and Kvothe's wandering and musical soul that defines his character.<br />
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<a href="http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs44/i/2009/145/9/d/The_Name_of_the_Wind_by_MarcSimonetti.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs44/i/2009/145/9/d/The_Name_of_the_Wind_by_MarcSimonetti.jpg" /></a></div>
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<h3 style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7235533-the-way-of-kings?from_search=true"><i>Way of Kings</i> by Brandon Sanderson</a></h3>
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I suppose its no coincidence that two of my favourite books both make this list, and I wonder which way it works: do I like the covers more because the book itself is so good, or does the art help me like the book even more? Or is it purely coincidental? There are numerous cover styles for <i>The Name of the Wind</i> in particular, and there are many that I don't really care for.</div>
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But I digress...<br />
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I absolutely love sunsets, especially in the middle of a beautiful landscape setting, so this cover just wins so many points from me. The use of colour in the background with the sunset is incredible, and the rest captures the unreal setting of the Shattered Plains in which much of the book takes place. The cover as a whole is epic, which the contents of the book matches easily.<br />
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<h3 style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12109372-range-of-ghosts?from_search=true"><i>Range of Ghosts</i> by Elizabeth Bear</a></h3>
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If it's a funny coincidence, if its a coincidence at all, that my two favourite books make this list, it's another one that the other three are all Asian-themed. This is the second of those three.<br />
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I like the wisps of smoke, coloured with a mixture of blacks, dark blues, and purples. I like the figure astride the horse, the larger figure among the smoke holding a bright jewel that is also the moon, and the stars that filter through. There is a special significance of the moon and stars in the mythology and lore of the series, so seeing them worked into this cover art is very appropriate.<br />
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<h3 style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7113498-under-heaven"><i>Under Heaven</i> by Guy Gavriel Kay</a></h3>
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The third Asian-themed fantasy book whose cover cracks my top five, this one presents a different style from the other two, which are themselves different than each other. But they are all fantastic. This one is much simpler, using different tones of green throughout. The stone head of the horse is very relevant for the plot of the book, and the subtle blending of the Chinese-style symbols and letters give you an easy idea of the inspiration Guy Gavriel Kay drew for the story.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-22089409954766813222014-01-01T23:30:00.001-05:002014-01-04T21:54:09.397-05:00Review: Path Of Anger By Anthony Rouaud<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><br />
<i><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></i>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17211934-the-path-of-anger?from_search=true"><i>The Path of Anger</i> by Anthony Rouaud</a> was a book that caught my attention a few months ago. There are a number of book blogs that I follow so that I can hear about new books, and this one was coming up on all of them. It was originally written and already released in France and was being translated into English. None of the blogs had any actual reviews up, but they all seemed to be saying the same thing: this is a book that's getting a lot of hype. The bits that were made available online were enough to intrigue me, so I was pretty eager to get my hands on it.<br />
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So was the hype accurate?<br />
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<h3>
The Good: One Heck Of A Start</h3>
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When I got about halfway through the book and reached "Part Two", I was already considering this book to be one of the better new series out there. </div>
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The back story for this book has a great empire toppled by a revolution of the people, and in its place a Republic was established. A young scholar, Viola, is on a special but unmentioned mission, and arrives in a port city at the edge of the known world. She finds a drunk old soldier who was rumoured to have boasted that he had hidden the famous sword of the emperor not long after the fall of the empire. The sword is supposed to be an ancient relic from before the time of the empire, and Viola wants to find it to preserve its history. She soon discovers that the former soldier, Dun, is in fact Dun-Cadal—the greatest general from the old empire. </div>
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While trying to convince Dun-Cadal to give lead her to the sword, Viola also tries to learn his perspective of the empire's collapse. He comes to tell her about the first battles in the rebellion before it turned into a full-scale revolution. More specifically, he tells the tale of Frog, his student who he says was the greatest knight in the world. He goes on to tell of Frog's origins, their time training together, the tragedies of the final days of the empire, and how Dun-Cadal went into hiding with the fabled sword.</div>
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The world in which this book is set, the battles fought during the revolution, the politics and factions that were tearing the empire apart, and the main players that fought to control the course of history were fantastically interesting. In fact, the mixture of large scale warfare, revolutions and compelling characters reminded me a lot of <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15810910-the-thousand-names?from_search=true"><i>The Thousand Names</i> by Django Wexler</a> or <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15790883-promise-of-blood?from_search=true"><i>The Promise of Blood</i> by Brian McClellan</a>. Yet it offered enough unique writing to set it apart from them.</div>
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<h3>
The Bad: A Whole New Direction</h3>
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The start of Part Two seemed to hold the same promise and compelling writing that was prevalent through Part One. It involved getting a new perspective on the fall of the empire: Frog's. He seemed such an interesting character in the first part, and it meant delving deeper into all those things I mentioned above that made it so good.<br />
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But...</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.scifinow.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Antoine_Rouaud02-petit.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="264" src="http://www.scifinow.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/Antoine_Rouaud02-petit.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The author: Anthony Rouaud.</td></tr>
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In truth, the parts of Frog's perspective of the war that led to the empire's collapse were still interesting. In fact, it was the only interesting part of the last half of the book. The rest of the time, Rouaud began working in what will be the main plot arc for the rest of the series. In this book, it involves Viola and Dun-Cadal, among others, having to prevent the Republic from being taken over by the same scheming nobles that helped facilitate the collapse of their own empire. Where the back story that the first half of the book touched on was in depth and compelling, the contemporary story line was clichéd and boring. After a while I realized that I only seemed to like the back story of this book, involving the fall of the empire. Everything else failed to keep me captivated.</div>
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On top of which, new characters were introduced or were given more prominence than they were before, but none of them wound up being interesting at all. In fact, some of them proved to be whiny and annoying. They simply failed to be as interesting and compelling as Dun-Cadal, who was no longer the only major character in the book. Coupled with the new plot lines, the second half of the book faded the further I read, all the way to the end. </div>
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<h3>
The Conclusion: A Lot Of Potential Turned Into A Mess</h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">What I imagine Dun-Cadal looks like, in his prime.</td></tr>
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The only times I felt compelled by the book was when it delved into the past, with the revolutionary war and the fall of the empire. The worrying part is that if the second half of this book is any indication, the back story is finished. Everything to come in future books will involve the plot arc from the second half of this one. Considering how poor that plot line was, I'm not very optimistic that it'll be much better in any further books. My one hope is that Anthony Rouaud proved with the first half that he is very capable of writing an interesting world, with good characters and a compelling plot, so perhaps he can recapture that magic.</div>
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As a side story, a friend of mine was leaving on a holiday vacation to Cuba and wanted a new book to read. At that point we had both known about this book, and I had read most of the first half that I've said I loved. So I recommend it, and he took my advice and bought it. A couple of days later I get a message from him, coming from Cuba, with this one sentence that rather accurately summarizes the entire book:</div>
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<i>"What started out as a decent book with a lot of potential turned into a bit of a mess."</i></div>
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Overall, on the strength of the first half I'd still give this book a 7 out of 10 with the caveat that the rest of the series improves upon the foundation it set. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-62192888539839050862013-12-31T16:50:00.001-05:002014-01-04T22:05:55.732-05:00Review: The Blade Itself By Joe Abercrombie<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://pipedreamcomics.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/TheFirstLaw-TGI_001-DIGITAL_Page_18.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="339" src="http://pipedreamcomics.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/TheFirstLaw-TGI_001-DIGITAL_Page_18.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">From the comic adaptation of Joe Abercrombie's The First Law. This panel depicts Inquisitor Glotka's grim humour.</span></td></tr>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/944072.The_Blade_Itself"><i>The Blade Itself</i> by Joe Abercrombie</a> is the first book in his <i>First Law Trilogy. </i>If you want to get an idea of the tone the novels use, the above picture should give you a good idea. These books are grim. There are few rays of light in the world. There are few heroes and people with a noble and honourable bearing, but such people seem to suffer for it constantly. The world is designed to eat up people who do not look to their own survival first and foremost.<br />
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<h3>
The Catch: The Tortured Now Wields The Knife</h3>
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This book has probably my favourite character in any book I've read, and he goes by the name of Inquisitor Glotka. His back story is that of a dashing nobleman with the highest of bloodlines and incredible skill as a swordsman. When war breaks out with a neighbouring empire, it seems the sky is the limit for him. Promotions will rain upon him, enough to begin his entry into politics where he would undoubtedly reach the highest echelons of power possible to him. </div>
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That is, until Glotka is captured by the enemy and tortured in a dungeon for two years. When the war is over, and he is returned to his people, he is a crippled mess. No longer handsome, physically impaired to the point that even the most menial of tasks are a painful struggle, his bright future is broken and ruined. He's missing toes, his back is twisted, half of his teeth are gone... it's not a pretty picture. The people who loved and respected him and his potential are now ashamed for him, and of him. So what does he do?</div>
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Why, he becomes an Inquisitor of course, where he oversees and enacts the torture of people in the name of his kingdom. What should be said of Glotka, however, is that he is not vindictive. He does not take pleasure from torturing people, though neither is he repulsed by it. Instead, he simply accepts it as a reality unto itself. That's not to say that he is not bitter about his fate, or capable of cruelty to people. He isn't really a good guy in these books, but he is probably one of the better souls the series reveals.</div>
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<div>
Glotka's back story is interesting enough to make me like him, but what sells me is the grim humour with which he views the world and his situation in it. Take the following passage, which comes on the first page of Glotka's first POV chapter. It comes in the form of a dialogue he has with himself about climbing stairs, which is an agonizing chore for him due to his physical deformities:</div>
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If Glotka had been given the opportunity to torture any one man, any one at all, he would surely have chosen the inventor of steps. When he was young and widely admired, before his misfortunes, he had never really noticed them. He had sprung down them two at a time and gone blithely on his way. No more.<i> They're everywhere. You really can't change the floors without them. And down is worse than up, that's the thing that people never realize. Going up, you usually don't fall that far.</i></blockquote>
He holds the same mentality with the prisoners he is tasked to torture when they try and bravely defy him ("Look at me, this is what I will do to you unless you confess"), or whenever someone threatens to kill or torture him ("Look at me, death would be mercy. Living is torture, and you can't break what's been broken"), or whenever he holds an internal monologue with himself about all the things in life that cause him problems.<br />
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<h3>
The Plot: Everything, Everyone, Everywhere Is Screwed.</h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Logen Ninefingers</td></tr>
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The barbarian horde in the north is threatening to invade the Midderlands kingdom, as is the aforementioned empire led by a cabal of cannibalistic mages at the same time. Rather than make things easier on themselves by staying united, the Midderlands are in a state of high dysfunctional. The king is a mere figurehead, and the real power lies with a council of noblemen that constantly snap at each other, trying to wrest as much power and wealth from their peers as they can.<br />
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Arriving to the kingdom is the famous wizard, Bayaz, who has overseen and protected the Midderlands since its inception centuries ago. He gathers together a group to help save the kingdom: Jezal, a young nobleman who wins the dueling championship (not unlike Glotka in his day); Logen Ninefingers, an aging barbarian with a strong sense of honour that is ruined by his absolutely psychotic and bloodthirsty state of berserker rage he enters in battle; and good old Inquisitor Glotka. </div>
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Throughout this book, everyone suffers. Bayaz is slowing losing his powers, Glotka's every living moment is agony, Ninefingers struggles to control the raging psychopath within him, and Jezal finds himself being dragged into a series of messes that he wants nothing to do with.<br />
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In truth, the plot isn't that special. What makes this book is the characters. None of them fall into cliché, and all of them have unique mannerisms and mindsets and behaviours, rather than being cookie-cutter in their repetitiveness (see: Jordan, Robert).<br />
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<h3>
Conclusion: Not For The Faint Of Heart</h3>
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This is not the most profound book you will read, but neither is it a 'fluff' or easy read. It lies somewhere in the middle. If you're the kind of person that loves to read interesting characters and see them developed in a compelling manner, this is a book for you. I honestly recommend this book to people just because of Glotka, who as I mentioned is my favourite character in any book that I've read.</div>
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I'd give this book an 8 out of 10, even though part of me really wants to give it 8. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-19376944438979938722013-12-30T00:54:00.004-05:002014-01-07T15:09:23.289-05:00Review: Gods Of Gotham By Lindsay Faye<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><br />
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11890816-the-gods-of-gotham?from_search=true"><i>Gods of Gotham</i> by Lindsay Faye</a> is a historical mystery novel about the formation of New York's first regular police force in the 1840s. More specifically, it is about Timothy Wilde who is among those who find themselves recruited.<br />
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The Detective: A Soul On Fire</h3>
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Timothy Wilde is a young man living in New York City as a bartender. His parents were killed in a fire, and his only family is his older brother, Valentine, a politician in the Democrat Party who are responsible for the newly created New York Police Department. Timothy happens to have a love-hate relationship with his drug addicted, smarmy politician of a brother.<br />
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But he's happy, mostly. As a bartender he learns how to talk to people, how to understand them, and most importantly of all how to read them. So when he finds himself, somewhat unwillingly it should be said, enrolled by his brother in the new police force he finds he has all the tools needed to be more than just a footman with a club. </div>
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He is able to mix with just about every level of society, even if he doesn't want to. He can speak the slang dialect popular among the slums in the city, he knows at least a bit about what goes on in the different sections of the neighbourhoods: all the different cultures, religions, political camps, social groups. More importantly, he is able to navigate all of the tensions that are rising in the city. Which is a good thing, for him, because...</div>
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The Setting: A City On Fire</h3>
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The setting is very charming and well crafted. Lindsay Faye does a great job setting the scene of New York during the historical period in which the book takes place. In the background of events, rumours reach the city of the Irish Potato Famine that will cause even more Irish to migrate to the United States and Faye helps illuminate the tensions between more established Protestant Americans and the Irish Catholic immigrants that arrive in increasing numbers. The immigrants from Ireland are poor and take all of the menial, poorly paid jobs if they get any jobs at all. Added to the mix are the African Americans living in the city, who are also poor, struggle to get the same crappy jobs as the Irish, and are also viewed with suspicion and derision by the non-poor, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Anglo-Saxon_Protestant">W.A.S.P. Americans</a>. On top of which, there is the seedy, dark underworld of the city, where the child-sex trade is rampant and tolerated, even if it is illegal.<br />
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So there are many sources of problems and tensions for the new police force to contend with: Fights between the various groups, riots and protests by the WASPs against the Irish and the blacks, rampant prostitution, drugs and criminal activities, and the politics that could have them shut down before they even get their feet under them. </div>
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<h3>
The Mystery: Children On Fire</h3>
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In the midst these situations, a nightmarish crime reveals itself in the form of a small girl found wandering the street and covered with blood. She is a kinchin-mab – a child prostitute, from the house of a woman who just so happens to be a prominent and large contributor to the Democratic party that created the police force. Timothy Wilde is the one to discover her, and slowly but surely finds out what she was running from.<br />
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What the girl tells him could cause widespread chaos and fear throughout the whole city, because it touches on all of the tensions that I touched on above. On top of which, it very quickly becomes entangled with Timothy's personal life, both with his brother and the woman he has longed to court. On a couple of occasions he almost gives up on the case and being a policeman entirely, on a few more he is almost killed, and it is only some unlikely sources of support that helps him stay on alive and on track.<br />
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<h3>
The Conclusion: This Book's On Rapid Oxidation Of A Material In The Rapid Oxidation Of A Material In The Exothermic Chermical Process Of Combustion</h3>
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If you didn't like the heading title above, you're not going to like many of my other attempts at humour.</div>
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This book is good mostly because of the setting that is skillfully put together. The characters are mostly interesting, with some very good ones. Unfortunately the main character is not among the best. The girl who is the heart of the book's mystery and Tim's brother Valentine steal the show for me, and even the Police Captain was more compelling a character for me. The mystery at the heart of the plot is a strong one, as it did a good job revealing all of the key characters (and the lesser ones) who could conceivably be suspects, while giving reasons for suspicion of each of them. I was kept guessing until the very end, and yet Faye gave enough clues that you don't feel cheated by something that came from left field and makes no sense. </div>
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I would give this book an 8 out of 10, and I'd recommend this book to anyone who likes mysteries and/or historical fictions. </div>
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</h3>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-13768984092083428832013-12-28T02:09:00.004-05:002014-01-07T15:41:23.825-05:00Review: Name Of The Wind By Patrick Rothfuss<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><i style="font-size: medium; font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">.</span></i><br />
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<h3>
The Plot: Kvothe The Kingkiller</h3>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/186074.The_Name_of_the_Wind?from_search=true"><i>The Name of the Wind</i> by Patrick Rothfuss</a> begins in a third-person narrative, telling how a famous scribe called The Chronicler comes to find the famous and infamous Kvothe, known as the Kingkiller, the Bloodless, and the Arcane. Except Kvothe is still a twenty-something year old man, living in a small town away from everything, running a tavern as a no-name, no-fame bartender. How did someone who is still so young become a living legend? Well, that's exactly what The Chronicler came to find out.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">My favourite cover art version</td></tr>
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The rest of the book is Kvothe telling his life's story – the real story behind the legends that already surround his name. So most of the book is written in a first-person narrative and is not just a simple recounting of events: Kvothe adds in his musings, philosophies and opinions on matters and events as he tells of them. The series, called the Kingkiller Chronicles, is a trilogy where each book covers one day in which Kvothe recites to the Chronicler his life. </div>
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It starts with Kvothe as a young boy, living among a group of travelling minstrels. He travels the lands with them until he finds himself having to live on his own before he is even a teenager. He lives in a large city for a few years as a penniless beggar and pickpocket, then finds his way to the University to learn two things above all else: first, how to use magic, specifically to learn the name of the wind; second, he seeks knowledge of a particular sort (what the knowledge might be is kind of a big spoiler, so you'll just have to read to find out). Obtaining that knowledge is what largely drives Kvothe's life and how he manages it. It might take a back seat to lesser and more immediate issues at times, but he is always moving towards that ultimate goal.</div>
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The good thing is that this quest for knowledge leads him to investigate seemingly related matters whenever and wherever he comes across them, and this has him on several adventures that helps to grow his legend.</div>
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<h3>
The Characters: Kvothe The Bloodless</h3>
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<span style="text-align: center;">With most of the book being narrated by Kvothe, he's obviously the most important character, and he is quite the character. To me he is at the same time a hero and an anti-hero, and for both he is not conventional. As a hero he is not a warrior or courageous in that sense (he has his own courage). He starts his life as a musician and an actor, learning how to be a minstrel. Along the way he meets an Arcanist who begins to teach him about herbs and science and magic. While at the University he is certainly brilliant, but also gets into trouble constantly. And I don't even necessarily mean "trouble" in the same way Harry Potter got into trouble while saving the school, I mean he is expelled once, nearly expelled a couple of other times, punished by whipping, and arrested by the judicial powers in a nearby town... all for various misdeeds and breaking important rules. He also does some pretty horrific things, even if his motives or the outcomes were for the best </span>– he faces some of those "impossible choices" a few times – and this is where the anti-hero part enters the equation.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">My least favourite cover.</td></tr>
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Kvothe isn't one of those characters where trouble finds him. Kvothe <i style="font-weight: bold;">seeks</i> trouble, and half the time seems to deserve what he gets.<br />
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But that is also a defining characteristic of his: his life is hard. Legitimately hard. He suffers through a lot of incredibly difficult experiences, but forges through it all with a firm determination. That knowledge I said he seeks drives him in all that he does, oftentimes desperately and savagely. As the trilogy is a retelling of his life, there is some meandering in the book and doesn't always stay on one direct path to finding that goal, as parts are thrown in to continually develop him as a character.<br />
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And in that, Rothfuss does a fantastic job. There is real growth and development in Kvothe, in ways that you <span style="text-align: center;">don't see as much or to such an extent in other books. It helps that the book is entirely dedicated to him and his development, but where other characters don't so much change as develop new abilities and powers, you can see Kvothe being affected by his experiences. His core personality might largely stay the same, but when Kvothe gets burned you can see him be wary around fire rather than just learning some magic to make himself immune to the flames.</span><br />
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While Kvothe does perform heroic acts in this book, and the series, and is by and large a good person, he is not perfect. He is flawed. He is cocky and arrogant, conceited and insecure, stubborn as a mule and reckless beyond reason at times. And all of these traits are exacerbated by the fact that he's very young, inexperienced in a lot of things, and lacking in wisdom. But for all of that he is undeniably brilliant, a voracious learner, witty and sly, brave in his own way, and a kind soul to the few friends and loved ones he manages to make.</div>
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The Magic: Kvothe The Arcane</h3>
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Speaking of magic, this series has a fantastic magic system and it comes in two parts. </div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">A nice middle ground cover</td></tr>
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First, there is Sympathy. It involves a lot of calculations that sounds a lot like science and math at times, training your brain and your willpower, and exerting your mental capacity upon people and things. The more difficult the task you seek to achieve, the more willpower is required (unless you can craft Sympathy-imbued objects that can help ease the burden) and the more likely you are to kill yourself. You can use your own body heat to start a fire, but you directly reduce your own body temperature and if you go too far you will kill yourself. You can create or use objects much like voodoo dolls to inflict pain and sensations upon another person, or create a chain reaction that results in causing lightning to strike (under the right conditions). </div>
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Second, there is Naming. Everything in the natural world, including people and creatures, has names. To know a name, you must know and understand everything about the thing or living being. Once you know the name of a thing or a living being, you can manipulate if not directly control it. The Name of the Wind is the first young Kvothe is exposed to this magic, and it leaves a big impression on him. When he arrives at the University, it is not just to seek that important knowledge that largely drives his life's purpose, but to learn the name of the wind, such as he saw as a child. </div>
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<h3>
The Writing: Rothfuss the Bardic Gnome</h3>
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I call him a gnome only because of the picture below. I call him a bard because this series is all about story telling. It reads very much like a tale being told by a story teller, and not just because that's exactly what Kvothe is doing. Rothfuss' prose, the way he constructs dialogue, narrative, and descriptions just reads and <b style="font-style: italic;">feels </b>like you're sitting by a fire while a bard recites an epic ballad. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Patrick Rothfuss: living gnome</td></tr>
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This book is also full of just great scenes and phrases. Some are absolutely hilarious, some are tear-jerkers, and some induce rage or pity or despair. Through clever word play, and masterful use of sentence construction, he is very adept at evoking strong emotions of all kinds in the reader (or at least in me). </div>
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I said about <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7235533-the-way-of-kings?from_search=true">Brandon Sanderson's <i>Way Of Kings</i></a> that it was as close to perfect as I think a book could be, at least for my taste, and <i>Name Of The Wind</i> matches that success. I don't mean to say that it is perfect and without its flaws. None of the other characters have enough depth to them, and I don't mean compared to Kvothe who is the obvious focus of the series. Kvothe's love interest just seems so... flighty. In many ways, that seems to be how Rothfuss wanted her to be, but at times I think it was overdone and she becomes annoying. Too often Kvothe's interactions with her don't seem to really develop anything, and things just repeat rather than develop. The tension of "when/will they get together?" is obviously being drawn out, but I'd like some more development in their relationship. </div>
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However, since I can't reasonably expect perfection, I give this book a 10 out of 10 as a fantasy book. Like <i>Way Of Kings </i>this is a must-read for anyone who even mildly likes fantasy literature.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-35899749053002241862013-12-24T23:01:00.001-05:002014-01-13T15:43:31.138-05:00The Night Before Christmas: A Story Of Two BooksI love books. The fact that I write my own blog solely about books should make that fairly obvious. I'm the kind of person that wonders how I came to love books so much, which touches on the nature vs nurture debate: was I born someone who was always going to love reading, or was it something that I picked up as I grew? Honestly, I'm inclined to say it was a bit of both.<br />
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But this post is a story of nurturing, in every sense of the word.<br />
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<h3>
A Christmas Eve Tradition</h3>
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<span style="text-align: center;">When my sister and I were children, for as long as I can remember our family's routine on Christmas Eve was always the same.</span><br />
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<a href="http://einsrevolver.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/christmas-tree-background-wallpaper.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="http://einsrevolver.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/christmas-tree-background-wallpaper.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a>First, we'd travel into Toronto to our grandparents' house, where we'd gather with our relatives from my mother's side of the family and do our Secret Santa stocking exchange. Everyone would get two presents for one other person in the family, and write poems describing what each gift was. We'd have some appetizers and munchies, with my favourite being grandma's egg salad sandwiches. After the presents were opened, we'd either go to a Swiss Chalet or order it in to their home. Then we would go to their local church for a quick sermon. I'm not religious, but I still love going to them. Partly because the people who have run those sermons always preach simple things that can be admired regardless of religious affiliation (peace and love, giving and joy, etc), and partly because of the sense of tradition and the spirit of Christmas. In fact, the more I worked in retail the more I came to appreciate that sense, rather than the commercialization that saps my ability to enjoy the spirit of the holiday. </div>
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Once all of that was over we would head home for our final two traditions. First, my mother would hand out a new set of pajamas, and then we'd sit around the Christmas tree and read two books, aloud and together.<br />
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<h3>
A Wish For Wings That Work</h3>
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The book we always read first is called <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/410913.A_Wish_for_Wings_That_Work?from_search=true"><i>A Wish For Wings That Work</i> by Berkeley Breathed</a>. It's about a penguin who always wished he could fly and writes a letter to Santa for a new pair of wings that will enable him to fly. Of course, in the end, he winds up having to help Santa by doing what penguins do best, and he truly "flies" with the wings he already had.</div>
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Basically, we'd take turns reading a page or two, show everyone the pictures, then pass it on to the next person. In truth, we loved the pictures as much if not more than the writing. There was one of Opus, the penguin, sitting on one shoulder of a cast-metal statue, offering a pickle to some pigeons who bristled away from him; there was another of Opus "flying" through the water, trying to save Santa and his sleigh from sinking, with a sheet of spray trailing behind him, and frogs and catfish leaping out of his path; the last one we always loved was of Opus shaking hands with Santa at the end, clutching his soggy red bow tie as he dripped from the water, looking tired but proud. Whoever the artist was, and I can't find it mentioned on Goodreads, deserves an award.<br />
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That's not to say the writing wasn't good, because it had some memorable phrases and rhythmic sentences that proved very catchy and giggle-worthy to us as kids. "Catastrophe! Calamity! A considerable setback!" is the one we all still smile and laugh at.</div>
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<h3>
The Night Before Christmas</h3>
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Because that wasn't obvious, eh?</div>
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Yup, the book we'd finish off with was the classic: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/196970.The_Night_Before_Christmas?from_search=true"><i>The Night Before Christmas</i> by... someone</a>. We would do the same thing as with the previous book, reading a couple of paragraphs and passing it to the next person. A shorter book, with art that didn't appeal to us nearly as much as adorable and silly penguins and snow ducks, it was a quicker read than A Wish For Wings That Work. The artwork was much more "classic children's picture book" in its style, which was certainly well done but didn't have the same charm. What it did have is the rhythm of the poem's verse, and the wording that was always difficult to remember but was so beautifully written it was always a pleasant surprise to hear.<br />
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Can I say for certain that this Christmas tradition that I had with my family helped create a foundation of my future love of books? I cannot, but it certainly didn't hurt. </div>
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Merry Christmas everybody!</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-18308969104249600552013-12-23T02:14:00.002-05:002014-01-07T16:25:54.834-05:00Review: The Way Of Kings by Brandon Sanderson<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">This review will have some mild spoilers. I will try not to give any major or specific plot points away, and will speak more generally about the world, the characters, and plot concepts.</span></i><br />
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When I first read <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7235533-the-way-of-kings?from_search=true"><i>The Way Of Kings</i></a>, I had only recently discovered Brandon Sanderson as an author. I was a fan of the <i>Wheel of Time</i> series, and after Robert Jordan passed away before its completion Mr Sanderson was announced as the author who would finish it. Soon after, I was due to attend Comic Con in San Diego, and saw that Brandon Sanderson would be on a panel and book signing. I bought <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/68428.Mistborn?from_search=true">Mistborn: The Final Empire</a></i> to read over the weekend. I finished reading it by the time my flight landed in San Diego and I reached to the hotel we were staying at, and that night ordered all three Mistborn books in hardcover.<br />
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A couple of months later, <i>The Way Of Kings</i> came out. A friend at work, who worked in the back receiving merchandise and knew I was really looking forward to Sanderson's new book, let me know the minute we received it. We got them two weeks before the official release date, and since it wasn't a strict on sale book I could buy it right away. I wound up reading it twice before other friends in different parts of the world even had a chance to buy it.<br />
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Along with <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=kingkiller+chronicles">Patrick Rothfuss' <i>Kingkiller Chronicles</i></a>, <i>Stormlight Archive</i> (of which <i>The Way Of Kings</i> is the first book) is my favourite fantasy series.<br />
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And here's why.<br />
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<h3>
The Catch: Kaladin Stormblessed And A Whole New World</h3>
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I recently wrote <a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-catch-when-and-how-does-book-grab.html">an article on what I called "The Catch"</a>, which is a name I give to the element(s) in a book that make me hooked into reading it through entirely.</div>
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One of the first things you notice when reading this book is that Brandon Sanderson crafted a refreshingly original fantasy world. It has newly conceived animals, humanoid races, landscapes, plants, supernatural weather patterns, currency/money, religions, cultures, kingdoms/nations, magic, technology, and world history/mythology. It would take a very lengthy post in and of itself just to try and describe all the ways that the world in <i>The Way Of Kings</i> is different and unique. You can tell that Sanderson put a lot of time, work and thought into creating it, because there's so much depth and content to it. Not only that, but the characters and the plot are obviously affected by the world.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://thebooksmugglers.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Brandon-Sanderson-author-photo-776x1024.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://thebooksmugglers.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Brandon-Sanderson-author-photo-776x1024.jpeg" height="320" width="242" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mr Sanderson himself</td></tr>
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The other thing that I noticed very quickly is that I loved the characters. Specifically, I knew I would love Kaladin Stormblessed before he had his own POV chapter. I love heroic characters, and Kaladin very quickly established that he doesn't fit into the traps and tropes a lot of heroes do. He is not perfect or infallible, and has his flaws, the hallmark features of great characters with lots of depth to them. He seems to suffer from depression, and is constantly at war with himself. Rough experiences in his life has made him cynical, to the point where he constantly asks himself "what's the point?". There are times he gives up trying to help anyone, and in the end the primary reason why he comes out of those dark moods is that he comes to hate himself for not caring.<br />
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But when he commits to being heroic and principled, the man is an absolute, unstoppable <i style="font-weight: bold;">tank</i>. I absolutely love heroes who manage to win people over to their side, even those who hitherto expressed dislike for the hero. I love it even more when they do so with simple yet powerful gestures and deeds, done out of the goodness of their heart rather than anything manipulative. By the end of the book, Kaladin has a small band of ultra-loyal followers whose hearts he won over using hearty stew, first-aid, and putting himself in harms way so they don't have to. What further makes Kaladin amazing as a character is the absolutely hellish journey he takes through the book. In the prologue, he's a warband leader and a warrior. In his first chapter, he's a slave. After a few chapters, he's worse than a slave... he's a bridgeman. You'll have to read the book to find out what that means, but I can tell you that it's both horrific and <i style="font-weight: bold;">awesome</i>.<br />
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I will say quickly that Kaladin is only 1/4 of the main POV characters in this book. The others are no slouches either. Dalinar and his son Adolin are Shardbearers (more on them below) and nobles in the most powerful kingdom in the world. They are noble in more than just title, but struggle with the intrigue and opulent behaviour of their peers while they wage a war against the "barbaric" humanoid people that assassinated their king. Finally, there's Shallan. A young and obscure noblewoman from a different kingdom, trying to save her family by becoming a student-ward of a brilliant and controversial scholar. She's a self-conscious, shy bookworm, so I adored her for obvious self-reflective reasons.<br />
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Now, the webcomic <a href="http://www.penny-arcade.com/">Penny Arcade</a> recently drew up a comic that pokes fun at Sanderson fans and their penchant to praise his magic systems and world building. I got a really good laugh at it, because it's true. But... it's still true, because those are Sanderson's two of his greatest strengths as a fantasy author.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://art.penny-arcade.com/photos/i-vVtgTc4/0/950x10000/i-vVtgTc4-950x10000.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://art.penny-arcade.com/photos/i-vVtgTc4/0/950x10000/i-vVtgTc4-950x10000.jpg" height="320" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It's funny, because it's true.</td></tr>
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<h3>
Speaking Of The Magic...</h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This is what a Shardbearer looks like</td></tr>
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Seriously, I <i style="font-weight: bold;">was</i> really impressed with the magic system. There weren't old wizards throwing fireballs and conjuring demonic monsters. Instead, there are supernatural storms containing and compelled by some magical force, which can be infused within special gemstones. The energy they contain is called Stormlight, and the gemstones are used both as currency and to power the ultra powerful Shardblades and Shardplates. The Shardblades are the weapons that are summoned from thin air by its wielder, and can cut through anything like a hot knife through butter. Shardplate is near impenetrable armor that even a Shardblade can't break through without a flurry of solid blows. Even if the armor is broken into a million pieces, it can be completely regrown using enough Stormlight gems. Those wielding both a Shardblade and Shardplate can almost single handedly wipe out an opposing army. The history behind these Shards is only touched on and hinted at in the first book, but is obviously of great importance.<br />
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Oh right, and some special people can breathe in the Stormlight and become as powerful as someone who wields both a Shardblade and Shardplate. They become stronger, faster, and more skilled at everything they do. They can walk on walls and rooftops, they can pull objects towards a spot that they infuse with Stormlight, and bind things together through a similar process. It turns Kaladin, a formidable warrior in his own right, into a one man army on par with a Shardbearer. In fact, he kills one Shardbearer and seriously wounds another using nothing but Stormlight and his own skill.</div>
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<h3>
He Did <i>WHAT??</i></h3>
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One other thing Sanderson has established is really good plots. The reason for that, at least in my mind, is that his magic, characters, world and plots are all intertwined. They all feed off and tie in to each other in a manner that always seems logical because of the rules and mannerisms that he establishes for each aspect. </div>
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In this world, humanity faces a cataclysmic war of extinction called Desolations every few thousand years. Semi-divine figures called the Heralds arrive to lead humanity against the Voidbringers. At the start of the book, you don't know who or what the Voidbringers are or what their motivations or goals are, despite what the predominant religion in the world proclaims. By the end of the book we are told what they are... but I have my doubts that it will turn out to be true. It seems too convenient. And that's what Sanderson does so well with his plot: with the plot intertwined with the history and lore of the world he feeds throughout the book, every bit of worldbuilding he throws at us isn't just cool... it's <i style="font-weight: bold;">important</i>!<br />
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...possibly.</div>
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He is also very good at dropping subtle hints and foreshadowing that seem innocuous at the time, but wind up being very significant for his plot twists. He established that in all of hisbooks that preceded <i>The Way of Kings</i>, and as a result when I read (and re-read, and re-read again) through this book I paid extra attention to any word or phrasing that seemed out of place, or oddly significant. It's like a puzzle, trying to fit together the pieces I gathered, sifting through what I think will wind up being important and what won't be, trying to guess at what bombshells he'll drop on us in the future. I am rather proud of myself in that I think I picked out a couple of nuggets and can guess at their significance, which of course means I'll be completely wrong.</div>
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<h3>
In Conclusion</h3>
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This book is fantastic. Seriously, inarguably fantastic as far as I'm concerned. I give it a 10/10. I don't mean that it's flawless or perfect, because there's no such thing. But since there's no such thing, I give it a perfect score because to me it's as good a book as is possible to craft. There is so much about this book that I didn't even mention, or just barely touched on, but this review is already getting long. You'll just have to find out about it all yourself.</div>
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If you like fantasy, even just a little bit, this book is a must-read.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-18795685826012722262013-12-18T23:20:00.002-05:002013-12-18T23:21:31.686-05:00The Catch: When And How Does A Book Grab You?<div class="tr_bq">
This is something that I've thought about before, and discussed with people when the topic of books comes up.<br />
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When you're reading a book that you like (and I won't flatter anyone here and say that we've never liked a book that we knew wasn't good), there comes a point when the book has either grabbed you to the point that you know you want to read on and finish it, or has failed to grab you and you give up on it. I've read in various places that some people will select an arbitrary threshold in terms of page numbers—usually somewhere in the range of the first 50 to 70 pages. If the book hasn't grabbed them by then, they'll give it up.<br />
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I've never set such a limit. In fact, very rarely in my life have I ever started a novel and not finished it (aside: I've started plenty of non-fiction books and not finished them, but I consider them differently at a fundamental level). Almost invariably, there is something about the book that I will encounter very quickly, within the first chapter or two, that will make me finish the book. I've come to call it "The Catch".<br />
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It can be any number of things, but for me the Catch is usually one of three things: a clever or witty line, an intriguing mystery, or just plain good writing. </div>
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<h3>
Wit Beyond Measure Is Man's Greatest Treasure</h3>
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The first time I ever really gave some thought to the idea of the Catch and the role it plays in books that I read was after reading the first chapter of <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7165300-the-black-prism?from_search=true">Brent Weeks' <i>The Black Prism</i></a>:</div>
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<i>Another wolf answered, farther out. A haunting sound, the very voice of the wilderness. You couldn't help but freeze when you heard it. It was the kind of beauty that made you shit your pants.</i></blockquote>
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Alright, this isn't exactly the pinnacle of wit and cleverness that you'll come across. In fact it's quite crude, but poop humour has it own kind of wit to it.<br />
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<a href="https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327921884l/7165300.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327921884l/7165300.jpg" width="206" /></a>This quote came up on just the second page of the book, but I found it so unexpectedly humorous that I laughed out loud. Even then, even consciously, I acknowledged that this one small paragraph was enough that I knew I would read the whole book. Part of it was an assumption, that because the author managed to produce a quick turn of phrase that amused me so greatly I trusted that he would have a similar ability to craft a whole book that I would enjoy. As it turns out, that assumption proved correct. <a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2013/12/the-one-list-to-rule-them-all.html">I ranked Brent Weeks' Lightbringer books #15 in my list of favourite fantasy series</a> (It might not seem like that high, but I included 33 different series in the list and have read several more that I didn't like enough to even include them).<br />
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There are other books that have had a similar Catch to them. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/944073.The_Blade_Itself?from_search=true">Joe Abercrombie's <i>The Blade Itself</i></a> has one of my favourite characters in any book, Inquisitor Glotka. The second chapter in the book is Glotka's first POV chapter, and contained enough clever writing and internal dialogue that I made the same assumption.<br />
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And again, that assumption proved correct. The first time I read one of <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=terry+pratchett">Terry Pratchett's books</a>, it only took a few pages before I found a big grin etched into my face that didn't fade until several hours after I finished reading the final page. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=gods+behaving+badly&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips</a>, which I reviewed in my previous post, achieved the same feat in its first chapter.<br />
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<h3>
It Is Only Through Mystery And Madness That The Soul Itself Is Revealed</h3>
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The second type of Catch that regularly succeeds with me is some element of mystery. Who is that shadowy character? What's his/her story? Will the guy get the girl? What's going to happen? And so on.<br />
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You can probably sense a pattern with those types of questions, they're all character and/or plot based. If an author does their job well, either in introducing a well-crafted character or foreshadowing an interesting plot development, I'll want to keep reading to find out more about either, or both.</div>
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One example of this is <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7235533-the-way-of-kings?from_search=true">Brandon Sanderson's <i>Way of Kings</i></a>. In fact, it succeeded in both ways... multiple times. </div>
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First and foremost is Kaladin, one of the main POV characters that the book follows. A brilliant young soldier, leader and hero, turn dejected and vilified slave. The little that is immediately revealed about him is full of mystery: how did such a young man come to be such a well-regarded warrior, especially given the derision heaped on those from his class in the society Sanderson introduced? What happened to him between then, and when he is considered a dangerous slave? What will happen to him as a slave? Will he ever again show the same kind of heroism and importance that he did in that one chapter?</div>
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Each of the main POV characters achieved something similar, though not as powerfully for me as with Kaladin. Adolin, Dalinar, Shallan, and Szeth all had their own pasts and mysteries and intriguing futures. </div>
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But Sanderson also presented various plot arcs for the book, and a main plotline for the series, that were just as captivating. The cataclysmic Desolations that happen every few thousand years, the Knights Radiant and their Shardblades and Shardplates, the war with the Parshendi on the Shattered Plains, Shallan's quest to save her family, and more. All were introduced as at least mildly interesting concepts, written into the book with well-crafted prose, and with enough mysteries foreshadowed and hinted at that I <i>wanted</i> to find out what would happen. </div>
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Patrick Rothfuss' <i>Name of the Wind</i>, Django Wexler's <i>The Thousand Names</i>, and George R.R. Martin's <i>A Game of Thrones </i>provide other examples. The first using a seemingly ordinary man with a <i>very</i> intriguing backstory hinted at; the second with a military challenge—that would an undermanned army already beaten in battle having to defeat a much more numerous enemy in hostile territory; and the latter with the White Walkers, the mysterious murder of one of the main character's friends, and the looming civil war hinted at almost in the beginning. </div>
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<h3>
All Good Writing Is Swimming Under Water And Holding Your Breath</h3>
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The final category for me is just plain good writing. Technically, the two above examples would also be considered "good writing". However, what I mean by good writing in this instance is when I'm reading a book that doesn't have a single identifiable catch. There isn't some clever phrase or dialogue, there isn't some kind of character or plot development that makes me want to find out what will happen, I just find it so well written that I want to keep reading for the sake of reading what's on the pages. There are a few examples I can throw out there off the top of my head.<br />
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7139892-under-heaven?from_search=true"><i>Under Heaven</i> by Guy Gavriel Kay</a> is just an all-round superb book. It does have an interesting setting, and a good main character: Shen Tai. However, the book takes its time to get into the main plot or show any kind of character development. And Shen Tai, while he was good character, didn't really grab me. What grabbed me was the writing itself. </div>
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Here is a bit from the synopsis on Goodreads that describes the beginning: </div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><i>It begins simply. Shen Tai, son of an illustrious general serving the Emperor of Kitai, has spent two years honoring the memory of his late father by burying the bones of the dead from both armies at the site of one of his father's last great battles. In recognition of his labors and his filial piety, an unlikely source has sent him a dangerous gift: 250 Sardian horses.</i></span></blockquote>
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The setting for the first portion of the book has Shen Tai in a small cabin in the midst of the battlefield mentioned above. The prose used to describe the battlefield is simply fantastic: the landscape itself, scarred from the battle and strewn with a seemingly endless number of bones; the ghosts of the fallen (that are real, in the book) that come out at night to wail their pain and sorrow, yet who accept Shen Tai for his efforts on their part; the painstaking labour that Shen Tai goes through, gathering up the bones, digging enormous mass graves for them, and filling them in; and how the soldiers in the opposing forts nearby the battlefield are inspired to bring increasingly grand gifts in thanks for giving their comrades peace.<br />
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It is only after a fairly lengthy period in the book that Shen Tai is visited by another human being, and the main plot involving the Sardian horses and their impact on his life is introduced. Even before that happened, I was hooked into the book almost as much as any other book has managed to hook me. </div>
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There are other examples: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12109372-range-of-ghosts?from_search=true"><i>Range of Ghosts</i> by Elizabeth Bear</a>. It is two books into the trilogy and yet I still read on for the writing more than the plot or the characters. Coincidentally, the setting is also inspired from historical Asia and the story also begins in the aftermath of a battle. Bear simply does an incredible job bringing her world to life by painting simple yet elegant scenes of the landscape.</div>
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Another is <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/628036.The_Shadow_of_the_Wind">Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon</a>. It is not a fantasy book, like the others, but a historical fiction taking place in Barcelona, Spain in the 1940s and 50s. It follows the life of Daniel, from when he is a young boy, as he tries to find out what happened to the author of his favourite book. Like Elizabeth Bear above, Carlos Ruiz Zafon is amazing at establishing and describing his setting. His descriptions are quick but vibrant, and manages to bring to life the city of Barcelona and its people. Even something as simple as describing the awe one of the supporting characters feels as he sees a movie in a theatre for the first time is made to seem like an event of profound and beautiful significance.<br />
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All of these examples give descriptions that aren't too long and dry (see: Rings, Lord of the) yet are full enough that my imagination was able to see the settings as if I were there in person. On top of which, the settings that they used were beautiful to begin with. </div>
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If One Thinks, One Must Reach Conclusions</h3>
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My conclusion is simple. In fact I've already said what my conclusion is: witty phrasings and dialogue, good characters and plot with some aspect of foreshadowing or mystery, and plain and simple good writing acts for me as a Catch. When I encounter them, even within the first few pages of a book, the author has won my trust over completely and I'm in for the entire journey.<br />
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Not that I never wind up being mistaken in my assumptions. Sometime this year I read a book called <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/16116029-beyond-the-storm?from_search=true">Beyond the Storm</a>.By the end of the first chapter its Catch was, I felt, the writing. The first chapter described the tragic death of a young woman as she awaited her lover to return from a sea voyage (actually, it was a lake voyage, but "lake voyage" sounds stupid). The rest of the book, which I didn't read until after I bought it, was about a man and a woman with troubled pasts meeting on their way to their high school reunion. They had two previous amorous encounters, once in high school and once years later during a chance encounter in New York. In this final meeting, they come to realize they're perfect for each other. There are many... intimate moments, and much waxing poetic about coincidence and fate.<br />
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Honestly, after the first chapter the good writing I thought I read disappeared completely. There was no subtlety, no good characters or plot developments. I kept reading to find out what the hell the point of the first chapter was, which had no obvious bearing on the rest of the book. Only near the end was it revealed that the two of them were some kind of reincarnated souls of the tragically killed woman and her heartbroken lover, only for it to be revealed that the two of the main characters were actually dead from a car crash and their spirits were what had met... or something. </div>
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So, in conclusion, I've found that the Catch is a very useful tool. But like all tools it isn't perfect. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-86397739198648219712013-12-17T02:51:00.000-05:002013-12-17T12:05:21.967-05:00Review: Gods Behaving Badly By Marie Phillips<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<i>Warning: This review will contain mild spoilers. I will strive to avoid giving anything major away, while trying to give someone who hasn't read the book the best impression I can.</i></div>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1159679.Gods_Behaving_Badly?from_search=true">Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips</a> will be the first non-fantasy book I've reviewed. It is categorized as a general fiction book, though it still has elements of the fantastic in it.<br />
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From Goodreads:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19px;"><i>Gods of Olympus are alive, but crammed into a crumbling London townhouse, and, powers waning, unhappily employed. Artemis is a dog-walker, Apollo a TV psychic, Aphrodite a phone sex operator, and Dionysus a DJ. Aphrodite's quarrel with lover and nephew Apollo escalates into the end of the world. Humans Alice and Neil are caught in the crossfire.</i></span></blockquote>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_drdh9nPvBOc/S6nZl9PLw0I/AAAAAAAAAAM/C7jFbcc1Y4o/s1600/Artemis-2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_drdh9nPvBOc/S6nZl9PLw0I/AAAAAAAAAAM/C7jFbcc1Y4o/s1600/Artemis-2.jpg" height="200" width="170" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Artemis, goddess of hunting</td></tr>
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"Ancient Greek Gods living in modern London?" I says to myself. "Sounds too good to be true, Brain must have gotten us drunk again."<br />
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"Twaddle-poop" my Brain shouts. "Hands, flip to page one and we'll see who's drunk!" After reading the first chapter, I'm glad I listened to Brain. The opening scene, with Artemis speaking with a tree that was actually a woman who spurned the sexual advances of Apollo, was the type of British humour that I love: utterly bizarre situations where everyone speaks properly and as if everything is normal.<br />
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It's not just that there are ancient gods living in the modern world, which itself has much promise either for awesomeness or hilarity. It's that the modern world is still entirely dependent on the efforts of those gods to fulfill their responsibilities. At the same time, their interactions with us mortal humans rather brilliantly reveals the alien and sometimes terrifyingly different mind set of the Greek Pantheon.<br />
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Gods Gone Wild</h3>
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Basically, the Gods are real and they're actually in charge/control everything they are said to. Ares <br />
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causes/orchestrates all of the wars, Apollo ensures the sun rises and sets, Artemis can speak with animals and plants. But, as the synopsis says, their powers are not infinite. In fact, they're running out and so they're <b>supposed</b><i style="font-weight: bold;"> </i>to be conserving whatever they have left for their respective responsibilities. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Apollo, god of Sun and prophecy</td></tr>
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Problem is, they have very human personality flaws, but since they're Gods those flaws are amplified. As a household, living in a London flat, they're all incredibly dysfunctional. Apollo, god of (among other things) the Sun and prophecy, is a sex-crazed megalomaniac who earns his living as a TV psychic. Aphrodite, goddess of love, beauty and procreation, is extremely shallow and petty and her job is on a sex-talk phone service. Artemis, goddess of hunting, animals and chastity, is very proper and stubborn and works as a dog walker. </div>
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These three Gods are the main actors from the Gods' side of the story: Aphrodite gets angry at Apollo for "being mean to her" and not using his power to warm up the water basin for her shower. The prank she devises is to make him fall in love with a mortal woman, but make it so she will hate and spurn him rather than return his desperate advances. The spiteful scheme inadvertently winds up threatening the end of the world, and all the while Artemis scrambles to keep the world in order. </div>
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Oh, The Humanity!</h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Aphrodite, goddess of beauty</td></tr>
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Enter Alice and Neil. They're two mere mortals, both in love with each other in that incredibly awkward way where neither believes the other is at all interested that is just so adorable (as long as you're not one of them). Unfortunately for the two, they're the ones who get caught up in Aphrodite's scheming. Alice, mainly, is the one dragged into their world, with Neil doing his best to drag her back out of it. It winds up testing their budding relationship. Thankfully, Neil proves that he's willing to go to Hell itself to save Alice! And that's rather convenient, because the depth of their love could very well decide the fate of the world. Dun dun dunnnn...</div>
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I did say this book shares some elements of fantasy, and I wasn't just talking about the fact that Greek Gods are real in this tale. I'm willing to admit it if others won't: fantasy as a genre is pretty much the male equivalent of the romance genre. What guy wouldn't want to save his lady love from the underworld and save the world at the same time, to prove his love for her?</div>
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No one else? Just me? Thanks guys, way to make this awkward.</div>
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Very Much Of This World</h3>
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This book has an intriguing concept, great comedy throughout the whole thing, and the charming romance between Alice and Neil, but doesn't really have anything else going for it. The book itself is pretty short, which is probably for the best. The main plot arc about the world possibly ending seems somewhat contrived, the ending worthy of a slight grin but not especially clever.<br />
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In the end, this book stuck to its strengths. It is brilliantly charming and amusing, and definitely worth the read. But it is very much something of a fluff novel. I really, really liked it. But I didn't love it, since it just didn't have the power or the depth to completely win me over. </div>
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If I were to give it a grade, I'd say it earned a 7.5 out of 10.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-67278537944448855962013-12-16T01:36:00.002-05:002013-12-16T01:41:57.018-05:00The One List To Rule Them AllWhat? Who said I was whoring myself out for page hits by creating a list of my favourite fantasy series? Lies and slander, I say!<br />
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Now excuse me while I whore myself out for page hits by creating a list of my favourite fantasy series.<br />
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<i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/33.The_Lord_of_the_Rings?from_search=true">Lord of the Rings</a></i> by God</h3>
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Lord of the Rings will not be included in this list, because it's not fair. I don't even mean that in the sense that "Well it was the very first modern fantasy book, it established the genre". I mean, specifically for me, Lord of the Rings might as well be the Bible. <br />
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First, as you may have noticed by now I love books. Like... I really, REALLY like books. Especially fantasy books. And as I already mentioned Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit are kind of Genesis. <br />
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Second, I also happen to love Celtic, Anglo-Saxon, and Norse history, culture, mythology and folklore. I majored in Celtic Studies in university, and applied to grad schools for it as well. The only reason why I didn't major in Anglo-Saxon and/or Norse studies is my university didn't have majors for them. I loved those studies almost as much as I loved fantasy books, which only makes sense since Tolkien drew a lot of inspiration from those historical cultures and mythologies. Speaking of which, guess who was actually a fairly prominent scholar in Celtic, Anglo-Saxon, and Norse linguistics, folklore, and mythology? Yeah, that Tolkien guy. I actually read some of his scholarly work for some of my essays.<br />
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So when I list above that Lord of the Rings is by "God", I'm mostly being tongue-in-cheek. But not entirely. And quite frankly, the mere mortals below on this list cannot hope to compete with God. It just wouldn't be fair. <br />
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#1<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=kingkiller+chronicle&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Kingkiller Chronicles</a></i> by Patrick Rothfuss</h3>
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In truth I'd say this series is tied with the Stormlight Archive, below. Love the prose, love the protagonist, love the magic and the adventures and the shenanigans.</div>
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#2 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=stormlight+archive&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on" style="font-style: italic;">Stormlight Archive</a> by Brandon Sanderson</h3>
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I think the only reason why I would say it's not tied with Rothfuss' series, is that there's only been one book so far. We'll see if I change my mind after reading Words of Radiance. Kaladin and the Bridgemen is one of the most unique and incredible plot arcs I've ever read in any book, ever.</div>
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#3 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+shadow+campaign+django+wexler&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on" style="font-style: italic;">The Shadow Campaigns</a> by Django Wexler</h3>
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I loved the characters, I loved the setting, I loved the plot, and I loved the battles. I can't really find any fault with it, except to say I didn't like it as much as the above too... but not by much.<br />
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#4 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=moontide+quartet+david+hair&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on" style="font-style: italic;">The Moontide Quartet</a> by David Hair</h3>
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Honestly, the second book might have forced me to put it in with a tie with the above. It's massive but focused, every character POV is interesting and none of them seem cliché, the magic and world is great.<br />
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#5 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=mistborn+brandon+sanderson&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on" style="font-style: italic;">Mistborn</a> by Brandon Sanderson</h3>
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Loved the magic, loved the world, loved the characters, loved the plot twists, and loved the ending of the series. The second and most of the third book didn't have the same magic as The Final Empire did, which keeps it from being up top with Sanderson's other series.<br />
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#6 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+demon+cycle+peter+v+brett&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on" style="font-style: italic;">The Demon Cycle</a> by Peter V. Brett</h3>
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Characters are good, world is great, plot is somewhere between good and great, the cliffhanger (literally) at the end of Daylight War made me extremely angry... which I can appreciate is a sign that it did its job well.</div>
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<i>#7 <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+first+law+joe+abercrombie&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The First Law Trilogy</a></i> by Joe Abercrombie</h3>
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Has probably my favourite character in any book I've read: Inquisitor Glotka. Twisted in body and mind, the internal monologues he has with himself are grim and hilarious.<br />
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#8 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+broken+empire+mark+lawrence&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Broken Empire</a></i> by Mark Lawrence</h3>
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Has one of my other favourite characters, this one is the main (indeed only) protagonist. It can be seriously twisted, but almost always mixes those moments with humour as if to dare you to find it funny. I always did... probably doesn't speak well for me.<br />
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#9 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=farseer+trilogy&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Farseer Trilogy</a></i> and <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=tawny+man&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Tawny Man Trilogy</a></i> by Robin Hobb</h3>
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The internal struggles the protagonist in these trilogies has (it's the same character, which is why I grouped them together), hit me really close to home. I don't know if Mrs Hobb meant for Fitz to come off as suffering depression, but it certainly resonated with that part of myself. </div>
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#10 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=eternal+sky+elizabeth+bear&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Eternal Sky</a></i> by Elizabeth Bear</h3>
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<a href="http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/matociquala/863621/152620/600.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/matociquala/863621/152620/600.jpg" height="200" width="131" /></a><a href="http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1340427694l/13627169.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1340427694l/13627169.jpg" height="200" width="132" /></a><a href="http://www.elizabethbear.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/steeles-the-sky-elizabeth-bear-donato-giancola-680x1024.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.elizabethbear.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/steeles-the-sky-elizabeth-bear-donato-giancola-680x1024.jpg" height="200" width="132" /></a></div>
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One of the most beautifully written books I've read, as far as both the prose itself and the world it manages to paint. It helps overcome a just "okay" caste of characters, in my books at least.<br />
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#11 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=gentleman+bastard&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Gentleman Bastard</a></i> by Scott Lynch</h3>
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Great dialogues between the main characters, great plots and capers, mostly great characters. I have yet to read the third book, which I've read and been told is a bit disappointing. I almost expect that, having heard that, my bar will be set lower and I'll wind up enjoying it more than I would have otherwise.<br />
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#12<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13569581-blood-song?from_search=true">A Raven's Shadow</a></i> by Anthony Ryan</h3>
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Just a well written, well executed book. Love the main character and his journey in life, love the direction it took. Its biggest weakness is that it seemed to take a while to get there, even though I understand that I could only really appreciate it as much as I did because Ryan spent so much time setting the stage for it.<br />
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#13<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=malazan+book+of+the+fallen">Malazan Book of the Fallen</a></i> by Stephen Erikson</h3>
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Massive series, incredibly massive world(s). This series defines the word "epic". There is more mythology and world building in this series than every other series on this list combined (excluding Lord of the Rings, because God).<br />
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#14<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=traitor+son+cycle&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Traitor Son Cycle</a></i> by Miles Cameron</h3>
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Love the siege warfare, love the dialogue between characters, love most of the characters themselves. The constant jumping of POVs was a bit irksome at a few points, and the magic system doesn't seem to have the depth of others. </div>
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#15<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=lightbringer+brent+weeks&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Lightbringer</a></i> by Brent Weeks</h3>
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<a href="http://www.brentweeks.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Weeks_Black-Prism-TP.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.brentweeks.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Weeks_Black-Prism-TP.jpg" height="200" width="131" /></a><a href="http://www.brentweeks.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/The-Blinding-Knife.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.brentweeks.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/The-Blinding-Knife.jpg" height="200" width="129" /></a><a href="http://www.brentweeks.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/The-Broken-Eye-HC.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.brentweeks.com/news/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/The-Broken-Eye-HC.jpg" height="200" width="129" /></a></div>
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Love the magic, the world, the characters, and the plot twists. The first book spent far too much time constantly explaining how the magic system worked, but the second made up for it by dropping those explanations entirely and concentrating on the amazingly surprising plot twists.<br />
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#16<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+dagger+and+the+coin&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Dagger and the Coin</a></i> by Daniel Abraham</h3>
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Well written, has the most sympathetic and psychopathic, genocidal villain in any books I've read. Some things seem too superficial at times, or just a bit plain/uninteresting. But that seems to have changed by the end of book three.<br />
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#17<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=wheel+of+time+robert+jordan&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Wheel of Time</a></i> by Robert Jordan</h3>
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One of the first landmark fantasy series after Lord of the Rings. The first 5-6 books were really good, the next 2-3 were good to okay, books 8-11 were bloated and awful, and Sanderson's writing of the final three books recaptured the magic from the first half of the series. The characters were repetitive and incredibly annoying at times, while a select few were fantastic. The magic was cool, the world and the battles were too. It all balances out as a good series overall.</div>
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#18<i> </i><i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=codex+alera+jim+butcher&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Codex Alera</a></i> by Jim Butcher</h3>
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Love the magic, love the world, love the characters and their development. Some parts of the plot were either a bit obvious or kinda silly.<br />
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#19<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=riyria+revelations+michael+j+sullivan&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Riyria Revelations</a></i> by Michael J. Sullivan</h3>
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The first book (which is only half of the first omnibus in the picture above) was very cliché fantasy, but the dialogue between the two protagonists made me keep going. I'm glad I did, as each book improved upon the last. The ending gave me goosebumps, and my jaw literally dropped. It is without a doubt the best ending to a series I've ever read.<br />
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#20 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=sword+of+truth+terry+goodkind&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Sword of Truth</a></i> by Terry Goodkind</h3>
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This series is very divisive to me. Books 1, 2, 6, 9 and 11 were all great. Books 7 and 8 seemed utterly pointless to the rest of the series, and seemed to only serve the purpose that Goodkind could pontificate on his philosophies. Goodkind himself really soured his reputation, at least for me, by seemingly deriding fantasy fans in general and snubbing his own fans at times. However, his official forum was where I became an admin, and I became so close with some of them that we all went to Comic Con together one year. These were the people I met, and these were the books I read and loved, during the worst year in my life as far as personal loss and depression goes. For these reasons they still hold a place in my heart.<br />
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#21 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=long+price+quartet&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Long Price Quartet</a></i> by Daniel Abraham</h3>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Icbte-BfDNg/UNReWkzVuVI/AAAAAAAAEiU/ixi3wvgF6ms/s1600/Daniel+Abraham.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Icbte-BfDNg/UNReWkzVuVI/AAAAAAAAEiU/ixi3wvgF6ms/s1600/Daniel+Abraham.jpg" height="151" width="400" /></a></div>
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Very unique magic system, and unusual (in a good way) plot arc over the whole series. Not much real drama though, when it seems there could and maybe even should have been.<br />
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#22<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+left+hand+of+god+paul+hoffman&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Left Hand of God</a></i> by Paul Hoffman</h3>
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<a href="http://images.barnesandnoble.com/images/97180000/97182571.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://images.barnesandnoble.com/images/97180000/97182571.JPG" height="200" width="133" /></a><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GhRs6U8Rj34/TeLYPNd-0BI/AAAAAAAAAKE/25BhenLQlbg/s1600/The+Last+Four+Things.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-GhRs6U8Rj34/TeLYPNd-0BI/AAAAAAAAAKE/25BhenLQlbg/s1600/The+Last+Four+Things.jpg" height="200" width="130" /></a><a href="http://drn8oiexfsgf1.cloudfront.net/cdn/farfuture/dDh-YP_WwHqybYp0gMKq_mNjZzkcs63fjPfBr3bwMqI/mtime:1375749192/sites/penguinbooks.co.za/files/styles/jacket-large/public/cover/9780718155223_0.jpg?itok=zRPQzq0o" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://drn8oiexfsgf1.cloudfront.net/cdn/farfuture/dDh-YP_WwHqybYp0gMKq_mNjZzkcs63fjPfBr3bwMqI/mtime:1375749192/sites/penguinbooks.co.za/files/styles/jacket-large/public/cover/9780718155223_0.jpg?itok=zRPQzq0o" height="200" width="130" /></a></div>
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<a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2013/12/review-left-hand-of-god-trilogy-by-paul.html">I wrote a review about this series in my previous post</a>, which neatly outlined in more detail why I both love and hate this series.<br />
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#23 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=a+song+of+ice+and+fire&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">A Song of Ice and Fire</a></i> by George R.R. Martin</h3>
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<a href="http://briansbookblog.blogspot.ca/2013/12/more-like-game-of-waiting-amirite.html">The blog entry before THAT was a review of THIS series</a>, which again outlined what I loved and hated about this series.</div>
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#24 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=low+town+daniel+polansky&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Low Town</a> </i>by Daniel Polansky</h3>
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It's a mystery, which I also like as a genre, mixed with fantasy. What's not to like about it? Nothing, even if there also really isn't anything to love about it.<br />
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#25 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+lotus+war+jay+kristoff&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Lotus War</a></i> by Jay Kristoff</h3>
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Gorgeous covers, interesting blend of fantasy, Japanese mythology/history, and steampunk.<br />
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#26 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=richard+ford+herald+of+the+storm&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Steelhaven</a></i> by Richard Ford</h3>
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An overall good series. That is both the best and most damning thing I can say about series.</div>
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#27<i> <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+grim+company+luke+scull&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Grim Company</a> </i>by Luke Scull</h3>
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What I said about the above series is equally true about this one.<br />
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#28 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+crescent+moon+kingdom+saladin+ahmed&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Crescent Moon Kingdoms</a></i> by Saladin Ahmed</h3>
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Unique and original magic and world, some incredibly annoying characters at times.<br />
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#29 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=gallow+nathan+hawke&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Gallow</a> </i>by Nathan Hawke</h3>
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<a href="http://www.gollancz.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/GALLOW.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.gollancz.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/GALLOW.jpg" height="200" width="130" /></a><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qE-8k-bOmz0/UTfTVOsjBwI/AAAAAAAAFBw/acx84iEpptY/s1600/gallow2-coldredemption.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qE-8k-bOmz0/UTfTVOsjBwI/AAAAAAAAFBw/acx84iEpptY/s1600/gallow2-coldredemption.jpg" height="200" width="130" /></a><a href="http://www.nathanhawke.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Cover-artwork-lo-res.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.nathanhawke.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Cover-artwork-lo-res.jpg" height="200" width="130" /></a></div>
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Kind of a fluff fantasy read. Viking culture, battles and duels, basically a book equivalent of <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2306299/">History Channel's Vikings show</a>.<br />
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#30 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=the+belgariad+david+eddings&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Belgariad</a></i> by David Eddings</h3>
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Another classic fantasy series, more appropriate for young adults than adults. Unfortunately, I read it as an adult and so I couldn't really form that emotional attachment to it than if I had read it as a young teenager.</div>
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#31 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=blake+charlton+spellwright&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">Spellwright </a></i>by Blake Charlton</h3>
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Pretty unique magic system, good plot, decent characters. Kind of superficial, in that there didn't seem to be much depth. I'm not sure if this series will ever actually continue, as the author seems to have fallen off the map.</div>
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#32 <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&q=elspeth+cooper+the+wild+hunt&search_type=books&search%5Bfield%5D=on">The Wild Hunt</a></i> by Elspeth Cooper</h3>
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<a href="http://elspethcooper.com/media/covers/songs_mmp_thumb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://elspethcooper.com/media/covers/songs_mmp_thumb.jpg" height="200" width="131" /></a><a href="http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1357404024l/15793131.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1357404024l/15793131.jpg" height="200" width="132" /></a><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7Na6MTseIE4/UWm6OH6wCRI/AAAAAAAAaFY/HCnvkaFvj_M/Cooper-RavensShadow_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7Na6MTseIE4/UWm6OH6wCRI/AAAAAAAAaFY/HCnvkaFvj_M/Cooper-RavensShadow_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="200" width="126" /></a></div>
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Lots of clichés and not much depth. Well written, though not fantastic. Still enjoyed it, but not one I'm sure I'd recommend to others unless I knew them well enough to know it was up their alley.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-7077730281840990532013-12-14T01:05:00.001-05:002013-12-14T01:45:29.044-05:00Review: The Left Hand Of God Trilogy by Paul Hoffman<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7116709-the-left-hand-of-god?from_search=true">The Left Hand of God</a></i>, <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8737174-the-last-four-things?from_search=true">The Last Four Things</a></i>, and <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15997975-the-beating-of-his-wings?from_search=true">The Beating of His Wings</a></i> by Paul Hoffman managed an incredible feat. As a fantasy trilogy it was simultaneously brilliant and original, while also frustratingly lazy. It could have been one of the best fantasy series I've ever read, and in some ways it was, but it fell tragically short of that level... well short of it in fact.</span><br />
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The Good: Characters, Plot, Action</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In some ways this trilogy is very similar to <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13569581-blood-song?from_search=true">Anthony Ryan's Blood Song</a>. Both involve the protagonist being raised by a religious-militaristic order from a very young age, and finding they have an incredible gift as both soldiers and commanders. They gain friends and comrades along the way, and when they are in the outside world they find themselves in the middle of a war they would prefer to avoid but inevitably find themselves right in the thick of things, gaining fame and notoriety along the way.</span></div>
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<a href="http://images.barnesandnoble.com/images/97180000/97182571.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="http://images.barnesandnoble.com/images/97180000/97182571.JPG" height="320" width="211" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The similarities end there. Where Vaelin, from <i>Blood Song</i>, has all the usual traits of an honourable and good hero, and the warrior-priests that raised and educate him are similar in their own way, it is the exact opposite for Thomas Cale in <i>The Left Hand of God</i>. He was sold by his parents to a bloodthirsty and zealous religious order, called the Redeemers, raised in a brutal fashion where many children his age are starved, beaten, and even killed during their 'education'. He flees the corruption and brutality, rather than embracing it. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Overall, the plot arcs within the trilogy are superb. It is well paced, has some nice twists and turns, and never failed to keep me engaged. It has a nation of extreme religious zealousness that it seeks to wipe out all of humanity from the earth, and an alliance of kingdoms and nations to stop them from pulling it off. At the heart of it, Thomas has to get the other kingdoms and nations to rely on him to lead the fight against the Redeemers, something that is made difficult by his nature. He himself has to rely on the politicking and schemes of his friends and allies. Along the way, there are several battles between massive armies and smaller ambushes. It has love and betrayal, heart-wrenching loss and delicious vengeance. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The characters is another strength. Thomas Cale, the protagonist, is a very interesting and unique take on the typical hero. He is also about as far from noble and heroic as a person can be. He is petty, stubborn, and arrogant—also a teenager, which I'm sure did not in any way exacerbate those qualities. He does not seek to stop the Redeemers from wiping out humanity because it is the right and noble thing to do, he acts for vengeance against those who abused him and so people will see his greatness and rely upon it for their survival. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Alongside Thomas are two of his friends who raised by the Redeemers with him, and two politicians and masters of intrigue that meet them as they first escape into the outside world. There is Thomas' love interest, which takes a dark turn of jealousy and spite, and the many other interest groups who come to see Thomas as their only salvation but who want to use them to their own ends. As a whole, the caste of characters is well balanced and quite original from the usual archetypes and tropes you see in fantasy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The third main strength of the series is the action. The battle scenes are exquisitely etched onto the pages, with plenty of variety so it's never stale. Hoffman does a great job in creating very detailed and sophisticated settings and scenarios, where the weather, terrain, tactics, equipment/technology, discipline, and sheer blind luck all factor into the outcomes of each engagement in different ways. For the most part, the battles are treated in such a way that you are given an omniscient view and description, where you are told the mindsets of both sides involved at any given time rather than constantly switching POVs. Only occasionally will it focus in on one of the main characters and their specific actions and feats and concerns. It was a very different treatment than I'm used to reading, but was well handled and executed. </span></div>
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The Bad– Oh Who Am I Kidding The Rest Is Just Ugly.</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I mentioned before that this series was both incredibly interesting and original in some ways, and I listed those above, and also frustratingly lazy. This section will deal with the latter. Mainly, it comes down to the world building. And by world building, I mean taking real-world, historical cultures, kingdoms, nations, and peoples, and doing a CTRL+V onto the pages. The plain copy-paste attitude is usually only superficial, but also at times mixes them together in an extremely odd fashion.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Here's a list to give you an idea of what I mean:</span></div>
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<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After escaping from the Redeemers, Cale and his friends go to the heart Materazzi Empire: the city of Memphis. And the leader of the empire is called the Doge.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Throughout the world are the Jewish people, who are bankers and moneylenders and often persecuted by other religions in the world.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Within the Materazzi Empire is the Norse, a warlike nation of people in the cold north, with beards and axes and... you get the point.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There is also the Laconics, who raise/train their citizens from a young age to be warriors partially out of a sense of glory, and partially because their entire economy is based on the slaves–called Helots–that do every other task. The Laconics are constantly paranoid that these slaves will revolt. They also kill any infant born with a defect, and have a tradition of homosexual relations before they're old enough to marry. They're Spartans through and through.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There's the kingdom of Switzerland, who always try to remain neutral in the affairs of other nations and kingdoms. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Finally, the weirdest example came in the form of a scholar/engineer. He was convicted of heresy by the Redeemers, for claiming that the Earth revolved around the Sun. Even though everyone, even the Redeemers, knows that this is true, because the head of their church–called the Pope–declares that it's the other way around, his word is law. So the engineer's words that contradicted the Pope's are heretical, and he has to be killed. Thomas Cale saves him, hoping he can use his engineering to build war machines capable of helping combat the Redeemer armies. In a discussion with Thomas, the engineer explains the world is made up of matter and atoms, and that he'd really like to make a giant metal tube in which he can smash the atoms together to find out more about them. He's talking about a freaking Hadron Collider... in a medieval-style world. </span></li>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Those are only some examples, the most obvious ones that I recall to my mind. I know there are others, but you should get the point by now.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Initially, when I encountered this in the books I didn't really care that much. Sure it was a bit weird, but fantasy can be weird by itself when people make up names and cultures and peoples and places that are obviously inspired by historical elements, sometimes as blatant as in this series.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But the more and more I encountered them, and the more Hoffman mixed Ctrl+V'ing with his actual original world building, the more annoying it became. For example, the king of the Laconics (read: Spartans) was not Leonidas or some other famous Spartan name. No, it was King Stuart-Clarke of course! Then there's the Materazzi Empire, comprising a number of historical people like the aforementioned Norse, which is run by the Doge (a title given in historical times to the <i style="font-weight: bold;">elected</i> leader of the Republic of Venice) and has as its capital city a place called Memphis (the name of a modern American or ancient Egyptian city). There's also the freaking Hadron Collider! A GOD DAMNED HADRON COLLIDER!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In truth, if all he did was just straight up borrow the superficial names and concepts of historical people and places, I'd probably have been fine with it. And if he did that for everything in his world building, that would be fine too. It's the fact that he did it half-and-half: half of the time, he'd make up his own concepts for people and places and give them his own names, like the Redeemers. The other half, he'd suddenly feel lazy and just look up some wikipedia articles on real-world history and use the ol' Ctrl+C and its partner in crime Ctrl+V. And what made THAT even worse was the fact that he mixed and matched things: an empire that he made up, with an emperor's title used for an elected leader in a historical republic, and a capital city named from an ancient Egyptian or modern American place. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The inconsistency was truly baffling, and made utterly inexcusable by the fact that the rest of the series he created was so utterly brilliant. </span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-79022249011145939592013-12-13T02:23:00.000-05:002013-12-16T01:42:09.531-05:00More Like A Game Of Waiting, Amirite?<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i><b>Spoiler warning for those who have yet to read all of the currently released books in the series.</b></i></span><br />
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<a href="http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/a-game-of-thrones-book-1-of-a-song-of-ice-and-fire.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"></a><br /></div>
<a href="http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/a-game-of-thrones-book-1-of-a-song-of-ice-and-fire.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/a-game-of-thrones-book-1-of-a-song-of-ice-and-fire.jpeg" height="320" width="210" /></a><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=a+song+of+ice+and+fire">A Song of Ice and Fire</a></i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> by George R.R. Martin is a landmark fantasy series, that much is undeniable. As of April 2011, </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The New Yorker</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> reported that the series as a whole had sold more than 15 million copies globally. This was even before the release of the fifth book, </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10664113-a-dance-with-dragons?from_search=true">A Dance With Dragons</a>. </i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">April 2011 was also when the TV adaptation on HBO first aired, so this was before the show's popularity spilled over to book sales as well. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As a book series, not even just as a fantasy series, it is one of the highest selling, most talked about, and perhaps most loved feats of literature in the world today. I add the qualifier "perhaps" to that last bit, because I have several gripes about it that need airing and I know I'm not the only one.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Rant sequence, begin.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First, I like the books. I really do. It's refreshing in a lot of ways, and the size and scope and depth of the world Martin created is truly breathtaking at times. However, it is not without flaws. Lots Lots of truly annoying if not enraging flaws. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />For some perspective, I have a list of my favourite fantasy series, finished or still ongoing, and <i>A Song of Ice and Fire</i> sits... 23rd.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If You Love It, Marry It! Just Don't Invite The Freys</span></h3>
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<a href="http://jacquiking91.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/52067-game-of-thrones-meme-you-have-cecw.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://jacquiking91.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/52067-game-of-thrones-meme-you-have-cecw.jpg" height="320" width="214" /></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Before I get into the specifics of what bothers me about the series and why, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">it's important to establish what I think makes it good. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As I already touched on above, the world building is epic. Lots of cultures that</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> were obviously not just thought up on the spot to fulfill some other purpose. Martin takes plenty of time to delve into each and every one of them, giving lots of details that are for the most part interesting if not outright bad ass. The Wall and the Black Watch, the history of the dragons, the White Walkers, the peoples behind the Wall, Westeros with its different cultures and kingdoms of old, the Dothraki, all come to mind.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It also has (or in some cases, had) a lot of interesting characters. Jon Snow, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Arya Stark, Tyrion Lannister, Brianne of Tarth, Jaime Lannister, Ned Stark, Samwell Tarly, Tywin Lannister, Oberyn Martell, Daenerys, the Onion Knight, The Spider... they're characters I can think of off the top of my head that I really liked to read about. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The plot has all kinds of unexpected twists and turns. It doesn't pull any punches, it's not all sunshine and rainbows, the heroes don't have it easy and there aren't more than a handful of truly "heroic" characters in the first place. Martin isn't afraid to kill off seemingly important characters for the sake of his plot, and it really helps ramp up the tension whenever any character finds their lives threatened. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why All Of What I Just Said Makes It Awful</span></h3>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The number one, main problem I have with the series is that Martin seems to have fallen in love with just creating more and more. More characters, more world building, more plot twists featuring the deaths of hitherto important characters. All of the reasons I and most people started to read the series</span>—<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Daenerys and her dragons, the White Walkers, the civil war in Westeros, all the interesting characters I mentioned</span>—<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">have been pushed further into the distance as Martin adds more filler to the series. By now, the series has become bloated with new characters, world building, and plot arcs that aren't as interesting as the others he's started to ignore. </span></div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">Robert Jordan on the cover? That explains a lot.</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To give you an idea of what I'm talking about, the series was originally supposed to be a trilogy. The first book was supposed to be about the Westeros civil war, the second about Daenerys invading with her dragons, the third about the White Walkers threatening everyone. The series now has five books, and Martin says will be seven books long. I have my doubts that he'll manage to keep it to only that many.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Daenerys, in fact, is probably the most emblematic of what I'm on about. I've always gotten the impression that Martin never really knew what to do with her until she was to finally invade Westeros. It's taken five books for her to get the dragons, raise them, and gain an army. By the end of <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/62291.A_Storm_of_Swords?from_search=true">A Storm of Swords</a></i>, the third book of the series, Daenerys has all of that. Problem was, Martin still was not even close to wrapping up the civil war plot arc in Westeros. So Daenerys instead lingers on with her dragons and her army, resolving to ensure that the cities she's conquered remain strong and peaceful and free from slavery, which she does by sitting behind city walls and indulging in sexual affairs. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And as a result of this stretching of that story arc, we have a new character: Quentyn Martell. He is there to wed Daenerys and/or tame her dragons, but fails to reach either goal and is killed in the span of a single book. An utterly pointless character, and a POV character at that, that only served to make the novel even more bloated. Prince Aegon Targaryen is another example. It's that sort of thing that wound up forcing Martin to split the fourth book into two. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Wake Me When We Get There</span></h3>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px; text-align: center;">A Memory of Writing his own damn stuff</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's a shame too, because <i>A Storm of Swords</i> was fantastic. The two books that followed it failed utterly to seize on its success. Where they should have wrapped up the civil war and prepared for Daenerys' invasion, moving everything along at a nice pace, absolutely nothing of importance happened between books four and five. Everyone continued to maneuver and plot and scheme, but nothing came to fruition. No battles, no political victories, the most momentous thing that happened was it started snowing</span>—<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">signs that Winter has all but arrived. All that happened was some pieces were moved around, and a whole bunch of new pieces were carved and put onto the board, and the board was also made bigger, all of which delayed the game by about... fifteen years.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />Now all of this might not necessarily be a problem if Martin was a prolific writer, and churned out a new book every couple of years at most. In fact, <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13496.A_Game_of_Thrones?from_search=true">A Game of Thrones</a></i> was first released in in August of 1996, <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10572.A_Clash_of_Kings?from_search=true">A Clash of Kings</a></i> in November of 1998, <i>A Storm of Swords</i> in in August of 2000. Those three books established the series as great, and with two years between them. Unfortunately, it took five years for <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13497.A_Feast_for_Crows?from_search=true">A Feast For Crows</a> </i>to hit the shelves in 2005, and six years after that for <i>A Dance With Dragons</i> to be released in 2011. And keep in mind, they were originally supposed to be one book, so it effectively took Martin <i style="font-weight: bold;">eleven years</i> to finish the follow up to <i>A Storm of Swords. </i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Eleven years it took to pen the two worst books in the series, where nothing</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">of importance happened, and he bloated the series with pointless and uninteresting characters and plot arcs. Now i</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">t's been two years past the release of </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A Dance With Dragons</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, and there is no word on his progress on book six. Odds are it will wind up being split into two books again, and we can expect the first one to be released in 2018 if the pattern holds. Forget about Martin staying ahead of the show, we should worry more about whether he'll be alive long enough to finish the series.<br /><br />Actually, what's Brandon Sanderson up to these days?</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-63364254296884357852013-12-12T01:55:00.001-05:002013-12-16T01:42:22.250-05:002013: The Year of Bloody Fantastic Fantasy Debuts<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So I work at a bookstore, and the first thing I do every shift is wander through the Fantasy section to see if anything new came in. I look mostly for new series, as the second thing I do is check on our computers to see if there are any pre-orders/release dates for books in series I like so I already know if any of them would be on the shelf or not.<br /><br />This year hasn't been all that great for established series having new installments coming out. Actually that's a lie, there were as many sequels/new installments from established authors and series as there were new series. I'm just bitter that neither the new <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/11543195-words-of-radiance?from_search=true">Stormlight Archive</a></i> nor the new <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/10394348-untitled-rothfuss-3?from_search=true">Kingkiller Chronicler</a></i> books came out, as they're by far and away my two favourite fantasy series—finished or ongoing. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I digress...</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The point I'd like to make is that it's been a fantastic year for surprising new finds when I've been perusing the fantasy shelves.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>The Cream of the Crop</b></span><br />
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<span style="color: black; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15810910-the-thousand-names?from_search=true"><i>The Thousand Names</i> by Django Wexler</a></span></h4>
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZnpPLefW394/URqiugRxclI/AAAAAAAAYdE/7QDhmmpsnTw/Wexler-ThousandNames_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></a><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZnpPLefW394/URqiugRxclI/AAAAAAAAYdE/7QDhmmpsnTw/Wexler-ThousandNames_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; display: inline !important; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZnpPLefW394/URqiugRxclI/AAAAAAAAYdE/7QDhmmpsnTw/Wexler-ThousandNames_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" height="243" width="320" /></span></a><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of the three that I truly loved, I think that this is my favourite... although it's close. It had just about everything that I look for in a good fantasy book: good characters, be it heroes or villains or anyone who falls in the middle; a good plot, with both surprising and interesting twists and developments; good pacing, it never felt really rushed or really slowed; an interesting world, a refreshing change of pace from the usual Medieval, Western European inspired backdrop. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I loved Winter, the female soldier pretending to be a man so she could run away from her troubled past. I loved that the heroes weren't perfect or even otherworldly in their knowledge and powers, they were capable of both brilliance and naivety and/or stupidity. I loved the storyline that was reminiscent, but still original enough from, the Chain of Dogs story line in Stephen Erikson's <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/55401.Deadhouse_Gates?from_search=true">Deadhouse Gates</a>. </i>I loved the battle scenes, with the Victorian-esque musket and gunpowder combat. The tension of awaiting a charge was built superbly, along with the shock of the erupting muskets and cannons. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><u><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/15771846-mage-s-blood?from_search=true"><i>Mage's Blood</i> by David Hair</a></u></span></h4>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-R3ugZ1SihGA/UGO_hKANvYI/AAAAAAAADOw/v7QreTDXtPQ/s1600/Mages-Blood_Hair.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-R3ugZ1SihGA/UGO_hKANvYI/AAAAAAAADOw/v7QreTDXtPQ/s1600/Mages-Blood_Hair.jpg" height="320" width="209" /></span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To me, this is the series that <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=a+song+of+ice+and+fire"><i>A Song of Ice and Fire</i></a> should have been. (Aside: I'll have to write a post about my complaints regarding Mr George R.R. Martin's landmark series, but I shan't do it here).</span><br />
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-R3ugZ1SihGA/UGO_hKANvYI/AAAAAAAADOw/v7QreTDXtPQ/s1600/Mages-Blood_Hair.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It has intrigue and politicking in abundance, it has massive wars and conflicts, it has several different factions, groups, cultures, it has betrayal and bloodshed, it has seemingly important characters dying/being killed off. However, where Game of Thrones became bloated with unnecessary new characters, back stories, and world building that have become both uninteresting and even repetitious, David Hair's Moontide Quartet series feels so much more focused. It has a lot of POVs, and a lot of characters. Yet the characters are all so diverse in their personality, their backstory/background, their motivations, and yet all are interesting in their own way and to some extent. Yet, somehow, none of them feel all that cliché<span style="font-size: 11pt;">.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Best of all, that holds true for female characters as well as it does for the male ones. There isn't the typical "strong female character" that's basically just a badass man with breasts slapped on him. They're young and old, good and evil, intelligent and dim, naive and worldly, beautiful and ugly, stubborn and meek, and most importantly of all... </span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">flawed</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> and </span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">real</b><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. They're not all damsels in distress, they're real people. One of the best story lines follows Elena, a female mage-soldier-bodyguard, and the young foreign princess/Queen Regent that she protects. The relationship between the two of them was great to see unfold.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=blood+song"><i>Blood Song</i> by Anthony Ryan</a></span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of the three, this is probably the more "traditional". It has the young hero, from noble (yet also common) blood, who is a warrior protege that also has a mysterious magical power within him. Yet for all the seemingly trope-y foundation that the book seems to be based on, it is still refreshing and original enough in its execution.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The narrative structure is similar to that of <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/186074.The_Name_of_the_Wind?from_search=true">Name of the Wind</a></i> by Patrick Rothfuss: the protagonist, already famous for his deeds despite being a young adult, tells his life's story to a scribe for recording. However, where Rothfuss' used first person narrative for the parts where Kvothe is telling his story, Vaelin's is in the third person. And as you find out, what you read in those parts isn't precisely what he is telling the scribe.<br /><br />The other difference is that where Kvothe is a musician, a rogue, a student-scholar in a "University" and a magician, Vaelin is a warrior first and foremost. His schooling is at a religious-military order, and he is given over at a very young age to be trained as a soldier and a leader. His supporting cast of fellow students, and his love interest, again fall into the "familiar yet new" place that seems to define the book as a whole. It was just so well written that it didn't have to be as innovative or original as the other two mentioned above.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>And the Bronze Medal(s) Goes To...</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&query=promise+of+blood"><i>Promise of Blood</i> by Brian McClellan</a></span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The third of the "Blood" titles to be released this year, and the second that has muskets and gunpowder. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Brian McClellan was a student of <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/38550.Brandon_Sanderson">Brandon Sanderson</a>'s writing class in Utah, and you can see some of his style and influence in this debut book. That's not a knock on him either. It has a unique magic system, an intriguing world, and a slew of compelling characters. Teacher would be proud!<br /><br />And of course there are Gods, there are revolutions, there are epic battles and mysteries being investigated... all of which are, of course, interconnected with each other as far as the plot goes. I was tempted to group this with the other three above, but I think I might have to wait for the second book to confirm its status in my heart. Thankfully, Mr McClellan also seems to have learned the art of quick and productive writing from Professor Sanderson as well, rather than the University of Rothfuss or Martin Community College.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17707471-the-grim-company?from_search=true"><i>Grim Company</i> by Luke Scull</a></span></h4>
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<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uZhzp7ONGvw/UfaYMZtvktI/AAAAAAAAA5o/u6jNIQ1zfLs/s1600/9781781852125.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-uZhzp7ONGvw/UfaYMZtvktI/AAAAAAAAA5o/u6jNIQ1zfLs/s1600/9781781852125.jpg" height="320" width="208" /></span></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First, I'd like to note how annoyed I am that the cover *I* bought <a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-wCbfEMC8j9w/UiYmhqc52DI/AAAAAAAAABY/sm_f6huH0gI/s1600/911NqsMfK9L._SL1500_.jpg">is lame as hell and I hate it</a>. This one, while not great, is much better in my books</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Anyways, this book has Mage Kings who slew the Gods themselves, fighting among each other for the raw magical resources that are dwindling from the world. Meanwhile a group dedicated to the assassination of these Mage Kings meets with a pair of barbarian warriors, one of whom is a weary and aged man with a noble code of honour and a big ass sword and fleeing the king he turned is back on after years of dedicated service. So... pretty much <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/944073.The_Blade_Itself">Logen Ninefingers from Joe Abercrombie's books</a>, except he doesn't go bat-shit-crazy berserk in battle, and is more sympathetic as a character as a result.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A solid if not spectacular debut, one that hinted at all kinds of intriguing potential in the future. For now, a poor man's Joe Abercrombie.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17623344-herald-of-the-storm"><i>Herald of the Storm</i> by Richard Ford</a></span></h4>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Similar to Mage's Blood in that it has lots of POVs, but is a shorter novel and far less ambitious in scope as a result. It takes place in a single city on the verge of all sorts of conflicts: invasion by a barbarian horde led by an otherworldly and mysterious prince, internal strife among the court, the thieve's guild causing misery among the slums and refugees, and other distinct groups with their own interests at heart.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The characters also feel much more clichéd and trope-y, but retain enough originality and charisma to hold my interest. Just like with The Grim Company, there was a lot of potential hinted at, as far as world building and plot/character development goes, but the potential wasn't seized upon enough for me to consider this at the same level as the "Cream of the Crop" mentioned above.</span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6334101591572184180.post-32064645677791793432013-12-11T18:07:00.000-05:002013-12-14T01:09:26.337-05:00Introducing... Me!Greetings and salutations, people of the interwebs.<br />
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My name is Brian. I'm a book addict. I admit it's a problem, but I'm not ready to do anything about it. Mostly because I don't actually admit it's a problem. Books are awesome, and as far as I'm concerned there are far worse vices to have.<br />
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How do I love books? Let me count the ways:<br />
<ol>
<li>I'm one of those extremely anal readers/book collectors. I don't like loaning out books, especially to people I know dog ear pages or break the spines. </li>
<li>One way I've gotten around this issue is by buying multiple copies of the same book. For books I like, I almost always wind up buying the hardcover of it, if it was ever published in hardcover.</li>
<li>The fact that the hardcover version(s) might be out of print and maybe even collectible doesn't stop me. The most I've spent on a single book is $300 on <a href="http://www.patrickrothfuss.com/blog/uploaded_images/The-Name-of-the-Wind---Mainstream-cover-for-AMAZON-RGB-710572.jpg">this hardcover of Patrick Rothfuss' </a><i><a href="http://www.patrickrothfuss.com/blog/uploaded_images/The-Name-of-the-Wind---Mainstream-cover-for-AMAZON-RGB-710572.jpg">Name of the Wind</a>. </i>First, because it's one of my favourite books ever, and second because it's an absolutely gorgeous cover. I also have <a href="http://www.doodledbooks.com/ekmps/shops/doodledbooks/images/patrick-rothfuss-the-name-of-the-wind-exclusive-first-edition-book-gold-varient-21-qa-winner-1304-p.jpg">this edition of <i>Name of the Wind</i></a>, one of the two first edition covers for it, and also <a href="http://thebooksmugglers.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/35626823.JPG.jpeg">this edition</a> that is the current edition being published. All three are signed by the <a href="http://ronanwills.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/250px-patrothfussgnome.jpg">jolly ol' gnome himself</a>.</li>
<li>I was a member on an author's forum throughout university, and was even an admin for a period.</li>
<li>I read Brandon Sanderson's <i>Way of Kings</i>, a 1000 page hardcover book, from start to finish in one day. I read it twice before it's official release date (it was not a strict on sale book, and my store received it more than a week before the official release date).</li>
<li>It is my yearly goal to read at least 50 books. This current year I'm around 70.</li>
<li>I work at a bookstore, and have been since 2009. </li>
<li>I've written a full length novel that was 170,000 words in length while I was in university. It was awful terrible rubbish that will never again see the light of day, but I can say I've done it. I am currently working on another novel/series, this at a much more careful and deliberate pace. It's more of a hobby than something I ever expect to have published, but I still want to do it right.</li>
<li>I went to college for editing and publishing, and finished it this month actually. I hope I can work up to editing full novels, but in truth I've found I like grammar and editing enough that I'd be happy with any kind of editing job.</li>
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That should be enough to give you an idea of who I am and how I think about books. There are other ways, but the list would be too long for any sane human being to be genuinely interested in reading through. </div>
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Why do I like books so much? Some people read for an escape, some read because they appreciate the creativity involved in the writing of a book, its prose, the characters, the setting, and so on. I love books for all of those reasons. My mind is more "creative" than it is logical or scientific or anything else. But as I am someone who has experienced depression for most of my life, I can easily appreciate the escapism involved as well.<br />
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What sort of content will I be writing for this blog? Mostly reviews, and mostly about fantasy books. But I can anticipate that I'll occasionally want to write about all kinds of topics and genres related to books, literature, publishing, editing, language, and so on. </div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04491539040335575754noreply@blogger.com0