When this story started to come together, when all the disparate threads started to weave together and create some sort of momentum, this book was suddenly a lot of fun and pretty damn amusing. Unfortunately, it didn't hit that point until about 340 pages in, with 40 pages left to go. While I enjoyed the last forty pages quite a bit, that's not really enough to make up for the way the previous pages didn't really engage me at all.
It's billed as hilarious. At most, I'd say moderately amusing. It's not a terrible book, and I'm not angry I read it. I was just a little bored by it. And here's why:
So little mattered to the main character.
And so, in consequence, I found it hard to have anything that happened matter to me. I don't like these detached, dissociated characters. I'm not interested in them, and their lack of connection to the world to me seems less a statement than lack of attention to writing a vivid character. <i>The Stranger</i> bothered me in the same way, but at least Camus was trying to do something there. In this case, it seems like the author is trying to create a blank slate and I don't think it helps the story.
The inside cover bills this as Forrest Gump, if Forrest Gump were 100, enjoyed vodka and knew how to build explosives. As far as we can tell, Allan Karlsson, the main character doesn't share the intellectual disabilities of Forrest Gump, but his life takes him through a surprising number of world events, including helping build the first atomic bomb, accidentally giving that secret to the Russians, drinking with Truman, saving Franco, not getting along so well with Lyndon B. Johnson, getting along quite well with Mao Tse-Tung, getting sent to a gulag in Vladivostok, etc., etc.
Allan's just not interested in politics, you see, and so he meets these people and doesn't pay attention to the political nonsense they speak, he just wants a drink. But while I think you can get away with a character who isn't as interested in world events as world events are interested in him, I don't think it works to have the main character care about nothing. If world events happen to him and are the backdrop for something that does have meaning to him, then that's one thing. But nothing does. Except maybe a drink. But even that isn't urgent enough to mean that much - he gives up drinking for over five years in Vladivostok, with nary a tremour. It does eventually drive him to leave, but apathetically. It's all apathetically. He does things, with a minimum of effort, but does them. And doesn't care.
For that to be enough to carry the work, everything else would have to be a damn sight more vivid than it is. Instead, it retains that detachment, that apathy, that lack of concern. And I didn't find that funny, I just found it tedious. And although the ending started to bring it together in amusing ways, that was not enough to make me fall in love with this world and this character.
Sunday, 3 November 2013
Monday, 28 October 2013
The Fault In Our Stars by John Green
I was all prepared to bawl when I sat down to this book. For months, this review has been getting an inordinate number of "likes" on Goodreads, with pretty much just a picture of a girl with tears streaming down her face. It's supposed to be emotional. And I am a huge suck. (More with movies than books, but still.)
So, I girded my loins, laid in a supply of Kleenex (actually, I never know where the Kleenex is) and sat down to read and cry.
And didn't. And that's not necessarily a bad thing.
I teared up a tiny bit twice, but I don't think any tears even escaped my eyes.
This is a story about terminally ill teenagers. It's supposed to tug at the heartstrings. But what I actually did enjoy far more than that was the way it mostly avoided easy melodrama, too heroic characters and too much emotional manipulation. It was fairly matter-of-fact. Those who were dying were not saints. They struck me as, well, fairly precocious but not utterly unbelievable teenagers. The emotional manipulation was not overdone. I mean, you're dealing with dying young women and men, there's going to be emotion, but it didn't felt like it was purposefully done to make me feel all the feelings, without much underneath.
But here is what I liked best. None of the characters felt like they were supposed to be representative. I hate it when what I call "issue books" try to come up with representative characters - the mother who is the Mother Who Can't Deal With Her Child's Death and Is In Denial. The Father Who Is Sad and Withdrawn. The Child Who Is Facing Death Bravely. None of that here. These characters were only themselves, and not trying to stand in for textbook descriptions of How People Deal With Terminally Ill Children. I really liked both of Hazel's parents, and who they were and what they did and why.
Yes, the teenagers are precocious. But I've always said I'd rather listen to the witty dialogue of Veronica Mars, however "unrealistic" it might be, than to how teenagers actually talk. Plus, I was pretty precocious myself.
Hazel has terminal cancer, but at the moment the book starts, the growth of her metastases has been arrested by a new miracle drug. No one knows how long it will work, and she's still going to die, but the timeline has been thrown into absolute unknown territory. At a Support Group she hates, she meets a boy who had osteosarcoma, named Gus. Or August. These facts are far more important than his diagnosis.
How do you fall in love when you know you're not going to have a full lifespan? Do you try to stop it from happening, to protect others? What if they don't want to be protected? And is, in the end, the pain worth it?
This book picks its way fairly sensitively through the issues, through snarky and wiseass teenagers, and if I never teared up, I still enjoyed it. (One moment with Hazel's mother, in particular, did bring a tear to my eye.) I've never had to deal with someone young dying of cancer, but I've been up close and personal with someone dying of cancer, and I know some of the moments of waiting, of laughter, of tears, of snark, of grace and of excruciating, unattractive pain. This book does fairly well with those. It didn't make me bawl, it isn't my book of the year, but it's a solid Young Adult entry and Green avoids most of the pitfalls of "issues books" that make me want to tear out my hair in anger.
So, I girded my loins, laid in a supply of Kleenex (actually, I never know where the Kleenex is) and sat down to read and cry.
And didn't. And that's not necessarily a bad thing.
I teared up a tiny bit twice, but I don't think any tears even escaped my eyes.
This is a story about terminally ill teenagers. It's supposed to tug at the heartstrings. But what I actually did enjoy far more than that was the way it mostly avoided easy melodrama, too heroic characters and too much emotional manipulation. It was fairly matter-of-fact. Those who were dying were not saints. They struck me as, well, fairly precocious but not utterly unbelievable teenagers. The emotional manipulation was not overdone. I mean, you're dealing with dying young women and men, there's going to be emotion, but it didn't felt like it was purposefully done to make me feel all the feelings, without much underneath.
But here is what I liked best. None of the characters felt like they were supposed to be representative. I hate it when what I call "issue books" try to come up with representative characters - the mother who is the Mother Who Can't Deal With Her Child's Death and Is In Denial. The Father Who Is Sad and Withdrawn. The Child Who Is Facing Death Bravely. None of that here. These characters were only themselves, and not trying to stand in for textbook descriptions of How People Deal With Terminally Ill Children. I really liked both of Hazel's parents, and who they were and what they did and why.
Yes, the teenagers are precocious. But I've always said I'd rather listen to the witty dialogue of Veronica Mars, however "unrealistic" it might be, than to how teenagers actually talk. Plus, I was pretty precocious myself.
Hazel has terminal cancer, but at the moment the book starts, the growth of her metastases has been arrested by a new miracle drug. No one knows how long it will work, and she's still going to die, but the timeline has been thrown into absolute unknown territory. At a Support Group she hates, she meets a boy who had osteosarcoma, named Gus. Or August. These facts are far more important than his diagnosis.
How do you fall in love when you know you're not going to have a full lifespan? Do you try to stop it from happening, to protect others? What if they don't want to be protected? And is, in the end, the pain worth it?
This book picks its way fairly sensitively through the issues, through snarky and wiseass teenagers, and if I never teared up, I still enjoyed it. (One moment with Hazel's mother, in particular, did bring a tear to my eye.) I've never had to deal with someone young dying of cancer, but I've been up close and personal with someone dying of cancer, and I know some of the moments of waiting, of laughter, of tears, of snark, of grace and of excruciating, unattractive pain. This book does fairly well with those. It didn't make me bawl, it isn't my book of the year, but it's a solid Young Adult entry and Green avoids most of the pitfalls of "issues books" that make me want to tear out my hair in anger.
Thursday, 24 October 2013
Kushiel's Dart by Jacqueline Carey
This book made me start thinking about what fantasy is, what makes something a fantasy book. Is merely setting a book in a world that is not our own, in a vaguely medieval/monarchical setting enough? Do you need magic? Those elements of fantasy? Because at the beginning, I wasn't getting much fantasy out of this fantasy. I was getting plenty else - characters, intrigue, plotting, sex. But not fantasy.
Of course, then the Master of the Straits came along and blew that whole digression out of the water. But if that hadn't been there, the other touches of "fantasy" could equally have been found in what might have been classified as perfectly normal fiction, were it set in our own time and place. Even all the religion, it didn't seem overly fantastical to me.
If Guy Gavriel Kay uses magic to reflect what people in certain places and time periods believed, this is one more step removed from that.
So what is fantasy? Does it need magic?
Anyone want to pipe in?
Because I'm not entirely convinced that just because this is an alternate universe, set in a world that is vaguely reminiscent of the British Isles, just because it's Terre d'Ange and the Skaldi and the Cruithne instead of the Viking and the Picts or Britanni or whatever, that makes it fantasy. It's a continuum, obviously, rather than a binary, but I dislike the idea that books have to slavishly reflect the world just as it is to be shelved in general fiction.
I may be nitpicking here. This digression may not be interesting to anyone but me. So, the book! I really enjoyed it. I found the main character, Phedre, to be interesting and complex. The many sex scenes I found enjoyable, even though I don't share the main character's kink. The turn the story took away from that, just as it might have started to become repetitive, was welcome. The court intrigue took me a little while to get on top of, but was thoroughly engrossing.
This is a damned good fantasy. If you are comfortable with sex and kink in your fantasy. Not, definitely not, for the prudish.
Phedre is dedicated to one of the Houses of the Night Court as a young girl (read: very high end brothels.) But the fleck of red in her eye marks her out as imperfect. At least until someone correctly recognizes it as "Kushiel's Dart," a mark that shows that her own sexual proclivities lie where sex and pain overlap. She is what's called in these books an anguissette.
(But the only one who enjoys pain sexually in three generations of her whole country? Really? I know about the kink scene by rumour more than anything, but I'm pretty sure I know more people who share that kink myself. In this generation. In the circle of people I know.)
At any rate, she is taken on by a former poet and courtier (why he's a former poet is eventually explained), Anafiel Delaunay, who teaches her not only how to use her own nature for pleasure and profit, but how to gather information and analyze political situations. That becomes urgent when he is suddenly betrayed, and Phedre, along with her monk-knight guardian are sold into slavery amongst the Skaldi.
Suddenly, although far from home, Phedre is in the middle of the struggle to save herself, her companion, and her home. And it is to Carey's credit that I was convinced and engrossed all the way through. Phedre is not a fighter, but she is intelligent, resourceful, and creative. The book is also very good at examining levels of consent, particularly in situations where Phedre has no choice.
It's not a particularly fantastical fantasy, but this is an excellent read.
Of course, then the Master of the Straits came along and blew that whole digression out of the water. But if that hadn't been there, the other touches of "fantasy" could equally have been found in what might have been classified as perfectly normal fiction, were it set in our own time and place. Even all the religion, it didn't seem overly fantastical to me.
If Guy Gavriel Kay uses magic to reflect what people in certain places and time periods believed, this is one more step removed from that.
So what is fantasy? Does it need magic?
Anyone want to pipe in?
Because I'm not entirely convinced that just because this is an alternate universe, set in a world that is vaguely reminiscent of the British Isles, just because it's Terre d'Ange and the Skaldi and the Cruithne instead of the Viking and the Picts or Britanni or whatever, that makes it fantasy. It's a continuum, obviously, rather than a binary, but I dislike the idea that books have to slavishly reflect the world just as it is to be shelved in general fiction.
I may be nitpicking here. This digression may not be interesting to anyone but me. So, the book! I really enjoyed it. I found the main character, Phedre, to be interesting and complex. The many sex scenes I found enjoyable, even though I don't share the main character's kink. The turn the story took away from that, just as it might have started to become repetitive, was welcome. The court intrigue took me a little while to get on top of, but was thoroughly engrossing.
This is a damned good fantasy. If you are comfortable with sex and kink in your fantasy. Not, definitely not, for the prudish.
Phedre is dedicated to one of the Houses of the Night Court as a young girl (read: very high end brothels.) But the fleck of red in her eye marks her out as imperfect. At least until someone correctly recognizes it as "Kushiel's Dart," a mark that shows that her own sexual proclivities lie where sex and pain overlap. She is what's called in these books an anguissette.
(But the only one who enjoys pain sexually in three generations of her whole country? Really? I know about the kink scene by rumour more than anything, but I'm pretty sure I know more people who share that kink myself. In this generation. In the circle of people I know.)
At any rate, she is taken on by a former poet and courtier (why he's a former poet is eventually explained), Anafiel Delaunay, who teaches her not only how to use her own nature for pleasure and profit, but how to gather information and analyze political situations. That becomes urgent when he is suddenly betrayed, and Phedre, along with her monk-knight guardian are sold into slavery amongst the Skaldi.
Suddenly, although far from home, Phedre is in the middle of the struggle to save herself, her companion, and her home. And it is to Carey's credit that I was convinced and engrossed all the way through. Phedre is not a fighter, but she is intelligent, resourceful, and creative. The book is also very good at examining levels of consent, particularly in situations where Phedre has no choice.
It's not a particularly fantastical fantasy, but this is an excellent read.
Sunday, 20 October 2013
Foundation and Empire by Isaac Asimov
What does it say that I'm never quite sure which Foundation books I've read? I know I've read two or three, but which ones...that remains a mystery. Part of it is the titles - they're fairly nondescript. Part of it is the stories. But I do like them, so that sounds unwontedly harsh. They run together, though, in my mind.
Someone had described the first Foundation book as being written like a history - a little dry, a little detached, still very interesting. I think I buy that, for the most part, although it's been a long while since I read it.
Foundation and Empire, on the other hand, has quite a bit of immediacy, and if the prose isn't sparkling, it is always sufficient for the story Asimov's trying to tell. I'd never run out and quote a line, rapturously. But I'd almost always be willing to sit down and spend some time with him. And so it is with this one. Which I had read before, but wasn't sure until I sat down, and then, was more than willing to reread.
Foundation and Empire goes through the third and fourth crux moments in the life of the Foundation, out on the edge of the galaxy as they are, trying to survive the death throes of the Empire. Much of the science of psychohistory has been lost, and in some ways, the inheritors of the mantle of the Foundation are becoming complacent and bureaucratic.
But the Empire will not go so quietly. In the first of the two stories that make up this book, one enterprising general actually realizes what's going on out on the fringes of space, and decides to go investigate. How will Seldon's psychohistorical planning deal with this individual, as psychohistory is only the science of groups?
Asimov likes his endings that come with a bit of a twist, and neither story in this book is an exception. You can see his enjoyment of writing mysteries in every book that ends with a revelation of some sort. (I really do enjoy the Black Widows series of short mystery stories.)
But the second part of this novel is more ambitious. How could an individual actually break the Seldon plan? Well, if he's the Mule, he just might, and suddenly, the Foundation finds itself scrambling to deal with an emergency that has nothing to do with what Seldon thought would be happening.
Two low-level Foundation people are on the run with the Mule's jester, just one step ahead of his invading forces, and planets are falling with alarming regularity. Is this a chance to shorten the period of instability to a mere lifetime, or the start of a despotic reign that will ruin all the planning?
The end of the book hearkens forward to the mystery of the Second Foundation, which I believe I have read.
I don't read Asimov because I'm looking for indepth characters or literary prose. I read him because they're good stories, told in a clear if unstriking style, and always enjoy myself.
Someone had described the first Foundation book as being written like a history - a little dry, a little detached, still very interesting. I think I buy that, for the most part, although it's been a long while since I read it.
Foundation and Empire, on the other hand, has quite a bit of immediacy, and if the prose isn't sparkling, it is always sufficient for the story Asimov's trying to tell. I'd never run out and quote a line, rapturously. But I'd almost always be willing to sit down and spend some time with him. And so it is with this one. Which I had read before, but wasn't sure until I sat down, and then, was more than willing to reread.
Foundation and Empire goes through the third and fourth crux moments in the life of the Foundation, out on the edge of the galaxy as they are, trying to survive the death throes of the Empire. Much of the science of psychohistory has been lost, and in some ways, the inheritors of the mantle of the Foundation are becoming complacent and bureaucratic.
But the Empire will not go so quietly. In the first of the two stories that make up this book, one enterprising general actually realizes what's going on out on the fringes of space, and decides to go investigate. How will Seldon's psychohistorical planning deal with this individual, as psychohistory is only the science of groups?
Asimov likes his endings that come with a bit of a twist, and neither story in this book is an exception. You can see his enjoyment of writing mysteries in every book that ends with a revelation of some sort. (I really do enjoy the Black Widows series of short mystery stories.)
But the second part of this novel is more ambitious. How could an individual actually break the Seldon plan? Well, if he's the Mule, he just might, and suddenly, the Foundation finds itself scrambling to deal with an emergency that has nothing to do with what Seldon thought would be happening.
Two low-level Foundation people are on the run with the Mule's jester, just one step ahead of his invading forces, and planets are falling with alarming regularity. Is this a chance to shorten the period of instability to a mere lifetime, or the start of a despotic reign that will ruin all the planning?
The end of the book hearkens forward to the mystery of the Second Foundation, which I believe I have read.
I don't read Asimov because I'm looking for indepth characters or literary prose. I read him because they're good stories, told in a clear if unstriking style, and always enjoy myself.
Friday, 18 October 2013
Wicked by Gregory Maguire
This was another in the series of my bathroom rereads. I had first read Wicked many years ago, and was revisiting it. Coincidentally, this happened at the same time I was listening to an audiobook of The Wizard of Oz, so the two were occupying space in my brain at the same time. (Side note: I don't really recommend the Brooke Shields-read version of The Wizard of Oz. She occasionally breaks into this singsongy way of reading, and it feels patronizing.)
And I have to say, I didn't enjoy it as much the second time. The first time, it was the shininess of something new - why hadn't anyone written from the Witch's perspective before? I was so entranced with the idea that any other flaws pretty much passed me by.
On this read, though, I was suddenly much more critical. I still love the idea, but I'm no longer convinced by the execution. Mostly because the characters are so shallowly explored. If you want to recast the Wicked Witch of the West, then, by gum, you've got to give me a character study! This time, I was noticing the jerkiness, the way the story sort of lurched from episode to episode, without a clear throughline, and with a Witch who was much less well-defined than I had wanted.
I mean, seriously. You have a Witch who's part of an Animal rights underground, and later in the book, she's suddenly a vivisectionist? If you want that kind of veer, you at least have to explain how she justified it to herself. I thought it would be cool if these monkeys had wings is not enough.
You want her to be scarred by her childhood? Would have helped if we'd seen some of that in her formative years, and not then related right near the end. And when it was related, it didn't help make sense of what had gone before. I was just baffled as to the placement. If you want her to be the neglected sister, use that as part of the book, don't just throw in a few vague allusions and then expand in the last hundred pages. If it's that integral to who she would become, it either needs to show up earlier, or be the kind of lightning bolt that truly does recast everything we've seen to that point. It did neither.
This book skirts around much of the Oz mythology, and makes references, but doesn't really take that opportunity to change and mess with it in interesting ways. So what are the Adepts supposed to do? That's kind of dropped. Why does the Wizard become a fascist dictator?
Which was another issue, reading two at once. As far as I'm concerned, you can have the Wizard as the evil despot. but I would have liked to seen the reason for that reign of terror come out of his fear of being unmasked as a humbug. I think that charlatanism is so essential to that character, and "powerful Wizard who came to Oz to find a magic book" just doesn't cut it. There's stuff in the book that you could unmask so beautifully - have Elphaba be the one to figure out that the Emerald City isn't really all emeralds, it's just that everyone is required to wearing locked green goggles at all times! That would be wonderful thing to delve into in a recasting of the legend, the way that what people are told doesn't reflect what is actually happening. Changing it from that to a titanic struggle for magic isn't as much fun.
I like what Wicked is trying to do. On the first read, I really enjoyed it. On reread, and particularly in close proximity to listening to The Wizard of Oz, it felt choppy and a bit clumsy.
And I have to say, I didn't enjoy it as much the second time. The first time, it was the shininess of something new - why hadn't anyone written from the Witch's perspective before? I was so entranced with the idea that any other flaws pretty much passed me by.
On this read, though, I was suddenly much more critical. I still love the idea, but I'm no longer convinced by the execution. Mostly because the characters are so shallowly explored. If you want to recast the Wicked Witch of the West, then, by gum, you've got to give me a character study! This time, I was noticing the jerkiness, the way the story sort of lurched from episode to episode, without a clear throughline, and with a Witch who was much less well-defined than I had wanted.
I mean, seriously. You have a Witch who's part of an Animal rights underground, and later in the book, she's suddenly a vivisectionist? If you want that kind of veer, you at least have to explain how she justified it to herself. I thought it would be cool if these monkeys had wings is not enough.
You want her to be scarred by her childhood? Would have helped if we'd seen some of that in her formative years, and not then related right near the end. And when it was related, it didn't help make sense of what had gone before. I was just baffled as to the placement. If you want her to be the neglected sister, use that as part of the book, don't just throw in a few vague allusions and then expand in the last hundred pages. If it's that integral to who she would become, it either needs to show up earlier, or be the kind of lightning bolt that truly does recast everything we've seen to that point. It did neither.
This book skirts around much of the Oz mythology, and makes references, but doesn't really take that opportunity to change and mess with it in interesting ways. So what are the Adepts supposed to do? That's kind of dropped. Why does the Wizard become a fascist dictator?
Which was another issue, reading two at once. As far as I'm concerned, you can have the Wizard as the evil despot. but I would have liked to seen the reason for that reign of terror come out of his fear of being unmasked as a humbug. I think that charlatanism is so essential to that character, and "powerful Wizard who came to Oz to find a magic book" just doesn't cut it. There's stuff in the book that you could unmask so beautifully - have Elphaba be the one to figure out that the Emerald City isn't really all emeralds, it's just that everyone is required to wearing locked green goggles at all times! That would be wonderful thing to delve into in a recasting of the legend, the way that what people are told doesn't reflect what is actually happening. Changing it from that to a titanic struggle for magic isn't as much fun.
I like what Wicked is trying to do. On the first read, I really enjoyed it. On reread, and particularly in close proximity to listening to The Wizard of Oz, it felt choppy and a bit clumsy.
Thursday, 17 October 2013
The Way of Shadows by Brent Weeks
This isn't terrible, it's just not great. (Yes, I'm back to my whining about generic fantasy. But there's so much of it out there, guys! It's so much rarer to find the really good stuff. The recurring moaning is mostly a function of how much more fantasy I've been reading recently, thanks to the continuing loan of a friend's Kindle. Have I mentioned that while I much prefer to read actual books, there's something delightful in being loaned a friend's entire library and getting to browse through it at my leisure?)
But mostly, I don't think this book knows what it is. It keeps wanting to be dark. Very dark. Dark enough that I physically drew back a few times and considered whether or not this book was really for me. But then, and this is even more irritating, it kept pulling its punches. Think that character was just horribly murdered in front of your eyes? Probably not! A huge massacre at which everyone's supposed to die? Not the characters we have any attachment to!
You don't need to kill everybody, but if you want to write dark, write dark. Don't write DARK and then quickly run away, squeaking "light, light, light!" I might not want to read it if it is truly that dark, but have the courage of your freaking convictions. Don't undercut yourself.
The main character is a streetrat named Azoth. (I've read a lot of these streetrat books recently. Scott Lynch and Patrick Rothfuss do it about a million times better - and Lynch, although his books are not overwhelmingly dark, carries through and does horrible things to characters I loved. And I thank him for it. Yes, I may have issues. Who's asking?) His streetrat friends have horrible things done to them. Azoth manages to get taken on as an assassin's apprentice. But not an assassin. A "wetboy," because a wetboy is way more fearsome and magical than an assassin. I was a little fuzzy on this.
And he grows up and is taught he has to forswear all human connection, and of course, discovers that he can't, and rediscovers his childhood love, and feels guilt, and anger, and it's all okay, I guess, but not really affecting. It didn't latch onto my heart and give it a good wrench at any point.
This is a story of underworld and court intrigue, and it's okay, but not great. The underworld is relatively stable, run by a council. Someone wants to change that. And a foreign empire is planning on attacking.
Also, the female characters are particularly sketchily drawn. They are mostly caricatures, running the traditional gamut (or should that be binary) from the impossibly saintly to the oversexed.
This is fairly generic fantasy, that tries to be darker than it is. The writing style didn't grab me, and the characters weren't that appealing. It's not dire, but there is so much better out there.
But mostly, I don't think this book knows what it is. It keeps wanting to be dark. Very dark. Dark enough that I physically drew back a few times and considered whether or not this book was really for me. But then, and this is even more irritating, it kept pulling its punches. Think that character was just horribly murdered in front of your eyes? Probably not! A huge massacre at which everyone's supposed to die? Not the characters we have any attachment to!
You don't need to kill everybody, but if you want to write dark, write dark. Don't write DARK and then quickly run away, squeaking "light, light, light!" I might not want to read it if it is truly that dark, but have the courage of your freaking convictions. Don't undercut yourself.
The main character is a streetrat named Azoth. (I've read a lot of these streetrat books recently. Scott Lynch and Patrick Rothfuss do it about a million times better - and Lynch, although his books are not overwhelmingly dark, carries through and does horrible things to characters I loved. And I thank him for it. Yes, I may have issues. Who's asking?) His streetrat friends have horrible things done to them. Azoth manages to get taken on as an assassin's apprentice. But not an assassin. A "wetboy," because a wetboy is way more fearsome and magical than an assassin. I was a little fuzzy on this.
And he grows up and is taught he has to forswear all human connection, and of course, discovers that he can't, and rediscovers his childhood love, and feels guilt, and anger, and it's all okay, I guess, but not really affecting. It didn't latch onto my heart and give it a good wrench at any point.
This is a story of underworld and court intrigue, and it's okay, but not great. The underworld is relatively stable, run by a council. Someone wants to change that. And a foreign empire is planning on attacking.
Also, the female characters are particularly sketchily drawn. They are mostly caricatures, running the traditional gamut (or should that be binary) from the impossibly saintly to the oversexed.
This is fairly generic fantasy, that tries to be darker than it is. The writing style didn't grab me, and the characters weren't that appealing. It's not dire, but there is so much better out there.
Wednesday, 16 October 2013
Goodreads, This Is Not Okay
I've been away for a good deal of the past two weeks, so I'm coming to this a little late. And my prevailing emotion isn't anger, it's sorrow. I've been through the schisms and death throes of one of my online homes before, and it appears to be happening again. And I am saddened beyond words.
Let me tell you a little about why I loved Goodreads. It is and was the people. The community of reviewers, of supportive friends and witty allies. I got to talk about books to people who had intelligent things to say. I bared my soul in a few reviews, got very personal, and received amazing and supportive feedback. Hell, without Goodreads, I might not have ever discovered that I liked writing book reviews, let alone that I loved doing so. (Not to mention that ego boost every week when I got to check where I was on the "best reviewers" list. Let's be honest.)
The sale of Goodreads to Amazon worried me, and so I started a blog, to have a backup of my reviews if it became necessary to leave. But I hoped, truly and deeply hoped, it wouldn't come to that. Because I know from experience that when a group of people are scattered to the internet winds like that, you lose people. People you wanted to stay in touch with.
Goodreads' initial actions took their fairly reasonable terms of service on the subject of abuse being heaped on authors and greatly extended them, making it illegitimate to comment on author behaviour. Authors and their works are not easily extricable, and behaviour, I'm sorry, is perfectly legitimate as a source of reviews. If we're delving into libel territory, that's one thing. Acknowledging the public actions or political motivations of an author and saying that's why you choose not to read a book, that's entirely another.
But then their reaction to the dissent around this decision was even more troubling. Many creative, funny people have had innovative responses to the initial decision, and the response has been to crack down on reviews that have nothing to do with author behaviour, but which have been vehicles for dissent. They were deleted for being "off-topic." And we are down a very scary rabbit hole, brothers and sisters, when something as nebulous as "off-topic" is used as a tool for stifling disagreement.
I hadn't intended to leave, myself. And I'm not exactly leaving. I'll still be around to read the reviews of my friends who remain, and participate in the groups. But I won't be giving Goodreads my content anymore. Make no mistake, we are their content providers, and I will not have my reviews be beholden to the new policies they've instituted on both authors and on dissent and being off-topic. My own reviews might not be affected by the new rules, but these rules are not okay. Not even a little. Instead, I'll be posting my new reviews on my blog, and probably on Booklikes, which seems like the best alternative at the moment. I'll also gradually be withdrawing my older reviews, starting with the most popular.
If Goodreads takes a long, serious think about the damage they've been doing, reverses their recent policies on what can and can't be in reviews, and shows that they understand what the core issues here are, then my reviews will be returned to the site. But not until.
I'm so saddened to feel that I have to do this. I am going to miss the community, the comments, the "likes." And did I mention the community? If you want to see what I'm reviewing, please check out my blog, Smorgasbook and drop me a line. But I know I won't have the wonderful audience I have had. I hope perhaps someday we'll coalesce as a community once again, either at Goodreads or the new sparkly book site. If you want me to add you on Booklikes, please leave me a comment with your info.
But staying, right now, feels like tacit consent. And I can't do that.
Let me tell you a little about why I loved Goodreads. It is and was the people. The community of reviewers, of supportive friends and witty allies. I got to talk about books to people who had intelligent things to say. I bared my soul in a few reviews, got very personal, and received amazing and supportive feedback. Hell, without Goodreads, I might not have ever discovered that I liked writing book reviews, let alone that I loved doing so. (Not to mention that ego boost every week when I got to check where I was on the "best reviewers" list. Let's be honest.)
The sale of Goodreads to Amazon worried me, and so I started a blog, to have a backup of my reviews if it became necessary to leave. But I hoped, truly and deeply hoped, it wouldn't come to that. Because I know from experience that when a group of people are scattered to the internet winds like that, you lose people. People you wanted to stay in touch with.
Goodreads' initial actions took their fairly reasonable terms of service on the subject of abuse being heaped on authors and greatly extended them, making it illegitimate to comment on author behaviour. Authors and their works are not easily extricable, and behaviour, I'm sorry, is perfectly legitimate as a source of reviews. If we're delving into libel territory, that's one thing. Acknowledging the public actions or political motivations of an author and saying that's why you choose not to read a book, that's entirely another.
But then their reaction to the dissent around this decision was even more troubling. Many creative, funny people have had innovative responses to the initial decision, and the response has been to crack down on reviews that have nothing to do with author behaviour, but which have been vehicles for dissent. They were deleted for being "off-topic." And we are down a very scary rabbit hole, brothers and sisters, when something as nebulous as "off-topic" is used as a tool for stifling disagreement.
I hadn't intended to leave, myself. And I'm not exactly leaving. I'll still be around to read the reviews of my friends who remain, and participate in the groups. But I won't be giving Goodreads my content anymore. Make no mistake, we are their content providers, and I will not have my reviews be beholden to the new policies they've instituted on both authors and on dissent and being off-topic. My own reviews might not be affected by the new rules, but these rules are not okay. Not even a little. Instead, I'll be posting my new reviews on my blog, and probably on Booklikes, which seems like the best alternative at the moment. I'll also gradually be withdrawing my older reviews, starting with the most popular.
If Goodreads takes a long, serious think about the damage they've been doing, reverses their recent policies on what can and can't be in reviews, and shows that they understand what the core issues here are, then my reviews will be returned to the site. But not until.
I'm so saddened to feel that I have to do this. I am going to miss the community, the comments, the "likes." And did I mention the community? If you want to see what I'm reviewing, please check out my blog, Smorgasbook and drop me a line. But I know I won't have the wonderful audience I have had. I hope perhaps someday we'll coalesce as a community once again, either at Goodreads or the new sparkly book site. If you want me to add you on Booklikes, please leave me a comment with your info.
But staying, right now, feels like tacit consent. And I can't do that.
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