4 posts tagged “fantasy”
I read about Crystal Rain on Pat's Fantasy Hotlist. I couldn't resist the idea of Caribbean pirate steampunk. I read about The Lies of Locke Lamora on many blogs, including Pat's. I don't know if I needed to read another fantasy about a thief, but how could I resist reading about the leader of the Gentlemen Bastards?
But I found too often that the writing itself annoyed me. For example, the book starts with a chase through a crowded market. Nice action scene. Except when the action stopped for a brief paragraph describing someone's clothing. That might have fit if a character had also stopped, but in the middle of a chase, I expect description to be woven into the action.... a detail here and there as the action proceeds. Other places I felt like the writing could have been tighter and with fewer "X was Y" constructions. But maybe that's just me being a writer.
I expected to love Blood and Iron. I loved Elizabeth Bear's science fiction trillogy (Hammered, Scardown, Worldwired) so much that I gave it as a gift to several people. And I love urban fantasy.
Unfortunately, I didn't love Blood and Iron. The story was
interesting, and the characters intriguing. But somehow they just
didn't grip me. Only in a few places (mostly in the final 25%) did I
care so much that I couldn't stop reading.
Blood and Iron is about the ongoing war between fairy and humankind, and about key emotionally damaged people involved in this war. Part urban fantasy, part twisted Arthurian legend, it twists everything fairy into it's own story.
I think the problem was that I didn't care much about the main character (Elaine Andraste) until far into the book. For much of the book, I didn't see her as having a goal or a specific problem to overcome.
But it is quite cool what Elizabeth Bear does with
fairy tales, especially with the Arthurian legend. I might check out
the next book in this series, Whiskey and Water, because the implied main character of that book already intrigues me. And I'll definitely pick up her next science fiction - Carnival.
This book is about someone with the weirdest family ever. Seriously - his father is a mountain, his mother is a washing machine, one of his brothers is an island, and another is a set of 3 nesting dolls.
When I started this book, I couldn't get into it and thought I might not finish it. I couldn't relate to the story of Allen's family, and I wasn't overly enthusiastic about his plans to create free internet access throughout Toronto.
But I stuck with the book, as it wasn't bad and eventually I started liking it. It really clicked for me when it got into his attempts to be normal and fit in with normal society. At that point I could put up with the super-weird family, because I felt they existed to make his background weirder than anyone real ever.
