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Recent Reads
Aug. 1st, 2004 08:34 amI have been reading more lately. Part of it steams from my lack of Internet. Let me rephrase my first sentence, I have been reading more books lately. Some are by new authors, some by established writers, and some collaborations. Not all of the books have been fiction either. It is one of those times that I am trying for a nice mix.
I finally read the DaVinci Code after a number of people recommended it to me. I want my time back. That book is so badly written with strange information dumping flashbacks in the middle of people’s sentences. The plot is thin at best and all the religious revelations are all things I heard back in college in my early Christian religion history course. I know it has struck a cord with the people since it has been on various bestseller lists for the better part of a year. There have even been knock off books based on the DaVinci Code. It is a book that has become a phenomenon. Personally I thought it was a load of badly written tripe.
Firethorn by Sarah Micklem is one of those sweeping fantasy novels with politics and sex at the forefront. Over all I thought it was a very good first novel. Her characters were clearly drawn. She gave you enough information about the various peoples in her world without spelling everything out very carefully to the point that I find myself shouting, “Get on with it”. The “Get on with it” problem has been rearing its ugly head a lot recently including in the DaVinci Code. The romance angle was a bit thick at times but I could over look it until I got to the end. I had to read the last chapter twice to figure out what was going on. The whole novel fell apart for me in a matter of about 15 pages due to a very sloppy end. I know that this is the first in a series but I am a believer in giving your reader some sort of understandable conclusion. So it is a good read over all but I didn’t like the end of the book.
Julian May is an author I have read off and on for a long time. She is also very much hit or miss for me. She either draws me in within the first 3 chapters or I never finish the book. Conqueror’s Moon was one of the hits. It is a very nicely done fantasy novel with a well-defined system of magic. She gives you the information you need to understand the world she is creating but doesn’t fall into minutia. Good political fantasy novel with characters I really wanted to know more about. The end was a bit of a mess. I could see about where the editor really started to breathe down her neck and finishing the ruddy thing. Again it is book 1 of probably 3. I was more satisfied with this than the end of Firethorn or just about any chapter of the DaVinci Code.
I finally read the DaVinci Code after a number of people recommended it to me. I want my time back. That book is so badly written with strange information dumping flashbacks in the middle of people’s sentences. The plot is thin at best and all the religious revelations are all things I heard back in college in my early Christian religion history course. I know it has struck a cord with the people since it has been on various bestseller lists for the better part of a year. There have even been knock off books based on the DaVinci Code. It is a book that has become a phenomenon. Personally I thought it was a load of badly written tripe.
Firethorn by Sarah Micklem is one of those sweeping fantasy novels with politics and sex at the forefront. Over all I thought it was a very good first novel. Her characters were clearly drawn. She gave you enough information about the various peoples in her world without spelling everything out very carefully to the point that I find myself shouting, “Get on with it”. The “Get on with it” problem has been rearing its ugly head a lot recently including in the DaVinci Code. The romance angle was a bit thick at times but I could over look it until I got to the end. I had to read the last chapter twice to figure out what was going on. The whole novel fell apart for me in a matter of about 15 pages due to a very sloppy end. I know that this is the first in a series but I am a believer in giving your reader some sort of understandable conclusion. So it is a good read over all but I didn’t like the end of the book.
Julian May is an author I have read off and on for a long time. She is also very much hit or miss for me. She either draws me in within the first 3 chapters or I never finish the book. Conqueror’s Moon was one of the hits. It is a very nicely done fantasy novel with a well-defined system of magic. She gives you the information you need to understand the world she is creating but doesn’t fall into minutia. Good political fantasy novel with characters I really wanted to know more about. The end was a bit of a mess. I could see about where the editor really started to breathe down her neck and finishing the ruddy thing. Again it is book 1 of probably 3. I was more satisfied with this than the end of Firethorn or just about any chapter of the DaVinci Code.
