bookrblog

Enchanted Glass

Thursday, August 26th, 2010 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

The latest Diana Wynne Jones book is great! I really enjoyed it. An old wizard dies, and his grandson inherits the place - inheriting not just the house, but a stray boy, two funny domestics, and an entire village to take care of. It’s a fun adventure, with great characters and interesting situations. While it’s primarily a 10-12yr old book, there are a few twists which raise your eyebrows, but which probably would go over the head of your 10-12 yr old anyway. A good one!

Tongues of Serpents

Sunday, August 1st, 2010 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

This is the latest in Naomi Novik’s Temeraire series. We have both been looking forward to reading this one for at least a year so it was wonderful to get it in the mail . . . “you can read it first, no you . . .”

This book was set in Australia just after the Rum Rebellion and just before Macquarie comes on the scene. It has the crossing of the Blue Mountains - and then historically gets a bit crazy, but in a cool way, with bunyips and smugglers and a brand new type of dragon. She makes a few errors (it would be emus not cassowarries in the desert), but whatever. It had mystery, struggle, history, and even a battle with an unexpected ending. And hurray, Macquarie turned up to save the day in the end (well, maybe not save the day). And Tharkay was in it, who is a wonderful character. I don’t know why, but I enjoyed this far more than the previous book, which I felt wrote itself into a very dark corner. This one opened up large possibilities, and that is lovely.

Lavinia

Tuesday, May 26th, 2009 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

Ursula Le Guin is famous for her science-fiction and fantasy stories, and I suppose this too could be fantasy except that it is based wholly on the Aeneid, by Vergil (although when we studied him he was Virgil, the “e” looks wrong to me!) It’s the story of Aeneas’ wife, barely mentioned in the poem. Le Guin uses her character to retell the story of the Aeneid as well as to recreate life at that time (although at the end she admits it’s probably not historically correct.

I really enjoyed this book. Lavinia was a great character, strong-minded without being a stereotypical “strong female character”, and the details of pre-Roman life were really interesting. I liked the device of including Virgil himself, and the concept that they were all simply poetical constructs; a different way of depicting fate. A very good and quite original story.

The Bell at Sealy Head

Saturday, February 7th, 2009 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

I quite enjoyed this new novel by Patricia McKillip. It’s a story set say in the 19^th century, about a small village by the sea. There’s a legend about a bell they can hear from the sea - some believe from an old shipwreck. Actually, the local manor is under a curse, and some are there to break it, while others want to keep it going.

It’s a story-within-a-story, a romance, and most of all a fairytale. I really like McKillip’s lyrical style, and her pleasant, ordinary, book-loving characters. An enjoyable if not deep read.

Finnikin of the Rock

Friday, October 17th, 2008 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

A new book by Melina Marchetta has always heralded great excitement from me. This novel, however, was a completely new direction for Marchetta whose other 3 novels have been teenage coming of age in Sydney books. This is fantasy - grim, violent and very graphic - and it’s just not as good.

Finnikin is a survivor of a great catastrophe in his country, an invasion which led to thousands of deaths and a magical curse meaning no one can go in or out - he happened to be out, so he’s an exile. His mission is to support the exiles (as he’s nobility) and to find the lost prince who will hopefully be able to break the curse. He finds himself linked up instead with an annoying novice who somehow manages to find his father and reunite the exiles. Of course, there’s love and a twist, and a happy ending - happy, if not ecstatic for the torn-apart nation.

Marchetta’s strengths in her previous novels have been the recognition that the reader finds in them - the yes moment as you recall your own teenage years. Being fantasy shouldn’t necessarily mean a sense of unreality hanging over the piece, but that’s what happens here. The country is the usual “fantasy-land” with the map at the front of the book; the place sketched too lightly for recognition, and the horrors too graphic for real connection. As exiles, the relationships - which Marchetta has excelled in previously - are quite convuluted and lack the depth necessary to really respond to them. And because of the graphic nature of the book, I’m not certain if it’s aimed at teens - though the main characters are teens - or adults.

This book really didn’t work for me, which is a pity, because I’ve always loved Marchetta before.

Neverwhere

Monday, October 22nd, 2007 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

While this fantasy/horror by Neil Gaiman is set in an alternate London underground, it’s somehow so similar to Stardust that it’s practically the same book. There’s the goblin market, the quest, the dangers, the unusual girl who turns out to be more special than the girl at home, the references to myths and fairy-tales, and the clumsy boy who becomes a hero. I really don’t like in most fantasy novels, and didn’t like here, the horror elements – how writers can spend so much time on such disgusting things I have no idea – but I liked the idea of the Underground reflecting historical and imaginative aspects of the real world. The language was reminiscent of Terry Pratchett but with a slightly more American flavour. Clever, interesting – but like the previous book, not particularly deep or moving, and so I doubt I’ll be seeking out other books by this author.

Stardust

Saturday, October 20th, 2007 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

This fantasy novel by Neil Gaiman is something like The Princess Bride without the mocking flavour of that particular book (although like TPB, the film of Stardust is more tightly structured and therefore slightly better). Tristan Thorne is asked by a girl he’s keen on to go catch a falling star – and so he crosses the Wall into fairy-land and discovers that over there, stars are girls and magic is real. It’s a fun, clever, and well-written fairy tale, albeit with a rather modern American tone to it all. There’s the usual twists on the usual fairy stories, and some of the darkness of modern fantasy novels – an altogether good, if not deep or moving, read.

Something Rich and Strange

Wednesday, October 10th, 2007 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

This is a small sea-story by Patricia A McKillip, who writes fantasy. Megan and Jonah live near the beach somewhere in modern-day USA, running a shop full of sea-treasures like drawings (done by Megan) and fossils (found by Jonah). One day a stranger appears, offering them jewellery to sell in the store; luring them into the sea, so that Jonah is seduced by a siren and disappears, and Megan’s drawings begin to contain worlds she never knew existed. That part is good, but when they get down into the sea, it turns into an environmental message (pollution of the ocean/they’re sent back to bear witness) which really feels at odds with the rest of the book, and brings it down to a children’s morality tale. However, the writing is very beautiful, and the first part so mesmerising that you feel desperate to drop everything and go directly to the beach.

The Last Days

Thursday, September 6th, 2007 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

This is a YA novel by Scott Westerfield, and it’s a sequel to Peeps which I reviewed earlier. Set nowish in NY, more people have caught the vampire virus, and there are more signs of the underground worms who are going to eat everyone. A couple of young people put a band together, and get signed up to play at a massive concert. Their unique sound not only draws a crowd, but calls up the worms, too. They end up going round the world calling worms out of the ground so everyone can kill them. Obviously, it’s an end of the world novel, but it focuses on a small bunch of people and while it’s simple, it’s not simplistic. It’s slightly depressing, although the obvious fantasy element does engender enough disbelief to stop the reader wallowing in it. The author introduces some basic ideas about viruses and civilisation, in a less complex way than in his previous book, which is food for thought, even if he doesn’t elaborate on it.

Talyn

Wednesday, September 5th, 2007 | Sci-Fi/Fantasy | No Comments

This tale by Holly Lisle is one of those thick fantasy books, with the usual fantasy-lands, violent action, great heroes doing deeds that at first everyone reviles them for but in the end rewards and cheers them on, magic and magicians, and very nice horses. Talyn is a magical soldier in a permanent war; when the ceasefire is declared, she’s suspicious. She gets involved with one of the Peacekeeper race, finds out they’re bent on mind control and destroying everyone, and joins up with a former enemy to take them down. It reminded me a lot of Farscape, and also of a sort of justification for xenophobia and the US imperialist policy. Better the war you know than the peace you don’t, is the theme; but there’s also the idea that while you’re fighting the familiar enemy, several more unfamiliar ones are lining up unexpectedly at your border. It was fairly well-written and made me want to read to the end, but without that real depth that would lead me to seek out more by the same author.