The Wizard Hunters by Martha Wells

[meganbmoore]

Set around 30 years after The Death of the Necromancer, The Wizard Hunters begins with our heroine, Tremaine Valiarde, trying to think of a way to kill herself. But she can’t just die any way, it has to look like an accident. Being raised by an emotionally distant (I believe Tremaine refers to him as “emotionally dead” at one point) master criminal

Comments

[chomiji]

What, Ilias' tormented background wasn't angsty enough for you? And how about his brotherly relationship with Giliead? (Not to mention the immortal line about Ixion: "Ixion alive had been bad enough. Ixion, dead, headless and really, really annoyed was unimaginably worse ... .") Wells really does love to bring The Snark.

I'm glad you're enjoying this! I can never understand why an author like Wells languishes unbought, while so many pieces of crap - or at best, plastic - sell like hot cakes and get good reviews. (Stand by - if I can make myself finish reading it - for a prime example ... .)

[meganbmoore]

Ilias's angsty past is properly appealling, but I'm afraid it's hard to top the lead when she opens the book trying to think of a way to kill herself and make it look like an accident. (And his angsty past is also kinda common.)

No idea who Stand is by, or what it is...

[chomiji]

Ooops, that wasn't meant to be a title. It was an order, so to speak - "Just hang in there, and eventually I'll fill you in on this book, which is a great example of what I mean." The book in question is The Lies of Locke Lamora, but I was trying to be cagey - clearly a big mistake.

I didn't think that Ilias' backstory was any kind of record-breaker for angst, but I liked it, and it gives him (and Giliead) more character.

In puzzling over the book's relative lack of popularity, I find myself wondering whether people just don't find Tremaine sympathetic enough because she's so down-to-earth about her problems - "Hey, I can't stand my life, so I'm going to do something about it, but I gotta make sure it doesn't backfire on anyone else" - rather than angsting on about them.

[meganbmoore]

Hmm...I really liked Locke Lamora, but I think that, like Melusine, the narrative structure there is either going to suck you in, or make you think it's a ploy at being "interesting." I admit, though, that it didn't really click for me until a certain point. But there's plenty of truly, genuinely bad stuff out there that's massively popular, or stuff that's generic that's hugely popular. And let's face it, nothing tops Eragon in "how could anyone think this is good?"

Wells's book tend to be kind of an odd mishmash of things. The Ile-Rien books tend to be clear send ups to certain storytypes-Element of Fire is a swashbuckler, Death of the Necromancer a gothic revenge, and Wizard Hunters 1930s pulpy adventure-but then take them out of their normal elements and add magic and technology that's out of place to the story normally. For me, it's why I like them, so far, and helps with the sometimes convoluted and rambly plots, but I think the odd combinations are offputting for some.

[redbrunja]

You know, I first discovered The Wizard Hunters by linking hoping to a post on the author's lj where she was talking about how her publishes didn't know what to do with Tremaine since she was neither a strong, stoic warrior women with a soft heart nor a typically emotional female. She made choices and then other people had to deal, and someone else pointed out that the only female character like that on tv (was) Veronica Mars.

So, I think you have a damn good point about people not realizing how awesome she is.

[meganbmoore]

i've been meaning to ask who that icon is, and what it's from...

[redbrunja]

That is Keira Knightly from a Vanity Fair photo shoot, and the tag was my summation of Tremaine when I did my huge, ideal casting of the movie on my lj.

[meganbmoore]

Ah.

I may have to steal the icon, if I may.

[redbrunja]

You may. It's by posionjest, and if you could also put 'made for redbrunja' in the comments, you'd fulfil my possessive nature. ^_^