Review: The Light Fantastic

The Light Fantastic by Terry Pratchett

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Well that was really good. Much improved from the first book, and much more in the style of the later Discworld books. I enjoyed it thoroughly!



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Review: The Warlord of Mars

The Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



This one is still enjoyable, but it does drag a little, as nothing substantially new occurs in it. It follows the formula established in the first two books of John Carter again and again falling victim to some nefarious evil-doer (in this case two characters carried over from the last book). Tales of his adventures follow. It's not bad, but if you're not in the mood for more of almost exactly the same, it tends to be a little boring. Also, it's a bit too long to be merely a rehash of the same plot from the last two books, and although Burroughs' writing is never less than serviceable, there's only so many times you can take reading about how much John Carter loves fighting.

All in all, I'd say that if you really liked the first two Barsoom books, you should read this one, but if you were bored by the second one, there will be nothing new here for you.



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Review: Reamde

Reamde by Neal Stephenson

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Truly a good book. I haven't read all of Stephenson's works, but I was worried that the newer his books were, the slower they moved along. Snow Crash remains the fastest-paced of his novels, but Reamde certainly picks up the pace compared to later releases like Anathem.

This is one of the most interesting books I've read in a while. The basic plot is that a computer hacker wrote a virus for users of the fictional game "T'Rain" that just happened to ensnare the Russian mob, a member of whom kidnaps Zula, the niece of the founder of T'Rain. Their plot to wreak vengeance on the hacker goes astray when they run afoul of terrorists bent on sneaking to American and committing acts of terror there.

The official blurb of the book only mentions the "main" character Richard Forthrast, but in reality the book revolves around Zula. Then again, it does center around Richard for a long time at the beginning, but Zula's story grows in scope until it dominates. This is both good and bad. Stephenson being Stephenson, he never seems to feel that too much information is a bad thing. For a long, long time, I thought that this book was about Reamde (the computer virus) and T'Rain. Turns out, both of them are almost entirely irrelevant. And yet Stephenson spends hundreds of pages on Richard and his dealing with the game, which is responsible for getting the story moving along, but not at all for keeping it moving along. As a matter of fact, I thought a subplot was developing along the lines of the break between the "Bright" and "Earthtone" coalitions in the game, which turned out to go nowhere. So there's the main problem with this book: it's just too much information which is unnecessary.

That being said, it's still a really, really great thriller. When events finally get to the point where the terrorists (with Zula in tow) make it to Canada, stuff really starts happening, and it's pretty amazing. Another reviewer said this was like "14 Die Hards in a row" and that's definitely true. May not be a selling point for some, but it is for me! However, all the intense action tends to be broken up by long pauses, at least until the ending. And then it's just amazing!

One of the best things about this book was the characters. The cast is wide and varied, and it's great. To begin with, none of them turn out to be superheros like John McClain (of the Die Hard series) who can do impossible things and survive in the worst of circumstances despite being shot at by a dozen enemies. None of them are James Bond. The couple of guys who do have military expertise use it to great advantage, but are not supermen, so there are no scenes of them mowing down 20 terrorists. The civilians are all special in their own way, but they're still just ordinary people trying to survive an extraordinary situation. And really, that's what makes them great. Zula especially has got to be one of the most heroic yet ordinary person that a book has ever had. Frankly, she's one of my favorite characters of all time, and probably my favorite female character of all time. She's not some shrinking violet, but at the same time she doesn't somehow become a female Punisher taking on all comers. Nor does the author overcompensate by making her either over- or under-sexualized, or a tough-talking wisecracker who can give as good as she gets. She's an intelligent, interesting person who just happens to be thrown in unimaginable circumstances and does her best to survive, and through sheer force of will just happens to do a great job at it. If you read this and don't find yourself saying that Zula is great, there's just something wrong with you.

The other characters on Zula's side are also pretty interesting. Csongor, the big Hungarian computer expert who happens to fall in love with Zula is a very admirable character, as is Yuxia, the little Chinese woman who is determined to come to Zula's aid no matter what. Marlon, the hacker who wrote Reamde is a little less well-fleshed out, but still a cool guy and he adds important points to the story at times. Sokolov, the Russian ex-military "security expert" is the hardass gunman you want on your side. Olivia, the British-Chinese spy lady, is smart and capable, and Seamus, the Boston-Irish terrorist hunter has a smart mouth and is good with a gun. As a matter of fact, I'd go so far as to say that just about all of these people could star in their own books. The only one who's not as well fleshed out is Jones, the terrorist, but he at least is not a cardboard cutout of a jihadist. I would guess that probably Stephenson didn't actually want to delve into the psychology of a terrorist. That's a deep, deep topic in itself and he already had a couple of plots and a dozen characters to worry about.

Stephenson lets his sense of humor come through a lot, and it definitely adds to the appeal. Examples include Yuxia, Csongor and Marlon wash up in the Phillipines and just happen to take a bus carrying European sex-tourists, for one, and in another instance when Sokolov refers to the American separatists as the "American Taliban" for another. The book has moments of humor in the middle of the bleak desperation of the situation, which keeps the mood from ever getting too heavy. It's really a quite good strategy to keep the book from being monotone.

The only real problem of this book is Stephenson's absolute need to just dump pointless facts and information on us about any and every topic addressed. Not that authors can't provide details here and there, but, as an example, when Stephenson says that Richard has noise-cancelling earmuffs for use when he's at the family reunion shooting range, I don't actually need to be told how they work. I mean, if I didn't already know how, I'd assume it was some techno-magical device, which it is. And early on in the book, he spends a lot of time talking about Corporation 9592 (the corporation behind T'Rain) including the feud between the two authors they have working on writing the game, the economic system, the Brights and Earthtones, the arbitrary distinction between good and evil characters, etc, etc. Not to say that it doesn't need to be mentioned, just not at the length of dozens of pages.

Still, despite the obsessive need of Stephenson's to detail absolutely everything going on, this is a fantastic thriller, and I'd recommend it to anybody who's a fan of that genre. This is most certainly not a work of science fiction (that we would normally recognize as such) so if you're into Stephenson for that reason alone, you probably don't want to go near this one.



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Review: The Gods of Mars

The Gods of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Man, what an adventure! This book resumes the story of John Carter ten years later, as he is once again magically (not really) transported to Mars. After that, this book is one of the fastest-paced reads I've ever had! Carter returns only to discover the terrible secret that has lain at the heart of Martian religion for thousands of years, and that his wife, Dejah Thoris, has disappeared. He is reunited with his friend, the Jeddak Tars Tarkas. This is an exciting story and for anyone who likes the first story, it not only compares favorably, but in some ways improves upon it.

My only criticism is that Burroughs' writing is sometimes just too dramatic. It doesn't quite feel natural that John Carter himself would describe the "red mist" coming over his eyes time and time again (since this is written in first-person view). The writing should be a little less flowery, but that doesn't seriously detract from enjoyment of the story.

There's an interesting over-arching theme to this book, and that is that the Martian religion is not only flawed, it leads them to do horrible things in the belief that they have some divine right to do them. While it's never stated explicitly, it seems like the author was at least making some comments on the power of religion to make people behave terribly. Given the otherwise completely pulpy, substance-free nature of the John Carter series, it's quite surprising that he would make such a point about religion in this book. Just another surprise, and one reason why Burroughs can't simply be dismissed as a pulp writer.

All in all, a great follow-up to A Princess of Mars. Well worth reading!



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Review: Singularity Sky

Singularity Sky by Charles Stross

My rating: 0 of 5 stars



This book, like many sci-fi books, has an interesting idea and tries to do too much by building a book around it. The central plot is that an alien intelligence comes to a world which is deliberately trapped in an arrested state where the aristocracy rules over a land of peasants and the economy is mostly agrarian. The aliens drop devices on the planet that can basically grant anyone's wishes, with predictable results on the order and structure of this world.

The other plotline revolves around an agent who is attempting to keep the imperial power from going back in time to defeat what the empire considers an invading enemy. The two plots finally meet at the end, but for the vast majority of the book have very little to do with each other.

While I enjoyed Stross' writing for the most part, the book suffers from the common failing of trying to build a story around an interesting idea. The characters are not truly memorable, although they're serviceable for hanging the plot on. The other problem is that the plot that the author chooses to spend most of his time on (the one about the agents trying to stop the imperial fleet from time travelling) is a lot less interesting than what's happening on the planet. The entire story is driven by the changes happening on the planet, but aside from maybe a total of 40 or 50 pages we don't see what's happening there at all!

The author, in the name of realism, uses a lot of descriptions of the fleet ships, detailing their hulls, weapons, and crew. It honestly gets quite burdensome, even for those of us who read plenty of military fiction. I think he overdoes it. In comparison, David Drake is much more readable in terms of his description both of his military technology and the battles fought. Less is more, as they say.

All in all, I would recommend this book for the average sci-fi reader looking for something to read, but this is another one I would not lead someone into the genre with. I liked it, but it failed to capitalize on its most interesting component, instead choosing to focus on the much less interesting story of the two agents.



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