Another great read by Mieville!

Iron Council by China Miéville



This is the 3rd book in the (very loose) trilogy started in Perdido Street Station. It is set in the same world, but, as in The Scar, it deals with people, places and situations much different from PDS.

In Mieville's usual vein, there are concepts and characters far more unique than anywhere else in current SF/Fantasy novels. This guy has an amazing imagination! The cultures he has created for this world, their ideologies, their politics, etc are very rich and believable. He creates a fascinating melange of people and situations!

Also, in his usual vein, this is not a "happy" book. Bad things happen. There are bad people. Life is hard. But this book seems to have a bit more hope than the first two in this series. But only a bit...

Mieville is rapidly becoming one of my very favorite authors. The depth, detail and sheer brilliance he puts into every book are very rare to find. And his books seem to be getting better and better, as he matures as a writer. I can't wait to keep reading his books, as long as he keeps writing like this!

The Sharing Knife Trilogy

The Sharing Knife Volume One: Beguilement by Lois McMaster Bujold



[This review is of the entire trilogy] This series was recommended to me by a friend, who had previously recommended books that I liked (including others by this author). He told me about the fantasy part of it, which sounded really, really good. Not your typical "fantasy" with elves, wizards, etc. Almost science-fiction, really - some of the humans(?) who live on this world have the ability to sense and use "ground" - much like 'the force' in the Star Wars universe. (It is basically a life-force.) They are the Lakewalkers. Think of them as half Native American and half Jedi knight (tho without the light sabers! :) They use their groundsense to heal and to hunt.



The non-lakewalkers are all referred to as 'farmers', tho not all of them actually farm. The level of technology is about 1700's earth - no power driven machines, other than water mills.



The really interesting thing about the Lakewalkers is WHAT they hunt: malices (called "blight-bogles" by the farmers). Malices consume 'ground' becoming more and more powerful, sucking the life out of everything around them. If they get too powerful, they can't be killed, and they will consume all the ground of the whole world and destroy the planet. (There's some interesting backstory about how they malices may have come into being).



The two societies are leery of each other, mingling hardly at all. The author does a very good job of portraying both societies, and the characters in each.



The main plot is a sort of "Romeo and Juliet" thing: a farm girl and a Lakewalker meet and fall in love. While the romance is a big part of the story, it's not overwhelming, and not what I would think of as your typical "romance" book plot. While I did enjoy the romance aspect, I really enjoyed the societies and characters. Our main characters are very interesting and well-drawn.



Once I started the first book, I didn't stop until I had read all 3 (over a 5 day period). They were that fun and compelling! A very good story!

The Club Dumas

I was disappointed in this book. It started out slowly, but there was enough intrigue to keep me reading. The 2nd half of the book was more interesting, as more events happened to bring us to the end. But that was the problem - the end. [WARNING: SPOILER AHEAD!]

The end was a cheat. Turns out the 2 big mysteries we were following the entire book, which were implied to be interlinked somehow (which was the 'big' mystery), were not related at all!! There really wasn't a mystery! There was just a group of Dumas fanatics and a guy who wanted to become the anti-Christ (and his motivations were never very clear). It was just so disappointing - I was looking forward to some clever intertwining of the 2 stories, but there was none. I felt cheated.

While the main character was interesting, many others were not - and were flatly drawn. However, the character I liked the most was the mysterious girl "with the green eyes". Who/what is she? Is she a fallen angel? A tool of Satan? I would love to have a book just about her.

So, while the book was mildly entertaining and somewhat educational, I can't recommend it strongly, because of the poor ending.

The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexander Dumas

I can't believe it's been so long since I've posted anything. So much for good intentions. It's certainly not that I haven't read anything since then! ;-) So, here's my latest read:

Our book club read The Count of Monte Cristo during December/January. I chose the unabridged version (1200+ pages), but it was worth it! This version (published by Penguin) was recently translated, so the language wasn't stilted or awkward. It was quite easy to read.

For those of you who aren't familiar with this book, it takes place in the early 1800's in France. The hero is Edmond Dantes, who is a dashing young sailor when we first meet him. However, he has an enemy who is jealous of his good fortune, and this enemy puts into motion the steps that will find poor Edmond falsely accused of treason and sentenced to life in prison in a dungeon. While imprisoned, Edmond connects with a fellow prisoner, who is tunneling out for an escape. This other prisoner is a learned Abbe, and educates Edmond in literature, science, language, psychology, philosophy, etc. The Abbe becomes so attached to Edmond that he tells him of a secret cache of uncountable riches. Edmond manages to escape (in a most daring and spine-tingling manner), and finds this treasure - on the island of Monte Cristo. With his riches, Edmond plans to reward those who were kind to him and his family during this ordeal, and to punish those who imprisoned him. Of course, no one knows who he is, as he now calls himself 'The Count of Monte Cristo'.

The book is essentially in three parts: the first part where Edmond is in prison, the second part where he rewards those who were kind to him, and the last part where he gets his revenge. This last part was the most entertaining for me - Edmond doesn't just want revenge, he wants to make them suffer for a long, long time. It's very interesting to see him set up these elaborate situations that basically enable each of enemy to be undone by his own foibles - greed, money, power. When each man falls, it's pretty impressive.

I also learned a lot about French society at the time, as well as some Napoleonic history. I was surprised at the amount of sex in the book, given when it was written. While the sex is not explicit, there's a lot of it happening, and not between married couples! There's even a lesbian character. Somehow I thought that books of that era were pretty G-rated. But, maybe not in France!

If you do read it, I suggest you find some way to track the characters and their relationships with one another. Silly me, while I was reading it I didn't think to look online for such an aid, so I mapped out my own diagram. Now I've found a very good diagram here.

I also read some commentaries about the novel, and about its style. Dantes is a perfect example of a Romantic hero: dashing, talented and possessing skills above the norm. And the novel is an example of a Romantic novel, where the hero overcomes all, and everything gets wrapped up into a happy ending.

Definitely a good read - all 1200+ pages!!