(no subject)
If you haven't heard Oregon's Representative Wu give a brief speech on the Vulcans and Klingons in the White House I recommend it.
My sister and I went to Muskegon today for a shopping trip. I needed some new pants, which I didn't find and a wireless mouse, which I did find. We also stopped at Barnes and Noble since we were in the area. I bought a book on the Cthulhu mythos since I don't have one in my own library and a book of Frost's poetry, a better one than I have now. Yay books!
I finished Terry Brooks' Armageddon's Children, but I'll cut my thoughts so I don't spoil it for anyone planning on reading it.
When I picked up the book, I thought it was a stand-alone or possibly a new series, but it's neither. It's the next in the Word and the Void series. That's all right, though, because I love that series, probably more than the Shannara series (and yes, I realize that Sword is pretty much a paraphrase of Lord of the Rings).
The story is set in the not-so-distant future, sometime after 2062 because that is Nest Freemark's date of death on her grave. The balance of the world shifted to the Void despite the Word's best efforts; there was pretty much another war, a nuclear one. Most of the earth has been poisoned, demons and their human followers, once-men, are hunting the last humans down and mutants have been formed from human bodies adapting to the poison and chemicals. It's a pretty nice set-up for a dystopian world and I do love dystopian settings.
There are actually two Knights in the story, Logan Tom and Angel Perez. The latter, by the way, is all kinds of kick-ass. She is attacked by the same demon twice and survives both accounts. Far up north in Seattle, there is a gang of street kids who call themselves Ghosts. A couple of them have gifts; Candle has visions of danger and Hawk as prophetic visions.
It's a nice read and I get into the groove quickly. It's hard to see how Brooks will pull all three plotlines together and then BAM!! The Ellcrys shows up. The Ellcrys is the Elven tree that keeps the Forbidding closed, first introduced in The Elfstones of Shannara.
There are Elves in my Knight and the Void story. It was jarring and surprising, especially since it's not mentioned in the summary on the flaps at all. I knew the world of Shannara was far, far in the future because in Sword, Shea and Flick are attacked while examining remnants of our world and in the Voyage of the Jerle Shannara trilogy, Walker Boh has to journey into the depths of some ancient building. It was a little disappointing to me because I loved the Word and the Void series simply because it was separate from the Shannara series.
Anyway, back to the story. Logan Tom is charged by Two Bears (who is still awesome) to find the gypsy morph, the boy that John Ross had in Angel Fire East and Angel is charged with finding the Elves. She has a hard time believing that Elves (who live in Oregon) exist and I sympathize with her. They both are traveling north with Logan heading toward Seattle.
In the Elf plot, the Ellcrys speaks with two of her Chosen, asking for their help. She believes, as does the Lady, that the Elves must be brought into the world if it is to survive. The two Chosen, one of which is a princess, decide to defy the King and look for a way to help the Ellcrys.
The book ends with a cliffhanger, setting it up for his next book. As I said, I was disappointed with joining the Shannara world with the Knight and the Void world. I liked them as separate series. I wasn't impressed with Logan Tom. Most of his action was in flashbacks and there wasn't much to develop his character as he went along. While I loved Angel and wished for more of her, I think Brooks did an excellent job with Hawk. He was in love with a girl from a compound and the leader of his tribe, yet he always put his tribe first. When he was on the streets, he didn't dwell on her. I guess what I'm saying is that while there was romance, it was in passing and not a huge plot point. Until the end, when it gets him in trouble.
I would recommend this book if you're a huge fan of Brooks, but I would recommend it as the next Word and the Void or as a prequel to the Shannara series. It was good, but not great. I give it three stars out of five.
My sister and I went to Muskegon today for a shopping trip. I needed some new pants, which I didn't find and a wireless mouse, which I did find. We also stopped at Barnes and Noble since we were in the area. I bought a book on the Cthulhu mythos since I don't have one in my own library and a book of Frost's poetry, a better one than I have now. Yay books!
I finished Terry Brooks' Armageddon's Children, but I'll cut my thoughts so I don't spoil it for anyone planning on reading it.
When I picked up the book, I thought it was a stand-alone or possibly a new series, but it's neither. It's the next in the Word and the Void series. That's all right, though, because I love that series, probably more than the Shannara series (and yes, I realize that Sword is pretty much a paraphrase of Lord of the Rings).
The story is set in the not-so-distant future, sometime after 2062 because that is Nest Freemark's date of death on her grave. The balance of the world shifted to the Void despite the Word's best efforts; there was pretty much another war, a nuclear one. Most of the earth has been poisoned, demons and their human followers, once-men, are hunting the last humans down and mutants have been formed from human bodies adapting to the poison and chemicals. It's a pretty nice set-up for a dystopian world and I do love dystopian settings.
There are actually two Knights in the story, Logan Tom and Angel Perez. The latter, by the way, is all kinds of kick-ass. She is attacked by the same demon twice and survives both accounts. Far up north in Seattle, there is a gang of street kids who call themselves Ghosts. A couple of them have gifts; Candle has visions of danger and Hawk as prophetic visions.
It's a nice read and I get into the groove quickly. It's hard to see how Brooks will pull all three plotlines together and then BAM!! The Ellcrys shows up. The Ellcrys is the Elven tree that keeps the Forbidding closed, first introduced in The Elfstones of Shannara.
There are Elves in my Knight and the Void story. It was jarring and surprising, especially since it's not mentioned in the summary on the flaps at all. I knew the world of Shannara was far, far in the future because in Sword, Shea and Flick are attacked while examining remnants of our world and in the Voyage of the Jerle Shannara trilogy, Walker Boh has to journey into the depths of some ancient building. It was a little disappointing to me because I loved the Word and the Void series simply because it was separate from the Shannara series.
Anyway, back to the story. Logan Tom is charged by Two Bears (who is still awesome) to find the gypsy morph, the boy that John Ross had in Angel Fire East and Angel is charged with finding the Elves. She has a hard time believing that Elves (who live in Oregon) exist and I sympathize with her. They both are traveling north with Logan heading toward Seattle.
In the Elf plot, the Ellcrys speaks with two of her Chosen, asking for their help. She believes, as does the Lady, that the Elves must be brought into the world if it is to survive. The two Chosen, one of which is a princess, decide to defy the King and look for a way to help the Ellcrys.
The book ends with a cliffhanger, setting it up for his next book. As I said, I was disappointed with joining the Shannara world with the Knight and the Void world. I liked them as separate series. I wasn't impressed with Logan Tom. Most of his action was in flashbacks and there wasn't much to develop his character as he went along. While I loved Angel and wished for more of her, I think Brooks did an excellent job with Hawk. He was in love with a girl from a compound and the leader of his tribe, yet he always put his tribe first. When he was on the streets, he didn't dwell on her. I guess what I'm saying is that while there was romance, it was in passing and not a huge plot point. Until the end, when it gets him in trouble.
I would recommend this book if you're a huge fan of Brooks, but I would recommend it as the next Word and the Void or as a prequel to the Shannara series. It was good, but not great. I give it three stars out of five.