Amazon.com
Yann Martel's imaginative and unforgettable Life of Pi is a magical reading experience, an endless blue expanse of storytelling about adventure, survival, and ultimately, faith. The precocious son of a zookeeper, 16-year-old Pi Patel is raised in Pondicherry, India, where he tries on various faiths for size, attracting "religions the way a dog attracts fleas." Planning a move to Canada, his father packs up the family and their menagerie and they hitch a ride on an enormous freighter. After a harrowing shipwreck, Pi finds himself adrift in the Pacific Ocean, trapped on a 26-foot lifeboat with a wounded zebra, a spotted hyena, a seasick orangutan, and a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker ("His head was the size and color of the lifebuoy, with teeth"). It sounds like a colorful setup, but these wild beasts don't burst into song as if co-starring in an anthropomorphized Disney feature. After much gore and infighting, Pi and Richard Parker remain the boat's sole passengers, drifting for 227 days through shark-infested waters while fighting hunger, the elements, and an overactive imagination. In rich, hallucinatory passages, Pi recounts the harrowing journey as the days blur together, elegantly cataloging the endless passage of time and his struggles to survive: "It is pointless to say that this or that night was the worst of my life. I have so many bad nights to choose from that I've made none the champion."
An award winner in Canada (and winner of the 2002 Man Booker Prize), Life of Pi, Yann Martel's second novel, should prove to be a breakout book in the U.S. At one point in his journey, Pi recounts, "My greatest wish--other than salvation--was to have a book. A long book with a never-ending story. One that I could read again and again, with new eyes and fresh understanding each time." It's safe to say that the fabulous, fablelike Life of Pi is such a book. --Brad Thomas Parsons
Book Description
The son of a zookeeper, Pi Patel has an encyclopedic knowledge of animal behavior and a fervent love of stories. When Pi is sixteen, his family emigrates from India to North America aboard a Japanese cargo ship, along with their zoo animals bound for new homes.
The ship sinks. Pi finds himself alone in a lifeboat, his only companions a hyena, an orangutan, a wounded zebra, and Richard Parker, a 450-pound Bengal tiger. Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi, whose fear, knowledge, and cunning allow him to coexist with Richard Parker for 227 days while lost at sea. When they finally reach the coast of Mexico, Richard Parker flees to the jungle, never to be seen again. The Japanese authorities who interrogate Pi refuse to believe his story and press him to tell them "the truth." After hours of coercion, Pi tells a second story, a story much less fantastical, much more conventional--but is it more true?
Customer Reviews:
Read this book! It's good........2007-10-20
This is one of the best books I have read in a long time. I was expecting it to be somewhat "deeper" than it was, what with the cover's proclamation of its' "soul-sustaining" powers and the very religous nature of the main character, Pi Patel. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself completely absorbed in a good old-fashioned adventure story. And while the book does contain some "deep thoughts" about God and the power of faith, I feel it's major strength is that it is simply a very gripping, entertaining story. You have to keep reading to find out what happens to Pi Patel and the tiger. What I loved best about the book was how the author created such an incredible story but yet kept it just this side of believable. That said, there are a few places where the story gets stretched just a tad too far (I won't spoil it and say where), and the magic is lost for a moment. I suspect this is some subtle intent on the part of the author to make us Think,about God and the nature of belief and all that, but honestly I don't really care. In the end it comes down to this: the stories with animals are just better. (You'll understand that if you've read or read it.) I picked up this book at a time when I was undergoing quite a bit of stress and it was the perfect cure. Pure escapist joy. I refuse to read anything more into it! :-)
The Life of Pi.......2007-10-19
The Life of Pi
Yann Martel, ISBN 0-15-602732-1. 319 p. Canada: Random House, 2001. $14.00.
Pi Patel is a quiet boy. He grew up being ridiculed and under the eye of a zoo keeping family. He focuses much on his religion, being a Hindu, Muslim, and Christian is hard to keep up with. His academic studies are important to him, but the zoo his family owns is a also a large part of who he is.
Yann Martel opens The Life of Pi, with much background information on the main character, Pi Patel. Much on of the beginning may seem pointless and like a lot of useless information, but as the story progresses, the large abundance of background information comfortably finds its place in the story.
Pi and his family soon find themselves on a boat to Canada: Their old home was not fit for a zoo any longer due to new governmental control. As their voyage is taking place, the boat Pi and his family are on, the "Tsim Tsum" sinks and leaves Pi a castaway in the massive Pacific Ocean. However, he is not alone in his new home. Pi is grouped with a hyena, a zebra with a broken leg, an orangutan, and much to his despair, a 450-pound Bengal Tiger named Richard Parker. Soon all of the castaways are disposed of by Richard Parker, except Pi. Pi, driven to do anything to stay alive, braves Richard Parker's territory and uncovers a locker that saves his life. In the locker Pi finds the necessary tools and items he uses to stay alive for the rest of his days on the lifeboat. After much deliberating with himself over how to deal with Richard Parker, he realizes he must tame Richard Parker to stay alive. Using his cunning and wits, Pi tames Richard Parker using only a whistle, the lifeboat, and the Pacific Ocean. Over time, Pi eventually loses hope and goes blind from malnutrition. He finally lays back and accepts his death. However, after some strange events, Pi finds himself on a mysterious island. Here he replenishes himself and the Tiger, and sets off in the lifeboat again. Pi eventually lands in Mexico, and to the end the book, is interviewed by the owners of the shipping company that owned the boat "Tsim Tsum." Like the book, The Outsiders, the end of the book is where the story first starts, back with the author writing the story we had just read.
The Life Of Pi is a great book. The author writes in a very catchy manner, incorporating religion and philosophy into the book that makes the reader think hard about what is happening in the book. Yann Martel hypnotizes the reader and often throughout the book one might mistake the story they are reading for a true tale, but is ultimately brought back to reality with the knowledge they are just reading an amazingly well written, fictional book. Although the book has its deep, pensive depressing parts, humor finds its niche in the book as well. One might find themselves laughing at the lengths Pi goes to keep himself alive. The book seems written for an older audience; however, many teens are mature enough to grasp the story of tattered human being. Overall, The Life of Pi is an amazing book for anyone who wants to enjoy a well-written book.
Great Fiction.......2007-10-17
Fiction is so homogenized these days, its boring. Not so with this book. Its refreshing and reads more like a non-fiction set of events than a novel. Loved it.
yeah, I'd recommend it.......2007-10-10
I kinda would like to rate this book a 4, because there are a few things I didn't like. I didn't like everything getting 'over-explained' in the end. That wasn't necessary. It was like the author didn't think the reader was smart enough to keep track of what was going on. That did a real disservice to the book.
And I didn't like all the start - I mean, too much opinion that seemed like an rookie blog.
But, I did recommend the book, and I wanted my Mom to read it and talk to her about it. So, what does that say? I don't do that too often. So, I gotta give it a five.
Read it and tell me what you think. :)
Fiction, Fable, Fantasy.......2007-10-10
Yann Martel's Life of Pi is at the least, a first rate adventure yarn. Even the simplest reader needs just to suspend a small amount of disbelief to join in the fun. There is enough texture to the writing-detail of place and experience-that the book is almost cinematic. You could imagine this being filmed as a simple 'survival in a lifeboat' story.
What makes this such a wonderful tale is that each little piece-the man-eating island, the orangutan, Pi's wonderful real name, is jolting and provocative. It's hard to hear the stories without connecting them to some other fantasy or alternative reality.
At the end, Pi's rescue and redemption are really nothing more than the technique of fantasy applied to the story itself. I'm sorry for the folks who were disappointed that this wasn't one kind of book and I hope they get a chance to experience the pleasure of it being a very good fable, fiction and fantasy.
----Lynn Hoffman, author of New Short Course in Wine,The and the slightly fabulous bang BANG: A Novel
Book Description
"I am so pleased to have written my first children's book and to have my dear friend Wendell Minor illustrate it. I thought it would be a daunting project, but with six grandchildren and eleven stepgrandchildren, I've been telling stories to children for a long time."
-- Mary Higgins Clark
Thomas loved his summer visits to his grandmother's on Cape Cod. He spent hours wondering about the sailing ships of the past and imagining their stories. He dreamed of being on a sailing ship himself. One afternoon after a night of terrible thunderstorms, Thomas finds, deep in the sand, a weathered, old-fashioned belt buckle. When he picks it up, a boy his own age, Silas Rich, who was a cabin boy on a ship called the Monomoy that sailed almost 250 years ago, appears. Suddenly the world of sailing ships is very near as Silas tells his tale.
Beloved and bestselling author Mary Higgins Clark tells a story of mystery and adventure that will transport readers to a time and place beyond their imaginings in her first book for children. Wendell Minor's inspired paintings make a time long ago very real.
Customer Reviews:
Ghost Ship by Mary Higgins Clark.......2007-07-05
My children enjoyed me reading this story to them. The illustrations are beautiful. I had to explain some of the terms in a little more detail, but the story held their attention. It is nice when you find books that also actually introduce a "real" history of what it was like many years ago.
Another hit for Mary Higgins Clark!.......2007-05-22
Mary Higgins Clark is a wonderful storyteller and it is very evident with this children's book. Being an avid fan, I purchased the book to pass on to my granddaughter when she gets a little older. The illustrations are beautiful too. It will be a pleasure to introduce my granddaughter to Mary Higgins Clark, through her children's books!!
First rate for MHC's First Children's Book.......2007-05-14
I have been a fan of MHC for years. I was delighted with her first children's book especially since it took place where I spent many of my summers over the years. Am passing this book on to younger readers.
Awesome Children's book.......2007-05-12
I have be a fan of this author for years. This book surpassed all my expectations. What superb fiction for young readers! As always she uses her talent to spark the imagination without all the violence and gunplay of the modern world. I look forward to sharing the next with my children, too!
No younger than 4 year olds for this one.......2007-05-12
I read this book to my 4 year old granddaughter, who loves books and is beginning to read now. The book held her interest well, and I loved the illustrations! It was great to be reading her a book that had an actually story, instead of the standard children's books. She loved the story, and in fact, after we read it, she wanted to start playing out her own version of the story...."Grandma! Pretend that you find a belt buckle in the sand, and I appear as the ghost of the boy who was given it to." She really got into being on a ship back in the days of big sailing ships, and had so much fun with it!
I love Mary Higgins Clark's books for myself, and loved being able to read my granddaughter one of her books that was written for children. I hope she'll write more.
Amazon.com
"God, he was a smart kid..." So why did Christopher McCandless trade a bright future--a college education, material comfort, uncommon ability and charm--for death by starvation in an abandoned bus in the woods of Alaska? This is the question that Jon Krakauer's book tries to answer. While it doesn't—cannot—answer the question with certainty, Into the Wild does shed considerable light along the way. Not only about McCandless's "Alaskan odyssey," but also the forces that drive people to drop out of society and test themselves in other ways. Krakauer quotes Wallace Stegner's writing on a young man who similarly disappeared in the Utah desert in the 1930s: "At 18, in a dream, he saw himself ... wandering through the romantic waste places of the world. No man with any of the juices of boyhood in him has forgotten those dreams." Into the Wild shows that McCandless, while extreme, was hardly unique; the author makes the hermit into one of us, something McCandless himself could never pull off. By book's end, McCandless isn't merely a newspaper clipping, but a sympathetic, oddly magnetic personality. Whether he was "a courageous idealist, or a reckless idiot," you won't soon forget Christopher McCandless.
Book Description
In April 1992 a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless. He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter. How McCandless came to die is the unforgettable story of Into the Wild.
Immediately after graduating from college in 1991, McCandless had roamed through the West and Southwest on a vision quest like those made by his heroes Jack London and John Muir. In the Mojave Desert he abandoned his car, stripped it of its license plates, and burned all of his cash. He would give himself a new name, Alexander Supertramp, and , unencumbered by money and belongings, he would be free to wallow in the raw, unfiltered experiences that nature presented. Craving a blank spot on the map, McCandless simply threw the maps away. Leaving behind his desperate parents and sister, he vanished into the wild.
Jon Krakauer constructs a clarifying prism through which he reassembles the disquieting facts of McCandless's short life. Admitting an interst that borders on obsession, he searches for the clues to the dries and desires that propelled McCandless. Digging deeply, he takes an inherently compelling mystery and unravels the larger riddles it holds: the profound pull of the American wilderness on our imagination; the allure of high-risk activities to young men of a certain cast of mind; the complex, charged bond between fathers and sons.
When McCandless's innocent mistakes turn out to be irreversible and fatal, he becomes the stuff of tabloid headlines and is dismissed for his naiveté, pretensions, and hubris. He is said to have had a death wish but wanting to die is a very different thing from being compelled to look over the edge. Krakauer brings McCandless's uncompromising pilgrimage out of the shadows, and the peril, adversity , and renunciation sought by this enigmatic young man are illuminated with a rare understanding--and not an ounce of sentimentality. Mesmerizing, heartbreaking, Into the Wild is a tour de force. The power and luminosity of Jon Krakauer's stoytelling blaze through every page.
Customer Reviews:
INTO THE WILD, An awesome young fellow.......2007-10-22
This is a detailed account of a young man's journey, as imagined and actually replayed by the author, with a "been there, done that", feel. Jon Krakauer got into Christopher McCandless' mind as to why this "walk alone" person searched the unknown wilderness - -From this account, I believe he was looking for his own soul.
No substance.......2007-10-22
Well written by the author but it comes across as deep research into wandering minds who think the world owes them a living. Meaningless material and not a real story with substance.
It was ok.......2007-10-21
Truthfully, there were a lot of big words I did not know the meaning of. I realize since the young man did not live to tell his tale, it is was all done via other people and writings or notes he left. I think the book was a little too disjointed.
Thoughtful, well-written biography.......2007-10-21
Krakauer has always been a non-fiction writer with a style very heavily seeded in literature, as his powerful narration shows in this novel. The story of the main character is one of recklessness and youthful aspirations taken to an extreme degree, and yet Krakauer--using his strong narrative skills and personal experiences--makes it so easy to identify with the main subject.
It's a short read, but well worth the trip.
I haven't seen the movie yet, but I wonder how good it could possibly be without Krakauer's stirring narrative prose to provide the elaborate and stunning background information found in the book.
A thought-provoking and heart-breaking adventure.......2007-10-19
Like several recent reviewers, I read this book when it came out 10 years ago and recently re-read it in anticipation of the movie. I wasn't that impressed with it originally, but I probably appreciated it a little more this time around.
How you react to the book will largely depend on your attitude about Chris McCandless, who dies from starvation after spending slightly more than three months in the Alaska wilderness.
Was he fool hardy or was he an adventurer who should be admired for pursuing his dream? McCandless didn't master crucial skills to survive and was ridiculously ill prepared. To make matters worse, he threw away his map and lacked sufficient provisions.
Krukauer says it's easy to stereotype McCandless and that he wasn't as reckless as others thought. He tries to show us the mindset of people like McCandless by writing about other pioneer types and earlier adventurers, including himself.
This is a thin book (barely over 200 pages) and it's apparent that Krukauer had to pad what was originally a 9,000-word article with material that wasn't directly related to McCandless or his adventures. But since there were gaps in his journal and his entries while in Alaska were sparse, there wasn't a lot known about what he did during that time.
Krukauer's masterful writing, however, makes the book work. It is interesting, thought provoking and heart-breaking.
Average customer rating:
- Vatta book 4
- Pure light Space Opera -- nothing earthshaking, nothing really new, but good fun.
- Virtually Flawless
- Command Decision (Vatta's War)
- More Skulduggery in the Spaceways
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Command Decision (Vatta's War, Book 4)
Elizabeth Moon
Manufacturer: Del Rey
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
 Moon, Elizabeth
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ASIN: 0345491599
Release Date: 2007-02-27 |
Book Description
With the Vatta’s War series, award-winning author Elizabeth Moon has claimed a place alongside such preeminent writers of military science fiction as David Weber and Lois McMaster Bujold. Now Moon is back–and so is her butt-kicking, take-no-prisoners heroine, Kylara Vatta. Once the black-sheep scion of a prosperous merchant family, Kylara now leads a motley space force dedicated to the defeat of a rapacious pirate empire led by the mysterious Gammis Turek.
After orchestrating a galaxy-wide failure of the communications network owned and maintained by the powerful ISC corporation, Turek and his marauders strike swiftly and without mercy. First they shatter Vatta Transport. Then they overrun entire star systems, growing stronger and bolder. No one is safe from the pirate fleet. But while they continue to move forward with their diabolical plan, they have made two critical mistakes.
Their first mistake was killing Kylara Vatta’s family.
Their second mistake was leaving her alive.
Now Kylara is going to make them pay.
But with a “fleet” consisting of only three ships–including her flagship, the Vanguard, a souped-up merchant cruiser–Kylara needs allies, and fast. Because even though she possesses the same coveted communication technology as the enemy, she has nowhere near their numbers or firepower.
Meanwhile, as Kylara’s cousin Stella tries to bring together the shattered pieces of the family trading empire, new treachery is unfolding at ISC headquarters, where undercover agent Rafael Dunbarger, estranged son of the corporation’s CEO, is trying to learn why the damaged network is not being repaired. What he discovers will send shock waves across the galaxy and crashing into Kylara’s newly christened Space Defense Force at the worst possible moment.
Customer Reviews:
Vatta book 4.......2007-08-16
Worth a read, if you like prior books as I did, but hope the next one is better- this was set up book in a lot of ways to widen the story line, imho.
Not worth the HC price in my view.
Pure light Space Opera -- nothing earthshaking, nothing really new, but good fun. .......2007-08-12
In a way there is little to say about the fourth novel in an ongoing sequence. Suffice it to say, perhaps, that Elizabeth Moon makes no major missteps in this book -- if you have been enjoying the Vatta's War series, you will enjoy this one. What else do we need to know?
To begin with, if you haven't been reading this series, I recommend going back and starting with book one. If you enjoy fast-moving space adventure, with involving characters and space war tactics and action and all... these books will work for you. They aren't perfect -- in common with most novels in this subgenre, the main characters are a bit implausibly skilled at the roles they are thrust into, in common with many series novels, the individual novels don't always work ideally on their own.
What of Command Decision, then? By this time essentially four main points of view have been established. Ky Vatta is the nominal protagonist of the series: a young woman unfairly forced out of the Slotter Key Space Academy, who joined her family space transport company and who thus was well-positioned to begin resistance when conspirators destroyed ansibles throughout human space and attacked several systems, including Slotter Key. Stella Vatta is Ky's beautiful cousin, who discovers in herself unsuspected talents for leading a business when most of the Vattas were killed and she was left the only candidate to try to keep the business going. Grace Vatta is Ky and Stella's supposedly dotty Aunt, who turns out to really be a spy, and as one of the few survivors of the attack on Vatta interests at Slotter Key is the natural choice to take a position in the new government. (No Moon books would be complete without a formidable Aunt -- after all, James Nicoll went so far as to dub her previous Space Opera series "Aunts in Space".) And finally Rafe Dunsbarger is a mysterious man, the disgraced son of the CEO of ISC, the company that controls ansible traffic, supposedly a remittance man (i.e. living on an allowance from his family) but actually serving as an undercover ISC agent.
Of these four Rafe's story is most central to this new novel. He has secretly returned to his home planet, Nexus, hoping to find his father and try to understand what's up with ISC and the ansibles. But his father (along with his mother and sister) has disappeared. So Rafe must try to find out what's up with his father -- and in the process figure out what's up with ISC. This forces him to reassess his troubled past life -- and also leads to fun but almost goofy scenes including a shootout in the boardroom.
Meanwhile, Aunt Grace is continuing to root out potential traitors in Slotter Key's government. Stella is pursuing further potentially lucrative business opportunities while still coming to terms with her personal history. And Ky is still trying to expand her fleet, this time with some unexpected help from a very romantic -- and very wealthy -- fellow. She also deals with a nasty system, complete with slavers, and she helps out the Mackensee mercenaries when they are in danger from the pirates. All this means she is faced with another difficult personal choice.
Basically, this is a middle book in a long series. Nothing is really resolved -- but nothing need be resolved at this point. There is plenty of cool action, several engaging good guys to root for in a struggle against some really really bad guys (as ever, Moon's villains are truly villainous). This is pure light Space Opera -- nothing earthshaking, nothing really new, but good fun.
Virtually Flawless.......2007-07-14
COMMAND DECISION (2007) is the fourth book of the VATTA'S WAR Series - following ENGAGING THE ENEMY(2006), MARQUE AND REPRISAL(2005), and TRADING IN DANGER(2004). These books follow the exploits of Kylara Vatta, a Space Trader with a military training background, who is forced to turn Space Privateer, in response to an attack by Space Pirates on the Vatta family Space Trading enterprise and the ansible inter-system communication network... the conflict begins to expand to a galactic war in ENGAGING THE ENEMY, and in this book, Ky takes charge of a small fleet at the center of conflicts in the enlarging galactic war.
Near the end of the book, 4 disparate groups of ships (pirates, mercenaries, Ky's new "Space Defense Force" and ISC's force) could meet up in a remote location... but I won't give away what happens - as it is the best scene out of the series.
As usual with this series, there are some overly-coincendental or contrived scenes (the magic "skull ansible" technology in Ky's head... why don't MORE people have it, if it works?) - but they really don't impact the exciting pace and overall quality of the book. While the book isn't perfect, it is very enjoyable, and it gets 4.5 stars - round it up to 5.
Command Decision (Vatta's War).......2007-06-13
I've read all the books in this series and I found them to be a read you can't put down. It kept me wanting to read the next book to see what happens. I looked up on the net to see when the next book is coming out and I can't believe it's not til next year, I can't wait that long, but I suppose I just have to.
More Skulduggery in the Spaceways.......2007-05-31
Command Decision (2007) is the fourth SF novel in the Vatta's War series, following Engaging the Enemy. In the previous volume, pirates jumped the privateer ships practicing maneuvers in a deserted system and destroyed several of the vessels. Kylara Vatta joined forces with two other ships as they fought their way out of the ambush.
Aunt Grace supervised the laying of the cornerstone for the new Vatta Transport building. Afterward, Master Sergeant MacRobert invited her to tea and then stated that she would be asked to serve in a high position within the government.
In this novel, Rafael Dunbarger lands at Nexus Center Port as Genson Ratanvi, a middle-aged Cascadian business man. He passes Customs and Immigration without problems and heads for the Ambisor where he has stayed before in this identity. After installing his baggage in the room, he goes out to make some calls.
Upon reaching Luce's, a cafe in his former neighborhood, Rafe tries his father's private number and gets a "no longer available" message. When he calls his home phone number, the call is answered by someone he doesn't recognize. Then the voice asks his business and reason for calling. After telling the voice that he is trying to reach Flasic's Bakery Supplies, Rafe is told that he has the wrong number. But then he is asked for his calling location and told to stay on the line.
After he is permitted to hang up, Rafe complains to the proprietor of the cafe about the rudeness of some people. He asks for directions to Flasic's and Luce walks over with him. He makes some inquiries, but finds the transportation costs are too high. Luce walks out with him, yet returns to his cafe. By that time, Rafe is being followed by someone else.
Later Rafe is awakened by a call on his implanted ansible. He doesn't answer immediately, but just waits. Eventually he hears voices and jacks up the sensitivity to listen to three voices. The conversation suggests that someone had gotten his number from his father.
Stella and Toby are doing well on Cascadia Station. Unfortunately, Toby has stacked electronic gear all over the apartment. Stella tries to get him to pick up the mess, but he keeps getting distracted. Since Toby is designing some interesting modifications to the shipboard ansibles, Stella can't just throw the stuff out. Luckily, she has a lead on office and workshop space for the rebuilding Vatta Transport organization.
Ky is having medical problems aboard the Vanguard. Several of her crew have ingested something virulent. Although they identify the substance and treat the crew in the medboxes, Ky needs a medical staff like the professional forces. In addition, she needs to tighten discipline, for the crew should have known not to bring anything unusual onboard without permission. She holds an all-crew meeting while they are in FTL.
Ky visits Gretna Main Station to restock on missiles and gains a bad impression of their ethics. Among other malpractices, the Gretnans have a form of slavery and Ky buys her medical staff as indentured laborers. Of course, she frees the individuals as soon as they come aboard, but she puts her crew on high alert after learning of some other Gretnan tricks from her new medics.
In this story, Rafe continues his masquerade as a Cascadian businessman while gaining assistance from his former classmates to find his family. Toby learns how to connect shipboard ansibles to system ansibles and Stella starts a patent search. Aunt Grace becomes a very high personage in the Slotter Key Defense Ministry.
Ky recruits three other ship captains to her System Defense Force squadron. Captain Ransome and his fellows are much too romantic -- in the swashbuckling sense -- to be trusted fully, but their ships are small, fast, armed and highly maneuverable, making good scouts. Indeed, the crews have some experience boarding pirate ships. Best yet, Ransome is very rich and actually *buys* the shipboard ansibles that he installs in his ships.
This story continues the evolution of a multisystem defense force to fight the pirates. Ky has some setbacks, but also gains much more experience and some influential friends, including stronger ties with the MacKensee Mercenaries.
Highly recommended for Moon fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of naval conflict, corporate intrigue and personal combat.
-Arthur W. Jordin
Average customer rating:
- Hell Hath No Fury (Multiverse, Book 2)
- A great series continues
- A very good Rich Weber book
- A great read
- Going From Bad To Worse
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Hell Hath No Fury (Multiverse, Book 2)
David Weber , and
Linda Evans
Manufacturer: Baen
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover
Contemporary
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ASIN: 1416521011 |
Book Description
It began with two men. They came from very different worlds¿entirely different universes, in fact¿and they met in a virgin forest on a duplicate planet Earth. Neither of them had expected it, both of them realized how important the first contact with any other trans-universal human civilization might be. But something went wrong. Neither side knows who shot first. But both the magic-using civilization of Arcana and steel-and-steam age Sharona, with its psionic Talents, think it was the other side. And it doesn't really matter, now, because the original incident has snowballed. Both sides have additional dead to mourn; both sides have additional wrongs to avenge. Both sides have additional military forces moving towards the front. War between the universes is the last thing responsible leaders on either side want. But the fury of their respective populations, xenophobic fear of the unknown, and cries for "justice" (or vengeance), are all driving both sides towards the brink. The actions of local military commanders and diplomats may well determine the final outcome, and unscrupulous, power-hungry men¿and Arcana and Sharona alike¿have agendas of their own. The fuse has been lit, and a war stretching across the universes, across an endless succession of identical Earths, fought between dragons, spells, and crossbows and repeating rifles, machine guns, and artillery is about to begin in white-hot rage and fury. Where it will end¿and how¿no one knows.
Customer Reviews:
Hell Hath No Fury (Multiverse, Book 2).......2007-07-05
A good follow up though a little weak in maintaining interest at some points. It is still a good read for Weber fans.
A great series continues.......2007-06-11
The conflict between two civilizations that span multiple parallel Earths (Sharona, based on technology and psi, and Arcana, based on magic) that started in Hell's Gate (Multiverse, Book 1) continues, blown into war by a power hungry faction of Arcanans, who are contemptuous of the abilities of barbarians unaware of the use of magic.
Several threads are present to be of later importance - the dolphin alliance with Sharona (from the first book, but not referenced since), the Voice (telepath) from Sharona with her husband and the honorable Arcanans escorting them into Arcana, the newly unified Sharononian government at pseudo-Constantinople and, of course, the soldiers of both civilizations (with a developing conflict between those Arcanans who knowingly fabricated the war and those who are finding out the truth). An additional intriguing occurrence is the gradual discovery by those of each side who've penetrated the other's territory of the nature of their own skills in a vastly different environment (that's a little cryptic, but to say much more would be spoiler). There's also a bit of a cliff-hanger ending each of the books.
There are glossaries that help overcome the sense of disorientation of unfamiliar names for familiar locations (I used a map for book one and wrote names as I read through the book) and to keep track of the large number of characters. The atlas glossary could use some editing - e.g. one region is referred to as being both "west of India" and "containing China" and another area is referred to as belonging to the opposite civilization from what's stated in the text. It is still very useful, despite a little carelessness.
There is so much material that this series should last for several more books. If not, there will be a lot of unhappy fans.
A very good Rich Weber book.......2007-06-01
In a world where trans-dimensional rifts allow movement between parallel universes, two mighty empires have arisen. One uses magic uses a highly-developed magic, while the other is based on steam technology and psionics. And when they came together, conflict was probably inevitable. In this, the second book of the series, war has now come, and Hell hath no fury like this war across the multiverse!
I am a big David Weber fan, and I couldn't wait to get this series. Overall, I like the way that the author handled the two disparate technologies (magic developed to the point of technology and psionics also developed to the point of technology), and the war scenes are pretty realistic and gruesome. Overall, I found this to be a very good Rich Weber book, one that I do not hesitate to recommend.
A great read.......2007-05-17
The first book in the series was good even though confusing with the introduction of all the characters and places. This one really clicked. I could hardly put it down. The action was great, the characters well developed, and the story flowed smoothly. I am so looking forward to the next one.
Top-notch combat action. The usual Weber detailed political intrigue.
Going From Bad To Worse.......2007-05-15
In HELL'S GATE, David Weber and Linda Evans created an interesting new series of universes in which to play and posited a first contact scenario between the two civilizations as a botched effort, rife with misunderstandings on both sides and tragic violence. In this second volume, the situation just gets worse as misunderstandings proliferate and people with ulterior motives and hidden agendas do their best to promote themselves at the expense of their societies.
One of the civilizations under scrutiny is fairly backward from a technological point of view and could best be described as pre-industrial. To make up for this lack, they employ genuine magic, complete with fire breathing dragons. Since the other side has no conception of this, it is difficult to fight.
The other side has a Victorian industrial base but supplements itself with various psionic powers. This too proves formidable for their opponents who have no conception at to how this might operate.
In this installment, the magical side has launched an offensive cloaked by negotiations in an order to gain the military high ground. The campaign is being run by officers in the area and their high command has no idea of what is going on or even that a war has broken out. This book takes us several months into the conflict and the line of communications is so long that the home world has not yet even found out about it. This leaves the in theater commander free to wreak havoc for his own personal agenda and that of his ethnic group.
The opposing side is remote but not as remote from the point of contact. They have been ambushed and are mad. They are mobilizing for total war but again, they are hampered by personal agendas.
We are only a few months into the series and it promises to be a long affair. I look forward to reading about it.
Book Description
At the end of Frank Herberts final novel, Chapterhouse: Dune, a ship carrying a crew of refugees escapes into the uncharted galaxy, fleeing from a terrifying, mysterious Enemy. The fugitives used genetic technology to revive key figures from Dunes pastincluding Paul MuadDib and Lady Jessicato use their special talents to meet the challenges thrown at them. Based directly on Frank Herberts final outline, which lay hidden in two safe-deposit boxes for a decade, Sandworms of Dune will answer the urgent questions Dune fans have been debating for two decades: the origin of the Honored Matres, the tantalizing future of the planet Arrakis, the final revelation of the Kwisatz Haderach, and the resolution to the war between Man and Machine. This breathtaking new novel in Frank Herberts Dune series has enough surprises and plot twists to please even the most demanding reader.
Customer Reviews:
Don't Bother!.......2007-10-19
I have been a Dune fan since I first read it when Dune was first published. This book is a travesty and a tradgedy! There is no way this was written from an outline by Herbert senior! The climax is not even there! The whole thing stinks! What a betrayal! I could write a better conclusion to the Dune saga myself.... and I wish I had!
Pat Mayhew
Happy Ending.......2007-10-19
The two authors have definitely achieved something and should be applauded for their effort to continue transporting readers to the Universe of Frank Herbert's Dune. Having stated that, I feel compelled to offer my opinion that Sandworms and its ilk lack the ability to provoke the existential inquiry that was the hallmark of the original saga.
Frank Herbert's novels left readers with numerous unanswered questions; the recent Anderson/Herbert project, which includes the six prequels and Dune-7 sequence, represents an attempt to answer some of these questions for certain curious readers. While many are certain to find this entertaining and/or satisfying, and will continue to contribute to the commercial success of this project, I am extremely skeptical about its intellectual significance.
The novel culminates with the emergence of a universal organic-robotic communion that promises to bring peace and harmony to the Universe. It is not clear what the implications of this outcome are, but the novel ends with all of the characters smiling, so to speak. This denouement seems to have been meant to satisfy the inevitable "and then what happened" tendency which often plagues the followers of a fictional saga such as Dune. Therein lies the problem. While no one, not even his son, can be sure what the original author had in mind in creating Dune, I would like to suggest that all the signs point to the conclusion that Frank Herbert never intended the line of existential inquiry that he had established to be resolved in some final synthesis. Indeed, such a synthesis represents something extremely antithetical to the very essence of speculative fiction. The best examples of this genre provide a schema that is capable of elevating the reader to the level of understanding where the most interesting questions can then be posed. Chapterhouse, the sixth and final Frank Herbert volume, leaves the reader with poignant symbolism that allows the reader to seek his own conclusions. Whether these questions were meant to be answered is unknowable, but I would prefer to think that Frank Herbert had more respect for his readership than to believe that they would be satisfied with something as banal as a happy ending.
Entertaining, but lacking.......2007-10-12
I was looking forward to a better "Dune" book . It's been over twenty five years since I first read Frank Herbert's "Dune" back in high school back in the 1980s. Every other Frank Herbert work in the "Dune" series was also quite good.
Brian Herbert has taken his father's place in developing the final "trilogy". Like his prior book ("Hunters of Dune"), I still have the same complaints: a more tightly-written work could have been made, but he's busy weaving his own ideas from his prequels into this finale.
As I said before, the "Dune" legacy deserves a conclusion that rates better than "okay". It's good reading, it's just not as entrancing as his father's writing.
John@SanAntonio.......2007-10-11
I'm sorry that the series has ended. Started after the father died. Read Brian's first. What a "phenomenal" series. Sandworks is a great ending. It finalize the 30 some years of great reading.
The conclusion to the great Dune Saga.......2007-10-10
The book wraps up and finalizes the series started by Frank Herbert and finished by his son and Kevin Anderson. All the parts from the machine war trilogy and the dune saga are brought to close.
Amazon.com
When Larry Brown died suddenly in 2004 at 53, he left a nearly finished sixth novel, A Miracle of Catfish, that revisits several of his favorite themes: fatherhood, alienation, and loneliness. Shannon Ravenel, Brown's Algonquin editor, had the daunting task of trimming the enormous manuscript to manageable size, almost impossible for a responsible editor to do without the help of the author. Brown's prolix, rambling style is at times mesmerizing and at times--just rambling. Brown's notes at the end show us where the story might have gone, but it does not suffer for being unfinished. Larry Brown definitely knew where he was taking his reader, and Ravenel helped him along.
Consideration of the fatherhood theme centers around a man known only as "Jimmy's Daddy," an unregenerate, wretched human being and an ignorant, violent drunkard. His preoccupations, view of women, and treatment of Jimmy might be seen as caricatures if we didn't know that such people actually exist. Another father, with a much more interesting story, is Cortez Sharp, a farmer in the low hills near Oxford, Mississippi, for nearly fifty years. He has a daughter, Lucinda, living "with a retard" in Atlanta. The man is a layabout artist who suffers from Tourette's Syndrome, which makes Cortez think that he is simply retarded. Cortez has a deep, dark, guilty secret which is eventually revealed, but the two things that we know about him from the beginning are that he is terribly lonely and is stocking a pond he just had dug with catfish--thousands of catfish. Two minor players are Cleve, a muderous black man who is an occasional employee of Cortez's and Tommy, who delivers fish to stock Cortez's pond and owns Ursula, the Mother of all Catfish. Jimmy is the hapless nine-year-old who suffers at the hands of his daddy, and comes to the attention of Cortez who tells him--initially--to get off his property. All of these lives intersect in unexpected ways and are changed by the encounters. Brown writes hell-bent-for-leather in a style uniquely his own which carries the reader along, into landscapes interior and exterior. --Valerie Ryan
Book Description
Larry Brown has been a force in American literature since taking critics by storm with his debut collection,
Facing the Music, in 1988. His subsequent work—five novels, another story collection, and two books of nonfiction—continued to bring extraordinary praise and national attention to the writer
New York Newsday called a "master."
In November 2004, Brown sent the nearly completed manuscript of his sixth novel to his literary agent. A week later, he died of a massive heart attack. He was fifty-three years old.
A Miracle of Catfish is that novel. Brown's trademarks—his raw detail, pared-down prose, and characters under siege—are all here.
This beautiful, heartbreaking anthem to the writer's own North Mississippi land and the hard-working, hard-loving, hard-losing men it spawns is the story of one year in the lives of five characters—an old farmer with a new pond he wants stocked with baby catfish; a bankrupt fish pond stocker who secretly releases his forty-pound brood catfish into the farmer's pond; a little boy from the trailer home across the road who inadvertently hooks the behemoth catfish; the boy's inept father; and a former convict down the road who kills a second time to save his daughter.
That Larry Brown died so young, and before he could see
A Miracle of Catfish published, is a tragedy. That he had time to enrich the legacy of his work with this remarkable book is a blessing.
Customer Reviews:
Larry Brown's last miraculous novel.......2007-09-05
Another reason to mourn Larry Brown's untimely death is the fact that we will never know just how the lives of the people he created in his final masterpiece would have turned out. Would Cortez have become the father little Bobby deserves, replacing the hapless and clueless daddy who can think of no one but himself? Would we ever know any more about the fish man? Perhaps we already know enough about all the living, breathing, all-too-real characters Larry imagined for us by the time we come to the page where we are left wanting to know more about them and about the others living in his imagination, waiting for future books that won't be written. It's a rare talent who can keep us interested in and even hopeful about the fates of some pretty unlikeable and apparently unredeemable people. Bobby, Bobby's daddy, and Cortez are among Larry Brown's finest creations.
The last hurrah of talented writer Larry Brown.......2007-08-24
'A Miracle Of Catfish' was unfinished when author Larry Brown died unexpectedly. Because the book was almost finished, publication of Brown's last offering to his fans was possible. The book uses ellipsis to show where editing was done, and though unfinished, includes the notes that Brown left behind as to how he planned to wrap up the novel.
In Brown's languid southern prose, he explores the lives of several people living in the quiet, countrified outskirts of a small town. Cortez Sharp, a 72 year old man who's wife is disabled, decides to dig out a large pond on his property and stock it with catfish. He lives a solitary life, preferring to be left alone with his vegetable patches and herds of cows. His daughter Lucinda lives in Atlanta with her boyfriend Albert, who suffers from Tourettes Syndrome. Cortez calls Albert 'The Retard', driving a wedge between him and his only surviving child. Cortez carries a dark secret with him, one of horrible proportions.
There's Jimmy, a ten year old boy with bad teeth, who lives near Cortez's farm in an old trailer. Jimmy struggles with his father's temper, his two half-sisters Evelyn and Velma, and his desire to fix the go-kart his daddy built for him. Jimmy's Daddy (known only in the book as 'Jimmy's Daddy') is a typical redneck loser. He drives around in his old '55 drinking beer and smoking cigarettes, fights with himself over trying to treat Jimmy better, and has an affair with a woman at the stove factory where he works that turns out bad (in pregnancy) which threatens his life and marriage to Jonette.
And then there's Cleve, an old black man who used to work for Cortez, mean as a polecat, and murderous to boot. He's been in prison twice and though he swore he'd never go back, he's not quite done committing crimes.
Typical of Brown's unhurried and languorous prose, there's lots of smoking, beer drinking, and driving around. There's surprises like DUI's, tractor accidents, unwanted pregnancies, affairs, fishing, hunting, and a young boy worried about having puppies.
These aren't exactly people you would want for neighbors, but Brown brings them out fully fleshed and alive, and you know there are people out there just like Brown's characters. Everyday folk struggling with everyday problems, inner monologues that both repulse and enchant, and scenes that will suck you into the story despite their slowly building climaxes.
While I highly recommend Brown's work, I would recommend 'Joe', 'Fay', and 'Father And Son' as a warm up to 'A Miracle Of Catfish', simply because this is an unfinished work and may leave the novice Brown reader feeling flat at the abrupt end. It's sad that this is the last time we will hear Brown's voice in the literature world. Enjoy!
Unfinished but pleasing anyway.......2007-07-10
I have the same feeling reading Larry Brown as I do reading Faulkner: He's writing about us! And this latest is the same as the others of his; he has the weather, the land, the people, the animals and all down pat. It's like it is down here. He's just chosen a few characters to show a representation but he uses them to give insight into the universal truths as Faulkner says. It's a shame he wasn't able to finish the book but it's wonderful that his wife and publisher went ahead with what's there. And most of it is there.
I was in the Oxford Hospital getting a stent put in and finally going home after a week of tests and procedures when I read that he'd died suddenly of a heart attack. I always wanted to meet him as I thought we had so much in common. A couple of years before I thought I saw him leaving Square Books as we were going in- my brother from North Carolina who always wants to got to Square Books and my wife and our daughter who lives in Oxford. He had on a gray raincoat or light overcoat and he smiled at us when he saw us getting out of the car and heading into the bookstore. What a loss.
Beverly Lowry of George Mason University has written a fine review in the April 27, 2007, New York Times Book Review and I'm sure there are others. Read this book and you'll want to go back and read his others too.
Dewitt Spencer
You simply MUST READ this book! Such a masterpiece!!!.......2007-07-07
I was devastated when I heard that Larry Brown had passed away. What a loss to his friends and family, and what a loss to his fans. This man could spin a tale, write a story, take you away, pull you in. Such a loss - God bless him!
I have read EVERY book that Mr. Brown ever wrote -- FAY, JOE, FATHER AND SON, etc. When I saw A MIRACLE OF CATFISH on the new book shelf at my library, I almost fell over! Knowing Mr. Brown has passed, I was shocked and happy to see this book there -- all 454 pages of it.
Let me tell you, at first I didn't think I was going to be able to get into this book. Which I found very puzzling! So, I sat down and really READ and by page five I was HOOKED!! I will think of this book for years to come!!! It is just THAT GOOD.
The characters in this book are sooo life-like and believeable. There are not many people in this novel, but you don't need many. Each chapter revolves around one character and their life; however, they are all inter-twined and make the book was it is ~~ EXCELLENT.
The main characters are Cortez Sharp, who farms and raises cattle. His wife is ill and his grown child lives in Atlanta. He is older and very lonely. He decides to build a pond and stock it with catfish. When the author describes the tomato sandwiches Cortez makes, yum, hook me up with one!
Another main character is Jimmy, a young boy who lives with his white trash family down the road from Cortez. He is a lonely little guy whose step-sisters treat him like crap. His mom, Johnette {gotta love the names!}, works, eats, and sleeps (around!!) and doesn't pay her children too much attention. Hence, Jimmy is looking for attention, affection, interest, and love. He wanders down by the new pond only to get kicked off the property by Cortez Sharp, which is how these two main characters meet.
My favorite main character was Jimmy's dad who is only referred to as Jimmy's daddy. Such a loser! Such a womanizer! Such a sorry excuse for a father! Always thinking of himself, always looking out for himself. Loves his old '55 car more than his family. But all of these bad traits make him the great character he is. You have to give Jimmy's daddy credit -- he does try, he does love his family; however, if something bad is going to happen it happens to Jimmy's daddy. He never quite makes things work right for himself or his family.
Cortez Sharp decides to have a pond dug and filled with catfish. He doesn't know how having this pond will affect not only him, but Jimmy down the road. The book takes us on a journey that involves all of the above mentioned characters and simply their lives -- at work, school, their friends, family, their affairs, and the deep dark secret that Cortez Sharp lives with daily.
Sound boring? It is NOT. I found I could not turn the pages fast enough. The way the story is told and how life in the South is related just takes you right to the banks of that pond with a fishing pole in hand and trouble on the way. Life in this small southern town is one hell of a ride. Get this book and enjoy it.
You must get this book and read it. There are other not so main characters that add spice to the book. The writing is stupendous -- you can feel the heat, see Cortez taking care of cattle and riding his tractor, see the dirty, nasty living conditions at Jimmy's trailer, see the dirt and grease on Jimmy's daddy's hands, feel the hurt in Jimmy's nasty teeth, see the trashy way Jimmy's sisters and Mom dress. Mr. Brown had a talent and gift that will be sorely missed. I find I am having a problem finding my next "read" as nothing seems to compare to this wonderful book.
Take my advice and the advice of the other reviewers -- get this book, read it, and then get the rest of Mr. Brown's works and just enjoy. Every book he has written is simply a treasure! A MIRACLE OF CATFISH ~~ a miracle in itself!!!!!!!!
Thank you!!!
Pam
Dadgummit Larry, why'd you have to leave...........2007-06-12
Larry taught himself how to write and his stories improved exponentially to the end. If you are a fan, look for Larry Brown in the Blue Moon Cafe line; one of them has a strange, but awesome short-story in it.
As I neared the last few pages of the book I was anxious as to what point it might end, or if it would end before he passed away. I wasn't sure. Undeniable sadness filled me too, because Miracle was his best, and I knew it was his last.
While he didn't finish the book with in a cathartic end, his heart, I suppose, was driving it towards something good. Likely Jimmy's daddy would "get his" and Jimmy would end up happy. Who knows, but it is how it was flavored.
But it ended. The chapter just ended and his notes wrapped it up-- questions remained over things from Jimmy's daddy, to Queen and Ursula. But all in all, the end cut short is in a way a fitting epitaph for a great writer's life cut short like Willie Morris. No doubt the two are now side by side at the great catfish pond in the sky.
Lord knows how many times we might have brushed shoulders at The Beacon, or Smitty's, or Sneeds...God, I wish I'd actually known him during my years in Oxford.
Book Description
Hunters of Dune and the concluding volume, Sandworms of Dune, bring together the great story lines and beloved characters in Frank Herbert's classic Dune universe, ranging from the time of the Butlerian Jihad to the original Dune series and beyond. Based directly on Frank Herbert's final outline, which lay hidden in a safe-deposit box for a decade, these two volumes will finally answer the urgent questions Dune fans have been debating for two decades.At the end of Chapterhouse: Dune-Frank Herbert's final novel--a ship carrying the ghola of Duncan Idaho, Sheeana (a young woman who can control sandworms), and a crew of various refugees escapes into the uncharted galaxy, fleeing from the monstrous Honored Matres, dark counterparts to the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood. The nearly invincible Honored Matres have swarmed into the known universe, driven from their home by a terrifying, mysterious Enemy. As designed by the creative genius of Frank Herbert, the primary story of Hunters and Sandworms is the exotic odyssey of Duncan's no-ship as it is forced to elude the diabolical traps set by the ferocious, unknown Enemy. To strengthen their forces, the fugitives have used genetic technology from Scytale, the last Tleilaxu Master, to revive key figures from Dune's past-including Paul Muad'Dib and his beloved Chani, Lady Jessica, Stilgar, Thufir Hawat, and even Dr. Wellington Yueh. Each of these characters will use their special talents to meet the challenges thrown at them.Failure is unthinkable--not only is their survival at stake, but they hold the fate of the entire human race in their hands.
Customer Reviews:
The Dumbing Down of Dune.......2007-10-20
This book is simply an exercise in money-making for the authors. Hunters has all the subtlety of an elephant in a china shop. Herbert Jr should be ashamed of himself, debasing his father's amazing literary legacy the way he is... This is like reading Harry Potter after reading Shakespeare. Ridiculous. I've read fan fiction from teenagers that was better than this. Ugh.
Hunters of Dune.......2007-10-04
First, I read Battle of Corrino by curiosity, a very bad book, the feud Atreides-Corrino very weak, the war machines and humans very long, and finaly , when the ship leaves the planet with a copy of Omnius, it was clear the link to the 7th Dune Book.
It was very convenient for the authors to "find" the manuscript of Dune 7, and wait several years to increase the curiosity of Dune fans.
I waited one year to decide to read Hunters of Dune, very disappointing, a lot of violence, planetary genocide, for Honored Matres and Bene Gesserit alike.
It is absurd to kill a 100 000 Honored Matres for 20 new members to the New Sisterhood. Destroying the Matres to fought the Enemy, what is the reason?.
The Symek empire waiting for the attack of the Matres to retaliate against the humanity?. They did'nt need a reason.
The authors are using Dune 7 to introduce as many of their own
creations as possible, like Omnius and Erasmus in the new novels.
Now is the season for Paul gholas, every one can have their own. How many Pauls are going to be created simultaneously?. The gholas acting and reasoning as adults?. It is not possible
Don't lost your money and time reading this book, the next, Sandworms of Dune, or any of the Dune books of Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson.
it's okay.......2007-09-26
i haven't had time to read it completely yet,but it looks okay.
Good that the writters remind us of past stories in the previous books.
Lettertype was a bit small,but that's because it was a pocket edition.
I like the cover art well !
Reading time you never get back..........2007-09-14
Simply put, it's trash. As a long time reader of Frank Herbert's novels (not just his Dune work), I've come to expect a certain standard in the writing. As a writer, I've learned to be more cirtical in my reading of fiction. This book in no way meets the minimum standards Dune fans should expect from someone who actually puts "Herbert" on their work.
Phrases like "they collided like asteroids" are indicative of the authors limited imagination and tell us something about his discomfort with prose.
The authors inabiity to properly pace his stories, his knack for foiling epic drama in a single paragraph, and dragging out cliche and trite banter for unending pages, makes the whole experience stomach turning.
Taking the intricately woven universe of his father's books, and lacking imagination to come up with his own characters, Brian Herbert (and to an extent Kevin Anderson) employ the cheapest technique ever: Let's clone them!
Now, I could even believe, that in this far flung culture where Gholas are, if not common, at least not unheard of, that they might Ghola a Hero or two to help them out in the battle. But they actually Ghola Dr. Yueh? To give hima chance to redeem himself or to steal another one of Frank Herbert's excellent plot points? It's just not well thought out.
On top of the authors obvious lack of mastery in his craft, it's just not a very good story.
Would it have been better if this book hadn't been written?.......2007-09-14
The urge to read Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson's continuation of Frank Herbert's Dune series is a bit like the urge to purchase a lottery ticket. Buying the ticket makes sense because what you're gaining is the thrill of anticipation. What makes very little sense is checking your numbers as your chance of being disappointed is infinitely greater than your chance of actually winning. Checking your numbers is frankly a complete waste of time.
Almost.
Frank Herbert died in 1986, one year after his sixth novel in the outstanding Dune series, Chapterhouse Dune, was published. Chapterhouse ends with a cliff hanger - it's clearly not intended as the end of the series but death has a way of stuffing up good intentions. Twenty years later Herbert Jnr and Anderson's Hunters of Dune picks up where Herbert Snr left off.
In the Authors' Note to Hunters of Dune we're told that in 1997 Brian and Kevin had discussed writing the fabled Dune 7 but that with no extant notes by Frank they would need to base the work solely on their own imaginations. For a number of reasons they decided to write a three book prequel to the series - House Atreides, House Harkonnen and House Corinno. Somewhere along the way, we're told, they made the serendipitous discovery of two safe-deposit boxes containing notes by Frank Herbert for Dune 7. And thus from the master's notes we have Hunters of Dune and its companion Sandworms of Dune (due out in August 2007).
I doubt whether Tor's marketing division could come up with a better idea than the serendipitous discovery of the note books, an implausible (but not impossible) story: in an infinite universe I'm sure there are several good reasons why an author would keep the notes for what was presumably a work in progress in a safe-deposit box with not even a single copy around the house in case he had a desire to do some writing.
Hmmm.
Hunters of Dune was released in August 2006 and for several reasons it's taken me almost a year to get around to reading it. For a start I hadn't read the Dune series for more than a decade and I was keen to read the whole thing from beginning to end. And the verdict: the whole series stands up extremely well. Dune itself really does deserve its ranking as the greatest SF novel of all time.
That was one reason it took me a while to pick up Hunters of Dune.
Another is that I'd already been burned reading House Atreides, the writing duo's first offering and one that I'd read with great anticipation on its release in 1999. And the verdict: I haven't been game to read House Harkonnen and House Corinno or, until now, anything else the duo has done in the Dune universe. To be fair to Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson, it's a tough task to pick up where the master left off, particularly as there are so many devotees of the master's work. Expectations are high and perhaps unrealisable even if you do a good job.
Unfortunately they don't even do a good job. Their writing is often poor and the complexity of plot, of ideas and of character that typified Frank Herbert's work and made the reading experience so satisfying is, frankly, absent. This is not the criticism of a Dune purist or conservative fan, jealous of Frank Herbert's legacy: if the new works were good, I'd be delighted.
My hope was that after honing their skills on six prequels (the three in the Prelude to Dune series and three others in the Legends of Dune series) Brian and Kevin would have improved enough to produce a worthy conclusion to the series. And there is definite improvement but in the end there really is only one thing to recommend Hunters of Dune and its companion Sandworms of Dune. I'll get to that one thing in a moment. In Hunters of Dune the prose is often flat, frequently reading like a stilted report about the protagonists. We're not invited to get inside these characters, and in any case they'd need to have an inside first: these characters might have the same names as they had in Chapterhouse, but they've lost the immense depth that Frank Herbert had bequeathed them and there's only surface left.
Also lost is any complexity and intellectual sophistication. Take this example of a discussion between mentat Miles Teg (a human computer) and Garimi, a Bene Gesserit. They've discovered a planet formerly belonging to the Honoured Matres, devoid of life although the infrastructure of civilisation is untouched (except by time). It's known that the Honoured Matres who invaded the Old Empire were fleeing something and that they wanted knowledge from the Bene Gesserit about how to manipulate and control their immune functions. So we have a planet with no living people but no obvious signs of destruction and a people seeking to control their immune functions as the Bene Gesserit do in order to overcome any pathogen:
Garimi held up one finger. "The whores came to the Bene gesserit demanding to know how we control our bodies. They were frantic to understand how Reverend Mothers can manipulate our immune functions, cell by cell. Of course!"
"Speak clearly, Garimi. What do you mean?" Teg's voice was abrupt, the hardened battle commander.
"She tuned a sour look on him. "You are a Mentat. Make a prime projection!"
Teg did not bristle at the scolding. Instead, his eyes became glazed for just a moment, and then his expression returned. "Ahh. If the whores wanted to learn how to control immune responses, then perhaps the Enemy attacked them using a biological agent..."
Frank Herbert's Miles Teg was a genius. Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson's Miles Teg is a moron. A Sinclair ZX81 (circa 1981 with a huge 1K of memory!!) could have pulled that one out of the box.
So, the one thing to recommend these books: they are a continuation of Herbert's work, purportedly based on his notes and the loose ends will therefore be tied up. And sadly, that's sufficient reason to read them.
Although some (Leto II for instance) might argue that the uncertainty of non closure is preferable.
(This review first appeared on www.sffmedia.com)
Book Description
The Happiest Man in the World buoyantly describes seventy-four-year-old David Pearlman, a restless and migratory soul, a mariner, a musician, a member of the Explorers Club and a friend of the San Francisco Beats, a former preacher and sign painter, a polymath, a pauper, and a football strategist for the Red Mesa Redskins of the Navajo Nation. When Pearlman was fifty, he was bitten on the hand by a dog in Mexico and for two years got so sick that he thought he would die. When he recovered, he felt so different that he decided he needed a new name. He began calling himself Poppa Neutrino, after the itinerant particle that is so small it can hardly be detected. To Neutrino, the particle represents the elements of the hidden life that assert themselves discreetly.
Inspired by Thor Heyerdahl and Kon-Tiki, Neutrino is the only man ever to build a raft from garbage he found on the streets of New York and sail it across the North Atlantic.
The New York Daily News described the accomplishment as “the sail of the century.” National Geographic broadcast an account of the trip as part of its series on extreme adventures. And now he is on a quest to cross the Pacific on a raft. If he makes it, he plans to continue around the world. No one has ever sailed around the world on a raft. Meanwhile, he has invented the Neutrino Clock Offense, an unstoppable football play, which a former coach of the New York Jets describes as being as innovative as the forward pass.
The philosophical underpinnings of Neutrino’s existence are what he calls Triads, a concept worked out after years of reading and reflection. He believes that each person, to be truly happy, must define his or her three deepest desires and pursue them remorselessly. Freedom, Joy, and Art are Neutrino’s three.
The Happiest Man in the World is a lavish, exotic, funny, and deeply serious book about a man who has led a life of profound engagement and ceaseless adventure.
Customer Reviews:
A Portrait of a Hero and Nut.......2007-07-17
Alec Wilkinson has written for _The New Yorker_ for years, and has ideas about who makes a good subject for his prose. "I do not believe that someone is a proper subject, or a laudable figure, only if he has made a lot of money or been a politician, an actor, a freakish public figure, or a criminal," he writes in _The Happiest Man in the World: An Account of the Life of Poppa Neutrino_ (Random House). Indeed, Poppa Neutrino is none of these. He is a rafter, a football strategist, a street musician, and most of all an independent being who in his seventy-odd years has relentlessly done things his own way. This makes him a real hero, but it also makes him a nut; there is no reason the two cannot be conjoined, but his way of living his life is not one readers can expect to be completely comfortable with. "I wouldn't suggest that anyone regard Neutrino as a model," Wilkinson confesses. "It wouldn't be sensible. I don't even myself regard him entirely as one." Model or not, Neutrino is unique, and he is happy, and if you jettison materialistic standards (as Neutrino surely has) he is a success, and Wilkinson's delightful, amused, and affectionate portrait lets us in on the life of an eccentric who is as worth knowing in his way as any tycoon or president.
Neutrino's mother was an incorrigible gambler, and his father was a sailor who wasn't around. He flunked school and was thrown out of the Army because he enlisted at fifteen. He attended seminary and was thrown out, and then headed a group called the Salvation Navy, which traveled on waterways and made money by painting signs. He formed a ragtag musical group and got some money by it, but money wasn't important, just getting by was: "His poverty had exposed him again and again to the harshest torments, and yet he behaved as if no one could be as fortunate as he was to wake up with the whole day long to invent." He invented a football tactic by which a quarterback can send signals to a receiver after a play is underway, and part of the book is devoted to Neutrino's traveling to different schools to interest them in his revolutionary tactic, which seems to work but is just too different for the teams to incorporate (so far). The main arena for his invention, however, is that of rafting. "Neutrino was not the first man to build a raft and sail it across the Atlantic," writes Wilkinson. "He was the first to cross the Atlantic on a raft built from garbage." Neutrino may have spent his life as a drifter, but he did so literally, and made an adventure and an art form of it.
He also made it a spiritual quest. He created the Church of the Seven Levels, which incorporates his metaphysics based on triads. "There's only one thing in my soul," Neutrino says. "It's attack. Whether it's musical, spiritual, emotional, it's a multileveled attack. If you don't attack, you're just receiving all the blows of life." And yet paradoxically, he is on a non-offensive and introspective quest: "I am always asking myself, How can I become more involved, more passionate, and less vulnerable?" If Neutrino had taken his philosophy and energy and expended it in business, he would have been a millionaire many times over, but then he would just be one of millions of millionaires, and he would not have been the fascinating character profiled here. At the end of the book, Neutrino, elderly but hanging on after heart attacks, is still making rafts, perhaps one to go across the Pacific. Few who read this intimate and absorbing book will want to imitate his particular style of life, but there is much to admire about Neutrino's eccentricity. "I'm going out of this life as what I have worked and striven my whole life to be, a free man - free of possessions, free of greed, free of worry and strife. Free of anything superfluous."
The Happiest Man in the World: An Account of the Life of Poppa Neutrino.......2007-07-17
I question the title. There are certainly happier people than Poppa Neutrino. However, Poppa Neutrino is an interesing character for a well written book. After reading the latest books on major polical figures, it is a pleasure to read a book about someone who "marches to his own drummer" and is not at least concerned with his image. I don't think many people will like this man, but it is inspiring to read about someone who is truly an individual in the age of conformity.
That being said, by the end of the book, I find myself disappointed. I ended the book feeling sad for Poppa Neutrino, although, the author clearly admires him. I found myself feeling that Neutrino wasted much of his opportunites to leave the world a better place.
Great Book.......2007-05-12
Great reading, seemed to remind me of On The Road. Highly recommended.
The Freedom of Movement.......2007-04-05
Alec Wilkinson's book has one big thing going for it: Poppa Neutrino, aka David Pearlman. Even a hack writer couldn't ruin this story.
Wilkinson begins with a 3-pronged hook - (1) Neutrino has just created a football play that will revolutionize the game; (2) he is planning to build a raft from scraps and sail across the Pacific; and (3) he's so eccentric that he changed his name after a dog bite in Mexico.
The first part of the book, in my opinion, is the best. It's a history Poppa Neutrino from birth to age 70. Peppered throughout are his philosophical musings. We learn of his childhood in San Francisco as the son of a Gambling mother, memories of falling asleep under card tables and living on the road, joining the army at 15, fights, love affairs; other highlights include Neutrino and others starting a religion, creating a band, sailing across the Atlantic in a raft. At first, I thought I was reading the greatest put-on ever written; the book seemed to be pretending to be non-fiction, and yet had to be totally, outrageously, fabricated. There are many elements of tall-tale here, and since Neutrino is the one retelling his story, one has to believe he is stretching the truth a little. Getting his teeth punched out, and then sticking them back in his gums backwards, where they remained for 30 years, is one example. Nevertheless, fact or fiction, the history of this itinerant man, his adventures, his outlook on life, are golden. Wilkinson sticks well to the meat of the narrative; but at times he treats major events too brusquely. Some of Neutrino's adventures need more space - they are that compelling. I think an extra 100 pages to the man's history would have benefited the book.
The last 2 sections of the book settle into the present, with Neutrino a 70 year-old man recovered from several heart attacks, trying to pursue 2 more ideas/adventures. The football play ends up being merely an interesting idea, although not so revolutionary - but reading how Neutrino follows his ideas through to the end, and his time on an Indian reservation in NM with a high school team is compelling. The final 1/3 of the book is the weakest, I feel, as we spend far too many pages with Neutrino as he prepares to sail a raft across the pacific. For a book that has such punch, such an engaging pace, much of this section feels redundant and at times page-filler. The interesting parts are the adventures, not the mundane details of a man procrastinating.
Neutrino's rafts are unbelievable looking - I suggest going online to see them - as there are no pictures in the book, and they defy description.
Overall, I can't help but regaling my friends and neighbors with the details of this man's life. On another level, one has to feel that Wilkinson's book could have been at least 1/3 better. I await the documentary - Random Lunacy: Videos from the World Less Traveled.
Customer Reviews:
Pick Yourself Up, Dust Yourself Off, and Keep Moving Forward!.......2007-01-04
Was a tad surprised about the pot smoking incidents, but it took some hutsvah (spelling?) to put it down in the book. With that said, this is great reading from 1987. Obviously, Barry did NOT kill off any brain cells with the pot, or, if he did, he certainly had many extra ones to play with. I bought this book because I wanted to know more about my absolutely FAVORITE singer. It was hard to put it down at night but I HAD to sleep. Lemme start by saying that I do not generally care to read bios, but this was written by the big Mr. Barry himself, so it's not somebody making up stuff just to sell a book. The ONLY bios I have read have been that of Barry and of Chuck Norris. (I was impressed by Chuck and the values he attempted to portray on Walker, Texas Ranger.)
As is consistent with Barry, he begins the book thanking everyone who helped him for their brutal honesty (obviously in helping him remember details) and helping him in any way with this book-writing venture, which took him over 3 years. He states, "...I want to tell you the story of an average guy on the way to the rest of his life...". (and that about says it.)
The book is very well written, and is done in such a way that it makes you feel that you are sitting across the kitchen table chatting with him over a couple of pots of coffee. It's interesting, witty, simple, and if it's not brutally honest, then he's got me fooled. I found it far more interesting than I had anticipated. Like I said, hard to put down.
It begins with his simple childhood in Brooklyn and discusses his background, family, his failed marriage, beginnings of his career, girlfriends, struggles of the career, challenges, his work at the NYC Bathhouse, alone and with Bette Midler, and so on. He never planned to be a singer, but it sure must have been in the stars. Some of the past must have been painful to write about, but writing about it was probably a type of therapy in itself.
This is a story of determination and perseverence, of getting knocked down and getting back up and going on. It's about putting fears and insecurities aside and having the guts to go forward and keep going. It's about doing a little bullcrapping, too. It's also about having an "I CAN" attitude, which I greatly admire in anyone, along with perseverance. Barry enjoyed the music world and he threw himself into it and got more than he ever expected. This bio is an average man's climb from a poor kid to a superstar, but then, is Barry REALLY average? I think not. "Average" people give up. Average/normal is overrated.
I'm ready for the sequel anytime, Barry! This was FANTASTIC and well worth reading. I LOVED it!!!
Great Entertainer, Superb Musician.......2006-01-25
Wow, I cannot believe it's been 8 years since I read this great book and reviewed it online @ Amazon. I have since read and re-read this book so many times, I've practically memorised the words - but they remain as touching and inspiring as ever. I laugh and cry each time I read it. My respect for him as an entertainer and a person grows each time I read the book.
Barry's words have helped me in my affirmation of my own self worth during the low times and in celebration of the highs - just as all his songs have done all these years. Here's one true blue fan who is looking forward to the next autobiographical update from the man himself.
It's a wonder my book is still in mint condition!!! but I am determined to treasure this book for always. :-)
What a pleasure!.......2004-06-16
Mr. Manilow is a great inspiration.
I loved this book.
It's sincere, funny, interesting and sad all at the same time.
Not only does this man write beautiful music, he sure knows how to write a book too!
If your a fan I would say it's a MUST read.
Barry speaks his mind and i agree with him.......2004-04-28
in this book,
The Kite Runner
The Secret Life of Bees
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time
The Time Traveler's Wife
Middlesex: A Novel
