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Followers
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Novel Tease
Random meanderings about the books I love—or don't.
Interspersed with observations about my hobbies: Beer & Wine, Bridge, Bikes and Bow-wows.
Dismissed with Prejudice (J. P. Beaumont Series #7)
This is a classical whodunnit, dun right.
We're introduced to all the characters fairly early, so there's no sudden introduction of the killer 90% of the way through the book. Everything follows logically, without outrageous coincidence (as detective Beaumont says, the police don't believe in coincidences, so why should mystery readers be expected to), and naturally, I didn't figure out whodidit, even with all the clues.
I must say though that it was terribly dated - this library e-book had a copyright date of 2005, but the DTB was published in 1989. Nobody has cell-phones (Beaumont has a car phone), everybody apparently uses actual answering machines, and computer technology is primitive. How did we ever manage?
On Wings of Magic (Witch World: The Turning #3)
The first novella, We, the Women, is just incredibly, incredibly, bad. I know Norton wasn't really involved in the Witch World, The Turning series, but I cannot imagine how she could permit her name to be attached to this.
We have a village of Falconer women, at the time of the Turning, caring for a group of exiles (presumably from Karsten, except that that appears to be geographically impossible) and finding themselves completely incapable of understanding the gender dynamics of a patriarchal society. Nevermind that the women of the Falconer race live apart from the men, filling all the roles — except as warriors — that men in the surrounding societies would take: Falconer women must, of necessity, understand that men are not just "he-women" because they know (if only from their worst excesses) Falconer men. It's simply not at all believable.
As well, apparently the Falconer women have had secret villages as long as the Falconers have lived on the Estcarp border, so that the Falconer men only ever see the women in Potemkin villages. Does a herder not know when 90% of his herd is missing? Everything we've been told of Falconers, in previous Witch World stories, suggests that however despicable some (possibly even most) Falconers may be, they're not stupid — they treat their women as chattel, even routinely referring to them as "mares", and it is inconceivable that they're only seeing a small number of the women.
Then a group of Estcarp Borderers finds the Potemkin village after the Turning, offering to help rebuild it. One of the Borderer troop wonders what has happened to destroy the village so thoroughly, and only belatedly realizes "Oh. The Turning." Duh? [He was, in fact, wrong, but in a cataclysm that could raise new mountain ranges, how did he expect buildings to survive?]
The one glimmer of light in the story is the clear depiction of the Goddess Jonkara as the protector of women — where the Falconer men believe she was the Dark One who almost destroyed their race. Unfortunately, at no time is this resolved. Even in the Afterword (which I think was written by Norton), we're given just one more tiny clue, and left hanging.
Awful, awful, offal!
The second story, Falcon Magic, is much better, but still suffers from a great many errors of continuity and lack of attention (e.g., at one point somebody escaping back to Alizon, when they're actually escaping from Alizon, trying to reach Estcarp; in another case a child is riding in front of one adult - and a paragraph later in front of another, without any suggestion that they'd stopped and exchanged; in both stories, the author's would seem to have benefited from ready access to maps of Estcarp and/or Alizon).
Two stars for Falcon Magic for at least being readable, <1 star for We, The Women.
A very interesting peek at the life of young (13 years old) Jack Reacher.Reacher admits to a military-base bully that he's probably a psychopath, and he's probably right — but as Elliott Leyton, author of [b:Hunting Humans: The Rise of the Modern Multiple Murderer|1072369|Hunting Humans The Rise of the Modern Multiple Murderer|Elliott Leyton|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1347703286s/1072369.jpg|2102131], tells us, the majority of psychopaths aren't Hannibal Lecter. As with any psychological diagnosis, there must be a range of psychopathy, from those who are merely empathically challenged to those who have no empathy at all. Young Jack Reacher exhibits many of the signs of psychopathy, but he does care for his family. Can he empathize with them? Perhaps not, but he fakes it well.
Another Canadian Elliott, Elliott Barker, says of The Partial Psychopath: "For about half a century, we have known one unfailing recipe for creating psychopaths -- move a child through a dozen foster homes in the first three years." I wonder if it even requires foster families: could moving a child as frequently between military bases, even with a loving but emotionally stunted mother, have some of the same effect.
This story shows that, even at 13, Reacher was dividing the world into Us & Them, and consequences to "Them" were never important, while he would protect "Us" (his family) at all costs. For the rest of his life, the attitude clearly never changes, though his definition of family does.
Develop an Android App in Less Than a Day with No Programming Skills Required: Android Development So Easy a Complete Novice Can Figure It
Well that was disappointing. It's not, as advertised, about developing Android "apps", it's about developing Mobile websites. Not an obvious difference to many end-users, but a huge difference to the target audience for this little book.
Not really my cup of tea, and could have used a bit better editing, but hilarious.I laughed, I cried.
What a cheat! The Witch World descends to a new nadir.
One would think from the way vast portions of plot were bypassed by the intervention of a goddess that there was a contract for 'n' pages, and any more could not be tolerated.
First things, first: If you belong to any of the Abrahamic religions, this book is seriously heretical. Please, demand that it be banned: there's nothing quite like a good book banning to drive up interest in a book!I was pointed to this book by one of my GoodReads friends, who was admittedly trying to drum up interest in his friend's book, but it was well worth the time.
Set in the context of the eternal war between God and Satan, this is a humorous (though not outright comedic) romp through the seven (well, now only four, but that's another story) levels of Hell. Along the way, we learn that not all Angels are good, not all Demons are evil, Lucifer may be really bad-ass - but so is God when she has to be.
The astute reader will no doubt figure out who our hero Joe is, long before Joe does himself, but Joe is deep in denial. It takes the impending apocalypse to start him questioning his role in Creation, the purposes of Angels, Demons, and even neighbors.
Biblical purists will be annoyed at an Archangel's use of the colloquial "Revelations" to refer to what they like to call The Book of Revelation, but, hey, they won't be reading this book anyway!
I always considered myself a biblically knowledgeable person, but I had to resort to Wikipedia to check some of Marie Browne's mythologic references, and I've got to say she knows her stuff.
Songsmith: A Witch World Novel (Tor Fantasy)
Impressed. Some twenty volumes into the Witch World Series, I was getting pretty annoyed with the "sameness" of it all. Hero (or more likely Heroine) is driven by forces beyond his or her understanding to save the world from Evil.
In this story, we actually feel that the characters mostly accomplish their feats through their own abilities, without being pushed by mysterious forces outside their (and our) experience.
And of course, along the way, they learn a great about themselves; True Love is revealed; and everybody lives happily every after ... until the next volume...
Were-Wrath
Odd little thing that masquerades as a Witch World story, without being obviously connected to any of the other Witch World stories. A story with no beginning and no end. Meh.
There's always been a fundamental difference between the magic of the Eastern portion of Witch World - in Estcarp/Escore - and the Western portion - High Hallack/Arvon.
In Escore, there's an ongoing battle between ancient forces of Good and Evil. In High Hallack, evil is something brought by people, and occasionally strengthened by the use of ancient - but essentially stationary - powers. In Arvon, we get the impression that Evil was long ago banished (though it may be stirring again).
So it's something of a surprise to find that this episode's Deus ex machina is named "Neevor", and appears to be the same one who appears to Aisling some years later (in both Witch World chronology and publication date) in Ciara's Song. Are we perhaps trying to tie together both sets of magic?
The Jargoon Pard.
Must we have the Deus ex Machina? The story could have been told as easily without the interference of yet another godly power. Ho hum.
Spell of the Witch World
Definitely better than the first two books in the High Hallack sub-series.
Strong characters who triumph mostly through their own abilities: the last novella is a bit too fatalistic.
Oh, dear. This series is going downhill. Gillan's journey meanders so badly it's a miracle that the book ever ended.
Fortunately I've been reading them in story-internal chronology, rather than publication order, so I know that it's not just a matter of getting worse as time goes on - there are later-published books I enjoyed more.
For the first time in this re-reading of the Witch World novels, I'm disappointed.As noted in the last review, there's an awful lot of "geas", men & women unable to do anything but what is fated. In this story, we come to a really annoying denoument when Norton, apparently completely misunderstanding the point of the three-part Goddess, allows the devotee of the Maid to be forced (despite protestations that it's only happening by her own will) to give herself to the hero. Gag me!
Ten volumes into my epic re-read of the Witch World novels, I've got to say I'm pretty happy to be doing it.
I hadn't previously read all of the novels (and I'm still not sure I'll be able to lay my hands on every one of them - I've managed to track down 27 of, I think, 28), but I must have read half of them over a period of some 40 years (their publication actually spans almost 50). They're fairly simplistic good-vs-evil fantasies, and sometimes the foregone conclusion of good triumphing over evil is too easy, but they draw you in, and I've always meant to read them all as a whole.
I was finally struck (on account of, I'm a slow learner), reading this episode, by the Calvinist nature of Witch World. It seems that every episode, to greater or lesser extent, involves people doing things they don't particularly want to do, but they're forced to by "geas" - or as Calvin would have said, "predestination". I'm a believer in free will, and I'm forced to the conclusion that I don't really want to live in Witch World. It's particularly distasteful to me that people need to be forced to do the right thing... especially since those acting under geas always seem to be good and decent people in the first place - so surely they're capable of doing the same thing of their own choice!
