Hawk looks down from lofty flight
I know, it's been a while since I posted. Many things have happened. I took a week vacation, cleaned my house, went to Ogunquit for my anniversary, and other fun stuff. But since my last post was kind of despairing, let me assure you I am doing pretty well.
Sadly, you are not going to get an extended report on my well-being here; I just want to squee about a book.
One of the things I did on my vacation was read Hawk, the new Vlad book. At VP last year, I had the rare opportunity to talk to Steve Brust about it. I asked him, first of all, if Daymar was in it, since he is one of the few Hawks we know of. "Daymar's all over it," he told me. I asked him if Paarfi was around. He, sadly, is not. I also heard Steve banter with Patrick Nielsen-Hayden about the fact that he had sent him the first draft sorted in alphabetical order by word frequency with the note "here are all the words for Hawk."
So, needless to say, I was extra excited about this one. When the prologue and first chapter were posted on tor.com recently, I was even more excited, as the prologue is basically an extended riff on the Burn Notice opening monologue. "Wait til you get to the Leverage homage," Steve told me, when I tweeted about it. That's not much farther along--when Vlad hatches a plan to finally, finally after many years and many books, get free from the death sentence put on him by the Jhereg Council, there's this exchange with Loiosh:
"Let's go steal us the Jhereg Council."
"And we're off!"
Other things this book features:
- All of Vlad's Dragaeran buddies, most significantly Kragar. LOVE the whole bit where [Spoiler (click to open)]Vlad, visiting with the recovering Kragar, decides to assassinate Terion, but doesn't mention it; when he gets back to the office, Deragar presents him with the info on Terion which Kragar told him to expect Vlad might want).
- Daymar, as promised, being his usual myopic self. I love the teleporting back in to ask Vlad if he shouldn't have teleported out of the cafe in South Adrilankha to begin with. I love the callback to "The Desecrator." I love his excitement about the challenges Vlad sets him to. I take back what I say about being a Dragon; I am really a Hawk at heart <3
- We get cameos from Perisil, the Iorich lawyer, as well as Saruchka, Vlad's Issola lover, who shows up to save the day with an enchanted euphonium. Like ya do.
- Khaavren! Papa Cat!
- I appreciate more than ever how incredibly intricate the web Brust weaves is. Things which seem inconsequential are not; he delights, in always, in telling us very little but leaving us to make the inevitable conclusions, making us feel clver. Between Tiassa and Hawk I've read (and re-read) a lot more Zelazny, and now I see just how much of an influence he was on Steve (obviously; he's said so before. But knowing it and understanding it are different). And I think he gets more and more like the master with every book...
Other, spoilery stuff:
[Spoiler (click to open)]
LADY TELDRA WAKES UP!!!! I was reading this in the middle of the night in my hotel room in Ogunquit, and I nearly woke Matt to tell him that. Also what happens when she and Iceflame touch. Or when she gets near Tukko.
Aliera saving Kragar's life, much against her will. And with elder sorcery, naturally. Love Vlad's reaction when she sends Kragar's enforcers out of the room--"Because of course you don't want Jhereg toughs to know you're doing something illegal."
The whole Kragar/Deregar thing. It was a surprisingly mundane explanation--he's Kragar's son--compared to the theories I'd been hatching. (Like that he was secretly Kragar in disguise, or that Kragar had somehow used a hawk's egg to hide himself for all these years). I felt like the whole Kragar-not-seeming-so-invisible thing in this book is more Steve telling us, "look, guys, there's nothing actually supernatural about Kragar, it was just a joke that I've been carrying on for years." Or something has changed. Not sure how much to read into it, or not.
One thing that annoyed me: I found the "here's a story about how this item I needed just happened to be in the hands of my friends" asides really... odd. I guess it extends the theme of "Vlad hatches a plan based on a bit of knowledge his friend's once mentioned, possibly when drunk," but it felt a little deus ex machina-y. It was not a major detriment to my enjoyment, but it's worth mentioning.
Well, I'm not sure how many of you have read the book yet and can squee along with me, but please do in the comments :) I look forward to flailing similar to mine while reading.
Sadly, you are not going to get an extended report on my well-being here; I just want to squee about a book.
One of the things I did on my vacation was read Hawk, the new Vlad book. At VP last year, I had the rare opportunity to talk to Steve Brust about it. I asked him, first of all, if Daymar was in it, since he is one of the few Hawks we know of. "Daymar's all over it," he told me. I asked him if Paarfi was around. He, sadly, is not. I also heard Steve banter with Patrick Nielsen-Hayden about the fact that he had sent him the first draft sorted in alphabetical order by word frequency with the note "here are all the words for Hawk."
So, needless to say, I was extra excited about this one. When the prologue and first chapter were posted on tor.com recently, I was even more excited, as the prologue is basically an extended riff on the Burn Notice opening monologue. "Wait til you get to the Leverage homage," Steve told me, when I tweeted about it. That's not much farther along--when Vlad hatches a plan to finally, finally after many years and many books, get free from the death sentence put on him by the Jhereg Council, there's this exchange with Loiosh:
"Let's go steal us the Jhereg Council."
"And we're off!"
Other things this book features:
- All of Vlad's Dragaeran buddies, most significantly Kragar. LOVE the whole bit where [Spoiler (click to open)]Vlad, visiting with the recovering Kragar, decides to assassinate Terion, but doesn't mention it; when he gets back to the office, Deragar presents him with the info on Terion which Kragar told him to expect Vlad might want).
- Daymar, as promised, being his usual myopic self. I love the teleporting back in to ask Vlad if he shouldn't have teleported out of the cafe in South Adrilankha to begin with. I love the callback to "The Desecrator." I love his excitement about the challenges Vlad sets him to. I take back what I say about being a Dragon; I am really a Hawk at heart <3
- We get cameos from Perisil, the Iorich lawyer, as well as Saruchka, Vlad's Issola lover, who shows up to save the day with an enchanted euphonium. Like ya do.
- Khaavren! Papa Cat!
- I appreciate more than ever how incredibly intricate the web Brust weaves is. Things which seem inconsequential are not; he delights, in always, in telling us very little but leaving us to make the inevitable conclusions, making us feel clver. Between Tiassa and Hawk I've read (and re-read) a lot more Zelazny, and now I see just how much of an influence he was on Steve (obviously; he's said so before. But knowing it and understanding it are different). And I think he gets more and more like the master with every book...
Other, spoilery stuff:
[Spoiler (click to open)]
LADY TELDRA WAKES UP!!!! I was reading this in the middle of the night in my hotel room in Ogunquit, and I nearly woke Matt to tell him that. Also what happens when she and Iceflame touch. Or when she gets near Tukko.
Aliera saving Kragar's life, much against her will. And with elder sorcery, naturally. Love Vlad's reaction when she sends Kragar's enforcers out of the room--"Because of course you don't want Jhereg toughs to know you're doing something illegal."
The whole Kragar/Deregar thing. It was a surprisingly mundane explanation--he's Kragar's son--compared to the theories I'd been hatching. (Like that he was secretly Kragar in disguise, or that Kragar had somehow used a hawk's egg to hide himself for all these years). I felt like the whole Kragar-not-seeming-so-invisible thing in this book is more Steve telling us, "look, guys, there's nothing actually supernatural about Kragar, it was just a joke that I've been carrying on for years." Or something has changed. Not sure how much to read into it, or not.
One thing that annoyed me: I found the "here's a story about how this item I needed just happened to be in the hands of my friends" asides really... odd. I guess it extends the theme of "Vlad hatches a plan based on a bit of knowledge his friend's once mentioned, possibly when drunk," but it felt a little deus ex machina-y. It was not a major detriment to my enjoyment, but it's worth mentioning.
Well, I'm not sure how many of you have read the book yet and can squee along with me, but please do in the comments :) I look forward to flailing similar to mine while reading.