And now, more books
Apparently I'm going to write posts tonight instead of work or watch TV.
We'll start off with Cast In Sorrow, volume nine in Michelle Sagara's Chronicles of Elantra. I actually like this series a lot, but you would definitely want to start it from the beginning. It's high fantasy in an urban setting, and it's got a distinctive style I find memorable. I usually find the books emotionally moving, but I don't know if I could take them all in a blob... one every year or so is about right.
In this installment, Kaylin completes her journey to the West March. She's been invited to attend - and later drafted to help run - the magical Recitation where the immortal Barrani tell themselves a piece of their history. This innocuous sounding ritual has been known to drive participants insane, so she's a little non-plussed. She also has to deal with the usual quota of monsters made out of twisted innocents, partially explained secrets, and really high-level magic she has no idea how to cope with. We learn a lot more about the background of her friend Teela, but virtually no other person or relationship evolves. All in all... I'm not sorry to have read it, but it's not a strong addition to the series.
I recently remembered that I read The Walking Dead volumes 17 and 18 (Something To Fear and What Comes After) by Robert Kirkman et al. I honestly keep reading this one out of momentum, I think... it's hard to stay engaged and I sometimes mix up some of the secondary characters. These two volumes deal with Rick and company encountering a powerful warlord who dominates the settlements in the area. He's an interesting character who mixes sadism with a certain amount of honest-seeming follow-my-laws-and-we'll-all-get-along civility. There's the usual amount of unpleasantness and tension, but I did find myself at least somewhat curious how things would play out.
After something of a hiatus, I decided to continue reading Kat Richardson's Greywalker series. This meant grabbing volume four, Vanished. The series is about Harper Blaine, a Seattle P.I. who gained supernatural powers after a near death experience. She visits her estranged mother in L.A. and digs around in her past, particularly her father's papers leading up to his suicide. Her realization that he was also involved in the world of spirits - and indeed probably went mad as a result - is interrupted when her vampire (friend? ally? acquaintance?) in Seattle calls. He pays her to rush to London and investigate the sudden silence of his contacts there. The rest of the story is more action heavy including vicious ghosts, old enemies, various odd creatures, and even another greywalker. Overall, it wasn't a bad read.
And now, we come to Magic Rises, volume six of Ilona Andrews's series about Kate Daniels. In this world, magic has been gradually replacing technology causing massive upheaval and chaos. Kate is more or less a mercenary, but she's settling down as the mate of Curran, the were-lion leader of the Atlanta-area shapeshifters. The shapeshifters have a problem... too many of their children don't survive the onset of their powers, becoming beasts that have to be put down. Their odds go up a lot if given "panacea", a medicine produced in Europe. The European shifters guard the supply jealously, though, so it is rarely available in the States at any price.
Curran is invited to come to Europe where three different packs are on the verge of warfare. An ugly territorial dispute hinges on the birth order of a shifter's twins, and the packs want Curran to protect the woman and generally mediate the mess. The offer a huge load of panacea as payment, so the Americans have no choice but to go. Of course, things couldn't be as simple as a war between shapshifter clans, and Kate will find her deepest and most deadly secrets dragged out into open.
I think I liked this best of any of the books in this series, and it stood alone pretty well. I'm hoping this marks a transition toward a conclusion... I want to see this series keep its momentum and not turn into another of the neverending urban fantasy series that are too prevalent right now.
We'll wrap up with Robert Heinlein's The Star Beast. I liked this one as a kid, so I borrowed it from my parents to read to A_. Set several hundred years in the future, this is the story of John Thomas Stuart XI, a young man living in rural America with his mother. He has a most unusual pet, Lummox, an alien brought home by one of his forefathers. Originally small enough to hide in a spaceman's gear bag, Lummox is now easily ridden by two adults (having had a major growth spurt after eating a used car). He exhibits childlike intelligence and language skills, and neither he nor John Thomas have any particular ambitions. Much of the plot centers around the property damage Lummox causes on a jaunt through town. The local courts want Lummox put down, so John Thomas runs off to hide in the nearby wilderness.
While this is going on, we also follow the story of Undersecretary for Spatial Affairs Kiku. One of the most powerful men on Earth, he is troubled by the arrival of a shipload of previously unknown aliens (and a phobia of snakes). The aliens have been searching for their lost child for two hundred years, and have finally followed the trail to Earth. They want the child returned at once and are prepared to launch an interstellar war to recover her. Despite early misidentification, this is (of course) Lummox, who is less interested in going home than continuing her long-running hobby of raising John Thomases.
The social roles are, of course, ridiculously dated, but for the 1950s it's a pretty daring work. In addition to Kiku, an African, being the de facto ruler of Earth, John Thomas's girlfriend is smarter, more ambitious, and better educated than him. That all pales beside the ridiculous technology, though. Heinlein was never much of a technologist, and the distant future has, apparently, still not invented cell phones or computers. It's still a sweet book, though, and the boy and I enjoyed reading it.
Okay, that's enough for one night. Maybe I'll see if M_ wants to watch Sleepy Hollow before bed.
This brings my total for the year to fifty-six.
This entry was originally posted at http://squidminion.dreamwidth.org/373100.html.
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comments there. You could add one via OpenID.
Or you can comment here if you'd rather; it's okay.
We'll start off with Cast In Sorrow, volume nine in Michelle Sagara's Chronicles of Elantra. I actually like this series a lot, but you would definitely want to start it from the beginning. It's high fantasy in an urban setting, and it's got a distinctive style I find memorable. I usually find the books emotionally moving, but I don't know if I could take them all in a blob... one every year or so is about right.
In this installment, Kaylin completes her journey to the West March. She's been invited to attend - and later drafted to help run - the magical Recitation where the immortal Barrani tell themselves a piece of their history. This innocuous sounding ritual has been known to drive participants insane, so she's a little non-plussed. She also has to deal with the usual quota of monsters made out of twisted innocents, partially explained secrets, and really high-level magic she has no idea how to cope with. We learn a lot more about the background of her friend Teela, but virtually no other person or relationship evolves. All in all... I'm not sorry to have read it, but it's not a strong addition to the series.
I recently remembered that I read The Walking Dead volumes 17 and 18 (Something To Fear and What Comes After) by Robert Kirkman et al. I honestly keep reading this one out of momentum, I think... it's hard to stay engaged and I sometimes mix up some of the secondary characters. These two volumes deal with Rick and company encountering a powerful warlord who dominates the settlements in the area. He's an interesting character who mixes sadism with a certain amount of honest-seeming follow-my-laws-and-we'll-all-get-along civility. There's the usual amount of unpleasantness and tension, but I did find myself at least somewhat curious how things would play out.
After something of a hiatus, I decided to continue reading Kat Richardson's Greywalker series. This meant grabbing volume four, Vanished. The series is about Harper Blaine, a Seattle P.I. who gained supernatural powers after a near death experience. She visits her estranged mother in L.A. and digs around in her past, particularly her father's papers leading up to his suicide. Her realization that he was also involved in the world of spirits - and indeed probably went mad as a result - is interrupted when her vampire (friend? ally? acquaintance?) in Seattle calls. He pays her to rush to London and investigate the sudden silence of his contacts there. The rest of the story is more action heavy including vicious ghosts, old enemies, various odd creatures, and even another greywalker. Overall, it wasn't a bad read.
And now, we come to Magic Rises, volume six of Ilona Andrews's series about Kate Daniels. In this world, magic has been gradually replacing technology causing massive upheaval and chaos. Kate is more or less a mercenary, but she's settling down as the mate of Curran, the were-lion leader of the Atlanta-area shapeshifters. The shapeshifters have a problem... too many of their children don't survive the onset of their powers, becoming beasts that have to be put down. Their odds go up a lot if given "panacea", a medicine produced in Europe. The European shifters guard the supply jealously, though, so it is rarely available in the States at any price.
Curran is invited to come to Europe where three different packs are on the verge of warfare. An ugly territorial dispute hinges on the birth order of a shifter's twins, and the packs want Curran to protect the woman and generally mediate the mess. The offer a huge load of panacea as payment, so the Americans have no choice but to go. Of course, things couldn't be as simple as a war between shapshifter clans, and Kate will find her deepest and most deadly secrets dragged out into open.
I think I liked this best of any of the books in this series, and it stood alone pretty well. I'm hoping this marks a transition toward a conclusion... I want to see this series keep its momentum and not turn into another of the neverending urban fantasy series that are too prevalent right now.
We'll wrap up with Robert Heinlein's The Star Beast. I liked this one as a kid, so I borrowed it from my parents to read to A_. Set several hundred years in the future, this is the story of John Thomas Stuart XI, a young man living in rural America with his mother. He has a most unusual pet, Lummox, an alien brought home by one of his forefathers. Originally small enough to hide in a spaceman's gear bag, Lummox is now easily ridden by two adults (having had a major growth spurt after eating a used car). He exhibits childlike intelligence and language skills, and neither he nor John Thomas have any particular ambitions. Much of the plot centers around the property damage Lummox causes on a jaunt through town. The local courts want Lummox put down, so John Thomas runs off to hide in the nearby wilderness.
While this is going on, we also follow the story of Undersecretary for Spatial Affairs Kiku. One of the most powerful men on Earth, he is troubled by the arrival of a shipload of previously unknown aliens (and a phobia of snakes). The aliens have been searching for their lost child for two hundred years, and have finally followed the trail to Earth. They want the child returned at once and are prepared to launch an interstellar war to recover her. Despite early misidentification, this is (of course) Lummox, who is less interested in going home than continuing her long-running hobby of raising John Thomases.
The social roles are, of course, ridiculously dated, but for the 1950s it's a pretty daring work. In addition to Kiku, an African, being the de facto ruler of Earth, John Thomas's girlfriend is smarter, more ambitious, and better educated than him. That all pales beside the ridiculous technology, though. Heinlein was never much of a technologist, and the distant future has, apparently, still not invented cell phones or computers. It's still a sweet book, though, and the boy and I enjoyed reading it.
Okay, that's enough for one night. Maybe I'll see if M_ wants to watch Sleepy Hollow before bed.
This brings my total for the year to fifty-six.
This entry was originally posted at http://squidminion.dreamwidth.org/373100.html.
There are
comments there. You could add one via OpenID.
Or you can comment here if you'd rather; it's okay.