Across Realtime, book one
Rating - 3: worth reading once (borrow it from a library)
I picked this up because it comes before Marooned in Realtime, and I have missed too many Book 1s lately. Early on I wondered, why hasn't anyone recommended this book to me?
The Peace Authority seized control fifty years ago, amidst the War. Their great power was the bobble: reflective, impermeable spheres that could encapsulate anything. They eliminated military hardware, nuclear weapons, the governments that had them, energy sources, and anything else that might have been a threat to peace or the Peace Authority. Under the Authority, as little as possible has changed, with humanity riding horses on a depopulated Earth, where it might be possible to throw off the yoke of the tyrants who rule in the name of Peace.
Vernor Vinge is an excellent writer. Whether or not you enjoy the plot, you must respect someone who can express the exhilaration of learning and discovery. He makes math tutoring sound like an exciting journey. We have all had epiphanies and had new venues opened by learning; he expresses it in a way that is compelling even if the subject matter is not your thing.
But then, I am not math-averse, so don't trust me.
The plot is nothing unusual for hard science fiction. One scientific breakthrough is the backstory, another is the plot driver. Men of the mind lead the revolution, with a few men of action in support. It is a Heinlein story as told by Asimov.
The enemy is given its due. The protagonists have the great brains, but a manipulative, intuitive thinker backed by force provides solid competition. The book would be far weaker without Della Lu.
Her presence outlines the sexism of the setting. Granted, society has fallen back to the late 1800s, not the most feminist time, and a massive depopulation tends to lead to protectiveness of potential mothers. Once you have reduced women to "potential mothers," most of the work is done there. This is not a criticism of the book, which presents this as an unfortunate development, but you notice when the womenfolk get shuttled off so that the men can get down to business. At the end, we have a time-displaced person who does not seem to even consider that she should think down to that level.
Describing the effects of technology is a strong point for Vernor Vinge. We shape our tools, and then our tools shape us. He introduces computer-to-brain connections and spends time with various perspectives on computer-assisted thought. There is an excellent contrast between the view of it as man-machine interface and accepting the computing capacity as an extension of the self.
Did I just lose people? Think of something you just do, while other people are aware of it as a process they are doing. You drive effortlessly, while a teenager must actively think about where the pedals and buttons are. You IM or text friends as simply as you would wave to them, while your parents think of those as programs they would need to learn. As with the math lessons earlier, Vernor Vinge shows the inside perspective: what it feels like to be that augmented human.
I comment mostly on the writing because it is the basis on which I recommend the book. The story is not bad, but it is nothing you have not seen before. We have the aged master, the young apprentice, the allies, the infiltrator, the traitor, and the dark lord. While the writing is hard sci fi, the plot would not be much different if they were smuggling a hobbit into Mordor instead of bringing the technological weapon to the enemy's base.
The setting is half-post-apocalyptic. We have a ruined world, a victim of war and plagues. Most modern technology has been suppressed with little innovation, except for low-energy computers. Holograms are possible but expensive, while nighttime lighting is easy but more expensive. Cars and lasers are banned, but horses and guns are around. Despite all this, it feels nothing like Firefly, more like Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
The beginning is stronger than the end. The early parts are where we get the characterization, while we have mostly plot by the end.
Amazon link
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Monday, July 13, 2009
Don't Say I Didn't Warn You by Anita Renfroe
Rating - 2: not worth reading (skip it)
Erma Bombeck is dead. Updating her material with references to cell phones and the internet does not improve it.
Not a bad book, with a reasonable perspective looking back after three children, but it has all been said before.
Amazon link
Expected publication: September 2009
Erma Bombeck is dead. Updating her material with references to cell phones and the internet does not improve it.
Not a bad book, with a reasonable perspective looking back after three children, but it has all been said before.
Amazon link
Expected publication: September 2009
Friday, July 10, 2009
Harley Quinn: Preludes and Knock-Knock Jokes by Karl Kesel, Terry Dodson, and Rachel Dodson
Rating - 2.5: parts of it are worth reading once (borrow it from a library)
Kind of cute, but of uneven and not exceptionally high quality. It does not have a lot to recommend it, but if you enjoy this kind of thing, there will be a few things to enjoy.
Harley Quinn: "The Joker's main squeeze, out on her own and out of her mind!" The back cover copy pretty much covers it. She plays with a lot of Batman's rogues gallery, allied or opposed. This collects the seven issues of the Harley Quinn comic book series from 2001.
Harley is a great character, spun for laughs or in the occasional darker version. Here, she stays light even while shooting people. You can forget that she is an insane killer, since the violence tends to look cartoonish when she does horrible things to people. Joker is usually spun in the opposite direction.
Harley does not start in these comics enough for my taste. She shares the spotlight at all times, as if the authors thought she could not carry a comic on her own. Starting with the Joker is obvious, then she immediately tries to be someone else's sidekick, and after deciding to strike out on her own, at least half the page count gets devoted to her henchmen. I hope that later issues let Harley be Harley.
The henchman emphasis can be done well. "A day in the life of a mook" can be a great story, and you can even get a good ongoing series about being a Stormtrooper or other minion. This does not do that, because Harley is jousting with her supporting cast for the spotlight.
She has four Quinntets with a rotating fifth position. Of them, three get one character trait each, and the last is Lewis, probably the best character so far in the series. Lewis is the brains of the mook-dom, and he even gets a bit of characterization. I am hoping that a later issue noted the conflict between his being a sympathetic character and his having gone to work for the Joker. A family man sending money home and making sure his family cashes in on his inevitable demise: fine, but there are far better criminals to work for than the Joker, say the other Gotham criminals who specialize in theft rather than mass murder.
Harley's interaction with Poison Ivy is one of the most commonly used elements of the character, and Ivy shows up in about half the issues. The tension they often have is not here, with Harley in more of a big sister role and both asserting their interests in men. It is a good take on things, with less fan service. It also works with the retcon origin story that explains, amongst other things, how Harley keeps up with the heavy hitters after having been introduced as an insane psychologist.
Let's talk fan service. Harley's outfit is a superhero standard: skin-tight and curve accentuating. For a comic book, her breasts are sane, usually in the C range and rarely swelling for no apparent reason, perhaps still a bit large for a gymnast. I hope she has some support under there, given her tendency to flip around. Oddly, she has a comment about Ivy's having a better figure, when the artists usually draw them with the same body. Someone is very fond of her backside, since she spends an inordinate amount of time bent at a 90+ degree angle. The "slumber party" turns that up a bit: it looks like a normal party, but calling it that fuels fanfic writers who can imagine what happened afterward; they have the entire female villain cast, with the Body Doubles flashing skin everywhere; and there is a scene with a pizza delivery boy. Again, rev up your fanfics, and we will ignore how a delivery boy walked into her hidden lair.
That is not a bad issue, since some of the characters interact well. The first issue, with the Joker, is also strong on characterization, and it introduces the mook banter that will grow later. The Two-Face issue is trash except for a moment when Harley rhapsodizes about romantic insanity. The issue introducing her Quinntets is a rather good one-off with a henchman narrating, mixing fun and darkness in the best combination in this collection. The origin issue is good exposition. The ending double-issue is weak, with a poor Riddler and ... Big Barda, seriously?
There is a B-arc about detectives tracking Harley. It creeps along without going far in these issues. I am not demanding instant gratification, but what makes sense as a background story in a comic does not succeed in a short collected edition. Similarly, the last issue ends at a lead-in to the next issue with no closure to the ongoing arc. As a book, it is horrible structure. I do not know how well a longer collection would have sold, but it might have had better narrative strength.
The seeming need to incorporate so many Batman characters is a weakness. The Penguin appears for two frames. Oracle pops in and pans through the heroic cast. Why Two-Face? Why is the Riddler so horrible? And... Big Barda, seriously? And isn't that like having Harley escape from Thor? They are not exactly on the same power scale.
Let's talk art. There are two styles; comic book standard and the animated series. I like both, and the pages done in the animated style are really great. They do not work together at all. One comic has three pages of animated style in the middle of a fight scene. No. Just no. Because there is more of it, there are more opportunities for the standard style to fail, although the art on Harley is usually very good. I do not like the Joker's look here.
My favorite art pieces: the theme park actors in the first issue; the cover of issue 3; that fan service-y shot greeting the pizza boy (somewhat ridiculous, but really well posed and drawn); Poison Ivy's face at the end of issue 3; the Quinntets' shirt design; pre-Harley Harleen Quinzel; the animated-style fight in issue 6, which would be great if it were not horribly out of place; and any time you put Harley next to big Buster, particularly when they high-five.
Two of my favorite art pieces were two of the things I noted as wrong with the comics. That is emblematic: the best pieces did not fit well in the whole, but there are fun bits.
Amazon link
Kind of cute, but of uneven and not exceptionally high quality. It does not have a lot to recommend it, but if you enjoy this kind of thing, there will be a few things to enjoy.
Harley Quinn: "The Joker's main squeeze, out on her own and out of her mind!" The back cover copy pretty much covers it. She plays with a lot of Batman's rogues gallery, allied or opposed. This collects the seven issues of the Harley Quinn comic book series from 2001.
Harley is a great character, spun for laughs or in the occasional darker version. Here, she stays light even while shooting people. You can forget that she is an insane killer, since the violence tends to look cartoonish when she does horrible things to people. Joker is usually spun in the opposite direction.
Harley does not start in these comics enough for my taste. She shares the spotlight at all times, as if the authors thought she could not carry a comic on her own. Starting with the Joker is obvious, then she immediately tries to be someone else's sidekick, and after deciding to strike out on her own, at least half the page count gets devoted to her henchmen. I hope that later issues let Harley be Harley.
The henchman emphasis can be done well. "A day in the life of a mook" can be a great story, and you can even get a good ongoing series about being a Stormtrooper or other minion. This does not do that, because Harley is jousting with her supporting cast for the spotlight.
She has four Quinntets with a rotating fifth position. Of them, three get one character trait each, and the last is Lewis, probably the best character so far in the series. Lewis is the brains of the mook-dom, and he even gets a bit of characterization. I am hoping that a later issue noted the conflict between his being a sympathetic character and his having gone to work for the Joker. A family man sending money home and making sure his family cashes in on his inevitable demise: fine, but there are far better criminals to work for than the Joker, say the other Gotham criminals who specialize in theft rather than mass murder.
Harley's interaction with Poison Ivy is one of the most commonly used elements of the character, and Ivy shows up in about half the issues. The tension they often have is not here, with Harley in more of a big sister role and both asserting their interests in men. It is a good take on things, with less fan service. It also works with the retcon origin story that explains, amongst other things, how Harley keeps up with the heavy hitters after having been introduced as an insane psychologist.
Let's talk fan service. Harley's outfit is a superhero standard: skin-tight and curve accentuating. For a comic book, her breasts are sane, usually in the C range and rarely swelling for no apparent reason, perhaps still a bit large for a gymnast. I hope she has some support under there, given her tendency to flip around. Oddly, she has a comment about Ivy's having a better figure, when the artists usually draw them with the same body. Someone is very fond of her backside, since she spends an inordinate amount of time bent at a 90+ degree angle. The "slumber party" turns that up a bit: it looks like a normal party, but calling it that fuels fanfic writers who can imagine what happened afterward; they have the entire female villain cast, with the Body Doubles flashing skin everywhere; and there is a scene with a pizza delivery boy. Again, rev up your fanfics, and we will ignore how a delivery boy walked into her hidden lair.
That is not a bad issue, since some of the characters interact well. The first issue, with the Joker, is also strong on characterization, and it introduces the mook banter that will grow later. The Two-Face issue is trash except for a moment when Harley rhapsodizes about romantic insanity. The issue introducing her Quinntets is a rather good one-off with a henchman narrating, mixing fun and darkness in the best combination in this collection. The origin issue is good exposition. The ending double-issue is weak, with a poor Riddler and ... Big Barda, seriously?
There is a B-arc about detectives tracking Harley. It creeps along without going far in these issues. I am not demanding instant gratification, but what makes sense as a background story in a comic does not succeed in a short collected edition. Similarly, the last issue ends at a lead-in to the next issue with no closure to the ongoing arc. As a book, it is horrible structure. I do not know how well a longer collection would have sold, but it might have had better narrative strength.
The seeming need to incorporate so many Batman characters is a weakness. The Penguin appears for two frames. Oracle pops in and pans through the heroic cast. Why Two-Face? Why is the Riddler so horrible? And... Big Barda, seriously? And isn't that like having Harley escape from Thor? They are not exactly on the same power scale.
Let's talk art. There are two styles; comic book standard and the animated series. I like both, and the pages done in the animated style are really great. They do not work together at all. One comic has three pages of animated style in the middle of a fight scene. No. Just no. Because there is more of it, there are more opportunities for the standard style to fail, although the art on Harley is usually very good. I do not like the Joker's look here.
My favorite art pieces: the theme park actors in the first issue; the cover of issue 3; that fan service-y shot greeting the pizza boy (somewhat ridiculous, but really well posed and drawn); Poison Ivy's face at the end of issue 3; the Quinntets' shirt design; pre-Harley Harleen Quinzel; the animated-style fight in issue 6, which would be great if it were not horribly out of place; and any time you put Harley next to big Buster, particularly when they high-five.
Two of my favorite art pieces were two of the things I noted as wrong with the comics. That is emblematic: the best pieces did not fit well in the whole, but there are fun bits.
Amazon link
Monday, July 06, 2009
Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand by Samuel Delany
Rating - 2.5: parts of it are worth reading once (borrow it from a library)
Abandoned at 30%. Not interesting enough to compensate for the disorienting style, and not terribly promising in terms of plot anyway.
The main story involves an industrial diplomat who travels between worlds facilitating something unspecific in the galactic economy. It works towards a discussion of one's "ultimate erotic object," and an example thereof for our protagonist.
Instead, I am going to recommend not reading any of that. Instead, read the prologue as a short story. It runs just under 60 pages, and it is a rather good Shoot the Shaggy Dog story that makes great use of its disorienting style, rather than needing to compensate for it.
The shaggy dog lives in the main story. I think it's better if we pretend that does not happen.
The problem of disorienting style: the text makes up new words (fine), but also re-purposes existing words. This could also be fine, but amongst those words are all the gendered terms in the English language. Once you have re-defined pronouns, you have made things unnecessarily difficult. When one of them is re-defined to have an exclusively sexual denotation, you have re-cast the entire species and the way it speaks in a ridiculously sexually focused way. Seriously, all adults are "she," which oh yes goes beyond the human species, except when they are immediately sexually desired, in which case you refer to them as "he"? Oh, and some words get sub-scripted numbers, for reasons suggested but not explained before I gave up.
The disorientation does good things. The book mostly lets the characters exist in their world, rather than speaking to someone in our world. They do not explain things no one would ever explain. They do a little, which weakens it.
Largely, I am not on board for the book's central conceit. I blame the back text of the current edition in part, which is no fault of Samuel Delany's, for portraying the "perfect erotic object" as a universe-shattering revelation. That is, two people are really really compatible in bed. Because sex is Serious Business (world-shattering sex should not bring Yu-Gi-Oh jokes to mind (in a completely clean sense)). The book itself argues against the idea of how significant it is to be 99.9999999% compatible in a universe with 6000+ inhabited planets; with only billions of people on our one planet, one-in-a-million events happen thousands of times a day.
Then there is the sex itself, which smacks a bit too strongly of Author Appeal. And this is in sci fi, where we have already accepted the Heinlein/Clarke view of sex. There is a furtive, dirty sense of engaging the author's proclivities, as in Darwin's Radio. Part of that is my own heterosexual perspective, although I can respect the perfect recounting of the gay male gaze that remarks on the play of shadow on a vein in a scrotum. Not my thing, but if that is your thing, and you are not put off by his being mentally handicapped, this will have some really great imagery for you.
My apologies for that. Also for the number of TV Tropes links, but once the Serious Business page came to mind, everything in the book came through the TV Tropes prism.
For the right audience, what I have written is a very strong endorsement. If I thought of the book as limited to trying to appeal to a narrow audience, I could recommend it on that basis, even not being interested myself. As it is, I think it fails to speak as universally as it hopes to.
Amazon link
Abandoned at 30%. Not interesting enough to compensate for the disorienting style, and not terribly promising in terms of plot anyway.
The main story involves an industrial diplomat who travels between worlds facilitating something unspecific in the galactic economy. It works towards a discussion of one's "ultimate erotic object," and an example thereof for our protagonist.
Instead, I am going to recommend not reading any of that. Instead, read the prologue as a short story. It runs just under 60 pages, and it is a rather good Shoot the Shaggy Dog story that makes great use of its disorienting style, rather than needing to compensate for it.
The shaggy dog lives in the main story. I think it's better if we pretend that does not happen.
The problem of disorienting style: the text makes up new words (fine), but also re-purposes existing words. This could also be fine, but amongst those words are all the gendered terms in the English language. Once you have re-defined pronouns, you have made things unnecessarily difficult. When one of them is re-defined to have an exclusively sexual denotation, you have re-cast the entire species and the way it speaks in a ridiculously sexually focused way. Seriously, all adults are "she," which oh yes goes beyond the human species, except when they are immediately sexually desired, in which case you refer to them as "he"? Oh, and some words get sub-scripted numbers, for reasons suggested but not explained before I gave up.
The disorientation does good things. The book mostly lets the characters exist in their world, rather than speaking to someone in our world. They do not explain things no one would ever explain. They do a little, which weakens it.
Largely, I am not on board for the book's central conceit. I blame the back text of the current edition in part, which is no fault of Samuel Delany's, for portraying the "perfect erotic object" as a universe-shattering revelation. That is, two people are really really compatible in bed. Because sex is Serious Business (world-shattering sex should not bring Yu-Gi-Oh jokes to mind (in a completely clean sense)). The book itself argues against the idea of how significant it is to be 99.9999999% compatible in a universe with 6000+ inhabited planets; with only billions of people on our one planet, one-in-a-million events happen thousands of times a day.
Then there is the sex itself, which smacks a bit too strongly of Author Appeal. And this is in sci fi, where we have already accepted the Heinlein/Clarke view of sex. There is a furtive, dirty sense of engaging the author's proclivities, as in Darwin's Radio. Part of that is my own heterosexual perspective, although I can respect the perfect recounting of the gay male gaze that remarks on the play of shadow on a vein in a scrotum. Not my thing, but if that is your thing, and you are not put off by his being mentally handicapped, this will have some really great imagery for you.
My apologies for that. Also for the number of TV Tropes links, but once the Serious Business page came to mind, everything in the book came through the TV Tropes prism.
For the right audience, what I have written is a very strong endorsement. If I thought of the book as limited to trying to appeal to a narrow audience, I could recommend it on that basis, even not being interested myself. As it is, I think it fails to speak as universally as it hopes to.
Amazon link
Friday, July 03, 2009
With a Single Spell by Lawrence Watt-Evans
Rating - 3: worth reading once (borrow it from a library)
It's good, maybe a 3.5.
Tobas, apprentice wizard, learned one spell before his master died in his sleep. Setting things on fire is not a bad trick, but it is not a ticket to wealth and comfort, which is all he really wants. Lacking anyone nearby who could provide him with either, he decides to try his luck in the Small Kingdoms. If his luck turns around, maybe someone will teach him more magic, or at least he can see how far he can go with a single spell.
I had trouble getting started because Tobas is not an enormously likable guy. He is quickly identified as a lazy good-for-nothing, the sort who hopes for a life of ease to fall into his lap. He is not a hero. Adventure is uncomfortable and dangerous, two bad things. His ethics are flexible, his drive is low, but at least he is not a whiner.
Much like The Misenchanted Sword, our protagonist is a non-hobbit everyman who is pulled into adventure against his preferences, although not literally conscripted this time. He is an eminently practical fellow, the sort that prefers town and safety to wilderness and danger. He is not particularly interested in honor, glory, power, or romance. Also following Valder, he has one magic ability.
Unlike Valder, Tobas is looking for the easy way out of pretty much everything, rather than thinking of what he can do in this situation. What he lacks in agency, he fails to make up for in desperation. He is adrift, a cork bobbling along, hoping the river drops him on a soft beach somewhere.
In what has been described to me as a defining feature of Lawrence Watt-Evans's writing, Tobas is reasonable. He is not heroic or idealistic, just someone with modest goals and interest in achieving them without additional trouble. He wants an easy job, not heroics. Magic comes along, and he thinks of how it can improve his life. If he learned how to teleport, he would think about opening a courier service or being able to commute a long distance to his job.
I was planning to write about how we was the sort of guy who would never go dragon-slaying. Those are giant, scaled, fanged, flying, fire-breathing monsters: not safe, not worth it. Even if they have treasure, they got it by killing people who had it, which probably means they can kill you (or else you could just go take people's treasure yourself). That seemed like a great example of Tobas's pragmatism, and then someone asks him to help slay a dragon. Can you guess what his take is?
I keep the example because it shows Mr. Watt-Evans's ability to create understandable characters. If less than 20% of the way through a book, you can predict how the character would react, that is a well-established and coherent character. This is not to say that books should be predictable, just that characters should not be driven by plot-induced stupidity or incomprehensible motives. Even if he is driven by the winds of fate, he is still himself.
I enjoy Mr. Watt-Evans's writing, as we follow Tobas across territory and through events. Over time, his lack of initiative becomes a lesser issue, as plot events keep him moving enough for him to always have a natural next step. This puts his laziness in the background and makes use of his practicality. His keen awareness of his own limitations is also endearing.
The plot is simple, with a few key events and facts moving pieces around the board. This leaves time for description, interaction, and a very natural feel of progression. Things are not hurried along the journey, a feeling very much like The Magic of Recluse.
You can also very much feel that this is the author of The Misenchanted Sword. Beyond similarities in characters and story structure, the world is quite obviously shared. Setting aspects mentioned in Sword are mentioned again in Spell, with characters expressing surprise or taking them for granted as appropriate.
You could read this without having read The Misenchanted Sword. It takes place later, so the events of the first book are mentioned in the past tense, but despite that, you would not be able to predict the events of the first book from the second. The relevant events are significant in the plot but not a surprise twist ending. Knowing about the Trojan Horse and the fall of Troy will not hamper your reading of The Iliad, either.
It ends well, again in the style of its predecessor, again quite practical despite unusual events. Both books insert a bit of good fortune near the end, helping the transition to their own interpretations of happy ever after. Amidst many that end on dark, ambiguous, and complicated notes, it is pleasant to have something classic.
So read With a Simple Spell, the story of a poor wizard in a world that is a bit abrasive for his tastes. I am off to imagine how a young Wallace Shawn might play the lead role. He is not quite right for it, but there is a certain something...
Amazon link
It's good, maybe a 3.5.
Tobas, apprentice wizard, learned one spell before his master died in his sleep. Setting things on fire is not a bad trick, but it is not a ticket to wealth and comfort, which is all he really wants. Lacking anyone nearby who could provide him with either, he decides to try his luck in the Small Kingdoms. If his luck turns around, maybe someone will teach him more magic, or at least he can see how far he can go with a single spell.
I had trouble getting started because Tobas is not an enormously likable guy. He is quickly identified as a lazy good-for-nothing, the sort who hopes for a life of ease to fall into his lap. He is not a hero. Adventure is uncomfortable and dangerous, two bad things. His ethics are flexible, his drive is low, but at least he is not a whiner.
Much like The Misenchanted Sword, our protagonist is a non-hobbit everyman who is pulled into adventure against his preferences, although not literally conscripted this time. He is an eminently practical fellow, the sort that prefers town and safety to wilderness and danger. He is not particularly interested in honor, glory, power, or romance. Also following Valder, he has one magic ability.
Unlike Valder, Tobas is looking for the easy way out of pretty much everything, rather than thinking of what he can do in this situation. What he lacks in agency, he fails to make up for in desperation. He is adrift, a cork bobbling along, hoping the river drops him on a soft beach somewhere.
In what has been described to me as a defining feature of Lawrence Watt-Evans's writing, Tobas is reasonable. He is not heroic or idealistic, just someone with modest goals and interest in achieving them without additional trouble. He wants an easy job, not heroics. Magic comes along, and he thinks of how it can improve his life. If he learned how to teleport, he would think about opening a courier service or being able to commute a long distance to his job.
I was planning to write about how we was the sort of guy who would never go dragon-slaying. Those are giant, scaled, fanged, flying, fire-breathing monsters: not safe, not worth it. Even if they have treasure, they got it by killing people who had it, which probably means they can kill you (or else you could just go take people's treasure yourself). That seemed like a great example of Tobas's pragmatism, and then someone asks him to help slay a dragon. Can you guess what his take is?
I keep the example because it shows Mr. Watt-Evans's ability to create understandable characters. If less than 20% of the way through a book, you can predict how the character would react, that is a well-established and coherent character. This is not to say that books should be predictable, just that characters should not be driven by plot-induced stupidity or incomprehensible motives. Even if he is driven by the winds of fate, he is still himself.
I enjoy Mr. Watt-Evans's writing, as we follow Tobas across territory and through events. Over time, his lack of initiative becomes a lesser issue, as plot events keep him moving enough for him to always have a natural next step. This puts his laziness in the background and makes use of his practicality. His keen awareness of his own limitations is also endearing.
The plot is simple, with a few key events and facts moving pieces around the board. This leaves time for description, interaction, and a very natural feel of progression. Things are not hurried along the journey, a feeling very much like The Magic of Recluse.
You can also very much feel that this is the author of The Misenchanted Sword. Beyond similarities in characters and story structure, the world is quite obviously shared. Setting aspects mentioned in Sword are mentioned again in Spell, with characters expressing surprise or taking them for granted as appropriate.
You could read this without having read The Misenchanted Sword. It takes place later, so the events of the first book are mentioned in the past tense, but despite that, you would not be able to predict the events of the first book from the second. The relevant events are significant in the plot but not a surprise twist ending. Knowing about the Trojan Horse and the fall of Troy will not hamper your reading of The Iliad, either.
It ends well, again in the style of its predecessor, again quite practical despite unusual events. Both books insert a bit of good fortune near the end, helping the transition to their own interpretations of happy ever after. Amidst many that end on dark, ambiguous, and complicated notes, it is pleasant to have something classic.
So read With a Simple Spell, the story of a poor wizard in a world that is a bit abrasive for his tastes. I am off to imagine how a young Wallace Shawn might play the lead role. He is not quite right for it, but there is a certain something...
Amazon link
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