Dan

A small list of stories this reminded me of

Revisado: 03-09-24

This is not to say this has the same plot or characters but rather that at a basic level I could not help finding similarities in positive comparison to the following at various points

Mash (tv show)
Small gods (Terry Pratchett)
American Gods/Anansi Boys (Neil Gaiman)
The Gods in Exile (Heinrich Heine)
Howl’s Moving Castle (Miyazaki’s adaptation)

In short, the story hits many different beats and notes, the story is necessarily long as there is a lot of it to tell and throughout remains gripping and dynamic

I was surprised at how neatly Czaikovski tied up all the story threads at the end and (hopefully this is not a spoiler) how happy/hopeful the ending was

If I could go back and reevaluate previous 5/5 scores that I’ve given books in the past in regards to this I would

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For Sure has Dune Vibes

Revisado: 02-29-24

It’s a space opera with a type of setting that is reminiscent of Dune, Feuding houses and bureaucrats scheming for supremacy in a space borne future

With that as a backdrop the story follows a cat and mouse game where a master hacker, a former super soldier, and a space pirate thrown together by circumstance are stalked by two agents with opposing motives with incredible twists and revelations along the way, some you may see easy, some that caught me off guard -though they made total sense in retrospect

In all a beautifully crafted story with characters I highly enjoyed reading

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Starts interesting, then gets stuck, also, how is this plot getting generic?

Revisado: 05-14-23

A fantasy story with a young male protagonist on the cusp of young adulthood whose life is thrown in disarray by crises and powers beyond his control and as a result must lead his family and/or friends to the relative safety of a far off city and on the way face a compelling and perilous journey.

On this journey they meet all sorts of altruistic people that selflessly help them and untrustworthy individuals that either are extremely minor, or broadcast their untrustworthiness before inevitably and unsuccessfully striking

On arriving at the city the kid faces a requisite level of drama and overcomes it with the help of helpful adults who go out of their way to sponsor and help him achieve what he hopes to achieve

If actual refugee stories read like this the world would be a lot happier of a place.

Whether or not the disjunction between the plot of the book and it’s real world counterpart s actually hurts the story. this is the third book in the last 365 days I’ve tried to read that has this same plot and they’re starting to blend together.

Each sort of suffers the same thing; after a compelling intro, a great hook, and some adventure, the story starts to lose steam.

In each case the second story arc, the one in the city with the school/academy/training place neither matches the stakes, nor anything that made the first arc compelling. Maybe I dropped this book right before the good part and am missing out, but judging by the other reviews that aren’t just 4-5 stars with a single sentence of praise I doubt it.

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Masterful writing and story weaving

Revisado: 10-01-20

I am still mentally going over the big climactic set piece battle near the end of the book specifically the sequence where Abercrombie takes the reader from the command center on one side of the battle through the field to the opposing command center jumping from character to character as they interact with each others storylines in a highly kinetic and gut wrenching imagining of what (among other things) it would be like to be stuck in opposing pike squares marching at each other. Being able to weave these threads together in such a way that stays fluid and engaging is an incredible skill that bears through the rest of the book and now that it’s over I’m looking forward to getting a full night’s sleep tonight without any more ‘15 more minutes’-ing for hours on end on my evening listen

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Okay for light reading/listening

Revisado: 06-09-20

What it says in the title, it’s not a strong narrative by any stretch but the story seems self aware enough that it doesn’t take itself seriously. My main issue was that I found myself personally disliking both the main character and the corporation just enough that I didn’t want to have to deal with the saccharine tie-it-all-up-in-a-bow-with-no-real-character-growth kind of ending these kinds of books tend to have -note, I never finished this book so I don’t know the ending, that’s just how it seems like it’ll end to me at the point in the book I currently find myself

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Fantastic Ending to An Extraordinary Series

Revisado: 02-13-17

I was first introduced to the first book of this series by my librarian when I was in 8th grade. As I have grown into adulthood this series has followed me. Though Nicodemus Weal has definitely aged at a faster rate than I have, it has been amazing to read and listen to the changes he has experienced throughout his and his family's life, to look at my own experiences and to recognize how alive and realistically dynamic these characters are.

To have such writing and consideration of humanity in a series as action packed as this is a real treat to put it mildly.

This book in particular which primarily follows Nicodemus's daughter and her experiences has managed to not simply be a coming of age story, but rather has transcended that consideration and delivered a huge arcing story that is itself vastly more compelling.

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