Waterstone Media

Adventure Stories

Knife of Dreams

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Finally!

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I really did not like books 8, 9, and 10 of Wheel of Time. I stand by those claims. But I’ve never experienced a turnaround in quality so abrupt as in book 11. I went from thinking how horrible finishing this series might be to becoming excited once again. It’s like Christmas, where the last few gifts you opened weren’t very good, but then someone brings out one last hidden gift, bigger than any other, and you’re excited all over again.

Calling the pace of the last few books “glacial” is an insult to all glaciers, which move much faster than Jordan’s narrative in 8, 9, and 10. Here in 11, the pace gets cranked up. Every chapter has something important happening that moves the plot forward.

Not only that, but this book has some of the most incredible magical battle scenes I’ve ever read, which were a true delight to read. It reminded me of the earlier books, where the fights left me in awe of Jordan’s imagination.

I’m also impressed by just how powerful and pervasive the magic is in Wheel of Time. I feel like modern conventions put harder limits on magic, but in Wheel of Time, the magic of individuals can cause illusions over an entire continent and cause the entire structure of reality to shift. It’s an exciting, exciting read.

Onward to 12!

Altered Carbon

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Violent, visually stunning, and captivating, Altered Carbon caught my imagination from the pilot episode and wouldn’t let up. It’s one of the few Netflix shows I’ve ever even attempted to binge-watch, and it rapidly became one of my new favorites.

The show isn’t for everyone, but this, in my mind, is actually a strength of this new wave of shows from Netflix, Amazon, and the rest. The show never apologizes for itself, and while the violent scenes, the physical and psychological torture, and the world itself may be off-putting to some, the shown never dulls its material to make it more palatable. This is a world where bodies have become almost meaningless, and the show reflects that. It certainly makes viewing some scenes uncomfortable at times. But I would argue the show is better because of it.

I personally liked this show for three reasons:

The first is that the characters are well developed and tie together in interesting ways. There are no angels or demons here, but a wide variety of people with a wide variety of motivations. For me, that’s a powerful sign of good storytelling, and I became involved in the story even through minor characters. Characters end up clashing against one another because of their motivations, not because of their inherent goodness or badness.

I also loved this show because of the world that it built. Perhaps more than anything, this was the quality of the show that immediately drew me in. Like a lot of my favorite science fiction, it posits a simple question: what if we could store our consciousness on a disc? What would that world end up looking like? It influences economics, space travel, daily life, religious belief, and fighting. Through examples both large and small, we get glimpses of what this world is like.

In fact, if I had a complaint about this show, I would have loved for it to have slowed down and spent more time in the world. Yes, it would have messed with the pacing, but to me this was one of the most fascinating pieces and I would have loved to spend more time on it.

Finally, I liked the ambition of the piece. This story spans worlds, lifetimes, and more. It’s not all that often we see big-budget original sci-fi, and this one went for everything. More than anything, I want this to do well simply so Netflix and the other streaming services will put more money into making more shows like this.

That, to me, would be the biggest success.

The Leftovers review

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I’m not sure I’ve encountered a book in recent memory that got me as emotionally involved as The Leftovers. I’ve been done with the book now for over a week, and I’m still sitting with it, trying to decide whether or not I love it or hate it.

I am aware that the book has been made into a series by HBO, a series which actually answers some of the questions not addressed in the novel. However, I’ve only gotten a brief overview of the show from a friend, and so this review is of the book and the book alone.

If there is one statement that encompasses my feeling of the book it is this: The Leftovers steadfastly refuses to be the book I want it to be. Love or hate, I think that statement is the root of my challenge with this book.

The premise of the book is simple. A rapture-like event happens, where some portion of humanity simply disappears one day. The event appears to be random. The story takes place years after the Sudden Disappearance, as it becomes known.

The challenge for me is that when you have a precipitating event like that, I want the story to be about that event. But here, it’s not. In fact, there’s not really an overarching plot line at all. The story generally follows a family as they attempt to go on with their lives, but it is a more Crash-like structure, where the plot lines are only loosely intertwined. The book draws meaning out of the mundane (which it does very well), but there’s no desperate page-turning here, nothing pulling you forward.

The best comparison I can think of is Neal Stephenson’s Seveneves. In that book, the precipitating event is the moon being destroyed, but the event, like in The Leftovers, is never explained. However, the difference is that I felt like Seveneves still circled around the event, dealing with humanity as we struggled to survive the calamity. In The Leftovers, the story feels more like a family drama, just set in a world where this really incredible event happened.

Ultimately, for me as a reader, I alternated between thinking the book was brilliant (which I really think it is in parts), and boring, as there was nothing really pulling my attention to the next page.

This review is already getting long, so I’ll finish with some other pro/cons if you’re interested in the book.

Pros:

  1. An amazing ability to cast everyday events in a new light after traumatic events.
  2. Some of the most compelling writing I’ve ever encountered about how reasonable people could be drawn into cults.
  3. A realistic depiction of how most people would probably deal with a rapture-like event.

Cons:

  1. A realistic depiction of how most people would probably deal with a rapture-like event. (see what I did there?) This was frustrating to me because I wanted people to rise above their limitations, which I don’t really think we see in this book. I wanted at least one character to make a truly heroic choice or decision, but most people were just concerned about appearances and sex.
  2. No real conclusion. This might be a more personal one, but I really didn’t feel like anyone’s story really wrapped up. There was no overarching plot arc to close, but it even felt like the characters never completed their arcs either.

Overall, I’ll give this a 3/5, because I really do think there are some brilliant moments here.

The Paladin

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Picking up The Paladin has been an interesting experience. It’s an older standalone fantasy book that was first published in 1988 and has since been largely forgotten, I believe. The author is the fantastic C.J. Cherryh, of whom I’m a fan. She has an amazing collection of work, and if one hasn’t read her yet, one probably should at least sample her work.

I’ve had the mass-market paperback for years now, and it was one of the few fantasy books I read back when I was in middle school. My memories of my first read-through are vague. I remembered a strong warrior and a woman who comes to train with him. I specifically remember a scene where he orders her to carry water up a hill and back down to strengthen her.

I didn’t remember (and was probably too young to notice) just how much of the book was openly sexual. Strangely enough, I didn’t remember that the book was set in an east-asian themed land either.

This book can be best be divided into two halves (although not formally). The book follows a self-exiled swordmaster named Shoka and a female pupil, Taizu, who longs to study under him. Roughly, and without trying to give too much away, the first half of the book is about the two’s training and developing relationship, and the back half becomes a quest.

The first half is tight and beautifully written. Love or hate the characters (and its perhaps likely you’ll do both), the first half is filled with the insight and wisdom that I believe defines Cherryh’s work. The second half quickly becomes a confusion of names and events, that while not poor, don’t match the promise of the first half.

If you’re interested in non-medieval European fantasy, this is certainly a solid option. The first half, in particular, is very well done. However, if you’re looking to dive into Cherryh’s work, I might perhaps suggest a different starting point.

Chamber of Secrets

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It happened faster than I expected, but I ended up reading the second Harry Potter almost right behind the first.

The short review is that I really liked it, even better than the first, actually.

Minor Gripes:

Through the second book, I still don’t much like Harry Potter. Like Ted in How I Met Your Mother, the main character seems to be the most boring and pointless. To me it feels like all we know about him is that he’s important (because everyone keeps saying so), he’s powerful and a natural at some things (although he doesn’t ever seem to study or practice much unless its required of him), and that he has a remarkable ability to charge into trouble without really thinking about what he’s doing.

I wasn’t a huge fan of how the final battle here was resolved, as only part of it seemed due to choices or attitudes of the characters.

But overall, these are minor quibbles. They didn’t detract much from the overall enjoyment of the book.

What I loved:

I liked that this book felt a little tighter than the first. Between having to do an enormous amount of world-building in the first book and stuff action and adventure into every page, I really felt as though the first book was just too much, too fast. That feeling, by the way, was reinforced as I re-watched the first movie. Wow! There was a lot stuffed into that book! In this book the world-building felt much more intertwined with the story.

I can still see why these books have become the phenomenon that they have. Rowling hits all the right notes, over and over, and its a quick and easy read. I’m pretty sure I plowed through it in only two or three nights, and I enjoyed it a lot.

So yes, I might be late to the party, but it’s still a fun one to join.

I read Harry Potter!

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It may surprise people to learn that I’ve never read Harry Potter. In fact, for a very long time, I knew almost nothing about the world. I knew it was huge, obviously, but that was about it. I think it was about three years ago my wife asked me to watch the movies with her and I agreed. I generally enjoyed them, but also made a fair bit of fun at them.

When Harry Potter first came out, I was in high school, and being the rebellious young man that I was, I avoided anything that was popular. If everyone else was reading it, I stayed far away. Even after I grew up, I just never really got around to reading them.

I finally decided 2018 was the year to give them a shot, and I sat down and read the first Harry Potter. And after all those years, what did I think?

It was good.

I’m not over the moon about it. I’m not considering renaming my daughter after Harry Potter characters or anything like that, but it was good.

I should also say: I don’t read much YA/middle-grade literature. I have nothing against it, it just usually doesn’t do it for me. But as I was reading I kept thinking: this book is the epitome of YA lit. It’s fast paced, funny, and full of mystery and adventure.

I did think Harry Potter was a boring and borderline flat character in his own book. Everyone else was much more interesting, although I expect that to change as the series continues. Also, at times I just wanted to scream at all of them to stop getting into mischief and just relax for a chapter, but my pleas fell on deaf pages.

So, although Harry Potter will probably not be my favorite read of 2018, I really enjoyed it, and I’m looking forward to reading future installments. I can see why it’s so well loved.