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| 006199104X
| 9780061991042
| 006199104X
| 4.00
| 17,902
| Jan 01, 2013
| Jan 08, 2013
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liked it
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Vampires: they are everywhere. Not in the literal sense, of course (or are they?), but as a feature of the popular literary landscape. Since the Twili
Vampires: they are everywhere. Not in the literal sense, of course (or are they?), but as a feature of the popular literary landscape. Since the Twilight Saga became incredibly popular (whether or not it's deserving of this popularity is another matter entirely), vampires feature prominently in novels, television shows, movies, and video games. I suppose this can hardly be helped: they are a fascinating subject for authors - not least the great Bram Stoker, author of Dracula, and Anne Rice, author of the Vampire Chronicles. In some ways, one might say that many of the contemporary interpretations of what vampires are stem in some way, shape, or form from these two interpretations (although Rice did base her vampires, in part, on Stoker's interpretation). Of course, there are the extremes: the Twilight Saga pushes the concept of the vampire as a romantic ideal (which began with Rice's books) to one end of the scale, whereas novelists like Swedish writer John Ajvide Lindqvist push farther back than even Stoker did, because in Lindqvist's novel Let the Right One In it's obvious that he drew more from the older, folkloric interpretations of a vampire is. For my part, I enjoy a good vampire story. I started out by reading Dracula when I was in high school, more or less the same time a friend got me into the Vampire Chronicles. When I gained access to the Internet, I started digging through the folklore surrounding vampires; to this day it's the older side of the vampire mythos that I enjoy the most (which is why I enjoyed Let the Right One In). But every now and then I like to read something a little less serious than Let the Right One In: the Black Dagger Brotherhood novels, for instance, are a particular favorite guilty pleasure of mine, and though I've read the Twilight Saga I purged those from my home library as soon as I could, they were that terrible. It's because of this desire to read something involving vampires that's a little less terrifying and a little more something-else than just a romance that I picked up The Blood Gospel, first in a series titled The Order of the Sanguines and written by Rebecca Cantrell and James Rollins. The plot begins with an earthquake ripping through Masada, the ancient Jewish fort famous for falling to the Romans - but only after its entire populace committed suicide rather than surrender. The earthquake reveals a chamber hidden deep underneath the fortress - a chamber containing a secret that a great many dangerous people would gladly kill for. Caught in the middle are Dr. Erin Granger, an archaeologist; Sgt. Jordan Stone, a member of the US military; Rhun Korza, a mysterious priest who is more than what he seems. The three of them find themselves at the crux of events as a secret Catholic sect and an even more ancient prophecy collide, leading to an artifact that could drown the world in blood - or save it. This novel, for the most part, follows the pattern made popular by Dan Brown's novels (though the true originator - and still the best-written - is The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco): an ancient secret is on the verge of being revealed to a world that is not ready for it and/or may be destroyed by the revelation, and it is up to a small group of variously-skilled and knowledgeable hunters to go after that artifact, all the while dodging attempts upon their lives by the other party that wants the artifact and/or secret for their own ends. I find such plots enjoyable in their own way, and since a lot of novels slot quite neatly into this structure, it takes world-building and writing style to distinguish a novel instead of making it just another copycat capitalizing on Brown's success. In some aspects, The Blood Gospel does well enough - functional, but not something to blow one's mind. In others, though, there were times when I could not decide whether to laugh or roll my eyes at what I was reading. One cannot expect much in terms of characterization from these novels, though I do appreciate it if the author or authors attempt to at least make them endearing. In this respect, Cantrell and Rollins do an okay job of making the lead character sympathetic, at least, which is more than I can say for some other authors who write this kind of novel - although they do mess up once in a while. I rather liked Dr. Granger's past: (view spoiler)[it's made clear throughout the course of the book that her family lived in a compound that practiced a very fundamentalist, cult-based kind of Christianity, and that this has left her deeply mistrustful of the Church. It would have been to interesting if the writers had chosen to explore this aspect of her history more, but this does not happen: instead, Dr. Granger begins to "find faith" again, and while this is a lovely sentiment, it does not quite seem to fit in with what has happened to her. This does not sit very well with me, mostly because it appears to have happened rather too quickly for my tastes. (hide spoiler)] The next most interesting character history is Rhun Korza's. In many ways it might be said he is the main protagonist of the novel, and he is quite a "dark and tortured" character, constantly living wrapped up in his guilt for past sins. Again, as with Dr. Granger, his past could have potentially made him a very interesting character, but his past, as it is related in the novel, did not quite make me feel as if he deserved all the "dark and brooding shadows" the authors have endowed him with. (view spoiler)[To be sure, destroying the woman one loves, and her family along with her, is cause enough to feel a great deal of guilt, but this kind of thing has been played up before. I was hoping he would have some other cause for guilt, some other reason to be so dark and brooding and tortured, but the reason the authors have given is so commonplace that it has lost almost all its power. (hide spoiler)] In fact, the lone character whom I found most intriguing was not even one of the protagonists. (view spoiler)[When Korza, Granger, and Stone make their way to Russia, they run into none other than Grigori Yefimovich Rasputin - who, as it turns out, was a former teammate of Korza's, but who has since been excommunicated from the Order and the Church for committing a very grave sin: that of turning children into vampires like himself, beginning with the tsarevich Alexei Romanov. His reasoning for this is heartbreaking, and moreover reasonable: he wanted to save the boy from dying due to his hemophilia. As for the children who were stuck in Moscow during the siege, he turned them in order to sad them, since the Church did nothing to help the citizenry of Moscow when the strigoi descended upon the besieged populace and began eating them. Another thing that I liked about the way Rasputin is written in this novel is that his motivations are very gray, and his relationship with Korza even more so. (hide spoiler)] One of the problems I had with this novel is the concept, especially as it was presented in the first half. A few days ago I watched the movie Priest (based on the Korean manhwa of the same title created by Hyung Min-woo), mostly because I stumbled across it while channel-surfing, and since it had Paul Bettany in it dressed in a very flattering black duster that showed his waist off to excellent advantage, I thought I would watch it just for kicks and giggles. Priest is a terrible movie, but I thought, at the time, that the concept was rather intriguing: a war between the Church and vampires has resulted in the Church creating an entire secret group of men and women called "Priests," who, through rigorous training and superior weaponry, are capable of fighting the vampires on their own terms. (view spoiler)[The thing is, the above concept is almost exactly the same as the concept for the Order of the Sanguines as presented in The Blood Gospel, save for the fact that members of the Order of the Sanguines are strigoi (the term used for vampires in this novel) who have turned away from their baser, more brutal instincts and chosen to serve the Church in the fight against their more wicked kind. Even the concept of the Belial - a mysterious, powerful entity who is behind the attacks against the trio of Granger, Korza, and Stone - is extremely similar to the concept for the antagonist in Priest. These resonances between the movie and the novel were so strong that I sometimes stared at the book in surprise and exasperation, wondering if I had really read what I had just read. Of course, this could just be a product of reading the novel far too soon, when the movie was still fresh in my mind, but I do rather wonder if either of the authors were aware of just how similar their book would be to the movie when they started conceptualizing. Given that the manhwa's English translation and the movie came out in 2011, and The Blood Gospel came out just this year, it does make these similarities seem a little suspect. I rather doubt either author intended for it to be that way, but there they are, nevertheless. Fortunately, the similarities peter out a little - or at least don't matter so much - by the last three-fourths of the novel. At this point the plot gets increasingly more concerned with Korza's past and his connection with Bathory Darabont, as well as actually figuring out where in the world the article they are trying to find is in the first place. It also helps that Rasputin was introduced at this point, and I have already mentioned that I like the way he is portrayed here. The rest of it is, of course, typical fare for a novel of this kind, and it is easy to just let all of those aspects glide by and enjoy the ride - insofar as one can enjoy it. (hide spoiler)] Overall, The Blood Gospel is not too terrible a read, all things considered, though it is not without its problems: certain character histories could have been made more interesting, but are otherwise functional for the purposes of the novel. The main issue is that the core concept itself might be entirely too familiar to people who have read the manhwa Priest or seen the movie of the same title, and this familiarity could interfere with any initial attempt to engage with the novel itself. This does pass towards the end, fortunately enough, though this shift may come a little too late for some readers. This is definitely one of those "hit or miss" kinds of books, because it depends entirely on the reader's tolerances whether or not he or she sticks it out to the very end. For my part, it's gotten me interested enough that I might pick up the next book when it comes out - or not. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Jul 10, 2013
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Jul 12, 2013
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Jul 10, 2013
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| 1416583300
| 9781416583301
| 1416583300
| 3.99
| 8,491
| Apr 02, 2015
| Apr 28, 2009
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liked it
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Jack the Ripper is perhaps one of, if not the most, (in)famous serial killers of all time. His brutal murder of five known (and perhaps more unknown)
Jack the Ripper is perhaps one of, if not the most, (in)famous serial killers of all time. His brutal murder of five known (and perhaps more unknown) women in and around London's Whitechapel district ensured his notoriety in the annals of history and, of course, in literature. The fact that no one has ever figured out who, precisely, Jack the Ripper is only adds to the mystique, and it is because of that mystique that the Ripper continues to be a constant presence in the collective memory of popular culture. Given the time period during which the Ripper operated, an interesting question that has lingered in the minds of some writers is: what would happen if Sherlock Holmes had been involved in solving the Ripper murders? It is a question that many fans and enthusiasts of Sherlock Holmes have asked at least once in the course of their interaction with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's creation: could the inimitable Sherlock Holmes have succeeded where so many others have failed and identified and captured the Ripper, if he had been permitted to do so? This possibility has already been explored in various media, from novels to television shows to video games, but the most recent iteration of this concept is Lyndsay Faye's Dust and Shadows: An Account of the Ripper Killings by Dr. John H. Watson. Dust and Shadows opens with an explanation from Dr. Watson as to why Holmes' involvement in the Ripper investigation was kept secret. According to Dr. Watson, there were two reasons for doing so: the first is that he felt the narrative was too open-ended, and therefore would not go over well with a reading public that prefers conclusive endings. The second reason is made clear at the end of the novel itself. In truth, there's nothing new here that the reader would not already expect of a proper Holmes pastiche. Holmes is as any reader expects him to be, which is a good sign because there are a great many pastiches out there that do not quite write him so well. My only issue with this particular Holmes is that his switches in mood are a bit more extreme than I remember them to be in the originals, but I personally think this to be a minor flaw. Watson is pretty much spot-on, for the most part, as are Lestrade and Mycroft. The writing style is, of course, not exactly like Doyle's, but again that is to be expected: no one can sound exactly like Doyle except Doyle himself, and he is long dead. Other writers can only attempt to sound like Doyle as best as they can, and fortunately, Faye manages to do just fine in that department. As for the Ripper himself, it's obvious that Faye has her own ideas regarding his identity, which is made clear in the novel itself. Many people have been put forward as the face behind Jack the Ripper, but Faye's spin on it is interesting. (view spoiler)[She proposes that it was actually a member of London's Metropolitan Police force who was Jack the Ripper - an idea that actually holds water, because it's likely the Ripper had more than passing knowledge of the way the police force worked in order to have done what he did without once being caught. There is also an attempt at behavioral analysis in the course of the novel, involving a very minor character from the Holmes canon, but it doesn't go as well as I think it could have. While I do find it admirable that the attempt was made, it doesn't seem to go over as well as I would like. (hide spoiler)] Another thing that bothers me about this is the ending. (view spoiler)[It rather feels like it was forced on the reader, somehow, as if there was so much more that could have been done and yet it ended where it did. I suppose it was just because Faye wanted to stick to the five murders mentioned in the history books, but I felt that the death of Ms. Monk, Holmes and Watson's intrepid associate throughout the novel, would have been thoroughly appropriate and added extra emotional weight to the capture and/or death of the Ripper. But Holmes saves her in the nick of time, and manages to bring the Ripper to justice - of a sort. And that is another thing that bothers me about this: the fact that one never truly finds out what is going on in the Ripper's mind. There's a lot of conjecture, of course, and Faye would have been free to do the same, given how she had already speculated as to the identity of the Ripper as a policeman in the first place, but that doesn't happen. I was really rather hoping that Holmes would get to pick the Ripper's mind, as he does in other stories and novels in the Holmes canon, but that never happens. This might be another reason why the ending falls so flat: there is not of that catharsis, in the form of finding out the villain's motivations, that occurs in the canon. Even worse, this is an interview that would certainly make it into legend: Holmes picking the brain of the Ripper to find out just what darkness, what shadows, made this man murder five women in the most ghastly manner. But it never happens. I can only suppose that the author steered clear of such a scenario because no one can factually claim to know what was going on in the Ripper's head that caused him to do what he did. While this adherence to factuality is admirable, it does make for less of an exciting conclusion to a story that is fictional anyway, and so there is much room to speculate on the Ripper's motives and thoughts. (hide spoiler)] Overall, Dust and Shadows is everything that a proper Holmes pastiche ought to be: no character is out-of-character; narrative is as close to the tone of the original canon as possible. It is throwing in Jack the Ripper that could have made this a standout, and while the lead-up to the ending lives up to expectation, the ending falls rather flat on its face, lacking a little extra something that could have made this novel quite something apart from others like it. Unfortunately, there is no oomph, only a fizzle that makes this novel enjoyable while being read, but rather forgettable once it has been put down. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Dec 18, 2012
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Dec 22, 2012
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Dec 18, 2012
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Hardcover
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| 0374214913
| 9780374214913
| 0374214913
| 3.72
| 210,151
| Sep 26, 2012
| Oct 02, 2012
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really liked it
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Part of the joy of a good story is the characters. In many ways, it might be said that the point of a good story is the characters themselves: how the
Part of the joy of a good story is the characters. In many ways, it might be said that the point of a good story is the characters themselves: how they hold up against the challenges slung at them by the plot; how they celebrate their triumphs and mourn their losses. It is also very much about who they are: are they funny and clever, dark and brooding, or perhaps a little bit of everything, with a touch of crazy in between? Oftentimes, it is the most complex characters that have the greatest impact, the ones that linger readers' memories: like Tyrion Lannister, from A Song of Ice and Fire, or Morgaine from Mists of Avalon. Neither of these characters might be considered purely good, nor purely evil: they simply are. It is this complexity of character that makes them very interesting storytellers. Much of Mists of Avalon is narrated by Morgaine from a first person point-of-view, and it's fascinating to see how her training as a Priestess of the Goddess, her relationships with the other characters, and her understanding of the world influence the way she tells the story. Tyrion is the same: his background and his understanding of the world all play a part in how he tells the story. While it's true they're not the most reliable of narrators, it is this very unreliability that makes them interesting storytellers. Sometimes, though, there are narrators who tell a story, but don't seem to make the same impact as Tyrion and Morgaine do. They are almost colorless, relating events and talking about characters as they appear, with no input of their own. There is some fun to such characters, of course, but for the most part it's obvious they're nothing more than a vehicle for the story itself. "Like the bread dipped in cheese fondue," as Hope put it when I commented on the "narrative shell" that is the lead character and narrator of Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan. Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore is the story of Clay Jannon, who gets laid off from his job during the American economic dip in 2008-2009, and winds up working as the night clerk in a quaint 24-hour bookstore owned by a mysterious gentleman named Mr. Penumbra. Although Clay finds the idea of a 24-hour bookstore a little odd, especially given the advent and growing popularity of electronic readers, he finds that he's happy to work at the bookstore - especially when he starts interacting with the regulars: an odd bunch of people who order books from what he's dubbed "the Waybacklist." As he begins to look further into the activities and mysteries of the Waybacklist and of the bookstore itself, Clay stumbles upon a deeper mystery that may lead to him unlocking an immense secret that's been kept hidden for hundreds of years. It's easy to see the appeal of this book: the title alone is enough to draw the attention of any avid reader, and the blurb at the back is capable of raising curiosity in anyone who happens to pick it up off the shelf. And as one dives into the first few chapters, Clay himself draws the reader in: his turn of phrase seems to indicate a wit that promises much snickering and amusement throughout the book. Unfortunately, wit is not indicative of character in this case, because Clay turns out to be quite unremarkable and colorless. He is, in fact, so colorless that he is borderline boring, and only the characters around him and the plot save the reader from dropping into a nap in the middle of the book. It's hard to say if this was deliberate, or Sloan simply has difficulty writing an interesting narrator - likely the latter, because the people around Clay are precisely the kind of people one would love to have around oneself. In fact, it is these supporting characters that manage to save Clay from utter ignominy - and reader frustration. Take his roommates, Ashley and Mat, for instance. (view spoiler)[Mat is an artist with Industrial Light and Magic, while Ashley is a rock-climbing enthusiast and PR agent (hide spoiler)]. And then there's Kat Potente, (view spoiler)[Googler, seeker of immortality, and Clay's love interest - though it's rather hard to see what she sees in Clay, given how boring he appears to be (hide spoiler)]. There's also his best friend Neel Shah, (view spoiler)[a computer genius who owns a company dedicated solely to the accurate digital replication of boobs for video games and movies. His friendship with Clay is built on a grade-school love of a fantasy novel series and table-top RPGs - the stuff that all the best friendships are made of (hide spoiler)]. And then there are the people at the bookshop: Mr. Penumbra himself is quite fascinating, especially towards the middle and latter portions of the book. The day clerk, Oliver Grone, has a special place in my heart because he "daydreams about Ionian columns," and "[doesn't] mess with anything newer than the twelfth century." And then there are the bookstore's regular, but more mysterious, clients: the excitable Tyndall; the stuttering but sweet Lapin; and Fedorov of the thick Eastern European accent. It is these mysterious clients that eventually lure Clay into investigating what he calls the "Waybacklist" - and to uncover what's really going on with his employer, their regulars, and the bookshop as a whole. Speaking of investigation, the other thing that saves this novel from being a complete bore is the plot. It starts out somewhat slow, but by the middle portion - incidentally, just when Clay starts to get utterly uninteresting - it really picks up as it takes the reader on a quest (this is literally what Clay and Neel call it) (view spoiler)[from San Francisco to New York, from the bookshop to the hidden library deep in the bowels of the headquarters of the Broken Spine, and then to the gleaming architecture of Google's complex (hide spoiler)]. The chase is exciting - exciting enough that Hope and I decided to blast through the last third of the book instead of sticking to our two-chapter-a-day quota for our read-along. As the pursuit gets more intense, the plot spirals up and up to reach a spectacular climax, before sliding out into a denouement and epilogue that some readers may find a mite saccharine, but which is, undeniably, satisfying and enjoyable. (view spoiler)[I personally find the use of the future tense for the Epilogue to be interesting and fun, a nice twist on the traditional epilogue most readers encounter in other books (hide spoiler)]. A word of warning, though, who walk into this and expect complexity a la Neal Stephenson, (view spoiler)[particularly in the parts involving codes (hide spoiler)]: such complexity is not to be found here. (view spoiler)[Even when the novel begins talking about cryptography and code-breaking, it never once goes into anything in-depth. Even the code-breaking done at Google is glossed over; not even Kat explains what's going on (hide spoiler)]. Overall, Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore is an entertaining and engaging read: the plot is pretty well-paced, with a good payoff at the end, and the supporting characters are a joy to read. The plot itself might not have the same amount of puzzle-solving as other, similar arcane mysteries (The Rule of Four, for instance, or The Name of the Rose), but is entertaining nevertheless, tying in the past, present, and possible future of books, reading, bookstores, and libraries. The narrator/protagonist might not be so interesting, but that simply leaves the reader free to slide into the story and go on a ride with the other, far more fascinating people surrounding the poor, colorless narrator. And if this novel is anything, it is that: a fun ride with a tidy, satisfying ending. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Nov 25, 2012
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Dec 04, 2012
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Nov 19, 2012
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Hardcover
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| 3.94
| 99,685
| Sep 18, 2012
| Sep 18, 2012
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it was amazing
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Of all American cities, none stand so tall or loom so large in the imagination as New York. The subject of novels, poetry, and music from Sinatra to J
Of all American cities, none stand so tall or loom so large in the imagination as New York. The subject of novels, poetry, and music from Sinatra to Jay-Z, New York has become a symbol and a byword for bright lights, big dreams, and every aspiration achieved. And though this neon-lit, optimistic vision of New York is no longer as accurate as it used to be, it is still a vision enshrined in literature and entertainment, one that writers, musicians, and filmmakers still revisit every now and then. If one were to go back and attempt to understand where this image came from, one would find that much of New York's mythology was made in the early twentieth century, particularly during the Roaring Twenties: the Jazz Age, as F. Scott Fitzgerald named the period, when flappers danced in speakeasies playing Harlem jazz, when the future seemed brighter than bright, when dreams really could come true, if one was willing to work hard enough to reach them. But the brighter the lights, the darker the shadow: racism ran deep in the fiber of New York during the 1920s, as did poverty, crime and corruption - as it still does today. Sometimes it seems as if all that bright, shiny optimism is necessary because the other side is so dark. It is with this understanding of New York's dual nature that Libba Bray writes The Diviners, the first novel in a series (woe is me!) of the same title. The story is about Evangeline "Evie" O'Neill, a "bright young thing" (or so she likes to think) who would love nothing more than to live the flapper lifestyle somewhere far away from her provincial hometown in Ohio. She gets her wish after she causes a scandal in her hometown's tiny social scene, and gets sent to New York to join up with her mother's bachelor brother, William Fitzgerald. To a certain extent, she does get what she wants: a chance to live the glittering lifestyle of boys, booze, and parties that she's always dreamed of. But something much darker stalks the streets of New York, and Evie's secrets connect her to a larger web of people and events that begins the moment she arrives in the Big Apple. One of the first things the reader will notice, especially if he or she has read Libba Bray's Gemma Doyle books, is how much brighter and crisper the writing seems to have gotten. Bray has always had a gift for creating atmosphere and bringing characters to life - the Gemma Doyle books are proof-positive of this - but it's like those talents have gained a sharper, more definite edge to them with The Diviners. With this clarity of writing she brings the settings of The Diviners into such sharp life that one could almost close one's eyes and imagine oneself into the story, right down to the smell of cigarette smoke and illegal booze in a speakeasy; or the cold wind blowing off the Hudson. This feeling of immersion is enhanced by the dialogue, which makes liberal - and, more importantly, appropriate - use of the slang prevalent during that period in time. I have read some reviewers state that they had a hard time keeping up with the slang, while others found it outright irritating, but I personally found it very comprehensible and, moreover, enjoyable to read. Language and dialogue, more than long, descriptive paragraphs, are the real keys to truly creating (or recreating, in this case) the feel and atmosphere of any setting, and Bray does just that by using 1920s slang as she does. At no point does it feel overdone, at least to me, and once again shows just how far Bray's writing skill has gotten since she wrote the Gemma Doyle books. But this newfound skill is most clearly seen (and best appreciated) in her characterization - and there are quite a few characters in this book, all of whom stand out in their own way. Evie and her best friend, Mabel, are the ones with whom a large chunk of Bray's audience will relate to the most, especially if they're coming over from the Gemma Doyle books. Evie and Mabel are young women in the process of growing up and finding themselves, similar in that regard to the protagonists of Bray's first trilogy, (view spoiler)[right down to having to deal with the consequences of having a mysterious, magical talent - or at least, that's what Evie has to deal with; it's unknown as of this first novel whether or not Mabel has any such gift (hide spoiler)]. Even Theta Knight, a Ziegfield girl with a dark past, will feel somewhat familiar to anyone who's read Bray's first trilogy, echoing the older female characters in those books. The similarities, however, are merely superficial: Evie, Mabel, and Theta are standouts on their own, and reading about them is a joy and a pleasure. There are also other female characters who prove just as interesting to the reader: Margaret Walker, for instance, or the Proctor sisters, (view spoiler)[(who I think might be related to or directly descended from the Proctors who were tried during the Salem Witch Trials) (hide spoiler)], but there's no doubting that Evie, Mabel and Theta are three of the stars of this story. I say three, because they're not the only standouts in this novel. Aside from the female characters, there are now some really interesting male characters as well. There were certainly male characters in the Gemma Doyle books, but for the most part they didn't play any major role in the course of the story. Even Kartik, who, due to his involvement with Gemma, might be considered a major character, pales in comparison to characters like Felicity Worthington or Ann Bradshaw. In The Diviners, however, there are three standout male characters right from the get-go: Memphis, a young man with aspirations to be a poet; Sam Lloyd, a smooth-talking thief; and Jericho, assistant to Evie's uncle William Fitzgerald. With the three of them Bray proves she's just as capable of writing male characters who are just as interesting as her female characters. There are other male characters, of course, like Henry, Theta's "brother," or Uncle Will, or even Blind Bill Johnson, but they don't have central roles in the same way that Memphis, Sam, and Jericho do - not in this novel, anyway. Another thing Bray is adept at is addressing issues of race and gender and how they work in society. She proved she was more than capable of this in the Gemma Doyle books, and she does so once more in The Diviners. I mentioned earlier that racism, poverty, and corruption ran deep in the fabric of 1920s New York, and in America in general, and Bray shows this in small, but clear, ways throughout the course of the story. Evie, for instance, is drawn to the flapper lifestyle because she believes it will grant her a measure of power and control over her own life that her conservative parents (specifically her mother) would not let her have. Memphis, as an African-American, struggles against racial prejudice whenever he leaves Harlem, and sometimes inside Harlem, too. What Bray is very good at is tackling these themes without getting too preachy; she did that in the Gemma Doyle books, and she does that again in The Diviners. As for the plot, Bray has created one that is thrilling and entertaining. The novel starts out slow at first, mostly because Bray has so many characters that she has to spend a significant amount of time introducing them and setting up her world, but she does this so well and her characters are so interesting that this slow first third doesn't feel like a horrific slog. But slowly, slowly, the action builds up as things come to a head, going into a screaming dive that made me drop everything I was doing for the sake of knowing what was going to happen next. Bray's antagonist is a familiar figure to anyone who watches Criminal Minds or enjoys reading serial-killer novels, but the way she handles said antagonist will likely cause at least a few chills to go up and down the reader's spine. The novel's ending is not too much of a cliffhanger, but there are more than a few loose ends, even before the reader gets to the ending, and they lay the groundwork for what will (or may) happen in the upcoming novels. Overall, The Diviners is an excellent, entertaining read. Bray's writing style is significantly improved, stylistically speaking, when compared to the Gemma Doyle books, but her gift for characterization and handling themes related to gender and prejudice is still there and very much in play. The novel is, admittedly, a long one, especially for a YA novel, but the plot is solid, and though slow, has a great payoff at the end with a promise for more. The only problem with getting to the end of the novel, is this: waiting for the next one to come out. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Nov 04, 2012
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Nov 18, 2012
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Nov 04, 2012
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Hardcover
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| 9710545183
| 9789710545186
| 9710545183
| 4.30
| 1,004
| Oct 27, 2012
| Oct 27, 2012
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liked it
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In the Philippines, the Christmas season starts early and ends late. The popular saying is that it starts as soon as the "-ber" months come in, meanin
In the Philippines, the Christmas season starts early and ends late. The popular saying is that it starts as soon as the "-ber" months come in, meaning it begins in September, and continues from then all the way until January 6, the Feast of the Epiphany or Three Kings' Day. Others like to argue it's technically Christmas until February 14, Valentine's Day. This explains the puzzling phenomenon (to foreigners, anyway) of Christmas songs being played on some local radio stations or on mall sound systems as soon as September 1 rolls in, and why they sometimes continue to play for a few weeks after New Year's. This should come as no surprise: Filipinos have a great affection for the holiday, and many sentimental memories are attached to it, too. This is especially true for overseas workers, who come home during Christmas, and not during any other time of the year, because most other cultures, even the Middle Eastern ones, understand the importance of Christmas as a holiday. But as for myself, I don't consider it Christmas just because September's arrived. The days are too long still, during September, and I always associate Christmas with shorter days and longer nights. The air isn't quite as cool, either, and Christmas is always about that little nip in the air that sends me towards a tin of tea in search of something warm to drink. Moreover, there's one more important holiday between the first of September and Christmas, and that's Halloween. I suppose the reason why Halloween, All Saints' Day, and All Souls' Day aren't quite so popular (unlike in Mexico) is because Filipino culture as a whole doesn't like to put too much focus on death. The dead are dead, after all, and while they will never be forgotten, the living are still here, and still around us. But the concept of Halloween - the scary stories, the ghosts and the ghouls and other such things - are appealing to many Filipinos, and there are more than a few of us who do appreciate it if only for that. (Of course, there's a large contingent of Filipinos who view Halloween as a chance for some costumed debauchery, but that's their thing.) And since Komikon 2012 happened the week before the long Halloween weekend, it made perfect sense to pick up something horror-themed in time for the holiday, which meant only one thing: the latest installment in Budjette Tan and KaJo Baldisimo's Trese series. Now, I've been following this series for a while now, since i was first introduced to them by a colleague at the university. At the time I was neck-deep in Mike Mignola's Hellboy, and to read something similar to it but set in the Philippines was very exciting. That first book got me hooked, and I got the second one as soon as I could, followed by the third and fourth when they came out. Of the four, it was the third book that I felt was the best. The first two were pretty episodic in nature, and while that was acceptable, I was very happy when the third book built itself around a cohesive storyline, one that explored the Trese family's past and laid down the groundwork for a possible future. Volume Four, titled Last Seen After Midnight, was something of a response to that, but it went back to the episodic feel of the first book, which was rather disappointing, to say the least. I had hoped for a cohesive storyline, one that felt more like a novel or a novella, creating one unified story arc that could be continued in the next volume. That's precisely what I got in Trese Vol. 5: Midnight Tribunal. Ever since Volume Three (Mass Murders) so many questions had been raised - some were about Trese's family and her past; while others were about her future. Volume Four did not quite answer those questions, leaving readers eagerly awaiting the next installment. Fortunately, Midnight Tribunal does answer some of those questions. For instance, it's become clear that, (view spoiler)[contrary to popular belief, Trese's brothers were not all killed - if any were killed at all - in one of the central events of Mass Murders. Many of them have, instead, gone out into the world in their own way: one is a professor at the University of the Philippines; another is a priest; and yet another moves in and out of the underworld, returning every so often when he gets into too much trouble and needs help from his siblings. (hide spoiler)] There's also a peek into the interactions between the different supernatural entities. It's easy to assume from earlier volumes that the supernatural creatures of Manila tend to keep to themselves, with Trese interceding of them as necessary, but that's apparently not the case, since (view spoiler)[the Higante (Giants) and Tikbalang clans do come together every so often at the Manila Polo Club for friendly games of football - or sipa, the Philippine version of sepak takraw, since the ball in play looks like the woven balls used for both sports (hide spoiler)]. It is these two things, along with the fact that the entire volume is one cohesive story arc, that I loved the most about Midnight Tribunal. They help to expand the universe in a way that Last Seen After Midnight didn't, providing insight into Trese's personal life, as well as laying the groundwork for possible future interactions, alliances,and even potential enemies. But those things, unfortunately, are possibly the only things I found positive about Midnight Tribunal. It's clear to see that the whole thing had potential, that it was a great way to expand the Trese universe and lay the groundwork for something bigger down the line, but there was something lacking in execution. My first issue is with the narration. There is a lot of "telling, not showing" going on throughout the issue, such as (view spoiler)[when Trese uses a small plastic bag showing the logo of a very well-known drugstore in this country as a focus to channel healing energies into another important character (hide spoiler)] - something she'd already done in a previous issue, and which had already been explained. Also notable - and rather irritating - were the frequent explanations of the action "onscreen," as it were, (view spoiler)[such as when Trese pays a visit to the Manila Polo Club to speak to the Tikbalang and Higante (hide spoiler)]. The art already shows what' going on quite clearly; there's no need for a mysterious narrator to inform the reader what's going on. It doesn't help that sometimes the narrator appears to sound like Trese herself is narrating - which would be okay, if the scenario called for it, but more often than not the art was good enough to do the speaking on its own. My second issue is with the dialogue: something was off with it, especially when characters were code-switching. Most of the characters speak English, but occasionally a Filipino word will slip in there from time to time - and no, Trese's spell-casting doesn't count. Unfortunately, the code-switching tends to feel very awkward, something made obvious if one reads it aloud to oneself, or can actually "hear" it being read in one's head. This is especially true in one particular conversation between the Kambal, when they're calling each other gago, or stupid (though "stupid" doesn't quite encompass the nuance behind the word gago, truth be told). For some odd reason, the use of gago doesn't ring true through the entirety of the conversation - and the use of "gago-er", to indicate greater stupidity, made me cringe. I'm not entirely sure if there was a specific reason for this effect; if there was, I'm not quite seeing the point of it (or maybe I am and I'm not sure I like it); if there was no specific reason for that effect, then there's definitely something wrong with the dialogue, and that code-switching needs to be ironed-out. Sometimes it feels like the Filipino words (again, outside of Trese's spell-casting) merely serve a decorative purpose, placed there as a reminder to the reader of where the action is taking place and who these characters are. I'm not opposed to the incorporation of Filipino in a work that's mostly written in English, but I feel there should be a reason for that word to be there - such as when one single word can succinctly describe a concept that would, in English, take an entire paragraph to explain; or which has no equivalent concept in English; or whose nuances are better encompassed by the use of a Filipino word compared to the English equivalent. My third issue isn't really an issue per se, but simply something that had me raising my eyebrow when it was first put out in the course of the story. (view spoiler)[For all this time Trese has been single - something that comes as no surprise, given the nature of her job. But in Midnight Tribunal, it's implied that Maliksi, a Tikbalang known from previous volumes, may - or rather does - outright have a crush on her, likely acquired after she busted his chops on illegal street racing some volumes back. While I have nothing against Trese being romantically involved with any other characters, human or otherwise, I just found it odd that this element to the plot should be introduced now. To be fair, it's early days yet in this new, developing storyline introduced in Midnight Tribunal (which includes a possible arch-nemesis for Trese), but I'm not entirely sure. Of course this could just be me, reacting to the way the concept was introduced in this particular volume, with minimal set-up from previous issues. Honestly, if I was asked to talk pairings and ships here I would say that there's far more evidence for Trese being paired up with one of the Kambal, but that's only because I've seen them work and grow together as characters for the last four volumes. Given time, perhaps, Maliksi's interest in Trese will be integrated more smoothly into the storyline in future volumes (hide spoiler)]. Overall, Trese Vol. 5: Midnight Tribunal, is a so-so addition to the Trese series. It does expand the universe some, and it does add more depth to Trese's personal history, but other issues, mostly pertaining to dialogue and narration may hamper personal enjoyment of the story. If approached with caution, and by a loyal fan, this may prove an enjoyable read, but it's not quite the best in the series so far, either. Hopefully, though, that will change with Volume Six. ...more |
Notes are private!
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not set
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Nov 02, 2012
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Paperback
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| 0756407397
| 9780756407391
| 0756407397
| 3.80
| 12,933
| Aug 07, 2012
| Aug 07, 2012
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liked it
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The saying "books are magical" might be viewed by many as a tired old phrase, a truism that's worn itself out from constant use. Many, many people kno
The saying "books are magical" might be viewed by many as a tired old phrase, a truism that's worn itself out from constant use. Many, many people know this to be true, so why repeat it? The fact remains, though, that for readers, this worn-out cliche rings very true indeed, which is why it has never really fallen out of favor, and why it's a sentiment that gets brought up and time and time again whenever people talk about books and the reading habit. And for readers, a book is literally magic: a portal capable of taking them away from wherever they are at the current moment; a doorway to new knowledge; a way to live lives other than one's own. If that isn't magic, then I don't know what is. The ancients thought of books - and the act of creating them - as a magical, almost divine, process. Many ancient cultures believes that the act of putting down ephemeral spoken language and thoughts into a solid and, more importantly, permanent form was an act that paralleled the powers of the gods, a belief which carries into the three monotheistic religions of today: "The Word made flesh" is a phrase with powerful resonance across Judaism, Christianity and Islam. But what if books were far more magical than ordinary readers thought? What if books were literally portals, into which a gifted few could reach and pull out whatever they so chose? What if books could give birth to the creatures within them? And what if the characters within them were far more alive than any reader could have ever imagined? That's the world of the Magic Ex Libris series created by Jim C. Hines, and explored in the first novel of the series, Libriomancer. Isaac Vainio is a Porter: a member of a secret society that consists mostly of libriomancers like Isaac, though it has other kinds of magic-users within its ranks. At the beginning of the novel Isaac has been forced off the field, after his last field mission went completely haywire and the higher-ups have decided it might be safer for him to do desk work than risk having him out there doing more mayhem. It's been quiet for a while, but that peace is shattered when a couple of vampires - including a sparkler, more properly called Sanguinarius Meyerii (three guesses which book the vampire comes from, and the first two don't count) - attack him at the library he's currently working at. This leads to a chain of events wherein Isaac finds out that all is not quite well in the Porter world, and likely he's the only one standing between the organization that rendered him powerless, and a threat that could destroy not just the Porters, but the entire world. So far, so standard, at least for most urban fantasy novels. With regards to the plot, at any rate, Libriomancer is pretty much par-on-course: a supernatural/magical threat looms over the world, and it's up to the protagonist and her/his friend/s and/or colleagues to stop it before the secret of magic/supernatural creatures leaks out into the mundane world and causes even more havoc. This similarity to other urban fantasy novels, is, however, forgivable, because it's not the plot that keeps most of us fans of the genre reading: it's more about the world-building, and of course the characters. Fortunately, Libriomancer has some pretty sturdy world-building, and some good characters - though it isn't without its problems. The characters are, for the most part, a fun bunch to hang out with. Isaac in particular is interesting, and this is a good thing: the novel is told in first-person, and if Isaac were intolerable it'd be difficult to get through the rest of the novel without wanting to chuck the thing across the room in frustration and annoyance. Thankfully, he isn't irritating to listen to at all: he has a good sense of humor - not quite as sharp as Peter Grant's from Ben Aaranovitch's Peter Grant series, but just as fun nevertheless. Isaac also has the amusing tendency to get lost in spinning out ideas and questions while in the midst of a crisis, which inevitably forces his companion to snap him out of his thoughts so he can focus on the task at hand. Isaac's companion in this whole adventure is Lena, a hamadryad, specifically a Balanos hamadryad, since her tree is an oak. (view spoiler)[However, Lena isn't what one would call a "natural" hamadryad, meaning that she is a true mythological creature that has existed in the world for thousands of years. Instead, she's a magical construct from a book, pulled out by some anonymous libriomancer, likely one who was not aware of his or her talents. Now, while Isaac mentions that it's impossible to pull anything out of a book that's bigger than the book itself, Lena explains that she came out as an acorn, which fell to the ground and then grew until she popped out of it. (hide spoiler)] She is in many ways the kind of female character I enjoy reading about: kick-ass and no-nonsense, thinking sensibly through crises and making sure Isaac doesn't really do anything supremely stupid. She does, however, present one particular aspect that makes me blink and raise my eyebrow - the primary reason why both I and Hope were pulled up short by this thing. (view spoiler)[In the novel, Lena explains that she comes from a pulpy and very questionable sci-fi/fantasy novel, wherein nymphs like her must - emphasis on must - attach themselves to a lover, or else they die. Once they do so, they shape themselves to become exactly what their lover wants - and the nymph has no choice in this matter, because it's in their nature. When she drops this bomb on Isaac she says this because she assumes that Nidhi is already dead, and though she gives Isaac time to think it over, she puts him in the most uncomfortable position of taking her as a lover, or leaving her to die. Lena's behavior is something both Hope and I find rather skeezy, to say nothing of the basic idea of a female character who has no choice but to take a lover and shape herself to that lover in order to survive, but what bothers me even more is that the novel from which Lena comes from isn't even a real novel: it was one that was made up specifically for this story by Hines. I can't speak for Hope, who has a better head for this sort of thing than I do, but even I find that very troubling and rather insulting. I find romance interesting enough, even for something that's not a paranormal romance, but couldn't Lena have just been a strong, sensible female character with magical origins, without any of this "lover or die" business? She would still have been an interesting character even without that particular character trait. (hide spoiler)] Aside from that particular wrinkle, the world of Libriomancer is fascinating, intriguing, and solidly-built. The ground rules laid down for libriomancy are pretty clear-cut, but with enough space in between for playing around - mostly because there's a lot about magic that even the libriomancers don't understand. This makes sense, because magic isn't something anyone is really supposed to understand completely: some people may understand it more than others, (view spoiler)[(in the case of the Porters, that would be their founder, Johannes Gutenberg - yes, that Gutenberg) (hide spoiler)], but even the experts can come across parts of magic that they either didn't know was there, or which are simply beyond their understanding. What is understood of it, though, is carefully monitored and policed - sometimes with unfortunate results. All of this makes for a cohesive, well-built world, and in urban fantasy, as with other kinds of fantasy, the world-building is usually half the battle, and Hines has done a marvelous job with his. Overall, Libriomancer is a fun yarn, set in a world that will have many avid readers side-eyeing their libraries and wondering if, just maybe, they're actually latent libriomancers after all. Isaac is a pretty good character, with a great storytelling voice that will let the reader slide into the Hines' world with no problems at all. The plot might be pretty standard for the genre, but the action is well-paced and pretty exciting, striking a great balance between introducing the world and making that world both dangerous and desirable. On the other hand, though, Lena's characterization will leave a rather sour taste in readers' mouths, especially once that complication regarding lovers and survival comes into play. It's rather sad that this potential deal-breaker should appear in an otherwise fun novel, but there it is. Given the ending of the novel, it's certain said complication will play into succeeding novels, but hopefully Hines won't put such a spotlight on it now that the first novel's already explained it away. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Oct 05, 2012
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Oct 12, 2012
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Oct 05, 2012
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Hardcover
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| 0525952616
| 9780525952619
| 0525952616
| 3.97
| 11,622
| Jul 19, 2012
| Jul 19, 2012
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it was amazing
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During January this year, I was witness to a most interesting event. It was a cool weekday morning, and I had just stepped out of the elevator onto th
During January this year, I was witness to a most interesting event. It was a cool weekday morning, and I had just stepped out of the elevator onto the floor where the offices for my department are located when, lo and behold, I looked out the windows lining the hallway and watched as none other than Jeremy Renner dashed over the roofs of the residential area just behind my university, pursued by cameras. The sight, of course, would have been startling on any other day, but I already knew what was going on: shooting for The Bourne Legacy was well underway, and the chase scene was apparently part of the film. Social media and the news channels had been abuzz with the filming, which was a pretty big deal, really. Legacy was a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster, and the Philippines was one of the more important shooting locations: a boon for those in the government who were trying their hardest to raise the tourist profile of the country. No one was entirely sure how negative or how positive the portrayal of the country would be on-screen, but back in January nobody really cared about that. It was about seeing Manila in a big-time Hollywood action movie, and the host of opportunities that presented, both while shooting was ongoing and in the future. When the movie finally showed here in August, there was a mad dash to the cinemas to see exactly how the Philippines - Manila, more specifically - was portrayed. My father, who works with the airport administration and so had a hand in some of the scenes shot there, wanted to see the movie, and since my mother wasn't too interested, that meant he and I got to have a father-daughter date to see it. We did just that, and came out rather disappointed - not in the way Manila was depicted (though we did have a good laugh over certain aspects of it), but in the overall story. Despite the powerhouse cast, with Renner, Weisz, and Norton headlining the whole thing, there was nothing their combined enormous acting talent could do to save the movie from its ill-paced and poorly-told plot. I suppose the reason neither my father nor I came to care for the movie was because of the lack of depth. The concept was fascinating, to be sure, but it had none of the tension we both had come to expect from the Bourne films. A certain predictability in the thriller genre is to be expected, but in such cases I want my thrillers to have at least two things: characters I enjoy, and a concept that is both fascinating and well-used in the course of the story. Legacy, unfortunately, had neither. When I first learned about Kill Decision by Daniel Suarez, I thought it would be a near-future military/sci-fi novel, since it dealt with drone technology and the possible ways the technology could be used and abused. It was only when I'd read the blurb at the back that I realized that while it was true I would be getting some science and drone tech, I wouldn't be getting a military/sci-fi novel: instead, I would be getting a thriller the likes of which would make executive producers at Hollywood drool. That was precisely how I approached it, and it did not disappoint. Kill Decision begins with a scene familiar to anyone who has already watched The Bourne Legacy: a group of military techs are monitoring a pilgrimage of Muslims to Karbala, on what's known as the Day of Ashura, an important day for Shiite Muslims who make the pilgrimage on foot to shrines at Karbala. The peace doesn't last, however, as a drone shoots a missile at the pilgrims - an attack that the Muslims blame on the United States, thus leading to a wave of terrorist bombings in the United States. Or at least, that's what most people think it is. The truth is that there's something far more complex, and far more deadly, going on behind the scenes - something that Dr. Linda McKinney, a myrmecologist, finds out the hard way when she's targeted by a drone attack and is rescued by a mysterious man named Odin. The first thing I realized about this novel, after I'd finished the first chapter, was that my initial assessment was entirely correct: this is no military/sci-fi novel, but a thorough-going Hollywood thriller of summer blockbuster proportions. If I had gone in with any other notion, I think I may have well and truly disliked this book, but as is often the case with a lot of books, if one approaches it with the correct expectations, then one is usually only minimally disappointed. The characters could all easily have been cut out of the typical military-thriller script with some alterations. McKinney is the damsel-in-distress in this tale, and would have been irritating were it not for the fact that most of her reactions are actually quite realistic. (view spoiler)[In so many military thrillers the female protagonist is generally portrayed as an obedient follower of the male protagonist, which is admittedly an acceptable reaction to having one's life threatened, but I like how McKinney, as a scientist, attempts to get to the bottom of something until she runs up against the wrong people. Her inquiring mind and the nature of her work prevent her from simply accepting everything Odin tells her, and so she goes out to find her own answers - and puts Odin's entire mission at risk (hide spoiler)]. Odin, though, is pretty typical for his role: brooding, isolated, great at his job but not with anything else outside of it. (view spoiler)[The relationship between him and McKinney takes an expected trajectory: he saves her, they nearly get killed a few times, and during a quiet moment they suddenly realize that they are, in fact, in love with each other, and they make love while Odin's ravens Huginn and Muginn watch what they're doing (something I find oddly creepy) (hide spoiler)]. I think I recall reading somewhere (or hearing Hope inform me at some point in the past) that extreme danger increases the sex drive of the human being: something to do with threats to one's life turning some primal switch on to full blast and creating a desperate need to procreate. I suppose in that light, McKinney and Odin make sense, but it was also to be expected, having seen it and read about it in other thrillers both onscreen and on the page. The other characters are, I think, more interesting. Odin works with a talented group of people, and though they don't usurp the stage from their boss and McKinney, still manage to shine in their own way. There's Ripper, for instance, who first makes her appearance dressed in a sari and turns out to have earned her name because of her proficiency with knives. (view spoiler)[In a scene in the latter third of the book, during a climactic battle against a horde of drones aboard a Swedish transport ship, another team member observes that Ripper is "crazy," which just goes to show how scary her own teammates find her sometimes - and it becomes pretty easy to imagine what she can do with her knives if given the chance to use them (hide spoiler)]. And then there's Foxy, who looks Eastern European but plays a mean kora (a West African stringed instrument), and has some very clear ideas about how music can help heal the world. Mooch is the team doctor, described by McKinney as a handsome man in his twenties with South Asian/Middle-Eastern looks. Hoov, team tech, is described as Eurasian with a soul patch. Smokey is Latino, and Tin Man is described as having a red beard; McKinney speculates he has some Irish and/or Scottish in him based on that assessment. As I said, they're not given much screen-time, so to speak, but what the reader does see of them is intriguing and fun, albeit a little cookie-cutter. And then there are the villains - or the supposed villains, I should say. (view spoiler)[One thing that's made clear in this novel is that no one really knows who's behind these attacks - Ritter, an old colleague of Odin's, states that "Everyone wants this," but it's never made clear who "everyone" is. The reader, of course, can easily guess, and that guess is confirmed when Henry Clarke, a master spin doctor, confronts his client, who is only known as Marta, about the truth behind the drone attacks. Even Marta herself is not entirely sure; she merely has information and passes it on to those who want it for a fee, and then uses Clarke to massage public opinion to get the results desired by her clients. It's pretty obvious by the time this conversation happens that it's warmongering parties in world governments that are behind the attacks, but there is no absolute conclusion to everything (hide spoiler)]. This leaves room open for a sequel, but I personally think that the ending of the novel stands just fine on its own. Despite the cookie-cutter nature of the characters and some of the plot, it was the core concept of this whole thing that kept me reading. The US military is already making extensive use of drones in warfare, mostly for surveillance. There are weaponized drones, of course, but those aren't automated; the kill decision is still in the hands of a human being, instead of on the machine alone. But it seems logical that automation become the next step in warfare, and Kill Decision presents what could happen if that becomes the case. It's not a pleasant reality, to be sure, and it will certainly raise questions regarding what exactly the US is doing with the drone technology it has right now - and what other countries might be doing with their own drone technology, if they do have such a thing. Novels and stories are great for this sort of thing, in my opinion: asking "What if?" and then proceeding to explore the possibilities of that question. Kill Decision asks a very relevant question: "What if military drones were automated, programmed so that they could take out targets on their own, with no one on the other end controlling them?" Suarez then proceeds to spin out a list of possibilities that are, if one considers them long enough, truly frightening. What makes the scenario presented in the novel even more chilling is how the technology to make an automated drone is actually quite cheap and readily available: just off-the-shelf stuff made to work for a more sinister purpose by someone with enough creativity to realize their potential. As for the software, any software needed to power it can be created based on readily-available research, or can even be stolen. This is precisely the sort of conspiracy that I find fascinating, and really, truly wish had been incorporated into The Bourne Legacy. Overall, Kill Decision is everything The Bourne Legacy could have been. Science and technology are not explored in-depth, but that's hardly the issue here: this is an unabashed Hollywood blockbuster of a novel that doesn't pretend to be anything other than a rollicking good read that could easily translate into a movie. As a matter of fact, this should be a movie - it has everything Hollywood could possibly want in a summer blockbuster: military conspiracies, evil politicians working in the background, exotic foreign locales, a pinch of romance and an enormous showdown that concludes with the biggest ship in the world going up in one enormous boom. I actually put together a fancast for this thing, that's how much I want to see this made into a movie. Readers looking for a more serious exploration of the question of automating war won't get what they're looking for with this novel, but for anyone who just wants something entertaining to read, then this is absolute perfection. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Aug 25, 2012
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Sep 03, 2012
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Aug 25, 2012
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Hardcover
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| 031617775X
| 9780316177757
| 031617775X
| 3.88
| 1,590
| Jul 05, 2012
| Jul 17, 2012
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liked it
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One of the very first martial arts I developed an interest in was fencing. I remember watching the 1993 Disney version The Three Musketeers, starring
One of the very first martial arts I developed an interest in was fencing. I remember watching the 1993 Disney version The Three Musketeers, starring a very young Chris O'Donnell and Kiefer Sutherland, and absolutely adoring the action depicted onscreen: sword-blades flashing quicksilver-bright as thrusts and counter-thrusts were delivered, all mingled with witty retorts and daring escapes. To be sure, a lot of the action wasn't entirely period-accurate (the movie owes a lot to Hong Kong action movies in terms of visuals), but it was enough to lead me to Dumas' original text, which I read over and over again throughout high school - usually when I ought to have been reading things like The Catcher in the Rye (I cannot count the number of times I've imagined Athos slapping Holden across the mouth for being too whiny). I still go back to read the novel every so often, revisiting my favorite moments and scenes when I need some quick mental decompression. Perhaps as a result of the prevalence of The Three Musketeers in all its forms, it's been difficult not to think of it when one reads about fencing in books, or sees it in movies. It's also very likely that a lot of writers have Dumas' book at some point in time, and so find themselves influenced by it. However, a good writer who writes about fencing will do his or her level best to avoid copying Dumas' work or characters. Not all succeed, of course, but those who do are incredibly fun to read. A personal favorite of mine is Arturo Pérez-Reverte, who wrote (and is still writing) the Captain Alatriste series of novels, set in Spain at more or less the same time as The Three Musketeers. Captain Alatriste is not, however, merely a copy of The Three Musketeers set in Spain, mostly because it is a far darker, far grittier rendering of the period - a testament to the fact that Pérez-Reverte was a war correspondent for a while before settling down to become a novelist. Since I discovered Pérez-Reverte's books, however, I stopped finding interesting fencing novels. I suspect that it mostly had to do with the increase in popularity of wuxia films and the increased interest in Eastern martial arts. I suspect this has to do with the seeming "impracticality" of fencing, which, given how it's portrayed in the movies, comes as no surprise, albeit unfortunate. When I stumbled across K.J. Parker's novel Sharps, however, I was more than happy to pick it up. Parker has quite the reputation as a capital novelist, and though I hadn't read any of her/his books (no one knows Parker's gender; s/he is pulling something of a Salinger at the moment), I viewed Sharps as an opportunity to experience her/his writing before dedicating myself to her/his longer works like The Fencer Trilogy (more fencing, yay!) and The Engineer Trilogy. Fortunately, Sharps has proven to be quite the fun read, and as unlike The Three Musketeers as a fencing novel can get. This, it must be said, is a very, very good thing. One thing one must remember about The Three Musketeers is that it's a rather light-hearted story - in particular if one hasn't quite read the novel and has focused only on the first half of the novel, dealing with the theft and recovery of Queen Anne's necklace. I suppose the reason why this part get portrayed in film so often is because it has romance, action, intrigue, and, to a degree, a happy ending that separates it from the darker, more depressing content of the second half of the novel. This is not the case in Sharps. To be sure, there are certain parallels, but a lot of Sharps - an overwhelming lot of it - is very different from The Three Musketeers, beginning with the characters. At the core of the novel is a group of five characters: Suidas Deutzel, a three-time fencing champion; Aduluscentulus "Addo" Carnufex, the son of an important military general; Iseutz Bringas, the daughter of minor nobility; Giraut Bryennius, a banker's son; and Jilem Phrantzes, a former fencing champion and long since retired from the scene. They form the "national team" of their home country, Scheria, and are being sent on to the neighboring country of Permia (which was once at war with Scheria) as part of a "peace mission" involving matches between Scheria's best fencers and Permia's best, since everyone in Permia is crazy about Scherian fencing. On the surface, all of this makes sense, and doesn't seem suspicious in the least. But as the story progresses, it becomes very obvious that something's going on underfoot, and nothing - and no one - is quite what it seems, or who he or she says they are. That's one of the interesting things about this novel: the characters are all unreliable narrators. The narrative style of the novel is mostly in third-person limited, and it does a lot of jumping around amongst the characters, giving the protagonists, and a few of the supporting characters, a chance to speak up. Despite this, however, it's difficult to figure out who is telling the truth and who isn't, because for the most part they're lying not only to the reader, but to themselves, as well. There are also a lot of moments wherein the reader is aware of the narrator's gender, but cannot identify who the narrator is, precisely, until at some later point in the novel when everything begins to come together and all the clues finally begin to make sense. The characters themselves are interesting, for the most part - especially since none of them want to be on the team in the first place, except for Iseutz. The beginning of the novel primarily concerns itself with explaining how certain members got onto the team in the first place: (view spoiler)[Suidas was extremely broke and needed the money; Giraut killed a Senator and joined in order to avoid jail and execution; and Phrantzes was blackmailed into it by having his properties and his wife seized, with the former going to the bank, and the latter to a convent. (hide spoiler)] Another interesting thing is that the characters are far from the most normal. Right from the get-go, the reader will be drawn to Suidas: a former soldier and extremely talented fencer, who has been given the dubious honor of being team captain. (view spoiler)[The thing about Suidas, though, is that he isn't quite right in the head: a spectacularly traumatic incident during the previous war against Permia has left him with some very deep emotional scars that result in him going into berserker-like rage during which he is capable of decimating an entire military unit and emerging from the encounter almost unscathed. (hide spoiler)] For the most part he comes off as capable, if impatient and rude at times, but with undercurrents of cunning that don't really come out until much later - and it's those undercurrents of cunning that I appreciate the most about him. The rest of it seems a little contrived, (view spoiler)[particularly the berserker bit (hide spoiler)], but it works in the context of the story so it's not so bad. Giraut is also interesting, if only because he feels like a regular person caught up in extraordinary circumstances. His initial portrayal as the spoiled son of a wealthy banker eventually comes apart, revealing him to be a coward and something of an idiot, incapable of truly understanding what's going on around him, but it's those flaws that make him interesting - to me, anyway. He's actually refreshingly normal as a character: neither heroic nor extremely intelligent, more prone to scratching his head in confusion than actually comprehending what he's just done or what's going on. The only thing he has really going for him is his extraordinary luck: pretty much everyone gets really badly hurt in the course of the novel, but Giraut makes it through with minimal injuries. That luck, of course, can be a little irritating at times, because it feels a little too much like deus ex machina, but it's really the only way a guy like Giraut can make it through this entire story to the very end. In a slasher flick, he would be the character the audience thinks will be the first one dead, but turns out to be the sole survivor. Iseutz is confusing, to say the least. The "sob story" that lands her in this team of misfits is pretty typical: (view spoiler)[she's trying to dodge an arranged marriage because she doesn't want to be the "perfect society lady" her parents want her to be (hide spoiler)]. Upon first encountering her, it's possible that the reader would want nothing more than to gag her, or stab her so she finally shuts up: she's the whiniest, most irritating female character I've ever come across in a long while. There are times when the reader may be tempted to run her through the mouth with her own sword (view spoiler)[(which does happen, kind of, towards the latter third of the novel) (hide spoiler)], but it becomes clear later on that, while Iseutz's whining is incredibly irritating to both the characters and the reader, her complaints have a point; it's just that the way she voices them makes it difficult to like her. In truth, she's the least easiest of the characters to really like, and this can be rather troubling for readers - such as myself - who like reading about female characters who do not fall into that pit of "whining nagger." Some of that feeling may be cleared up towards the middle of the novel, or it may not. Either way, Iseutz is not likely to win many fans, which is unfortunate for a novel like this and for a character with so much potential. And then there is Addo. At first he seems quite colorless, (view spoiler)[very much like his reason for being there: he was ordered to by his father (hide spoiler)], but he becomes a bit more interesting as the novel progresses - especially once he takes everything in hand himself, because (view spoiler)[Phrantzes is proving to be a bit useless as a coach, and Suidas can be quite undiplomatic (hide spoiler)]. During the very first part of the story he doesn't stand out much, but later on he comes into his own, and he makes for a pretty good character - (view spoiler)[especially since he's the reluctant villain in all of this, sent by his father to kill the Permian leaders and begin war again (hide spoiler)]. He can be easy to glance over at times, but that's part of what makes him an enjoyable character to read about: so much about him is unexpected. He does, however, suffer from some deus ex machina as well: all of his talents are commonly brushed off as being expected, because he's his father's son. (view spoiler)[There is a particular scene in the first third of the novel, wherein Addo mentions he has photographic memory, and it does come in handy in some subsequent events, but it's never mentioned or seemingly used afterwards. It's interesting, make no mistake, but it seems a bit like a throwaway thing that was useful only for that brief moment in the story and then forgotten because it served no other purpose (hide spoiler)]. Finally, there's Phranztes: the sorriest character in this entire novel. It's easy to pity him: at his age he ought to be settling down to a quiet life with his new wife, but is unable to do so because he has to deal with this fiasco. (view spoiler)[It's also rather hard to see the point of his being there, at all: he feels more like a red herring for the other characters, an attempt to distract the reader by putting him forward as the possible cause of all the insanity in Permia when in truth it's actually Addo and Suidas who are the agents involved in this elaborate game (hide spoiler)]. He does, however, have the advantage of being a character the reader can immediately like: it's easy to sympathize with his plight, and his characterization isn't as polarizing as Iseutz's or maybe Giraut's. In many ways he draws the reader into the misfit team, acting as a center upon which the reader may rest when all the other characters drive one up the wall. As for the plot, well, that's where the real fun of this novel lies. It's pretty clear to the reader early on in the novel that something's going on, and whatever it is, it's not going to be pleasant. There's discontent and mysterious machinations going on in the high circles of politics in both Permia and Scheria, because someone wants the war to start all over again. Certain factions - the same ones that sent the team to Permia in the first place - are trying their hardest to prevent the war, but they can only sit on their hands, and hope that all goes well. The unraveling of the mystery is incredibly well done: there were quite a few unexpected twists, particularly towards the end. There are hints and clues scattered throughout the first two-thirds of the novel, and it's really up to the reader to figure out how they fit together. It's been a while since I encountered a plot as thick with intrigue as this, and I'm very pleased to have found it - I certainly didn't find it in The Three Musketeers, that's for sure. And now that I mention The Three Musketeers, there's one other thing that this novel does better than Dumas' work: describing fencing. This can be a point of frustration or a point of fascination for the reader, but it must be said that Parker is to be congratulated for using proper fencing terms in this novel. It will likely take some research to get all the terms right (I know I did), but there's a sense of satisfaction to be had when one knows what "demi-volte" means, or what measures have to do with stabbing one's opponent. Overall, Sharps is a ridiculously fun story, at least in terms of its plot: the twists and turns can be unexpected, and the fencing is impeccably described. The characters are pretty interesting, too, but do have some flaws that might be deal-breakers for some readers, or which might not matter if the reader is willing to ignore them. Iseutz, in particular, is problematic, but this may be because I myself prefer a particular type of female character, and Iseutz does not fit into that mold as perfectly as I want her to. This appears to be the type of novel that a reader can enjoy, nor not enjoy, according to his or her own preferences, and it really does take reading it to figure that out. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Aug 12, 2012
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Aug 25, 2012
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Aug 12, 2012
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Paperback
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| 0307406342
| 9780307406347
| 0307406342
| 4.09
| 7,985
| 2007
| Apr 03, 2012
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really liked it
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Every child grows up with stories of monsters and things that go bump in the night, and I'm no exception. Aside from the monsters in cartoons and fair
Every child grows up with stories of monsters and things that go bump in the night, and I'm no exception. Aside from the monsters in cartoons and fairytales, I also grew up with the monsters of Philippine mythology. Some were said to exist only in the far-flung rural areas, but others were said to linger even in the urban areas. These monsters were, in some ways, scarier than the ones in fairytales, perhaps because they were so close to home. But the interesting thing about these monsters was that they weren't really known for killing people - or if they did, it was because the victim had done something particularly stupid. The monsters of Philippine myth and folklore, so it seemed to me, simply didn't kill without reason. They operated on a certain code of honor, and if one was aware of that code and made sure that one stuck to the rules of the code, one could get out of an encounter with a tikbalang or a duwende with relative ease. As for the monsters in fairytales and cartoons, those tended to be quite distant, far apart from my own reality, mostly because the setting was often not one I recognized as part of my own country. When I was eleven years old, though, I learned of a very different kind of monster, one that was far closer to home, and one that didn't play by the rules I'd come to learn monsters usually operated on. It was at around this age that my mother handed me Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child's novel Relic, right after I'd finished Michael Crichton's Lost World and asked for more novels like it. Now, those who are familiar with the novel Relic might argue that it's hardly the kind of book one hands to an eleven-year-old, but as I've explained elsewhere, my mother simply wasn't the type of mother to edit her daughters' choice of reading beyond steering us away from romance novels until she deemed us ready. Relic left a lifelong impression on me. For the first time, I was reading about a monster that didn't seem to operate on any recognizable code or set of rules that would determine how people could safely interact with it, which was often the case with monsters in Philippine folklore. Neither did it seem to punish people who deserved to be punished, as was often the case with monsters in fairytales. It simply existed, killing whoever and whatever crossed its path, because that was all it knew to do. This was, of course, something I'd learned about in Lost World and Jurassic Park: the drive for predators to kill because they need to do so in order to survive, a natural instinct on the part of an animal to do what it must in order to keep on living. This made sense in the context of entities I recognized as animals, such as lions and velociraptors, but not in monsters. The monster in Relic, and its sequel Reliquary, was something else entirely. What made it even more frightening was the setting. Monsters in fairytale lands, or in the countryside, or even on distant privatized islands, were very far from my reality. A monster in a museum? Whole other story entirely. I loved museums, even at that early age, but I really hadn't thought about all the dark nooks and crannies in such buildings, and what they could potentially hide if one found oneself stuck inside with no escape. Combined with the fact that this was a monster one couldn't negotiate with, or simply avoid by doing things that wouldn't attract its attention, and I had in my hands a truly, genuinely frightening thing - and I loved it. It's taken me a while to overcome my prejudice of horror (specifically supernatural horror - the kind involving ghosts and spirits and whatnot), but the monster story has always been a favorite of mine, especially in books. My personal copies of Relic and Reliquary have the cracked spines that signify constant reading, and I'm always on the lookout for a novel in the same vein. When I first heard about Nocturnal by Scott Sigler, I knew I had to read it. It was a monster story, that much I knew, and one that had nothing to do with zombies - I have, as I may have said elsewhere, become tired of zombies as my go-to monster of choice. These were monsters that existed within a city, and even better, one I was relatively familiar with: San Francisco. The final nail in the coffin of my interest in this novel was the Scott Sigler interview on The Sword and Laser video podcast. Nocturnal just sounded so ridiculously fascinating that I tried my hardest to find a copy - but no dice. I had my favorite bookstore keep their eyes peeled for it, and as soon as they got a copy - even if it was the only one in the shipment - they were to put it away just for me. And just a few weeks ago, three books came in on a shipment, one of which was set aside for me, the other two for two other customers. None of those books so much as touched a display shelf. Fortunately, it was worth the wait (and the price): Nocturnal is a capital monster story. Though it doesn't give me the same chills as Relic once did, I attribute this to reading it as an adult and not a child. If I'd read it when I was twelve, say, I know I'd have been really scared. The novel follows Bryan Clauser, a cop who's been having some very strange dreams - dreams wherein he kills people, and really, really likes what he's doing. These dreams parallel a string of brutal murders going on throughout San Francisco, murders being perpetrated by entities called Marie's Children, whose existence has been the city's dirty secret - a secret that people in high places would do pretty much anything to make sure no one finds out about. However, Bryan's caught up in these dreams and these murders in ways that run deeper than he thinks, and he has no other choice but to risk himself and the people he loves in order to get to the bottom of the mystery. What I think I liked the most about Nocturnal was how it feels so cinematic, like a good TV show or a movie. The way the chapters were cut, and the way the scenes were set up, echoed the feel of a good movie. This isn't always something I notice in novels, which can get away with a lot of things regarding flashbacks and setup because of the nature of the medium, but I'm of the opinion that a good monster story could stand to be similar to a well-edited movie or TV show. Nocturnal has precisely that feel. There were times when I wasn't reading so much as watching the action unfold in my mind; even the characters' thoughts didn't disrupt that feeling. The chapters felt like individual episodes in a series, or scene jumps in a movie. If someone picks this book up for a TV show or options it for a movie (and I really hope someone has), I don't think they'd have a hard time figuring out how to shoot this - the way the book is written pretty much describes how scenes should be shot. The characters also feel like they belong in a TV show, and many of their relationships can be defined according to certain TV show genres. Bryan Clauser is the classic strong-and-silent type of cop with a rather uncompromising view of life (which can be a good thing, but can also be a bad thing) - until that life gets stood on its head. His partner, Lawrence Chang (better known as Pookie), is a riot, though I did find myself a mite offended at some of his dialogue. It was easy to ignore that, though, especially in light of the fact that Pookie really does have his heart in the right place, and moreover, is fiercely loyal to those whom he thinks deserve that loyalty. Their partnership is a joy to read about, with many of the best elements of the buddy-cop show present in their interaction. Add to this the fact that Pookie himself is trying to write a series bible for a TV show, and the circle is completed. Robin Hudson, on the other hand, represents another TV genre: the crime procedural. She's the second-in-command to the head M.E. of the story, being groomed to take over when he retires, and it is she who provides much of the scientific background for the story - aside from being Bryan's romantic interest. I rather like her as a female character: she's pretty strong and no-nonsense, and doesn't let her feelings for Bryan get in the way too much (although they do, kind of). She also has a tendency to bite back, especially later on when Bryan tries to act all protective of her. (view spoiler)[I liked her enough that I was rather disappointed when she was killed in the latter third of the novel, with her death being used as the primary catalyst for Bryan taking on the mantle of the Savior. While I can see how that would be useful as a way of getting Bryan into the role that's obviously (at this point) his to fill, I found myself thinking that she might have been more useful alive, not dead. I also think that it would have been interesting to see how she and Bryan would have juggled a romantic relationship if she had been alive, with both their lives caught up in the business of hunting down and eliminating Marie's Children. (hide spoiler)] On the other side of this scale is Rex Deprovdechuk, introduced as an abused, bullied teenager who is, apparently, something much more than that. (view spoiler)[Rex, true to his name, is the "king" being sought out by Marie's Children: a race very similar to humans, but not quite, either. (hide spoiler)] Anyone who's been bullied at any point in their life (and I'm one such person) cannot help but feel sympathy, even pity, for Rex: living with a physically and emotionally abusive mother, as well as having to put up with physical and emotional bullying at school, it's completely understandable why he does what he does later on. This isn't to say, of course, that I approve of what he actually does; I'm just saying that I can see his reasons for doing what he did. (view spoiler)[Rex's first act, upon discovering that he's king of Marie's Children, is to have his bullies killed. The ringleader of those bullies, Alex Panos, is not only killed but tortured in a set of scenes that are quite horrific by any standards. No bully met a fate worse than he, and while he most assuredly deserved his fate, that still doesn't make it any less horrific. (hide spoiler)] On the other hand, I'm not quite certain I'm comfortable with putting all the blame for Rex's development into what he becomes later on in the story on his mother and the bullies. The development of a psychopath is, I think, more complex than that, but then again Nocturnal isn't that kind of story. Any complex psychological analysis of Rex's motives for doing what he did and becoming what he became will have to be done by the reader himself or herself, because doing so in-story would just get in the way of the plot. And now that I bring up Marie's Children, I would like to say that I find them quite interesting. Though they're similar in many ways to humans, I like the fact that, for the most part, their behavior is very much like that of ants and termites. Their social structure is very ant-like, with a queen producing offspring that are eventually divided into different castes. (view spoiler)[The comparison is not just metaphorical: when the reader encounters "Mommy" for the first time, comparisons to the queen of an ant or termite colony are absolutely unavoidable - especially given the visual description. (hide spoiler)] Occasionally she will produce other queens and other kings, but those will remain sexually dormant for as long as she's alive - something that's also vitally important in the novel. Even the fact that most of Marie's Children communicate via smell, as opposed to sight, is something that ties them once again to ants and termites. (view spoiler)[My only quibble is that the genetics that distinguish Marie's Children from normal humans is a bit wobbly. While it's true that trisomal abnormalities can and do occur, I rather find it a bit of a stretch that an entirely new chromosome is what distinguishes them from ordinary humans. This is likely me just nitpicking a bit, but I did find that the idea kind of took me out of the moment while I was reading the novel, instead of my brain simply accepting it and moving on. (hide spoiler)] What really makes this novel a hit, though, is the plot. I don't think I've read such a well-plotted monster story in a long while. The beginning took a while to build up, but as soon as the plot hit its stride, it kept going and going and going all the way to that explosive climax. The twists were pretty good, in my opinion, and while none were mind-blowing surprises, they were still pretty enjoyable in their own way. As I mentioned earlier, it felt like I was watching rather than reading the story, and the pacing of the plot, as well as the directions it takes, are all pitch-perfect for the genre. My only quibble is that there sometimes seemed to be too many characters on-deck to tell the story properly, but eventually Sigler seems to settle on a specific handful of characters, and uses them, primarily to tell the story. Overall, Nocturnal is a fast-paced (but well-paced) thriller, with just enough horror to make the reader squirm in his or her seat. The characters are pretty solid in their own way, despite the fact that there's no attempt to explore them too deeply, but that's not the point of a novel like this. As for the monsters, they're pretty interesting in their own right, though science buffs might find themselves raising their eyebrows at their admittedly questionable genetics. Other than that, though, the novel itself is a great read, and will go over well with people looking for an interesting monster story. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jun 25, 2012
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Jul 2012
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Mar 27, 2012
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Hardcover
| ||||||||||||||
| 0061174149
| 9780061174148
| 0061174149
| 3.98
| 13,274
| Apr 10, 2007
| Apr 10, 2007
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liked it
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There is an interesting pattern that I've noticed with quite a few novel series that I've read thus far: for some odd reason, the second book in the s
There is an interesting pattern that I've noticed with quite a few novel series that I've read thus far: for some odd reason, the second book in the series rarely ever is as good as the first. While there are exceptions - Iain M. Banks's Culture series, or Naomi Novik's Temeraire books, for example - the above pattern seems to hold true. This was the case with A Monstrous Regiment of Women, the second book in the Mary Russell series by Laurie R. King, and it is again the case with A Poisoned Season, the second book in Tasha Alexander's Lady Emily Ashton series. When the first book in a series opens well, I generally have high hopes for the next books. I know these hopes aren't always founded, but there have been enough times wherein the second novel has been as good or better than the first, so I tend to take a rather optimistic view on things when I get into the second book. Just a few days ago I put aside Umberto Eco's The Prague Cemetery, which had gotten a little too complicated for a mind that was already overly taxed by work. I had thought reading the latest Pink Carnation book would do just the trick for my overtaxed mind, but I thought it was just a little too fluffy. A Mary Russell novel, on the other hand, would put too much strain. That left Tasha Alexander's novels as a good middle-ground, and thus I picked up A Poisoned Season. The bar for A Poisoned Season was set rather high. I thoroughly enjoyed the first book And Only to Deceive, which had a good, though not overly complicated, mystery, and a hopeful ending with romantic undertones. Just the sort of read I enjoy every so often when my brain cells are too strained from other reading. As it turned out, A Poisoned Season was just a shade too uncomplicated to really provide the enjoyment I needed, though it was not an altogether bad read. There was much to remind me of Alexandre Dumas' novels, albeit the sensational ones that I don't enjoy as much as his swashbucklers. The novel begins some time after the ending of the last one: Lady Emily Ashton has returned from Santorini just in time for the London Season (hence the title) and is being pressured on all sides by society to marry once more. Marriage, however, is the farthest thing from her mind: she has Greek to study and artifacts to persuade out of private collections. Moreover, she is engaged in a lovely little affair with Colin Hargreaves, and she is in no particular mood to make herself available to anyone else but him. He has asked for her hand, but she has continually refused him out of a desire to keep living the life she enjoys as a widow with a significant fortune behind her. In the meantime, the London Season has become particularly busy because of the presence of Charles Berry, a man recently acknowledged by the House of Bourbon as a descendant of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette - therefore, the rightful heir to the French throne. As a result, every single matron in London with high ambitions for her daughter is attempting to snag his attentions. Finally, to make everything even more complicated, various items that once belonged to Marie Antoinette have been stolen from their owners throughout London, and in the process a new acquaintance of Emily's has been killed. And, naturally, it is up to Emily to figure everything out, while attempting to juggle society along with her relationship to her friends and Colin. Now, while all of this is quite interesting, a rather large chunk of the book is dedicated to identifying Emily's mysterious admirer, (view spoiler)[who also happens to be the Marie Antoinette thief (hide spoiler)]. There is something about this whole thing that rather reminds me of Dumas's more sensational works (of the kind I don't particularly enjoy), as well as a bit of the Scarlet Pimpernel books. At first I thought it was quite intriguing, but the amount of time devoted to this unknown admirer rather got in the way of what I thought were the more interesting bits: the murder, for instance, and attempts to expose Charles Berry as a fraud (though this is quite obvious to the reader right from the beginning, I should think). Had I been a little younger, or maybe in a very specific mood, I might have liked that particular plotline, but in this case I did not enjoy it so much. The mystery of the identity of Marie Antoinette's descendant, however, was more intriguing. The twists and turns leading to finding out this person's identity, which forms a sizeable chunk of the storyline, were quite fun, and its links to the murder helped plump up what would otherwise have been an, admittedly, uninteresting crime. It ties in very nicely with actual historical attempts to find the dauphin and later on his descendants, as well as attempts by fraudsters and charlatans to claim pretensions to the French throne, and all its attendant benefits. As for the characters, they are all as I remember them from the last book, which is a good thing. While Margaret and Cecile remain the same as they were in the last book, I found the shifts in Emily and Ivy's relationship to be very interesting. (view spoiler)[I suppose it is no surprise that Emily's new principles in life would clash with Ivy's, and I liked how their relationship in light of these things was presented. There was actually a point in the book when it appeared that they would stop being friends, but apparently they have known each other for so long and do care for each other a great deal, that the friendship did not come to an absolute end. (hide spoiler)] And speaking of relationships, the state of affairs between Emily and Colin is also incredibly fascinating. (view spoiler)[It is already quite clear that Emily is very much enamored with him, but fears that being married to him will only put her back into the cage that most Victorian wives are put into - something which she has no intentions to go back into. Colin, however, manages to prove that he will not be like the average Victorian husband by signing over to Emily his entire library, whether or not she chooses to marry him. This certainly trumps the antique gold and lapis lazuli engagement ring Colin puts on Emily's finger when she finally takes him up on his offer. I do have to say, even in the twenty-first century, for the right kind of woman, an entire library's worth of books would be a sufficient enticement for marriage. (hide spoiler)] Overall, A Poisoned Season is not as good as And Only to Deceive, but it is a sufficiently enjoyable romp. While not all the storylines are as enjoyable as others, the characters do make up for it somewhat, and the inclusion of the question of the lost dauphin and his possible descendants makes an interesting backdrop to the murder and thefts central to the novel. And for those looking for a little romance, particularly the one between Emily and Colin, will find that particular thread, and its conclusion, very much to their satisfaction. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Mar 22, 2012
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Mar 27, 2012
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Mar 22, 2012
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Hardcover
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| 0345522478
| 9780345522474
| 0345522478
| 4.10
| 89,245
| May 03, 2011
| May 03, 2011
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it was amazing
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I think all readers have a phase, when they first discover a genre, wherein they read practically everything and anything as long as it's vaguely conn
I think all readers have a phase, when they first discover a genre, wherein they read practically everything and anything as long as it's vaguely connected to the genre in question, without giving any thought to the quality of what they're reading until later. This, I think, is a natural part of learning what one does and doesn't like about a genre, until the reader's tastes are refined, and he or she is able to identify which authors and/or tropes they prefer. During this initial period there's a lot of hit-and-miss when it comes to books, but usually the reader comes out all the better for it. It was no different with me when it came to the urban fantasy genre. After American Gods I went digging for other books in the same genre, and while I found quite a few that I liked (Jim Butcher's Dresden Files series being a notable highlight, along with Ben Aaronovitch's Peter Grant series), there were a few that didn't quite meet my expectations: China Mieville's Kraken, for instance, which felt like a pale attempt to replicate American Gods in London. Another one would be Laurell K. Hamilton's Anita Blake series, which has become a little too preoccupied with sex for my taste, thus losing sight of the elements that drew me to the series in the first place. My hunt for urban fantasy books has since slowed down, mostly because I almost dread spending money on something I won't like, and there's been a lot out there that I haven't liked. The last time I'd lucked out on a series was with Aaronovitch's books, and only because those were recommended to me by my good friend Hope. So when my mother pointed out the first book in Kevin Hearne's Iron Druid Chronicles, titled Hounded, while we were visiting our favorite bookstore during December last year, I was reluctant to give it a try. I'd dithered over actually buying the book, until my mother, exasperated at my inability to decide, said it was either I buy it or she did. And since I'm loath to let her spend on books now that I'm earning my own money, I decided to take a risk and buy the book. Since then I've put off actually reading the book, lining up a whole lot of other novels on my summer reading list just so I didn't have to pick it up until I was reconciled to the idea of actually reading it. Finally I'd reached the end of my reading list, and I was pretty much staring at the cover without any other books in sight. In the end, I decided I might as well get it over with, and just cross my fingers that it was a painless read. As it turned out, Hounded was not only painless, it was a really fun, lighthearted read, a pick-me-up that put a smile on my face after the drop in joy I'd experienced after reading The Mongoliad: Book One. And, more importantly, it's restored my faith in a genre I was almost certain had been saturated with Butcher and Kenyon (of Dark Hunters fame) knockoffs. Hounded is told by Atticus O'Sullivan, the last living Druid in the world, and two thousand and one hundred years old, though physically he looks only twenty-one. On the run for most of his life, he's settled down in a little town called Tempe, in Arizona, where he runs an occult bookshop and tries to lay low as much as he can, so as not to attract any undue attention from anyone who might want him dead. Unfortunately, his worst enemy has finally tracked him down, and Atticus is forced to choose between fleeing - again - or fighting back to bring an end to the whole thing once and for all. As I read through it, it was tempting to compare this series, and its hero, to Harry Dresden of Dresden Files fame. The urge is hardly surprising, since both series, despite being written by two different authors and being set in two different locations, are essentially cast in the same mold: first-person detective stories with a supernatural bent. Dresden fits better into that mold, though, since he actually works with the police, whereas Atticus just owns a bookshop. But they're both trying to be as unobtrusive with their powers as possible, and mostly for the same reason: there are things out there that would like nothing more than to kill them. Aside from that, though, Dresden and Atticus are very different. Though Dresden has a great sense of humor, just like Atticus, he tends to be more serious, to have more angst than Atticus does. I will likely be proven wrong, eventually, as I read more of the Iron Druid Chronicles, but I rather like to think that Atticus, despite being constantly in danger, has managed to handle the angst of being an immortal Druid pretty well. Dresden, on the other hand, has had so much trouble of the emotional kind happen to him that I rather do feel sorry for him, given how cruel the universe has been to him so far. This doesn't mean Dresden is better, or worse, a character than Atticus; it just means that, now that the storyline of the Dresden Files has gotten heavier than it started out, Atticus and his relatively lighthearted (by comparison, anyway - there is nothing lighthearted about having one of the Tuatha de Danaan as one's sworn enemy) concerns are a nice breather from the heavier, emotional concerns that Dresden has. This does not mean that Atticus doesn't have his own fair share of trouble, of course, or that he's "better" than Dresden. He does have his own problems, and he deals with them in a way that are funny to the reader only because they are not on the receiving end of some of the things Atticus does to the people who irritate him. He might look and talk like a twenty-one-year-old, but he can be just as cantankerous as many septuagenarians and octogenarians out there. They are small things, really, nothing too terrible, but it's quite obvious that, while Atticus is just as cautious as Dresden when it comes to using his power, he's still not above using it in rather creative ways to get back at the people who irritate him. Another interesting point of comparison between the Dresden Files and the Iron Druid Chronicles is that both Dresden and Atticus have sidekicks, allies and friends who can be counted upon (most of the time) to help get them out of scrapes and problems they cannot solve on their own. Dresden has Bob, a spirit that lives - or is trapped - in an enchanted skull that Dresden inherited from his uncle. Atticus doesn't have anything quite as awesome as Bob, but he does have an Irish wolfhound named Oberon, who is just as interesting in his own right despite being a dog and not a spirit of knowledge trapped in an enchanted skull. Oberon as a character in his own right is exceptionally funny and interesting, and will be of interest to those who have pets of their own (especially dog lovers) and have wondered what it would be like if they could get into their companion's mind and listen into their thoughts. While it's true Oberon is not any ordinary dog, and so doesn't think the way ordinary dogs think, those very same thoughts are still filtered through the many instincts that a dog actually has. It has the result, therefore, of giving Oberon an air of intelligence far beyond that of the average Disney animal without making him come off as "a human in a dog suit." Aside from Oberon, Atticus has a few other friends in his corner, most notably an entire pack of werewolves (who also happen to be lawyers), and a vampire who works with the werewolves at their law firm. How that happened is going to be a very interesting story (it's already been hinted at in this novel), which means it's likely to get told further down the line in one or more of the other books. Some of his more dubious allies includes the Morrigan, the Celtic goddess of war, who has taken a particular interest in Atticus and his doings for a very, very long time now, and the leader of a coven of witches named Radomila. Naturally those alliances - all of them - get tested, questioned, and in a few cases broken, throughout the course of the novel, and provide an interesting source of tension aside from the fact that Atticus is trying his darndest to stay alive. The plot isn't really all that different from the typical urban fantasy/detective novel mashup, but that's only to be expected. What matters here is the way the world is drawn up, and I must admit, I really, really like the way the world of the Iron Druid Chronicles has been set up. In particular, I like how, despite there being a lot of gods and demigods and supernatural beings that have magic at their disposal because of what they are, being a Druid (or a witch, it appears) is really more a matter of study than anything else. While Atticus explains that a special tattooing ritual binds the Druid to the earth so that said Druid can draw upon the earth as the primary source for all magic, there is nothing that says a Druid is born. Druidry, then, is a learned skill, as is witchcraft. The trope of magic as learned skill, as opposed to birthright, is a trope that I always appreciate - and is a definite plus in favor of Hearne's novel series. All told, Hounded is a fun novel with just enough weight to it to make it a respectable read, but just light enough that the reader is easily engaged and doesn't feel overly emotional at the end of it. Atticus O'Sullivan's voice as the narrator is a fun and cheeky voice to listen to (an excellent bard, so one might say), while the supporting characters are interesting enough with great promise for future development in the later books. The plot is pretty standard, but this is to be expected in this particular genre - it's still a fun ride regardless. This is a great novel (and likely a great series, but I'm withholding judgment until I've read the rest of the books) for urban fantasy readers who've become rather jaded, or who are looking to get someone else into the genre. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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May 20, 2012
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May 26, 2012
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Mar 12, 2012
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Mass Market Paperback
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| 006114844X
| 9780061148446
| 006114844X
| 3.75
| 20,765
| Oct 01, 2005
| Oct 10, 2006
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it was amazing
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The Victorian period is considered by many to be a fascinating time. It was a time when all frontiers were being pushed - the westward expansion of Am
The Victorian period is considered by many to be a fascinating time. It was a time when all frontiers were being pushed - the westward expansion of America, for instance, or the incredible new discoveries made in science and archaeology. On the other hand, many other borders were being shored up in an attempt to maintain them: British power in its colonies, for instance, or the place of women in society. Despite the rapid innovations on every front that came up during this period, there was much that a lot of people did not want changed. It is this contradition between the old and the new, pushing borders and maintaining them, that makes the Victorian period a popular setting for writers from many different genres. Many, many books have been written by many notable writers who were alive during the period (Charles Dickens being one of the most notable, of course) and even in the twenty-first century it is still a popular setting for historical fiction. Steampunk, at its most traditional, is often a version of the Victorian period wherein advanced technology akin to what is present in the twenty-first century is powered by steam and widely used. I was looking for a new series to get into when I discovered Tasha Alexander's Emily Ashton series, and the first book And Only to Deceive. The blurb for the book provided an intriguing frame of reference: the Pink Carnation series by Lauren Willig. Although Willig's series is set in the Regency period, and Alexander's in the Victorian, I did not think they would be significantly different beyond that. I was, however, proven delightfully wrong. Make no mistake: I really like Willig's books. They are a great deal of fun, with a nice touch of romance that makes me smile. However, it is very rare that I feel any real suspense in them. Though the characters often find themselves in danger, it does not often feel like it is enough. In every book, there is always something or someone who will pull the protagonist out of trouble. There are only one or two books wherein it really feels like the protagonist is going to die; more often than not, as long as one is sure that these characters are not the villains and/or are one half of the book's main romantic couple, then they are sure to survive until the end of the book, because Willig's books always have a happy ending for the couple at the center of the story. If And Only to Deceive is any indication, it would appear that Alexander's books will not necessarily be like that. There is romance, to be sure, but it is not at the heart of the story. Mystery and intrigue take center-stage in this series, with the romance present but not quite the focus of the story. The novel concerns Lady Emily Ashton, recently widowed after her husband, Viscount Philip Ashton, was killed during a safari hunt in Africa. This does not bother her much, however: she married him so she could get away from her controlling mother, so the circumstances rather suited her, since it allowed her to remain out of her mother's reach, while at the same time having a source of income with which she could do as she pleased. But as she becomes interested in her deceased husband due to the influence of his friends, Colin Hargreaves and Andrew Palmer, Emily begins to find herself engaging in things that she previously would not have engaged in: an interest in Homer and ancient antiquities, for instance - and finding out the truth behind her husband, for another. And as she continues to follow the thread of her interests - her husband counting as one of those interests - she finds herself caught up in a web of intrigue connected to the black market for antiquities: a world where money is paramount, and where talented artists turn out fakes so authentic-looking that even museum experts can be fooled. Part of what makes historical fiction fun to read is how well it can conform itself to the actual circumstances of the period in which it is written. I am no expert on Victorian London, but from what I can tell Alexander has taken great pains to ensure that her characters and plotline fit in squarely with the period in which she is writing. The interest in antiquities from ancient Greece, Rome, and Egypt, especially, sets the tone very well, because it was indeed during the Victorian period that Britain began to take a great deal of interest in acquiring artifacts for its museums, and during which archaeologists were doing their digs in Egypt and elsewhere, bringing home notable antiquities for the museums. The case of the Elgin Marbles, for instance, is widely known and is still controversial today. It is only mentioned in passing, unfortunately, though I can only imagine what an interesting plotline that would have made had Alexander chosen to use it as one of the central plotlines of her novel. But I can only imagine that such a focus would detract from the main storyline, and besides, I doubt that Alexander would have wished to tackle something so controversial as that. Nevertheless, she does raise some very intriguing concerns in the novel, such as the question regarding whether antiquities belong in private collections or in museums. It is quite obvious in the novel that Alexander believes artifacts - the real ones - belong in museums, while collectors must content themselves with replicas, so there really is not much argument on that score. But quite a few of the characters do not seem to entirely agree with that line of thinking, and so the acquisition of antiques and of replicating them so the fakes can be placed in museums, while the real ones remain in private hands, becomes one of the central plotlines in the story. Of course, this on its own is quite interesting to me since I am a history buff, but if I wanted a straightforward documentary-style discussion of the topic, I would be reading a non-fiction book, not a novel. I acquired this book precisely because it was fiction, however, and it is as a work of fiction that I choose to judge it. In that regard, it is quite a fun read. As with so many novels told from the first-person point-of-view, it is absolutely necessary that the narrator be endearing to the reader, and it is very easy to like Emily Ashton. She is very calm and not too easily flustered, and has a wryness of wit that I appreciate in any first-person narrator. If she is not quite as sharp as some of the other characters - the male ones, specifically - this is no fault of her own, but a fault of the fact that she is a woman of her time. It is enough, I think, that she shows any interest at all in doing things unconventionally. If she still seems to be groping around as to how to get about doing so, or if her efforts do not seem quite so radical as they could be, it does best to keep in mind that this is only the first book in the series, and so there will be plenty of time for her to truly break out of the mindset and roles imposed on her by Victorian society. The female characters around her are intriguing as well, though some do strike me as a bit caricaturish. Her mother, for instance, is altogether too much like a stereotypical manipulative Victorian mother that, although I hate her for being what she is, I also rather hate her for being a stereotype. Lady Cecile, too, does not make me feel entirely comfortable, because she rather strikes me as entirely too much like a stereotype of the French libertine widow. To be fair, she does not go about crying "Cherie!" or other such things all the time, but she is entirely too close to that. I am, however, rather hestitant to call these characters absolute stereotypes, however, particularly because of the fact that this is a first-person narrative. If there is any caricaturing going on here, I can blame it on the fact that Emily likely has biases, and biases can render other characters rather flat. I would be much harsher had this been a third-person narrative, but since it is first-person, I cannot truly call this for certain. As for the male characters, they appear to be a bit better-drawn than the female characters, though again I blame this on Emily, since her interactions with men would likely have been rather limited, given the period, and so she is capable of viewing them a bit more sharply than the female characters. Nevertheless, there does appear to be a bit of stereotyping going on: Hargreaves, for instance, presents some of the qualities of the typical Byronic hero: romantic and dark in a brooding sort of way. Andrew Palmer, on the other hand, is so clearly the rake that it's almost not surprising that he turns out to be the cad he is at the end of the novel. What balances all of this out, however, is the way the plot is constructed. I like a mystery that keeps me on my toes, and this one certainly does manage that. I mostly attribute this to the first-person narrative, since the reader only receives information at the same time Emily does, and moreover, is restricted to her ideas concerning the events that occur around her. She makes on assumption, which will often strike the reader as reasonable, since Emily herself is reasonable, and will go along with that assumption until something comes up to prove both Emily and the reader wrong. This happens quite frequently in the middle portion of the book; some readers might view this as frustrating, but I personally view it as a ridiculous amount of fun, not to mention proof that the writer is doing something right in the mystery department by keeping things mysterious. This sense of mystery does not hold quite well towards the end of the book, because by that point the reader will likely have their own assumptions regarding who the villain really is, and will likely be right, but at that point it is all about catching said villain, and that is a different kind of fun on its own. All in all, If Only to Deceive is an enjoyable read, particularly for readers looking to graduate from or something similar to the Pink Carnation series. The lead character is a joy to read, and though some of the characters might not quite be up to snuff, the plot itself and topics tackled - including women's suffrage - prove intriguing enough to blot out any problems one might have with the supporting characters. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jan 30, 2012
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Feb 06, 2012
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Jan 30, 2012
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Paperback
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| 0575097604
| 9780575097605
| 0575097604
| 4.08
| 67,806
| Oct 13, 2011
| Oct 13, 2011
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really liked it
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London: one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the world, a reputation it has held since it rose in status from a backwater town on the Roman frontier
London: one of the most cosmopolitan cities in the world, a reputation it has held since it rose in status from a backwater town on the Roman frontier to the capital of one of the greatest countries in Europe. An economic, historical, and cultural center, it has been at the heart of or been involved in some of the greatest events of Western history. In other words, it is a city with character: an indefinable something that shapes the feel of a city and of the people who are born and live in it. It also means that, as the setting for writers to use in their stories, it is one that provides endless possibilities for variation, to the point that London itself becomes a character in its own right. In the hands of a writer like Charles Dickens, for instance, or Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, London becomes not just a mere backdrop for Miss Havisham or Sherlock Holmes: it takes on a life of its own, and is as vitally important to the work as the characters and the plot. In Ben Aaronovitch's Peter Grant books, this is most certainly the case. Rivers of London, the first book in the series, introduced Aaronovitch's London of magic, wizards, genii locorum and so much more, as seen through the eyes of Peter Grant, a cop and apprentice wizard who must ensure that the Queen's Peace is maintained not only in the mundane world, but also - or most especially - in the supernatural world as well. Apprenticed to Thomas Nightingale, Grant becomes the first apprentice wizard since the end of World War II. Rivers of London details how Grant became Nightingale's apprentice, and how he solves two very big, and very important cases: one is a turf war between the genii locorum of London's rivers (hence the title); and the other the exorcism of Mr. Punch, the embodiment of the spirit of mayhem and chaos particular to London. However, not everyone emerged unscathed: Nightingale was nearly killed, and Lesley May, Grant's partner, nearly had her face destroyed by Mr. Punch. Moon Over Soho picks up where Rivers of London left off. It has been a few months since the end of events in the first book, and everything seems to be going relatively smoothly so far. For instance, Lesley and Nightingale seem to both be recovering fairly well from their injuries (devastating though Lesley's may have been), and the truce between the rivers of London still holds. However, a new pair of cases has emerged that Grant needs to solve: one is a rash of mysterious deaths of jazz musicians, and the other concerns a young woman who has been killing men by cutting their penises off - a character that made an appearance towards the end of the previous novel, but whose identity will finally be resolved in Moon Over Soho. This novel has certain interesting aspects to it that were not seen in the previous novel. First would definitely have to be Grant's family. It is mentioned in Rivers of London that Grant's father is a jazz musician, but it is only in Moon Over Soho that the reader truly gets to see him and Grant's mother. As it turns out, Grant's father is more than just an average musician: he is known in the jazz circles of Soho as "Lord Grant," a nickname he gained while still a young man, and the nickname by which he is still known - and respected. (view spoiler)[It turns out that Lord Grant's jazz career was cut short primarily because of mouth or lip cancer, which has left him unable to play his favorite instrument, the trumpet. However, he is attempting to revive his flagging career by shifting to another instrument, the keyboard. (hide spoiler)] Lord Grant also provides one of the crucial clues that helps Grant solve the mystery regarding the death of several jazz musicians. And speaking of jazz, I rather enjoyed how important it is in this novel. Many jazz aficionados would approve of the idea that jazz is magical, and it is quite obvious that Aaronovitch tries to make that as true as possible in Moon Over Soho without going overboard - mostly by making Grant have neutral feelings about the genre. He might be the son of a jazz legend, but Grant does not have very strong feelings about it as a whole. He likes it, but is not totally devoted to it. I would have appreciated a playlist of sorts, actually, of the songs that appear in the story, as well as a few more that are in the spirit of the music in the novel. Such a playlist is not necessary to the enjoyment of the novel, of course, but it would have been a nice touch for readers who want to explore the genre. Another interesting idea put forward in the novel is the idea that it is the force of will that creates magic. If one wishes for something hard enough, for instance, or simply thinks about something hard enough, whatever it is one wishes for or thinks about comes true or comes into being. (view spoiler)[It is this strength of willpower over the universe that creates the jazz vampires: the entities that are killing the jazz musicians in Soho. They (for there are three of them) are survivors of the bombing of a jazz club during the Blitz, and from that time onwards have been feeding on the energies of jazz musicians, something which keeps them young and beautiful into the twenty-first century. Through the force of their will, they have created themselves into supernatural creatures, and moreover, do not seem to be aware of it - either that, or are capable of ignoring it most of the time. Grant isn't quite sure which it is. (hide spoiler)] The notion is an intriguing one, and one which will hopefully be explored in later novels. Moon Over Soho also introduces "the greater enemy": a coterie of evil wizards, one of whose members is known as the Faceless Man. (view spoiler)[He is in charge of the Pale Lady, the mysterious young woman whose victims have been left behind without their penises - because, as it turns out, the Pale Lady has what is known as vagina dentata, and she removes her victims' penises by literally biting them off. (hide spoiler)] The introduction of evil wizards and a "greater enemy" at this point in the series is certainly necessary, because Grant and Nightingale will need a more definite opponent in the coming books, but I cannot help but think it is all a bit too contrived at this stage. It is as if the author is aware that there will be more books forthcoming, and the introduction of the Faceless Man and the mystery of who is behind him seems like a deliberate setup instead of a natural outgrowth of the progress of the story. I cannot help but wonder: is London experiencing some kind of dearth of supernatural mayhem ever since Mr. Punch was eliminated that the introduction of the evil wizards is necessary? Can there not be some other kind of evil coming Grant and Nightingale's way, like maybe some mysterious goings-on at Westminster Abbey, for instance? Or what about the Tower? And Oxford seems like a prime setting for trouble of the supernatural kind. I am also a bit leery about what happens to Lesley at the end of the novel. (view spoiler)[The novel concludes with Grant paying Lesley a visit, and finding out that she can work magic. He is not quite certain what could have given her that talent, though he speculates it is a result of her possession by Mr. Punch. (hide spoiler)] I found the introduction of that element towards the end a bit contrived as well. (view spoiler)[Was it truly necessary for Lesley to have magic? Could she not have been another mundane working in the magical world, like Dr. Walid, for instance? I think it would have been better if Lesley's discovery of her talent came about slowly, while working alongside Grant and Nightingale. (hide spoiler)] Moon Over Soho is, simply put, not as jaw-dropping as Rivers of London, for reasons I have mentioned above. But despite being weaker than the first novel, it is still a great read. Grant's voice is still fun, and the narration still has that wry sense of humor that I find endlessly funny and entertaining. Recurring characters are still as interesting as they were in Rivers of London (Nightingale is more human in this one) and new characters are just as intriguing (look out for the "Muslim ninja"). And London, as Aaronovitch depicts it, is still as wonderfully insane as it was in the first book. For a sequel, it's not bad at all. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Jan 12, 2012
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Jan 16, 2012
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Dec 24, 2011
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Hardcover
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| 1608190153
| 9781608190157
| 1608190153
| 3.42
| 1,509
| Mar 02, 2010
| Mar 15, 2010
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liked it
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There are very few movies that I enjoy more than The Godfather. I know this utterance is so commonplace as to be practically a cliche, but I really, t
There are very few movies that I enjoy more than The Godfather. I know this utterance is so commonplace as to be practically a cliche, but I really, truly do enjoy the film - the first one: my feelings for the second are entirely too personal to be looked at from an objective perspective, and I really didn't enjoy the third. I know that Puzo wrote the novel, but I am more at home with Coppola's storytelling than with Puzo's. There is something about it that is foreign enough to be fascinating, and yet comfortable enough to be eerily familiar, that despite it's length and pace it is capable of sucking me right in without any complaint on my part. Due to the high regard I have for the film, there are very few things that I compare to it in a favorable manner. More often than not, any comparisons I draw tend to be rather negative, with the copycat unable to live up to The Godfather. So it was a rather pleasant surprise to find Conor Fitzgerald's The Dogs of Rome, and to get a feeling, based on the back blurb and a quick skim of the first chapter, that it would be rather like The Godfather. And it was - just not totally. As anyone who follows my reviews knows by now, I love a good mystery, and rarely ever turn down the chance to read one. From Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys I graduated to Sherlock Holmes via The Hound of the Baskervilles at twelve, and have never looked back since. I have worked my way through as many of the classics as is humanly possible, and I am always more than happy to devour any mystery that is put my way by recommendation or happenstance. It was through happenstance that I discovered The Dogs of Rome. I found the cover and title quite intriguing, and when I read the blurb on the back I was hooked. Over the Christmas break I chose to make my way through it, in between social obligations and eating my way through the mountain of (admittedly delicious) leftovers and presents of cake and cookies that inevitably builds up as a result of the holidays. In truth, the basic plot-line of The Dogs of Rome seemed to suit the concept of a holiday read - at least in my opinion. In it, Alec Blume, an American who has lived in Italy for most of his life, is a commissario in the police force in Rome. His life as a commissario has been relatively quiet, not too difficult, really, until the body of an animal rights activist is found in his apartment by his wife, a prominent politician. While investigating the case, Blume struggles to do the right thing in solving the crime - except he runs right up against rampant political corruption and meddling by an important crime family, and what starts out as an attempt to do things the right way only leads to things going even more horribly wrong. These attempts to do the right thing despite the fact that one cannot always do so without losing something vital about oneself is one of the first things that struck me as similar between The Dogs of Rome and The Godfather. In Coppola's film, Michael Corleone initially tries to disassociate himself from the family business, knowing that it's not quite in line with his own morals. But he gets sucked into it nevertheless, and his involvement transforms him. By the time the viewer gets to the end of the film, it is clear that Michael has sacrificed his high, noble ideals in order to take his father's place. The same might be said of Alec Blume. Though he is aware of the corruption so prevalent in the police force and in the politics surrounding it, and is even willing to take advantage of it, he still does his best to do "the right thing" when it comes to solving crimes. But he quickly realizes that, in the world of Roman crime, the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and his "good intentions" get more people killed - people who do not deserve to die. Another thing similar between The Godfather and The Dogs of Rome is the pace of the plot. One cannot call either of these stories fast-paced, but that is actually a good thing. The slow pace allows the reader to get to know the characters, to settle into their world without any unnecessary haste. However, unlike in The Godfather, the slow pace of The Dogs of Rome might be viewed initially as rather off-putting. This may be because I am more used to the more relentless pace of other mysteries, but the pace of the investigation in the novel struck me as a mite too lazy, even with the interference of corruption and crime lords. It does pick up somewhat in the latter one-third of the novel, but what comes before that admittedly exciting latter third might put off less patient readers. Aside from this, I think another difficulty of this novel is that some of the characters just aren't as engaging as I think they ought to be. Blume has his colleagues, and some of them are unique characters in the sense that they stand out and are easy to remember, but none of them is really worth truly getting to know. Even Blume, despite that aspect of him being "a stranger in a strange world" simply because he is an American working in with the Italian police, just does not seem to be a character the reader can connect with easily. One reads his story with a detachment which I find rather unpleasant: one must like at least the person narrating the story, but liking Blume is not quite easy. Finally, there is the utterly foreign police system used in the novel. Superficially it might resemble more familiar police systems around the world, but when one gets into the nitty-gritty of it, it really does not. And doesn't help that Blume's explanations as to how the system works (sans corruption, or even with it) are either too brief or not given at all. There is not much explanation as to how crime-solving works in this novel, and I think more information would have been helpful. Overall, The Dogs of Rome is the sort of book that requires patience: patience with the slogging pace of the first two-thirds of the story; patience with the characters; and patience with the unfamiliar police system of Rome and the dearth of information regarding how it functions. This patience is rewarded by a latter one-third that's quite fascinating, and enlightening in its own way, but I am not sure how many readers would even get to that point if they have already given up before this part. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Dec 23, 2011
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Jan 12, 2012
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Dec 08, 2011
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Hardcover
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| 1592401422
| 9781592401420
| 1592401422
| 3.63
| 4,611
| 2008
| Aug 10, 2010
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liked it
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One of my favorite sayings nowadays, especially when talking about true stories that are seemingly too good to be true, is: "This has to be true, beca
One of my favorite sayings nowadays, especially when talking about true stories that are seemingly too good to be true, is: "This has to be true, because Hollywood can't make this up." Even Hollywood seems to be aware of this, given how eagerly producers snap up life stories of interesting people, eager to turn their too-true-for-Hollywood tales into the next blockbuster or award-winner. Unfortunately - or perhaps fortunately - Hollywood has trouble telling true crime stories. For some odd reason, film is too distancing a medium for true crime. Even television has a similar effects. One would assume that, with all that violence up close and personal, as it were, right there for the viewer to see in all its gory glory, film and television would actually be more immediate, not distancing. And yet it is in literature and journalism - perhaps the most "distancing" of storytelling mediums because of the absence of concrete images - that convey true crime with the most disturbing and chilling immediacy that film and television have difficulty accomplishing. I suppose the same rule that applies to horror and erotica applies to true crime as well: if one does not see a concrete image, the imagination goes to work, and when the imagination goes to work, what it produces is generally more terrifying or erotic than any image that can be produced by artist or director. However, never let it be said that film and television have not left their mark on storytelling - whether that story be fiction or nonfiction doesn't really matter. Increasingly, writers of the 21st century write in a manner that reflects the principles of storytelling as seen in movies and television shows: cut-scenes, jump-cuts, cliffhangers, and all the rest - though, to be fair, these principles were already present in the popular serialized novels of the nineteenth to early-twentieth centuries. A story that once might have been told in a straightforward manner, from Point A to Point Z, may now be told somewhere at Point M, with flashbacks showing what has gone before, and, maybe (depending on the writer and the story, of course), dreams and premonitions showing what might happen from Point N onwards. Even in nonfiction, this cinematic sensibility for telling a story has become quite prevalent, and, in the writing of true crime stories, it works quite well - most of the time. The Murder Room by Michael Capuzzo, for instance, however, did not belong to those books that get this right "most of the time," it took me a while to realize that what I was reading was nonfiction, and not fiction, after all. In truth, the whole concept behind it struck me as something that might have come out of the mind of some semi-inspired, novelist or screenplay writer: a group of the best detectives in the world (though mostly from the United States) come together on a regular basis to solve cold cases - the cases that are deemed unsolvable. No case is too cold, no victim too small, and no criminal too cunning for the men and women of the Vidocq Society, hailed by Capuzzo in the subtitle to this book as "The Heirs of Sherlock Holmes." Perhaps that subtitle contributed to the idea that this was a work of fiction. While I understand - and enjoy - the hyperbolic nature of the titles of some nonfiction books (take The Grand Inquisitor's Manual as a title for a historic overview of the history of the Inquisition, for instance), this one caught me off-guard. Was it the link to Sherlock Holmes? Perhaps it was, to a certain degree. The question of whether this was fiction or nonfiction extended into the first two chapters: Capuzzo's style was such that I almost wondered if these people he was mentioning were real. It was not until I'd cleared the second chapter that I'd realized what Capuzzo was doing. In writing this nonfiction account of a real-life society, Capuzzo had chosen to write in the style and format akin to that of detective fiction - specifically in the style of Doyle and Poe, with just a little Hammett and Chandler thrown in for variety. Once I had figured that out, I gave myself room to settle into the book and accept it as a creatively-told tale. While this book could have been written as a straightforward casebook of the Vidocq Society's most notable cases, telling each story in the same manner that Doyle told the Holmes short stories, Capuzzo does something different. Instead, he chooses to tell the beginnings of the Society via its three founding members: William Fleisher, Frank Bender, and Richard Walter. In what might be called a semi-biography of sorts, Capuzzo writes about how each man found himself involved in the acquisition of justice; the cases that led them to find each other; and later on the crimes that they, along with key members of the Society, would solve when nobody else could. It helps that each man is quite the character unto himself. Fleisher is often described as a big softie, prone to shedding tears of emotion - the classic bleeding heart, one might say - and yet also capable of getting just about anyone to like him and work with him, too. Bender is described as a mystic, mercurial and unpredictable, but with an uncanny ability to reconstruct the faces of the long-dead, using just a few bones and his intuition. And then there is Walter, Bender's direct opposite: cold and calculating, and yet possessed of the deepest insight into the evil lying in the darkest corners of the criminal mind - "a living Sherlock Holmes." On Fleisher's initiative, they set up the Vidocq Society (Walter joined, despite his reluctance), and gathered together the most brilliant minds in criminal investigation in the United States to solve, free of charge, the cases no one else could solve. I do not know, however, if this is really how these men are in real life. There is an aspect of the mythic archetype here, something which comes out in the last few chapters of the book as a joke at a Society meeting. Nevertheless, they do make for very engaging characters. Some readers may find themselves drawn to Fleisher and his bleeding heart; others may find Bender's intuitive creativity and free-wheeling lifestyle to be more to their taste. For my part, however, I have a marked preference for Walter: cold and calculating, perhaps, but he has stared into the abyss, the abyss has stared back, and Walter has walked away with a knowledge of the criminal mind that he wields like a blade. His cynicism is shocking, and some might say to be pitied, but I do think he is rather the optimist, in his own way: he views the world in sharp black and white, and is aware that if there is evil in this world, there must certainly be good, and since he knows what evil is, he will use that knowledge to protect what is good. If that is not optimism, I do not know what else it might be called. Interwoven with the personal stories of these three men are the cases they and the rest of the Vidocq Society have worked to solve. Although the Society's members have worked on some very notable cases, the cases that have been for the most part documented in the book appear to be the ones that are the most personal to Fleisher, Bender, and Walter. I suppose this should come as no surprise, since they are the "protagonists" of this book, but I also appreciated the fact that Capuzzo includes cases that I had not encountered before, which had all the power and impact of some of the more notorious serial killings that the Society members (both before and after they became Society members) have helped solve. The stories also serve as an excellent vehicle for meeting the other members of the Society, some of whom turnout to be quite unique characters as well, though they do not stand out as much as the three founders. And here is where I run into a bit of a concern with the book: it does not quite comfortably straddle that line between casebook and biography. This manifests in the rather confusing way the cases in the book are organized: a case may have been introduced in an earlier chapter, and then so much more happens before the reader gets to the resolution of that case. In the meantime, two or three more other cases may have been introduced, or a digression into the personal lives of Bender or Walter or Fleisher, or other Society members, or even the victims or criminals, occurs. This has left me rather dizzy in trying to determine what case the Society is on and who is currently on it, and being dizzy in what I think of as something of a mystery novel is not pleasant in the least. There are also some issues regarding repetition. More than once I had a sense of deja vu when a chunk of dialogue I had read earlier in the book suddenly makes an appearance, almost word for word, in a later chapter. I do not know if this is a flaw of my copy, or if this was deliberate, but just like the disorganized nature of the rest of the book, it rather stood out in an uncomfortable manner. One final thing that I noticed was that there was not much on Fleisher. Though it might be argued that, as the Commissioner of the Vidoqc Society, he must have a rather large role to play in the story, the book mostly revolves around Bender and Walter. I do not know why Capuzzo did this, but it does seem rather odd to me that only Bender and Walter would get the spotlight. Surely Fleisher was doing something interesting at more or less the same time that his colleagues were solving their cases? Surely he was good for more than just bringing people together and sending them out into the world to dispense justice? While I am rather biased to Walter, I would have liked to see more of Fleisher. To say that this book is a Hollywood movie in the making is a bit of an understatement. In fact, I rather wonder if Capuzzo did not write it with that goal in mind. While it is quite an entertaining read, and insightful in its own way, the lack of organization is quite distracting, and irritating on more than one level. I would have vastly preferred it if Capuzzo had just done a straightforward casebook of the Vidocq Society's most notable cases - that, I think, would have been far more enjoyable. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Dec 09, 2011
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Dec 11, 2011
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Dec 06, 2011
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Hardcover
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| 0812982460
| 9780812982466
| B008KX61RA
| 3.76
| 3,855
| Oct 01, 2011
| Oct 25, 2011
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liked it
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I do not often read short story collections. Not to say I have anything against the format; as a matter of fact, a well-crafted short story is often r
I do not often read short story collections. Not to say I have anything against the format; as a matter of fact, a well-crafted short story is often rather like instant gratification to a reader: it does not take the same amount of time to read as a novel, but can be just as fulfilling if it's good. But I find that, as a rule, I only enjoy short stories if they are in collections written by one author, and preferably linked to one particular world or universe. Lots of writers do this, especially those who have long-running series, as a means of filling in certain gaps in the series, or for telling stories they might like to tell, but which don't have the necessary substance for a novel. And then there are the collections that are meant to be tributes to a single author. This is usually done for authors who have had immense impact on the genre in which they wrote. After the King, for instance, is a collection of short stories containing works by some of the most notable fantasy writers still living, and is a tribute to none other than J.R.R. Tolkien himself (the "King" in the title of the collection). That one proved to be quite an enjoyable read - one story in particular, Peter S. Beagle's "The Naga," is one of the stories I ask my students to read for class. But it is very rare that short story tributes are made up for a fictional character - mostly because said character would have to be more influential than the writer who created him or her. However, that is most assuredly the case with Sherlock Holmes. Though a fictional character, there is no doubting that Holmes has a stronger grip on the imaginations of all those who encounter him, in his various incarnations, than his own creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Indeed, so powerful is the presence of Sherlock Holmes in the minds of people that it's hard to think of him as fictional at all. Many people - mostly diehard Sherlockians, but oftentimes more run-of-the-mill folk as well - speak of Holmes as if he were a real person. They speak of Dr. Watson as real, of Moriarty as real, of Irene Adler as real. It is as if, through some mysterious, magical means, Sherlock Holmes and the characters around him have seemingly emerged and detached themselves from the fabric of Doyle's stories, and embedded themselves in that strange gray space between true history and speculation. So powerful is Holmes's hold on the imagination of all those who encounter him, that it seems only fitting that a tribute collection of short stories should be made up for him - not, it should be noted, for his creator. And that is what A Study in Sherlock is, essentially: a tribute collection of short stories honoring the most quintessential, most influential detective in fiction (and maybe history). The authors listed are notable, though I am only familiar with very few of them. I know who the editors are: Laurie R. King is the author of the Mary Russell series, and Leslie S. Klinger is one of the most famous Holmes scholars, not least because he put together the Sherlock Holmes Reference Library, which is an annotated version of the entire Holmes canon. I know Neil Gaiman, of course, being a fan of his work. I am also familiar with Lee Child, though I have not read his work; the Jack Reacher novels are really more my mother's thing than mine. The other authors are utter unknowns to me. None of this matters, of course. I am always happy to acquaint myself with new authors, and sometimes a short story is a handy way of doing so, especially in collections such A Study in Sherlock. However, one of the most common problems I have with these short story collections popped up almost immediately: a noticeable lack of consistency. Some of the stories were utterly intriguing. For instance, the first one in the collection, Alan Bradley's "You'd Better Go in Disguise," was interesting because it told a Holmes story from an utterly different perspective: (view spoiler)[that of the criminal. The reader does not know initially that the narrator of the tale is a criminal, but this is quickly revealed in the climax and denouement. (hide spoiler)] This was an utterly diverting new way of looking at the classic Holmes story. Another excellent example of the above is "The Man With the Twisted Lips" by S.J. Rozan, which is a direct reference to the Holmes story of the same title - no surprise there, really, (view spoiler)[since this story is actually a behind-the-scenes look at what was going on in "The Man With the Twisted Lip." In Rozan's story, it turns out that Holmes and Watson's involvement was carefully planned by the Chinese immigrants who maintained opium dens in the area, setting the events up as a means of ensuring the lascar of the original story is chased out of their territory for good, but without calling undue attention to themselves. (hide spoiler)] The way this story parallels Doyle's story is such that it is almost impossible to read the original without thinking of Rozan's, and how it fits so neatly into its fabric. Equally good is Thomas Perry's "The Startling Events in the Electrified City." Narrated (as expected) by Dr. Watson, it is a story that takes place after the events at Reichenbach Falls, and follows Holmes and Watson to the United States, where they receive a most unusual request: (view spoiler)[they are asked to help in the assassination of President McKinley - by McKinley himself. (hide spoiler)] While there is nothing new with Holmes being involved in the affairs of famous historical figures (particularly those who were alive when he was), this one takes a whole new spin on things by introducing an element of conspiracy into the supposedly "known" facts of a historical event. All of a sudden it is tempting to look at certain historical askance and wonder if it were not possible that Holmes might have had a hand in them somehow. Equally interesting is "The Adventure of the Concert Pianist" by Margaret Maron. Though it is set during Holmes's time, this is one of those stories that does not directly involve Holmes at all - (view spoiler)[in fact, the case is solved by Dr. Watson (thus proving that he is not the bumbling, well-meaning idiot he is portrayed as sometimes), and the narrator is none other than Mrs. Hudson herself. Though the case is one of those unremarkable things that Holmes would likely have been able to solve blindfolded and with one hand tied behind his back, it was still a wonderful opportunity for Dr. Watson to take center-stage, and to hear (for the first time, I think) Mrs. Hudson speak on her famous lodger (and perhaps her desire for him as well?). (hide spoiler)] A great many more of these stories, however, do not deal with Sherlock himself - in fact the connection is rather tenuous, like in "The Adventure of the Purloined Paget" by Phillip Margolin and Jerry Margolin, (view spoiler)[which involves a group of very wealthy Sherlockian collectors and a newly-discovered story, supposedly written by Doyle for Queen Victoria, and illustrated by Paget, hence the title of the story. (hide spoiler)] Others are rewrites of Doyle originals, such as "The Eyak Interpreter" Dana Stebenow, (view spoiler)[a rewrite of Doyle's "The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter," but updated for an audience more familiar with the blog format. It even includes comments on blog entries, some of which have been deleted by their authors. (hide spoiler)] "The Case that Holmes Lost" is a meta look into a Holmes story that will never see the light of day, with the focus on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle himself. And then there are the stories that are inspired by Holmes, instead of being about him or being a rewrite of his original advenures. "The Last of Sheila Locke-Holmes" by Laura Lippman and "A Spot of Detection" by Jacqueline Winspear are precisely that, (view spoiler)[with Lippman writing a coming-of-age story for a young girl who wants to be just like Holmes (and a great many other detectives, besides), while Winspear writes about a young boy who turns out to be a young Raymond Chandler, and how Holmes turned him into the writer he would eventually become. (hide spoiler)] Some stories, though, are just totally out there. I was expecting this with Neil Gaiman, and his story "The Case of Death and Honey" is precisely that: (view spoiler)[it takes off from an interesting plot point in "The Aventure of the Creeping Man," with Holmes advising Watson to change some information in the actual facts of the case, thus allowing Holmes to freely pursue the real "rejuvenation extract" mentioned in the story - not an extract from langurs, as the story claims, but the elixir of life itself. (hide spoiler)] Another story in this vein is "As To 'An Exact Knowledge of London'" by Tony Broadbent, (view spoiler)[which plays on the idea that Holmes and Watson are reborn, over and over again, even as their greatest nemeses, Professor Moriarty and Sebastian Moran. This one is interesting if only because it contains an up-to-date list of contemporary Holmes media culture, plus an image of Watson and Holmes working on computers and surrounded by all the technological trappings of the 21st century. (hide spoiler)] Such a diverse selection of writers, all writing stories in their own style and each with a different take on Holmes and the culture Holmes has created, is great for gaining insight into the ways that Doyle's creation has embedded himself into the collective consciousness of all those who have encountered him. However, I find that not all of these stories are quite so fun. Some, like Broadbent's story, really aren't about mystery at all, and are only interesting for their connection (and manipulation) of Doyle's characters. Neither did I enjoy Lippman's tale all that much, since I was rather hoping for a child-sleuth story with coming-of-age undertones, not a coming-of-age story with child-sleuth undertones. I suppose my dislike of some stories is due to the fact that I was looking for a particular type, or types, of stories, and the ones I didn't quite enjoy simply did not fall into those types. Perhaps if I were to read the stories I did not enjoy some other time, when I'm in the mood for them, I might enjoy them then. But, regardless of how I might feel about the individual stories at a later date, A Study in Sherlock comes off as rather inconsistent to me - and probably always will. I would have appreciated a certain kind of cohesion to the types of stories that were included, and not just a grab-bag of Holmes-related, Holmes-inspired material. I did not particularly enjoy the uneven nature of the collection, jumping from one type of story to the other. Overall, A Study in Sherlock is an interesting collection: a testament to the power Sherlock Holmes wields in the collective imagination. But the grab-bag nature of the collection, and general uneven feel as one moves from one story to the next, might prove to be a bit irritating to the reader who sits down to read the collection in its entirety, and not just one or two stories because it is by an author the reader recognizes. Individually, the stories are quite good, but together, they do not make for a very cohesive collection. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Dec 06, 2011
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Dec 09, 2011
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Dec 05, 2011
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Paperback
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| 0553386387
| 9780553386387
| 0553386387
| 4.27
| 15,684
| Jun 21, 2005
| Apr 27, 2010
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liked it
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Quite a few readers I know - myself included - have what I like to call a "saturation point." When a book series runs longer than three or four books,
Quite a few readers I know - myself included - have what I like to call a "saturation point." When a book series runs longer than three or four books, I have to stop at somewhere around book seven or so, because that is generally my saturation point for any given series. The length of each individual book has nothing to do with this saturation point level; merely the involvement I devote to the long-running storylines and characters of such series. I liken it to vacationing in one place for too long: after a while the scenery and environs that used to be so fresh and new are suddenly tedious and exhausting, which means that it is time to move on to someplace else. This was how I was feeling about Laurie R. King's Mary Russell series. When I'd first discovered it I found it so much fun and the characters so interesting that I quite gladly blasted through the first seven books with barely a pause between them. Even when I wasn't quite pleased with some of the other books, I forged on, and found myself rewarded by more good books than bad in the series. But by the time I reached The Game, the seventh book in the series, I was already quite aware that I had reached my saturation point. If I pushed through reading the series, I might find myself displeased with a book I might have, on any other occasion, found enjoyable. To spare myself from that possible disaster, I put the series aside, intending to return to it when I the saturation point had receded. How long that would take, though, I did not know. So I spent a good several weeks away from the series, reading other books, engaging in other series, but this time choosing to space them out so that I did not get to that saturation point again immediately. But when I read The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz, I was reminded of the fact that I had not yet finished the Mary Russell series, and determined that it was finally time to go back and pick it up again. There were other books ahead of it on my reading list, but as soon as I had made it through those, I was able to open the eighth book in the Mary Russell series with the same sense of eagerness I had when I first started reading the series. The general premise of the series is simple enough, and the stories of the previous novels memorable enough, that I did not need to go back and reread them in order to refresh my memory in preparation for reading the eighth book. Starting in The Beekeeper's Apprentice, the series introduces as its main protagonist a young woman named Mary Russell, who, as a teenager, encounters the legendary detective Sherlock Holmes. This first meeting leads Mary becoming, first, Holmes's apprentice, and then his partner, and, finally (perhaps inevitably), his wife. Just as inevitable are the cases they find themselves solving together, and while some of them have been less than enjoyable (A Monstrous Regiment of Women), a great many more have been quite fun (my current favorite is O Jerusalem). The seventh book, The Game, was one of the latter, and so I was not completely adrift when I started reading Locked Rooms. The eighth book opens almost immediately after the events of its predecessor. After successfully completing their tasks in India, Holmes and Russell board a ship to Japan, acting upon a message that requested their presence there. The events are only referenced briefly in Locked Rooms, and if I am not mistaken the entire story is detailed somewhere else as a short story. Nevertheless, after they conclude their business in Japan, they head towards San Francisco. This is apparently Russell's decision, since she thinks it necessary to go there in order to settle some business regarding her properties and assets in the area, many of which she does not really oversee since she lives in England most of the time now. On the way there, however, she is plagued by strange, terrifying dreams, which only seem to have come up now that she is going back to the place where the most terrible moment of her life - the death of her family - occurred. But what she - and Holmes - finds out later, however, is that those dreams are really quite important, and that, moreover, they might be the key to finding out the truth about the accident that took away Russell's family and changed her life forever. I will admit, I have rather been waiting for this book: waiting in the sense that it brings Russell back to her roots. I know that, in a way, O Jerusalem did that, and it did so admirably, but those were Russell's spiritual roots, not her actual, familial roots. Russell, as the narrator of the novels, has not really said anything much in the previous books about her family, aside from the fact that they died in a car crash, and I admit that I have been rather curious about what that family must have been like, to produce a person like Mary. Unfortunately, any early revelations get mired in Russell's confused, and thus confusing to read, narrative. (view spoiler)[Returning to San Francisco seems to have scrambled her normally-stable brain, and she is not functioning as well as she was in the last few books. The pressure of all those returning memories - which the dreams are, anyway, at least in a coded form - seem to be all too much for Russell, though I suppose her attempts to make like an ostrich and bury her head in the sand do not help matters at all. I suppose she might be excused, because of the trauma of the events concerned (the great San Francisco Quake of 1906, and the accident that killed her family) would certainly result in a subconscious attempt to bury those memories, but I personally wish there was a better way to introduce Russell's past than that. (hide spoiler)] Do not get me wrong; I do think dreams can be revelatory, in the sense that they are a means of recovering ideas, concerns, even memories thought long lost to the dreamer. But I did not enjoy how Russell's dreams were given such importance in this novel. There are so many ways that the concerns regarding her family and the accident could have been raised and introduced; I do not think dreams were the best way to do so. I simply could not wait to get away from the chapters wherein she was the narrator, because she was beginning to grate terribly on my nerves and my desire to get on with the story. Holmes is also equally frustrated with his wife's inability to think as clearly and efficiently as she normally would, and the third-person chapters involving his actions when Russell is not around are a welcome relief from Russell's narration. When reading mysteries, especially one involving the great Sherlock Holmes, narrations like Russell's simply have no place. It was always a relief to reach a set of third-person point-of-view chapters, because then it meant I wouldn't have to put up with Russell suddenly passing into reverie just because some small, random thing triggered a memory. Despite that large, glaring failure in storytelling, the rest of the novel is actually quite good, despite Russell's tendency to drift off when something triggers her memories. (view spoiler)[The perpetrators behind the murder of Russell's family, and of a few other people close to her besides (including her psychiatrist) are really rather boring, as is their motive. Then again, this novel is not about crime of any sort: it's about Russell. The fact that the death of her family was murder was interesting enough, but I had hoped for something a little more villainous, a little more complex, than what the story provided. It's not as irritating as the case in A Monstrous Regiment of Women, but it comes pretty close. (hide spoiler)] One thing, however, did prove to be the highlight of the entire thing: the appearance, as a supporting character, of a notable personage. (view spoiler)[Many people tend to forget that Dashiell Hammett, before he was ever the pioneer of the classic hard-boiled detective novel genre, was actually a Pinkerton man, and hence knew something of the ins and outs of investigation. That he should make an appearance - and quite the appearance! - in the story is exceedingly amusing, and a pleasant surprise for the reader who has read - or seen - and loved The Maltese Falcon. There is one conversation, in particular, that Hammett has with Holmes that absolutely had me giggling in delight: about how investigations are never as exciting as they seem in the stories. Holmes complains about how Watson never mentions the tedium, and while Hammett agrees, he does say that, for the sake of storytelling, it's necessary not to mention the boring bits. (hide spoiler)] All in all, Locked Rooms is a relatively mediocre book in a series that has some really spectacular stories in it, but I suppose this is to be expected in a series as long as this. While I had hoped for something a little more exciting, what I got from this novel is rather better than an absolutely boring or abhorrent one. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Nov 29, 2011
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Dec 02, 2011
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Nov 24, 2011
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Paperback
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| 0575097566
| 9780575097568
| 0575097566
| 3.86
| 135,734
| Jan 10, 2011
| Jan 10, 2011
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it was amazing
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Places have stories. Any traveler is aware of this idea, and writers are exquisitely aware of it. Many writers are fine hands at making places integra
Places have stories. Any traveler is aware of this idea, and writers are exquisitely aware of it. Many writers are fine hands at making places integral to their stories: landscapes can become epics of geography; lakes and rivers and the ocean itself can sing lyrics as varied and endless as the sounds water can produce. But if one must conceive of a place as a character, then one need not look any farther than a city: that concentration of humanity that seems to imprint its own unique identity upon the spot of earth it springs from. The character of a city is shaped by the humans that inhabit it, just as much as those humans are shaped by it. Currently, a popular trend has been to write about a city and its populace, in all its glory and shame, with an added supernatural element: history and folklore old and new come together to give any city a little something special. Of course, some cities lend themselves better to such efforts than others. New Orleans, with its ties to voodoo and Cajun culture, is a favorite for American writers. For British writers, though, they need not look much farther than the City: or London, to those of us who don't live there. And it is in London that Ben Aaronovitch sets Rivers of London. Rivers of London is the first book in a (hopefully lengthy) series of books centered around Peter Grant, the lead character of Rivers of London and of the series itself. Peter Grant is a policeman - a "copper" in the parlance of the book - and he thinks he's headed for a dead-end desk job, but it turns out he's meant for bigger, grander things. It turns out he's meant to be a wizard. And he will have to learn the ropes fast, because there is a lot of work that needs doing: cleaning out vampires, for a start, and negotiating between two opposing deities laying claim to the Thames River and all its tributaries. And then there are those strange murders going on in London, the cause of which needs to be found, and stopped, because if not, London itself will implode. Now, I have read quite a few urban fantasy books that play on something like this. I have read China Mieville's Kraken, which also uses the city of London as a primary staging-ground for all sorts of supernatural activity. Jim Butcher's Dresden series is one of my favorites, a series whose main character is a wizard who solves supernatural crimes. And before sex and romance became the primary preoccupation of the storyline, the Anita Blake books were quite a good read, too. But of these books, it was the Dresden novels I've loved the most, and in many ways, what I love about Jim Butcher's work is also what I love about Rivers of London. And indeed, there's plenty similar between the two of them. They both feature lead characters who are wizards, and who are both not comfortable with the inevitable comparisons to Harry Potter (though Peter Grant must feel it more keenly than Harry Dresden, since Peter Grant lives in England). They are both involved in solving criminal cases that the police cannot deal with because it's out of their scope of knowledge (though Dresden gets a lot more flak than Grant, mostly because the London police have been working with wizards far longer than the Chicago PD). They both have dark pasts (Grant's not so bad as Dresden's, though to be fair, Dresden has had several books in which to explore his dark past, and Grant has only two so far). And they both have mentors who were (are, in Grant's case) crucial to their development as wizards. But Aaronovitch's work is no mere copy of Butcher's. True, there are many similarities (some would say too many), but the simple fact that Aaronovitch is a British writer, and Butcher is an American writer, is enough to make Rivers of London quite distinct from any Dresden book. For one, Grant's humor is much drier, more deadpan than Dresden's - typical British humor, I should say. Grant is also somewhat less emotional in his reactions (as he narrates them; since the novel is in first-person it is unknown to the reader how Grant really reacts to anything) than Dresden. Finally, since Grant is with the police, he is able to explain how the police react and work around a wizard, which seems to be somewhere between mild reluctance to outright unwillingness to cooperate; in the Dresden books there is only outright hostility from the police, and even Dresden's usual liaison, Karrin Murphy, doesn't really trust him. However, whatever else one may say about the similarities (or not) between Grant and Dresden, it must be said that Rivers of London is a great read. The title of the book is based on the fact that, long ago, London had more than one river running through it. The reader is naturally familiar with the Thames, but there are several other, smaller streams and brooks that used to thread through London. The reason why they are no longer seen in the twenty-first century city is that they were built over sometime in the nineteenth-century, to become part of London's sewage system. And then there are, of course, the other tributaries in the countryside north of London, like the Isis (actually part of the Thames itself). (view spoiler)[In the novel, however, these rivers are embodied by spirits: genii locorum, as they are called. The trouble is that though the Thames used to be ruled in its entirety by Father Thames, he abandoned the lower half of the river during the Great Stink of 1858. As a result, that part of the river was without a spirit - until a young Nigerian woman heard the call of the river and became its spirit, with her daughters becoming the spirits of the tributaries around it. Father Thames, of course, still exists, but mostly to the north, with his sons and their wives acting as the genii locorum of the waterways there. These spirits form some of the most fascinating and important characters in the book, and not just because they are the rivers of London - one of their number, Beverley Brooks (obviously the spirit of the Beverley Brook in London), a daughter of Mother Thames, plays a crucial role in the progression of the storyline. (hide spoiler)] However, while the rivers themselves are quite important, the storyline involving them is a subplot compared to the other, larger one: the one connected to Punch and Judy. (view spoiler)[How Aaronovitch gets from a puppet show to a serial killer might be rather confusing, but it is all very deeply rooted in the old mythologies and folklore attached to the concept of Punch and Judy - and a tribute to Aaronovitch's ability to seamlessly weave these together without getting in the way of the story. Recognizing Punch's roots in the Trickster and Lord of Misrule archetypes, Aaronovitch describes Mr. Punch as the spirit of riot and rebellion particular to London: that sensation of "laughter and violence," as Grant describes it, fueling riots and demonstrations in the city. It must be assumed that all cities have just such a spirit embodying those qualities, but in London, it's Mr. Punch - and unfortunately, Mr. Punch has found a willing, ghostly partner with whom to make more mischief and mayhem than usual. (hide spoiler)] But this story, is, at heart, a mystery, despite all the interesting trappings, and on that level, Rivers of London functions very well. Aaronovitch manages to work a good balance between being informative and leaving things out for later, and never once does the reader feel like he or she is being led around by the nose - or at least not being led around by the nose in a bad way. I suppose the first-person narration helps there, since the reader is learning a lot of facts right alongside Grant, but even when Grant formulates his own theories and reaches his own conclusions, it doesn't feel like he is making very great leaps in connecting one thing to another, or in coming up in with his ideas. This sort of thing is very satisfying on the part of the reader, because never once is he or she made to feel stupid. Rivers of London is, in many ways, a solid tale. The best books, in my opinion, are the ones that teach us something along the way without making it a chore, and I have learned quite a few things from Aaronovitch's novel. Peter Grant is a solid, reliable (from the reader's perspective) character, and while the novel reaches a satisfying conclusion, there are enough questions still left unanswered to leave the reader hankering for more. Hopefully Aaronovitch continues this wonderful series, because it would be a pity if he does not. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Nov 21, 2011
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Nov 24, 2011
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Nov 20, 2011
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Hardcover
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| 1409133826
| 9781409133827
| 1409133826
| 4.01
| 57,196
| Nov 01, 2011
| Nov 01, 2011
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it was amazing
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Anyone who has been following my reviews so far knows that I love a good mystery, and I love Sherlock Holmes. Ever since I first read The Hound of the
Anyone who has been following my reviews so far knows that I love a good mystery, and I love Sherlock Holmes. Ever since I first read The Hound of the Baskervilles when I was twelve, I have been irrevocably hooked on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories and this most famous and quintessential of detectives. Dupin and Poirot fans are free to look at me askance; I know that Poirot is important to the development of the mystery genre as a whole, and Dupin is the template upon which Holmes is based, but they cannot displace Holmes in my regard and affection. Childhood bias? Perhaps. I did not encounter Dupin until I was fourteen, and Poirot until I was sixteen. By then I had been reading Holmes for a good long while, and could not help but compare Poirot and Dupin to him. Holmes, in essence, took on a life of his own in my imagination - something which happens to all the best characters, I think. And when a character does just that, said character is no longer restricted to the works of the author that created it. This is why there are so many stories about Holmes not written by Doyle - some of them good, and some of them bad. The last book (or set of books, really) that I read in this vein is The Game by Laurie R. King, which is part of a series of books about Holmes' finding partnership (and love!) with a woman named Mary Russell, who also happens to be his intellectual equal. But I had gotten rather tired of this series, and so have taken a break from it - and from all things Holmes, actually. That is, of course, until I stumbled on The House of Silk by Anthony Horowitz. At first I was ready to bypass it for now as another Holmes pastiche, but put on the brakes when I found out that it is an "official" Holmes book - official in the sense that it is licensed by the Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Estate. Essentially, this is a "canonical" Holmes story, the first, if I am not mistaken, since Doyle passed away. And just because of that, I moved it to the top of my reading list, and as soon as I finished reading Cherie Priest's Boneshaker (the last book I read and reviewed), I dove straight (and happily) into this one. The House of Silk is narrated by Dr. John Watson, now at the end of his life, and simply waiting to pass into the next one. He has recorded faithfully all the adventures and cases he and his friend Sherlock Holmes have encountered together in their long friendship, but he has one more case he wishes to put down, one last story to tell before he passes away. It's rather difficult for me to pin down when, precisely, in the chronology of Holmes stories the events of the House of Silk take place, but I am quite certain that it occurs before the events at the Reichenbach Falls, and after the events of The Red-Headed League. Those who have a more recent memory of the Holmes stories will be able to fit it into the chronology more accurately than I can, I am sure. Whatever the case may be, Watson explains that he could not write this story until this, the last few moments of his life, for a variety of reasons, one of which is that he promised a host of people he would not write of it until the very last because of their involvement in it. But the primary reason that Watson gives is that the nature of the crime itself is so heinous that writing about it so soon after the events of the crime took place, even if he did not choose to publish it, was a far too difficult task. And while the distance in terms of time have made the writing of it somewhat easier, the recollection of those events is not any easier on Watson. But he must tell it, and so he does. And Watson is very much right: the crime is indeed heinous - at least, in comparison to all the other crimes documented in the other Holmes stories. No doubt murder is heinous, but the particular nature of the crime at the center of The House of Silk is understandably disturbing enough for men of Holmes and Watson's time that it comes as no surprise Watson would want to distance himself from it, at least for a certain amount of time. (view spoiler)[A sex ring masquerading as a school for street children, whose clientele are wealthy pedophiles with a taste for young boys, is no unique thing to the twenty-first century reader; but it is entirely conceivable that such a thing would have been utterly appalling to both Watson and Holmes. Such a thing, had it been discovered in Victorian London, would have been sensational, especially if the type of clientele welcomed at the establishment had been made known. While I do not doubt it is entirely possible such a thing did indeed exist in actual history, the fact of the matter is that such a crime, such a story, is not a part of the traditional Holmes canon; in fact, in a concluding essay to the copy I have, Horowitz makes it clear that even murder was a rather infrequent crime in the Holmes and Watson case files. So though I, as a reader of mysteries and a child of my time, finds the crime rather underwhelming in terms of shock value, I also know enough of Holmes canon and of Victorian London itself to know how utterly diabolical the nature of this crime would seem to people of that time and age. Then again, I do not read Holmes stories for their shock value, as that is not their point. (hide spoiler)] Something that might strike the reader within the first few pages is the tone of Watson's narrative voice. It seems a little off-kilter somehow, like this is not the Watson we readers know and remember from the original stories. This should come as no surprise, since Doyle isn't the one writing it, and no matter how faithful Horowitz tries to be to Doyle's tone, he can never truly capture it, simply because he is not Doyle. But this is hardly a negative thing, for although Horowitz is not pitch-perfect Doyle, he does remain faithful to the spirit of Doyle's originals, and that is far more than I could ask for, considering the other works out there that don't even stick to that one basic rule. And now that I speak of Watson, it must be said that, although this is a Sherlock Holmes story beyond a doubt, I rather think that this is more about Watson than anything else, and I mean this beyond the fact that he is the narrator. (view spoiler)[There is a point in the story wherein Sherlock is removed from the story, and Watson is left out on his own to figure things out. He manages to do well on his own, with some help from Lestrade (Mycroft, surprisingly enough, has his hands tied earlier in the novel, and so is of no help) and one of his discoveries does eventually lead to crucial information. It is during this part of the novel that the other characters - yes, even Lestrade - get a chance to shine. I rather appreciate Horowitz taking the time out to give the other characters this chance, since Doyle so very rarely lets them do so. I am especially pleased with the way Lestrade was written here. In the Doyle stories he tends to get the short end of the stick, and Watson (as the ostensible narrator of those stories) does admit this in the course of the narration. Horowitz's version of Lestrade is still very true to Doyle's, but with a far more human face. (hide spoiler)] One other character makes a crucial appearance in this novel, and it was this appearance that was truly one of the highlights for me. (view spoiler)[Although one of the reader's first instincts is to pin this whole affair on Moriarty, it turns out that he was not his idea - especially since he tells Watson precisely that in a scene reminiscent in its intensity to some of the most famous confrontation scenes in the Doyle originals. While Moriarty does not give Watson his name, it becomes clear very early on just who Watson is talking to. Horowitz's characterization of Moriarty is incredibly enjoyable to read, despite the fact that he appears for only a brief moment in the course of the novel. It emphasizes the fact that Moriarty is truly Holmes's polar opposite: sharing all of Holmes's genius, and even his morals, because although Moriarty is a criminal (he even uses the word to describe himself in his conversation with Watson) he does have a code of behavior, and what the House of Silk does is beyond the pale even for someone like him. (hide spoiler)] All told, The House of Silk is an excellent addition to the Holmes canon. It has all the hallmarks of an excellent Holmes story, and a little something extra, besides. While it is rather longer than the novels Doyle wrote about Holmes (The Sign of Four being my favorite novel, and my absolute favorite Holmes story), I do think the scale of the story requires the extra length. After all, this crime is something extraordinary and horrific, quite unlike the other cases Holmes and Watson has encountered before. Fortunately, Horowitz does Holmes and Watson and all of a Holmes fan's favorite characters justice, and maybe someday soon, he'll be asked to write about them again. I definitely look forward to that. ...more |
Notes are private!
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1
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Nov 16, 2011
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Nov 20, 2011
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Nov 13, 2011
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Hardcover
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| 074343529X
| 9780743435291
| 074343529X
| 3.49
| 83
| 2002
| May 21, 2002
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it was ok
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The name "Darwin" is likely one to ring a lot of bells for a lot of people, mostly because the most famous bearer of the name, Charles Darwin put forw
The name "Darwin" is likely one to ring a lot of bells for a lot of people, mostly because the most famous bearer of the name, Charles Darwin put forward the theory of evolution. His fame, however, casts a very long, very large shadow over the rest of his family, who may have had been remarkably notable in their own right, except now no one knows about them because of Charles Darwin's fame. One such notable Darwin is Erasmus Darwin, Charles Darwin's grandfather. He was a highly notable physician, regarded as the best in his day - a reputation that led to him being invited to be Royal Physician in George III's time. Erasmus turned down this post. He is also noted as being the founder and key member of the Lunar Society of Birmingham, a group which counted such notables as Joseph Priestley, James Watt, and William Murdock amongst its members - men whose discoveries and inventions would help launch the Industrial Revolution. It is also speculated that Erasmus's musings on natural philosophy would eventually - along with the writings of other scientists - influence the development of his grandson's own landmark theory. Charles Sheffield's book, titled The Amazing Dr. Darwin, is actually a collection of stories, dealing with the adventures of Erasmus Darwin and his friend, Colonel Jacob Pole (likely a stand-in for the real Erasmus Darwin's own friend, Colonel Edward Pole) as they solve unusual cases the length and breadth of England. In the first story, titled "The Devil of Malkirk," Darwin and Pole (who meet here for the first time) head to Scotland to solve a medical mystery (Darwin) and to find treasure (Pole), though the two are actually linked in more ways than one. The second story, "The Heart of Ahura Mazda," finds Darwin and Pole in London, looking into the curse supposedly laid upon a fist-sized ruby to protect it from thieves. "The Phantom of Dunwell Cove" has Darwin and Pole looking into the strange disappearance of jewelry from a group of wedding guests. In "The Lambeth Immortal" Darwin and Pole attempt to make sense of the existence of a murderous creature that supposedly inhabits the bottom of an ancient flint mine. "The Solborne Vampire" is, as the title implies, about a vampire - whose existence Darwin (and Pole, naturally) seeks to disprove, or at least make sense of. The final story, "The Treasure of Odirex," starts out with Darwin being called to prove or disprove the mental condition of a man's wife, but it soon leads to something else entirely. On the surface, with such simple summaries, the stories seem to be quite entertaining, and admittedly, they are. Each one has a touch of the supernatural to it, one which Darwin quickly dispels with his medical and scientific knowledge. Pole, in the meantime, provides a kind of support to Darwin; he might not necessarily be Darwin's equal in the mental realm, but he more than holds his own when there is any action that needs to be undertaken. This is not, of course, to be mistaken as any reluctance on Darwin's part to do anything beyond sit and think; merely a reflection of the fact that, due to his weight (a somewhat legendary thing, in his time), Darwin simply was not as capable as Pole in executing more physically taxing actions. Despite their differences, Darwin and Pole are rather well-matched, despite Pole's credulity in all things supernatural, and Darwin's distinct incredulity (which he extends to religion). They are also rather entertaining in their quirks: Darwin with his prodigious appetite (well-documented by contemporary accounts), and Pole with his obsession for treasure (he claims to have chased it all over the world, whenever he could). Unfortunately, for all the possible advantages that the above attributes present, they are not nearly enough to make these stories stand out, especially when one puts them alongside the stories of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - stories whose pattern Sheffield seems to have adopted or adapted for his own use in these tales. Though the characters themselves seem fascinating, after the first three stories the reader almost gets bored with them, mostly because they seem rather static: the reader already knows what Darwin will do in a given situation, because it's exactly what Darwin did in the last story. While there is certainly some pleasure to be derived in such predictability (after all, Sherlock Holmes is quite predictable in terms of how he will approach a case, at least in the general sense), there is no such pleasure in Darwin's brand of predictability. Also, while Darwin might have been quite interesting on his own, Colonel Pole is really not that interesting in the least. He is not nearly so entertaining as Watson - though I suppose one can get to like Watson because he is the primary narrator for the Holmes stories (for the most part, at any rate), and a reader must at least like the narrator if they are to make any kind of headway. His mania for treasure, especially, might grate on readers after a while, not least because of how predictable it makes him. Another major flaw is the stories themselves. The potential for world-building is incredibly high, and yet the reader receives very little of it, with a significant amount of interesting information being condensed into a series of end-notes. It's possible to blame the fact that these are short stories, and so there is a very limited space for world-building of the detail I might like, but it might also be to blame for a host of other problems, including the fact that these stories simply never get as good as they could be. Each of the short stories, on their own, would make a pretty rip-roaring good novel - all the elements for one were right there, but they are never used to their full potential. The mysteries could have been made richer, deeper, and more involved than the simple puzzles they turned out to be. The chief joy in reading mysteries, after all, is to get caught up in a proper set of unusual events, and solve them alongside the protagonists, and to get sense of quiet satisfaction when, at the end, all is revealed and our suspicions are proven right - or wrong, as the case may be. There is no such satisfaction in these stories. The short story form, while noteworthy and enjoyable when applied to the right kind of tale (some of the most notable Sherlock Holmes stories are short stories), simply does not work for the kinds of mysteries that are in The Amazing Dr. Darwin. They are too big for the short story form, presenting potential that is quite literally stifled and buried by the limits of the form they were written in. Character development, too, is constrained by the limits of the form, and so characters who might have been interesting to the reader given time are done a great disservice because there is no chance for them to truly grow. The Amazing Dr. Darwin is a rather sad case: a case of six - six! - potentially intriguing novels, nipped in the bud because they were written in the wrong kind of form. As it stands, this book might be a worthwhile introduction to a young-adult reader seeking to get into the more "mature" (and by this I mean more intellectually challenging) side of the mystery genre, or for someone who is looking for something light and not too involved. But for someone looking for a serious read, for a book they can settle into for a while, then this is certainly not the book to read. ...more |
Notes are private!
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Nov 05, 2011
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Nov 06, 2011
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Nov 05, 2011
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Hardcover
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my rating |
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| 4.00
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liked it
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Jul 12, 2013
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Jul 10, 2013
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| 3.99
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liked it
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Dec 22, 2012
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Dec 18, 2012
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| 3.72
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really liked it
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Dec 04, 2012
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Nov 19, 2012
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| 3.94
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it was amazing
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Nov 18, 2012
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Nov 04, 2012
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| 4.30
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liked it
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not set
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Nov 02, 2012
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| 3.80
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liked it
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Oct 12, 2012
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Oct 05, 2012
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| 3.97
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it was amazing
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Sep 03, 2012
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Aug 25, 2012
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| 3.88
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liked it
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Aug 25, 2012
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Aug 12, 2012
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| 4.09
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really liked it
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Jul 2012
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Mar 27, 2012
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| 3.98
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liked it
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Mar 27, 2012
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Mar 22, 2012
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| 4.10
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it was amazing
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May 26, 2012
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Mar 12, 2012
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| 3.75
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it was amazing
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Feb 06, 2012
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Jan 30, 2012
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| 4.08
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really liked it
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Jan 16, 2012
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Dec 24, 2011
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| 3.42
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liked it
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Jan 12, 2012
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Dec 08, 2011
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| 3.63
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liked it
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Dec 11, 2011
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Dec 06, 2011
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| 3.76
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liked it
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Dec 09, 2011
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Dec 05, 2011
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| 4.27
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liked it
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Dec 02, 2011
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Nov 24, 2011
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| 3.86
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it was amazing
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Nov 24, 2011
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Nov 20, 2011
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| 4.01
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it was amazing
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Nov 20, 2011
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Nov 13, 2011
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| 3.49
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it was ok
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Nov 06, 2011
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Nov 05, 2011
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