B. Morris Allen

Speculative stories of love and disaster

Gormenghast  - Quentin Crisp, Mervyn Peake I think I'd only read Gormenghast (the book) once before, maybe twice, whereas I've read the first book, [b:Titus Groan|39063|Titus Groan (Gormenghast, #1)|Mervyn Peake|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327871204s/39063.jpg|3250394], multiple times. Unsurprisingly, I didn't remember this second book nearly as well as I did the first.

The second book is also simply not as strong a book as the first. Titus Groan is chock full of dark images and heavy symbolism seen through an obscuring cloud of gloom. In Gormenghast, in contrast, Peake literally comes straight out and tells the reader what the symbols are. This is most evident in the first 50-100 pages, but also occurs toward the end, when Titus is making his plans for the future. One character, the 'Thing', is clearly created purely for symbolic purposes, and it's disconcerting that Peake removes all possibility of mystery by telling us exactly what the character's meaning is.

That character is itself an awkward construct. While most of the new characters introduced in this book are decently put together - the Professors as a corps, and to some extent as individuals, some, such as this special one, seem more like afterthoughts. It's incongruous, then, for this one to play (we're told) such a central role on Titus' life.

Peake does a nice job of reconnecting with other characters, and tieing them back into the castle's (and Titus') story. The Countess, the Bright Carvers, and the Doctor all play important roles. Flay, while central, seems less fully developed, which is odd, since it seems clear that Peake fully intended this return to prominence. Peake also resolves Fuchsia's plotline in a seemingly offhanded manner.

The plot itself itself is interesting. Steerpike develops in a credible way. There's a key flood whose mechanics are questionable, but then Gormenghast is not tied too closely to reality. There's quite a lot of humor in the book.

There are a number of consistency errors - several related to Fuchsia's age, and one to Titus' location - signs of rushed or limited editing, perhaps. And there are scattered instances of words misused ('flaunt' for 'flout'), which would be less surprising in a writer less careful than Peake.

I've focused on the negative, because I found the book disappointing in comparison with its predecessor, but that's not to say it isn't a good read. All in all, it's a sturdy successor to Titus Groan, but lacking the magic of the first volume. Worth reading for people who were caught up in the characters that inhabit the castle, but less so for those who mainly liked the imagery.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4.
Songs of the Dying Earth: Stories in Honour of Jack Vance - Gardner R. Dozois, Jack Vance, George R.R. Martin, Dean Koontz I'm thrilled that so many good authors came together to honor one of my own favorite writers. It's an especially nice tribute as I read it after Vance's death this year.

Wisely, most of the authors here emulate Vance or make use of his world, but don't try to imitate him. Many acknowledge that it may not be possible to imitate him successfully (as those few who have tried have I think demonstrated). That last is also part of the problem with the anthology - it's Vancian, but it's not Vance. Good as they are, most of these writers are not as good as Vance - at least in doing what he did so well.

Still, the stories are fun and very readable, and it's entertaining to go through the Dying Earth from a slightly different angle, and to see the possible fate of some of that world's characters.

Unfortunately, the good writing and fun stories are slightly marred by poor copy-editing. There is a fair sprinkling of typos and some missed words that surprised me in an otherwise carefully put together book.

To my taste, the best stories were:

"The Copsy Door" by Terry Dowling
"Inescapable" by Mike Resnick (mostly for the plot, which ties back to the Dying Earth story that struck me most when I was young)
"The Traditions of Karzh" by Paula Volsky
"The Last Golden Thread" by Phyllis Eisenstein (one of the best in the book, and by an author who I wish would write more)
"The Good Magician by" Glen Cook (one of the stories that most captured the feel of a Vance story)

Fair Barbarian

Fair Barbarian - Frances Hodgson Burnett As, I suspect, with most, my previous exposure to Frances Hodgson Burnett was through [b:The Secret Garden|2998|The Secret Garden|Frances Hodgson Burnett|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327873635s/2998.jpg|3186437], [b:A Little Princess|3008|A Little Princess|Frances Hodgson Burnett|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1327868556s/3008.jpg|1313599], and [b:The Lost Prince|646351|The Lost Prince|Frances Hodgson Burnett|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1176700431s/646351.jpg|1718667]. Those books are better.
A Fair Barbarian is a harmless and mildly entertaining shift from those child-oriented books to more a young adult's realm. It's pleasantly reminiscent of Jane Austen, though less complex.

The book's strength is the characters, who are interesting and moderately likeable. However, despite a fair-size crew of young men and women looking to fall in love with each other, there's no strong resolution; the ending comes disappointingly ex machina, and the story simply stops.

Recommended for Burnett fans, and pleasant but not compelling for others.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe For some reason, I never got around to reading this when I was young. When I found it as a free download, I thought I might as well do it now.

Generally, I agree with many of the other commenters. The book isn't great as literature, but as a propaganda piece, it's pretty effective. As literature, much of the book is overly dramatic and sentimental. The characters are two-dimensional, and the story wraps up pretty neatly. The writing is decent. There's never a moment, though, in which you forget that the story is the carrier for the message, rather than the other way around.

On the propagandist front, Stowe makes a very good effort at showing several sides of the key issues: religion and slavery. There's no question which side she is on, but there are nuances even among the slave owners, and she castigates Northerners just as thoroughly. All in all, it's a very effective piece of anti-slavery propaganda, often through fairly direct argument to the reader. If anything, she's light on the horrible effects of the slave trade, focusing most often on emotional disruption.

Unfortunately, while consciously fighting the evil of slavery, Stowe often relies heavily on stereotype (blacks are naturally generous, credulous, and good cooks; women are emotional and not naturally suited to business). That's largely a sign of the time, of course, and she was much more progressive than most, so it doesn't grate as much as it might otherwise.

Equally troubling is the inescapable religious message. Stowe is clearly a Christian, and the solution to just about everything in the world is just for people to accept Christ into their lives. Do that, and you can die happy, even as a beaten, tortured man who's been ripped from his own family and several others. Conversely, in the final chapter - a direct appeal to readers - she suggests that only Christian Americans have a responsibility to do anything about slavery; atheists apparently get a free pass. To her credit, Stowe offers a reasonably balanced portrait of an agnostic in the book, but her underlying message about Christianity is hammered in, page after page. She never considers that 'Africans' might have their own beliefs, but that's pretty much true for everyone else she describes as well.

All in all, worth reading for its historical value as an argument against slavery at a crucial time in the United States, if not as a work of dramatic literature.

* It seems unfair that the book is associated with the term 'Uncle Tom'. While in some ways the usage is accurate, the Uncle Tom in the book acts the way he does in part because he's a pious Christian, and he's only one of a range of slave characters shown. More to the point, despite Tom's obedience, he doesn't come out of things very well.
Sheepfarmer's Daughter - Elizabeth Moon I read this based on a recommendation from a Goodreads member. I'm sorry to say that I wasn't converted. The book is decent, but not especially interesting; most of it is things we've seen before. Paksenarrion (the protagonist) is likeable, but much of the book is a fairly mechanical look at her induction into a mercenary corps. There's quite a lot of detail, but much of it is shallow - it reads a bit like someone inserting research they've done into how armies work.

This book was written as part of a much longer work, and it shows, By the end of the 450 or so pages, I felt like I'd just finished an incredibly long prologue. Unfortunately, I'm not tempted to read the bulk of the book.

All in all, pleasant, readable, but not particularly striking.
SIMON VECTOR - Jak Holding, Johnny Atomic, Deanna Hoak I discovered this universe through what Jak Holding calls Entrypoint novellas, which did just what they were meant to - provide an intriguing on-ramp to the main story. ('Entrypoint' is trademarked, and the 'about the author' note sounds less like two guys who got together to write a book than two guys who are executing a business plan that includes a novel. But that's beside the point.)

I've read two of these novellas, [b:CORRECTION|15788965|CORRECTION A Gerald Ruhming Tale of Terror|Jak Holding|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1344214578s/15788965.jpg|21509665] and [b:CORRUPTION|16008536|CORRUPTION A Marshal Boothe Tale of Justice|Jak Holding|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1347662879s/16008536.jpg|21774756], which were very well done, and I expect I'll get others. The two so far tell the stories of two characters who end up in a high-security prison. Simon Vector tells some of the story of what happens in the prison itself.

Interestingly, Simon Vector himself just happens to be at the prison. The main story is not about the prison per se, but about mysterious killer alien cyborgs. Here, unfortunately, is where things start to go a bit wrong.

The two novellas were very good dark SF-horror. The main novel is dark SF-horror, but it's not as good. There are several flaws.

1. Structure - the story starts in media res, and relies on flashbacks and exposition to explain what's happening. The explanation often arrives late, meaning that we've muddled through our own explanation, or just skipped over some of the confusing bits. It works, but is awkward.

2. Cyborgs - as noted, this doesn't really work. The aliens are intent on making awkward human-machine melds. It's made clear what they're for, but never why the melding itself makes sense. As far as I could tell, it didn't. It afforded the authors a chance to describe some horrific scenes (very movie franchise-friendly), but plot-wise, there's never a very clear argument for why you would rip a body in half and replace the legs on one part and the torso on the other. If you can control them both, why not just have a human and a robot?

3. Language - Mostly the writing is very good, but there are a few careless errors that I found jarring enough to correct. There weren't many of these errors, but here's where you want an outside editor looking at things.

More to the point, I just wasn't very interested in a key plot point - the aliens. Which means that I've liked the entrypoints, but not so much what they were an entry to. Even this book, for that matter, reads more as a long prologue than as a complete story. It's entirely unsurprising that at the end we've only begun what promises to be a long, multi-part series.

The authors have done very well with characterization and with setting. Story, in this mainline novel, is not as strong. In fact, the main storyline (evil, incomprehensible aliens attack) is a bit tired. Fred Saberhagen and so many others have already done told this story, and there's not much new offered here, though there are hints that that could change.

I expect to pick up the other ENTRYPOINT (TM) novellas. I think these guys are good writers. But whether I'll continue with the main Simon Vector storyline is another question. I might give it one more try. If the plot doesn't improve, I'm not sure I'll go further.

*Apologies for the awkward number and placement of spoilers. I intended to leave it all in the open, but later decided on caution.



City of Saints and Madmen - Jeff VanderMeer, Michael Moorcock I ordered this book purely on the basis of reviews. I'd never heard of Jeff VanderMeer, but the book sounded quirky, unconventional, and interesting. On two out of three, I definitely got my money's worth.

This is essentially a fully immersive, highly self-referential collection of stories about the city Ambergris, the Freshwater Squid in the river that passes by, the mushroom people that are its original inhabitants, and the humans that try to make the city their own. There are glossaries, bibliographies, and all sorts of other bits, each with a story to tell. Some of the stories appear to be previously published (it's a little hard to tell from the credits).

Probably the most accurate thing I can say about the book is that it's clever. In fact, relentlessly clever, and not always in a good way. It starts off well enough, with a fairly straightforward story ("Dradin in Love") introducing the gritty and complex city. The writing is good, and there are all sorts of in-jokes (I presume I missed many). I found the story dragged a bit, though the ending was strong.

For me, part of the problem with "Dradin", and with the rest of the book, is that I just wasn't very interested in Ambergris. VanderMeer has clearly had a lot of fun fleshing out backstory for the city and many of its characters, but it didn't really grab me. What was intriguing were the mushroom people and their mysterious history. Unfortunately, while they form an important backdrop to the story, VanderMeer never really digs into them in a very fulfilling way. Instead, the story is about the humans and their version of the city, which I found far less compelling.

This book has a lot of unusual pieces, and I read everything - including the glossary and the 40 page bibliography (for a 50 page story). I found a lot of humor (and hidden stories). The only thing I didn't do was to decode the last paragraph of one story. By that point, I just didn't care very much. The jokes and references had long before begun to seem not only tired, but self-indulgent. I like writers who experiment, but the truth is that a lot of experiments fail. Sadly, I had the fear that they would even before I finished "Dradin".

My ultimate impression was that I was reading a cult novel without being a member of the cult. I was willing to become one, but the literature on offer just didn't make me want to convert. In the end, I recognize VanderMeer as a talented, intelligent writer, but I really can't recommend this book to anyone who's not already a fan - at least of VanderMeer, if not of Ambergris.

The Artificer's Apprentice

The Artificer's Apprentice - D.J. Edwardson This is a world with great steampunk possibility. Even in this short story, we get a sense of a very interesting background. Unfortunately, the writing itself is often clunky and awkward, and the plot is thin. Here's hoping the writer explores the world again with more finesse.

The Conjure Book

The Conjure Book - A.A. Attanasio Attanasio is one of speculative fiction's more cerebral authors, and I approached this young adult book with some trepidation. In that, I was partly right, and partly wrong.

Attanasio tones down both his vocabulary (some) and his customary ethereality to a level appropriate for intelligent youngsters. The story is fairly simple, though in some ways not credible. The protagonist, a 13 year old spelunker, thinks nothing of plunging immediately into a deep hole in the ground. Since she's otherwise moderately wise and rule-abiding, this seems unlikely. Unfortunately, that incredbility infects much of the rest of the plot. Many of the things that happen, and the choices the protagonist makes, just don't seem believable.

It's a shame, because the language is mostly smooth, the characters are likeable, and the general story is interesting. The reading level seems to vary sometimes between 8 and 15, but the mix is not really suitable for either.

All in all, a decent book (2.5, rounded up because it is a nice story), but not one you'd go back to. If you're looking for intelligent adult fiction, by all means, try Attanasio's other books. For the young adult in you, look further.
A Gift Upon the Shore - M.K. Wren With her [b:Phoenix Legacy|18172122|Sword of the Lamb (The Phoenix Legacy, #1)|M.K. Wren|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1373381706s/18172122.jpg|815498], M. K. Wren did for science fiction romance what [a:Mary Stewart|15590|Mary Stewart|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/authors/1210367214p2/15590.jpg] did for fantasy - except that fewer people noticed. That's a shame, because the Phoenix trilogy is terrific.

Despite that, I didn't pick up A Gift Upon the Shore for many years, mostly because I'm not much of a post-apocalyptarian. But with its recent reissue, and Wren's confounding failure to write any other books (This is her only other SF novel, though she also wrote a series of mystery stories.), I decided to buy it.

The story deals with a writer who comes to live with an artist on the Oregon coast, just before nuclear war. (Coincidentally, Wren lived with an artist, on the Oregon coast...) The story explores the women's struggle to survive, and the different ways they approach their legacies. Key issues include knowledge (a trove of books), reproduction (as an imperative in a depopulated world), and religion (for good or evil).

Some people have disliked the way religion is treated, and I agree that it's not placed in a very flattering light. If you're an easily-offended Christian, this may not be the book for you. For others, the book poses some interesting questions about how we would prioritize our values if push came to shove.

Wren makes what I assume was a deliberate choice to put Mary, the writer, between two more extreme views. So far, so good. Unfortunately, many of the choices Mary makes are simply not credible - at least, not in the person Wren has shown to us. While we understand her to be balancing difficult choices, she in fact is extremely malleable, and is apparently driven by desires that manifest only vaguely in her own mind and emotions.

The book alternates flashbacks as a young woman and a present as an old woman. The present scenes are more consistent, but even foolish youth doesn't adequately explain the past Mary's choices.

All in all, and interesting story, but substantially weakened by a protagonist that simply doesn't ring true. Worth picking up for a story about how to balance imperatives, but without the impact of the far better Phoenix Legacy.
A Young Man Without Magic - Lawrence Watt-Evans Formal, slow-moving, not very interesting, ends abruptly.
Firebirds Soaring: An Anthology of Original Speculative Fiction - Jane Yolen;Kara Dalkey;Sherwood Smith;Elizabeth Wein;Nancy Springer;Laurel Winter;Nina Kiriki Hoffman;Louise Marley;Nick O'Donohoe A year or so ago, I picked up the first [b:Firebirds|40160|Firebirds An Anthology of Original Fantasy and Science Fiction|Sharyn November|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1309211431s/40160.jpg|17234924] anthology. I was substantially impressed, so when I saw this one, I bought it without a second thought.

This third book, unfortunately, is not as strong as the first. It's a collection of pretty good stories, but few of them are really outstanding. In part, that may be because it's so very narrowly focused on an audience of teen girls. Nothing wrong with that, but it's certainly not me, and, more important, not what I had been expecting. An entire anthology of that became a little wearing.

The one really strong story in the book is The Ghosts of Strangers, a short novel by Nina Kiriki Hoffman - an unexpected find, though from an author I already knew I enjoyed. Many of the other stories are good, though not really memorable. Unfortunately, there's also one story that is simply bad - astoundingly bad. I ended up skimming it, and simply can't understand why it was included in what was otherwise a decent collection. That story by itself (and it's fairly long), brought the anthology down from a 3.5 to a solid 3.

All in all, worth looking into as reading material for daughters, nieces, etc., though some of the stories are on the dark side.

Selections from Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories

Selections from Brave New Worlds: Dystopian Stories - John Joseph Adams Other reviews indicate their version had only a few stories. Mine had eight, so perhaps a different version of the limited edition. The stories were:

AMARYLLIS by Carrie Vaughn
THE THINGS THAT MAKE ME WEAK AND STRANGE GET ENGINEERED AWAY by Cory Doctorow
IS THIS YOUR DAY TO JOIN THE REVOLUTION? by Genevieve Valentine
JUST DO IT by Heather Lindsley
ARTIES AREN’T STUPID by Jeremiah Tolbert
OF A SWEET SLOW DANCE IN THE WAKE OF TEMPORARY DOGS by Adam-Troy Castro
RESISTANCE by Tobias S. Buckell
CIVILIZATION by Vylar Kaftan

One benefit of anthologies is to introduce readers to new authors. Some of the above were unknown to me, but I'm afraid none of the stories converted me. I did like Tobias Buckell's story - the best of the group. The rest were competently written, but I didn't find them particularly compelling. One, "Of a Slow Sweet Dance..." seemed to me so clearly a re-casting of Ursula Le Guin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas", that I'm surprised that both stories are included in the full version of the book.

Although this was only a sampler, and the stories are different in many ways, I found the styles and themes similar enough that a steady diet of serious dystopia grew wearing. This especially since Vylar Kaftan's story is essentially an outline for dystopian plots - choose one element from column A...

It may be that the full book is more balanced, but I ended up glad I didn't have more to read - surely the opposite of what this taster was intended for.
Vor - James Blish I first saw James Blish's name on the shelves of a public library, in the form of a Star Trek novelization. I don't recall that I knew much about Star Trek at the time - it seems unlikely. But I wasn't impressed, didn't borrow the book, and thereafter thought of Blish as 'the Star Trek guy'. I found this book for free somewhere, and thought I might as well give a try.

I was pleasantly surprised. Blish is a better writer than I'd have predicted. That's a pretty low bar, though.

The story is decent - UFO lands, inscrutable alien emerges. The actual SF part is pretty by-the-book - not exciting, not bad. The resolution fits a short story better than a short novel. The human part is better - the protagonist, an ex-air force, and now reserve, pilot has an unexplained reluctance to fly, and trouble with his wife. Blish does a fair job of balancing action with introspection. Unfortunately, while the flying problem is finally explained, the explanation is pretty thin, and not carried through consistently. The marital problem is just never explained. It's too bad, because I found it the most interesting part of the book. The combination would have worked better a generation earlier.

All in all, a pleasant read, but nothing to go out of your way for. I picked up a number of his other books at the same time I go this one. I don't see them going to the top of my list any time soon.

Demons Hide Their Faces

Demons Hide Their Faces - A.A. Attanasio, Jeff Bigman I lost track of A.A. Attanasio at the end of the last century. I had encountered him through his first novel, Radix was a poetic prose writer whose actual poetry was poor, I sometimes have the feeling that Attanasio is a poet whose prose is sometimes a little too abstract. If he were a painter, his work would be too 'modern' for my taste - too far divorced from any reality that attracts me. As a writer, though, he's much more approachable. When I started many of the stories in this collection, I thought "It's too ethereal; he won't pull it off." But he usually did, and he always came close. Attanasio has a knack for telling a solid, well-realized story even while spending much of his energy on fluid, complex images and concepts.

If you're looking for fluffy action adventure, this is not the place for you. But if you want something a little deeper, something that will make you think about the nature of being and reality without being pretentious about it, I recommend this collection - and Attanasio in general, for that matter.

City of Dragons (The Rain Wilds Chronicles #3)

City of Dragons (The Rain Wilds Chronicles #3) - Robin Hobb I don't know what happened to the cover of this one. The prior two books had great covers (if not very story-accurate). Then suddenly this one. I like either the US or the UK covers of the first two, but not this strange amalgam.

More substantively, this book is basically a continuation of the prior two, and not, for once, the climax of a trilogy. In fact, it's not really a series at all. The whole story is essentially one long novel broken into four books. City of Dragons picks up where [b:Dragon Haven|7011403|Dragon Haven (Rain Wild Chronicles, #2)|Robin Hobb|https://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1263769185s/7011403.jpg|21457174] left off. The dragons et al. have finally found Kelsingra - sort of. There's a complication that takes most of this (slimmer - despite the listing, mine was about 350pp) book to solve. I didn't find that to be very credible, basically. They've trudged through miles of swamp, through danger and disaster, and survived it all. But now they can't conquer what is really a pretty feeble obstacle. I had trouble suspending disbelief, since it's not credible within the story world itself, and it reads mostly like a convenient device to delay satisfaction. Maybe Hobb felt three books of trudging would be too much.

The writing is almost up to the Hobb standard. Almost, because in this book (and to some extent in Dragon Haven), there are signs of sloppy editing. For example, there are several places where a line of description is repeated almost verbatim in succeeding paragraphs - a pretty clear sign that the tidying up didn't get finished. It felt like watching one of those TV programs (e.g., Castle) where they're so keen to ensure you got what's happening that they keep telling you. Over and over. Granted, it didn't happen a lot, but it made me feel someone was asleep at the screen. To some extent, that's true of the series so far. It's well written, and I read the books eagerly, but it's just not as intriguing or intricate as prior trilogies in this world have been. Nor are the relationships as engaging; there's nothing like the ambiguity of the Fool here. The closest thing is the wonder about whether dragons will turn out to be likable, or just majestic.

The book does finally include some news about Tintaglia, but nothing that really convinced me that it made sense for her to have been missing for so long.

All in all, a good book, and from someone else, I might give it a 3.5. Here, I'll drop to 3 to note that the series is really a bit below Hobb's standard, and not what I'd hoped for in a story revealing some of the secrets of dragons and Elderlings.

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