A Great and Terrible Beauty

A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was an interesting book with a good cast of characters. Some of the characters were well developed others didn't have a big enough part in the story to justify further development.

The settings and locations are described in wonderful detail making it easy to go there with your imagination.

The plot has enough twists and surprises to keep it interesting.

In spite of all of this I only gave this book 3 stars. This is for two reasons:
1. The ending was rushed and not very convincing
2. There are parts of this book that are risqué but there is one part that is downright racy putting the book well beyond a PG-13 into a mild R rating. The worst part of this is that the racy scene did not add anything to the book at all. It only seems to be there to add some sexuality. Lame...

View all my reviews

Best Served Cold

Overall I liked this book, some parts of it are quite gory, others a bit steamy, and most of the book moves at a good clip. The problem I had with the book is that in the rather large middle of the book the story starts to become painful and pointless much like the pursuit of revenge. Is that an irony, or was this intended by the author?

New Spring The Novel

This book is a prequel to the Wheel of Time (WoT) series of books. The subtitle of the book is The Wheel of Time: In the Beginning. Not having read the actual series I don't know how the time line of this book fits into the larger scope of the story arc defined by the WoT stories.

Nevertheless, this book stands quite well on its own. It does a great job of describing the setting, people, and conflicts that the WoT stories are based around. The two main characters in this story are two women Moiraine and Siuan who have been discovered to have the ability to cast magic "saidar." The story starts with the two being "Accepted" or sorceresses in training and continues through their test and success at being full sorceresses "Aes Sedai." In this world only women have the power of magic. Men who display such talents are broken and cleansed or destroyed, because they have dark magic that can cause much grief.

Woven through these events is a grave foretelling of the birth of a savior/destroyer, a boy child with magic who under the wrong tutelage could cause the end of the world. The Aes Sedai are sent out to find this child and take him into custody to prevent the catastrophe. But strange accidental deaths start happening to the searchers and the Aes Sedai leadership culminating in a great plot twist and revelation at the end of the book. The plot lines and characters are very well developed and the book moves along at a very rapid pace.

The only complaint I have with the book ( and the only time the book slows down ) is when characters are described in great detail, never to be found in the book again. In some cases insight into the background and motivations of a tertiary character are justified, but the author spends time and ink on many characters that have no relevance in the story and don't further the plot in any way. This was annoying at times.

Overall the book is recommended for any fantasy reader. It is a great read whether you have read ( or plan to read ) the other WoT books or not.

Thanks to my friend Phil Knight for recommending I read it and lending it to me!

VITAL STATS:
Title: New Spring The Novel (The Wheel of Time: In the Beginning)
Author: Robert Jordan
# Pages: 334
Published by: Tom Doherty Associates (New York)
Year: 2004
ISBN #: 0-765-30629-8

Eldest

Two things before I start the review...
1> Oh my God!
2> I can't wait for the third book to be published!!

OK, now that I've got that off my chest...

This is an awesome next helping of the trilogy that will complete Christopher Paolini's saga about a farm boy that gets embroiled in a war of the races living in the fictional world called Alagaësia. The first book titled Eragon (for the title character) describes how Eragon gets involved in this epic battle and the effect that it has on the people around him. His flight from forces of evil trying to capture him and arrival in the rebel stronghold. The first book ends with a major victory for the rebel forces but at a high cost and Eragon on the cusp of real training and new adventures that will allow him to realize his full potential.

This book continues from where the first one ended and quickly pulls you in and along for the ride as Eragon leaves with the elves and with a protective contingent of dwarves to the homeland of the elves to continue his training. A serious wound that he recieved during the battle at the end of the last book threatens to severely limit the extent to which he can progress. The story continues and interleaves on three separate fronts; Eragon's training, trials and tribulations, the path the group of human rebels (the Varden) take under their new leader; and the hardships that befall the people of Eragon's village due to his involvement with the struggle at large. All the stories culminate in yet another epic battle towards the end of this book. At the very end a stunning piece of information is exposed that adds a whole new dimension to the story.

From a more general perspective, this is a very well written book; unfortunately it suffers from the typical second in the series pitfalls. It is a trifle longer than it needed to be. Some parts of the book really hit the doldrums with unnecessary details that slow down the narrative too much. But these parts are not pervasive enough to make the book boring at any time. A few new characters are introduced and explored and some old characters are given more space to become familiar, still more old characters disappear only to appear later and mix things up.

A final note; almost till the end of the book the title, "Eldest," did not make any sense to me. Then in the last three chapters it became crystal clear; like night turning to day with light from a huge lightning bolt! Then the book ended and all is dark again and I can't wait for the light to arrive with the next book.

Definitely a Must Read!


VITAL STATS:
Title: Eldest
Author: Christopher Paolini
# Pages: 668
Published by: Alfred A Knopf (New York)
Year: 2005
L.C. Control #: 2005009325
ISBN #: 0-375-82670