Rating - 2: not worth reading (skip it)
This is a weak example of genre fiction, low-magic fantasy adventure. It is not bad, so far as I read, just not worth the time when there are better books to read.
Tiger is a great sword-dancer, a gladiator-cum-mercenary. He is a Southron warrior, hardened by years of sand, sun, and swordplay. Del is a sword-dancer from the north, the pale bearer of a magic blade. Together, they seek her brother, abducted five years ago and taken to the southernmost reaches of the desert.
As an example of first-person characterization, full marks. Tiger is our POV character, and he comes across clearly. He is neither a polished knight nor a brutish thug. He is confident, sexist, and effective at what he does. The writing lets Tiger express himself as a character while providing all the information needed to see past the lens with which he views the world.
And you can see it all. He's a swarthy warrior from the South, fighting with strength and grit; she's a fair warrior from the North, fighting with grace and magic; they fight crime! I predict that he will develop a grudging respect for her skills as a warrior as she tries to prove herself despite his protective nature, and he will come to accept her as an equal but refuse to admit it aloud, if even to himself, because he has his pride and needs to remain a gruff badboy. In future volumes, he will come to full acceptance of her equality, and they will fight side-by-side as a devastating team. For her part, she will see the soul beneath his hardened exterior, and they will fall in love. In future volumes, her scorn will turn to humorous exasperation as he continues to say sexist things or otherwise demonstrate that men just don't understand.
Am I on target? There are a half-dozen books in the series, and I read about a third of the first one. I composed the preceding paragraph at the one-quarter point, and the chapters are fitting the template perfectly. If you have read more and want to contradict me, please. I saw a review that said it really comes together in the last hundred pages, so maybe there is something more than a formula at work here.
Not that formulaic is necessarily bad. You can take a known story and pattern and tell it very well or in an interesting way. This is told pretty well, just not in a way that adds anything if you know the tropes.
Let's try another prediction. In a later volume in the series, maybe the next, Tiger will follow Del into the northern lands, and there he gets to be the fish out of water, chafing under her guidance and scornful of the foolish, alien customs. We should also stick them on a boat sometime, for a nautical adventure and to have fun with the lad from the desert.
As a story, its significant failing (so far) is a lack of reason for it to happen. Tiger and Del meet in a bar (classic!). He lusts after her while ignoring early evidence that there might be something special about her. And then he offers to lead her across a desert, at considerable risk to himself and with no prospect of payment. Why is he doing this? At this point, he has known her for less than an hour, and he has only contempt for her northern female pride. In classic fantasy adventure fashion, everyone joins the quest without much question, but this is way too much effort for even a very nice looking piece of tail. Sexist man, deadly landscape, and he is going to cross it with an insubordinate woman who knows nothing about desert survival and will burn instantly in the sun? Better yet, she claims to share his profession, but her second appearance is after she is defeated by a frightened eunuch and a fat man with a club. Oh, and she is explicitly not interested in him. As he says at the end of the first chapter, not worth the effort. And she trusts him why?
Amazon link
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008
The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman
His Dark Materials, volume 3
Rating - 3: worth reading once (borrow it from a library)
It might not be worth reading without the first two, but it stands sufficiently high on the shoulders of relative giants.
When we last saw them, Lyra had been abducted by her mother and Will stood in the massacre left behind, with angels calling him to fight The Authority. Will first pursues something more important: Lyra. Lyra, meanwhile, wants to find Roger in the land of the dead. We follow them through worlds, beyond death, in the war against The Kingdom, and into new meaning lying beyond.
Hitting the most obvious negative first, the book lacks a summative climax. We have a half-dozen mini-climaxes, some of which work better than others. If one seems to you to be obviously the key event, that probably says more about you than the book. That I am not going to pick one probably says something about me. If anyone wants to discuss that, the comments are open for spoilers, but I am not going to detail the way(s) the series ends.
The writing quality is a little lower. That tends to happen when the books get longer as a series goes on. I presume it means that the editors are being more hands-off. I made a crack about an editor's changing the name of the first book, but I wonder how fair that is. We hear lots of stories about studios turning down The Beatles or harsh editors/producers on the early works of authors/singers/whatever that quickly become famous and recognized as great artists. And then many of them go over the cliff without those editorial restrictions. Those early editors may be more responsible for the great successes than we give them credit for. But I am wandering off topic, since I have no idea who had helped Philip Pullman move from drafts to published editions.
Speaking of cliffs, this never went over. I have always been told that the books descended into anti-religious screed. Having read them all, that's it?! A former nun takes a half-dozen pages to explain how the importance of romantic love drove her from faith, and people are in a panic? It is not even a very good atheist vignette, since it makes the jump from "living according to the dictates of this religion prevents me from fully experiencing life" directly to "there is no God." Maybe that epiphany is more convincing to you.
Yes, the story is literally about making war on heaven to kill a false god. That god is explicitly not the creator, although it is the god worshipped by the churches. Given the metaphysics of the world, it seems closer to panpsychism than atheism, although those two categories are not mutually exclusive. The story is more anti-church than anti-God, which you would think would be an asset given America's numbers of fundamentalist and evangelical believers. It is anti-religion, though mostly in tone and emphasis than in having actual arguments. Mostly, it is anti-authority, hence fighting The Authority.
Will is the best example of that. The previous book established him as a killer, from his first scene to his last ones. Will defies that. He tells every authority that presents itself not to tell him what to do, because he will resent it no matter what and it is better for him to make his own choices. If that was not reinforced enough, he is always praised for doing so. Hmm, maybe this is why parents want to keep the books away from their kids.
Lyra meanwhile is following her destiny. Her arc is odd. She is utterly driven to see Roger. I know she feels responsible for his death, but that is a heck of a motive to push her through events. It is not unrealistic, given the Subtle Knife, but there is another large jump between "he followed me into a trap" and "therefore I must physically go to the land of the dead and apologize." The previous two books set their protagonists on paths that would not have been available 30 seconds before or after they happened upon them, and both remark upon that. This book instead depends on this rather unusual compulsion. Triple bonus points, however, for the chapter title, "Suburbs of the Dead."
Spyglass does a good job of pulling in far-flung threads. Foreshadowing is applied quietly and well in advance. Elements are retrieved from previous books. It unifies quite a bit. It also manages to spin some new ideas and develop them at sufficient length.
The power level is erratic. You know those books where the enemy is a great warrior or monster, who opens the story by single-handedly defeating an army or arm-wrestling a giant, only to inexplicably become a weakling for the final confrontation? It is not quite that bad here, but capabilities are scaling up or down for dramatic purposes. A battlefield with artillery and helicopters also includes horsemen with nets when we need a smaller threat, and angels have extraordinary perception except when they cannot hear things in the same room. Mrs. Coulter's charisma continues to gain superpowers.
On a side note, Mrs. Coulter is the Darth Vader of this series, right? She is the evil parent who may be redeemed. She first appears as a dangerous agent under others' command, but in later volumes she is (retconned into?) one of the most powerful people in the setting. And then there is her last scene... Okay, back to topic.
The book has a few major events for Will and Lyra, each taking several chapters, punctuated by the activities of the rest of the cast. These activities thread together well, so this is good. It does give an odd feeling that, while universe-altering events are happening, not much is going on. This would be Will and Lyra's perspective, as they lead a character-driven story in the midst of an epic event-driven story, and they are never fully told about those events. The mesh is somewhat like the weapon that Iorek Byrnison forges: quite effective, but with overlapping seams when you look closer.
They are most noticeable in the last quarter of the book, when the character-driven story has taken over but the event-driven story is trying to poke its head in. If you thought one of the earlier climaxes was the real one, this will feel like a really long denouement. If you chose the last one, it still winds a bit. This is also when the preachy bits get added, granted by the religious figures. I do not just mean the anti-Authority comments; an angel descends from the sky to dispense life lessons, although that is perfectly fair given the context of the story.
Why you would listen to the angels, given the rest of the books, is questionable. The books' metaphysics also call into question the veracity of the alethiometer, given that it is Dust-powered. It is always right and honest? It has recommendations and an agenda. Luckily, Dust seems to have sided with The Adversary over The Authority, although enemy alethiometers work just fine.
On the whole, worth reading, though I am tempted to recommend just stopping after whatever feels to you like the climax of the story. But we are readers, and you have come this far, so you will finish it out.
Amazon link
His Dark Materials:
Rating - 3: worth reading once (borrow it from a library)
It might not be worth reading without the first two, but it stands sufficiently high on the shoulders of relative giants.
When we last saw them, Lyra had been abducted by her mother and Will stood in the massacre left behind, with angels calling him to fight The Authority. Will first pursues something more important: Lyra. Lyra, meanwhile, wants to find Roger in the land of the dead. We follow them through worlds, beyond death, in the war against The Kingdom, and into new meaning lying beyond.
Hitting the most obvious negative first, the book lacks a summative climax. We have a half-dozen mini-climaxes, some of which work better than others. If one seems to you to be obviously the key event, that probably says more about you than the book. That I am not going to pick one probably says something about me. If anyone wants to discuss that, the comments are open for spoilers, but I am not going to detail the way(s) the series ends.
The writing quality is a little lower. That tends to happen when the books get longer as a series goes on. I presume it means that the editors are being more hands-off. I made a crack about an editor's changing the name of the first book, but I wonder how fair that is. We hear lots of stories about studios turning down The Beatles or harsh editors/producers on the early works of authors/singers/whatever that quickly become famous and recognized as great artists. And then many of them go over the cliff without those editorial restrictions. Those early editors may be more responsible for the great successes than we give them credit for. But I am wandering off topic, since I have no idea who had helped Philip Pullman move from drafts to published editions.
Speaking of cliffs, this never went over. I have always been told that the books descended into anti-religious screed. Having read them all, that's it?! A former nun takes a half-dozen pages to explain how the importance of romantic love drove her from faith, and people are in a panic? It is not even a very good atheist vignette, since it makes the jump from "living according to the dictates of this religion prevents me from fully experiencing life" directly to "there is no God." Maybe that epiphany is more convincing to you.
Yes, the story is literally about making war on heaven to kill a false god. That god is explicitly not the creator, although it is the god worshipped by the churches. Given the metaphysics of the world, it seems closer to panpsychism than atheism, although those two categories are not mutually exclusive. The story is more anti-church than anti-God, which you would think would be an asset given America's numbers of fundamentalist and evangelical believers. It is anti-religion, though mostly in tone and emphasis than in having actual arguments. Mostly, it is anti-authority, hence fighting The Authority.
Will is the best example of that. The previous book established him as a killer, from his first scene to his last ones. Will defies that. He tells every authority that presents itself not to tell him what to do, because he will resent it no matter what and it is better for him to make his own choices. If that was not reinforced enough, he is always praised for doing so. Hmm, maybe this is why parents want to keep the books away from their kids.
Lyra meanwhile is following her destiny. Her arc is odd. She is utterly driven to see Roger. I know she feels responsible for his death, but that is a heck of a motive to push her through events. It is not unrealistic, given the Subtle Knife, but there is another large jump between "he followed me into a trap" and "therefore I must physically go to the land of the dead and apologize." The previous two books set their protagonists on paths that would not have been available 30 seconds before or after they happened upon them, and both remark upon that. This book instead depends on this rather unusual compulsion. Triple bonus points, however, for the chapter title, "Suburbs of the Dead."
Spyglass does a good job of pulling in far-flung threads. Foreshadowing is applied quietly and well in advance. Elements are retrieved from previous books. It unifies quite a bit. It also manages to spin some new ideas and develop them at sufficient length.
The power level is erratic. You know those books where the enemy is a great warrior or monster, who opens the story by single-handedly defeating an army or arm-wrestling a giant, only to inexplicably become a weakling for the final confrontation? It is not quite that bad here, but capabilities are scaling up or down for dramatic purposes. A battlefield with artillery and helicopters also includes horsemen with nets when we need a smaller threat, and angels have extraordinary perception except when they cannot hear things in the same room. Mrs. Coulter's charisma continues to gain superpowers.
On a side note, Mrs. Coulter is the Darth Vader of this series, right? She is the evil parent who may be redeemed. She first appears as a dangerous agent under others' command, but in later volumes she is (retconned into?) one of the most powerful people in the setting. And then there is her last scene... Okay, back to topic.
The book has a few major events for Will and Lyra, each taking several chapters, punctuated by the activities of the rest of the cast. These activities thread together well, so this is good. It does give an odd feeling that, while universe-altering events are happening, not much is going on. This would be Will and Lyra's perspective, as they lead a character-driven story in the midst of an epic event-driven story, and they are never fully told about those events. The mesh is somewhat like the weapon that Iorek Byrnison forges: quite effective, but with overlapping seams when you look closer.
They are most noticeable in the last quarter of the book, when the character-driven story has taken over but the event-driven story is trying to poke its head in. If you thought one of the earlier climaxes was the real one, this will feel like a really long denouement. If you chose the last one, it still winds a bit. This is also when the preachy bits get added, granted by the religious figures. I do not just mean the anti-Authority comments; an angel descends from the sky to dispense life lessons, although that is perfectly fair given the context of the story.
Why you would listen to the angels, given the rest of the books, is questionable. The books' metaphysics also call into question the veracity of the alethiometer, given that it is Dust-powered. It is always right and honest? It has recommendations and an agenda. Luckily, Dust seems to have sided with The Adversary over The Authority, although enemy alethiometers work just fine.
On the whole, worth reading, though I am tempted to recommend just stopping after whatever feels to you like the climax of the story. But we are readers, and you have come this far, so you will finish it out.
Amazon link
His Dark Materials:
- The Golden Compass (originally: Northern Lights)
- The Subtle Knife
- The Amber Spyglass
Friday, April 04, 2008
Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk
Rating - 3: worth reading once (borrow it from a library)
Oddly, I liked the film version of Fight Club better than the book. I saw it first, and I liked the direction it took. Fight Club is a rather philosophical film/book with surprisingly little violence, but what it does have is quite visceral. Snuff takes the same approach to porn, with sex instead of violence.
Cassie Wright has decided to end her career as a porn star with a bang, a six-hundred-man gang bang. Snuff is set backstage where the men, stripped to their underpants, wait to be called in small groups for their turns. We see this through the eyes of the cast wrangler; #137, a former TV star in search of publicity; #72, who might be Cassie's long-lost son; and #600, a pro who was Cassie's first film partner, now scheduled to be her last. Why "Snuff"? As the first chapter tells you, someone is not making it out of this filming alive.
Or maybe not. Every character is wrong or lying about something, and half-truths are the most interesting lies. Every character has in some way had his or her life destroyed by pornography. No one is very likely to have a better life as a result of this film, although everyone seems to think he knows how to come out ahead.
The book is clearly far from celebratory of porn, but it does not go so far as to condemn. A phrase recurs throughout the book: do we prevent people from making bad or self-destructive choices? Maybe this is a least-bad option for some. The worst case scenario is certainly safer than that of skydiving. But few will find it a radically life-affirming vocation.
There are other phrases that appear throughout the book, and I would quote them except that they are supposed to be checked against the final printed edition. Mine is an advance galley copy, so it is possible for words to change. I may edit them in later. There is an epigram every few chapters, the sort you would see in a little gray box on the side of a review in the print edition. There are lots of lines to reuse from this book.
There are also many anecdotes, the various kinds of self-torture Hollywood folks have used to make themselves look just right: lying in a tub full of ice, intentionally catching diseases, and toothpick-based mini-face lifts. Less painful tricks involve natural skin care solutions. More painful stories involve silent film stars who killed themselves with alcohol or more dramatic means when talking pictures ended their careers.
This book comes at what might be the end of an era in film, pornographic or not. High definition is supposed to let you see the very pores on actors' faces. Who wants that? Now we can all have Gulliver's experience of realizing how horrible everyone looks when magnified. At sufficient resolution, all makeup looks like an undertaker applied it. Do you prefer paint or pores and pimples with your porn?
Despite the preceding paragraphs of suffering and destruction, this is not a painful book or much of a downer. It is gritty, visceral, and sticky. It maintains a sense of absurdity or detachment as necessary. Our protagonists' perspectives are usually odd enough to keep them from despair (except when they're not enough). You are getting that view in high definition, but you need not feel personally polluted.
And then it ends on a twist. Not the twist that was telegraphed; you saw that one coming. Not even the twist that had fainter foreshadowing. We all know how stories end, and the book takes us there. Then somewhere else. And then again. In one sense, it is a clear and logical path, but in another, you really have not finished until you read the last page.
When a book is worth reading to the very last page, that is a good sign.
Amazon link
I believe a physical impossibility is included, but we can nitpick in the comments.
Scheduled publication: May 2008
Oddly, I liked the film version of Fight Club better than the book. I saw it first, and I liked the direction it took. Fight Club is a rather philosophical film/book with surprisingly little violence, but what it does have is quite visceral. Snuff takes the same approach to porn, with sex instead of violence.
Cassie Wright has decided to end her career as a porn star with a bang, a six-hundred-man gang bang. Snuff is set backstage where the men, stripped to their underpants, wait to be called in small groups for their turns. We see this through the eyes of the cast wrangler; #137, a former TV star in search of publicity; #72, who might be Cassie's long-lost son; and #600, a pro who was Cassie's first film partner, now scheduled to be her last. Why "Snuff"? As the first chapter tells you, someone is not making it out of this filming alive.
Or maybe not. Every character is wrong or lying about something, and half-truths are the most interesting lies. Every character has in some way had his or her life destroyed by pornography. No one is very likely to have a better life as a result of this film, although everyone seems to think he knows how to come out ahead.
The book is clearly far from celebratory of porn, but it does not go so far as to condemn. A phrase recurs throughout the book: do we prevent people from making bad or self-destructive choices? Maybe this is a least-bad option for some. The worst case scenario is certainly safer than that of skydiving. But few will find it a radically life-affirming vocation.
There are other phrases that appear throughout the book, and I would quote them except that they are supposed to be checked against the final printed edition. Mine is an advance galley copy, so it is possible for words to change. I may edit them in later. There is an epigram every few chapters, the sort you would see in a little gray box on the side of a review in the print edition. There are lots of lines to reuse from this book.
There are also many anecdotes, the various kinds of self-torture Hollywood folks have used to make themselves look just right: lying in a tub full of ice, intentionally catching diseases, and toothpick-based mini-face lifts. Less painful tricks involve natural skin care solutions. More painful stories involve silent film stars who killed themselves with alcohol or more dramatic means when talking pictures ended their careers.
This book comes at what might be the end of an era in film, pornographic or not. High definition is supposed to let you see the very pores on actors' faces. Who wants that? Now we can all have Gulliver's experience of realizing how horrible everyone looks when magnified. At sufficient resolution, all makeup looks like an undertaker applied it. Do you prefer paint or pores and pimples with your porn?
Despite the preceding paragraphs of suffering and destruction, this is not a painful book or much of a downer. It is gritty, visceral, and sticky. It maintains a sense of absurdity or detachment as necessary. Our protagonists' perspectives are usually odd enough to keep them from despair (except when they're not enough). You are getting that view in high definition, but you need not feel personally polluted.
And then it ends on a twist. Not the twist that was telegraphed; you saw that one coming. Not even the twist that had fainter foreshadowing. We all know how stories end, and the book takes us there. Then somewhere else. And then again. In one sense, it is a clear and logical path, but in another, you really have not finished until you read the last page.
When a book is worth reading to the very last page, that is a good sign.
Amazon link
I believe a physical impossibility is included, but we can nitpick in the comments.
Scheduled publication: May 2008
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