Posts from October 2015
Review: Nemesis Games
Review of Nemesis Games (The Expanse #5.0) by James S. A. Corey (9780316334716)★★★★(https://b-ark.ca/AU2Q2K)
A thousand worlds have opened, and the greatest land rush in human history has begun. As wave after wave of colonists leave, the power structures of the old solar system begin to buckle.
Ships are disappearing without a trace. Private armies are being secretly formed. The sole remaining protomolecule sample is stolen. Terrorist attacks previously considered impossible bring the inner planets to their knees. The sins of the past are returning to exact a terrible price.
And as a new human order is struggling to be born in blood and fire, James Holden and the crew of the Rocinante must struggle to survive and get back to the only home they have left.
Nemesis Games is a breakneck science fiction adventure following the bestselling Cibola Burn.
To say this book was better than Cibola Burn would be an enormous understatement… in fact, it was a close call as to whether I would bother continuing the series after book four, but I decided to take a crack at it, and I’m very glad I did!
Continue reading...Review: The Lies of Locke Lamora
Review of The Lies of Locke Lamora (Gentleman Bastard #1.0) by Scott Lynch (9780553804676)★★★★(https://b-ark.ca/kAC4mi)
An orphan’s life is harsh—and often short—in the mysterious island city of Camorr. But young Locke Lamora dodges death and slavery, becoming a thief under the tutelage of a gifted con artist. As leader of the band of light-fingered brothers known as the Gentleman Bastards, Locke is soon infamous, fooling even the underworld’s most feared ruler. But in the shadows lurks someone still more ambitious and deadly. Faced with a bloody coup that threatens to destroy everyone and everything that holds meaning in his mercenary life, Locke vows to beat the enemy at his own brutal game—or die trying.
Some have likened it to a fantasy version of Oceans 11, and I suppose that makes for a reasonable distant approximation, but it’s definitely a lot more than that. The world constructed, here, is familiar yet different, with a lot of standard fantasy tropes mixed with these little flairs that give Camorr a unique flavour all its own. And the plot is paced well enough to keep you wanting to move forward.
The characters feel a bit two dimensional… Locke is, obviously, fairly well sketched out, but Jean and the twins feel a little flat. If I had to pick a surprise stand-out character it’d be the Spider… pity we see so little of them, relatively speaking. But while they may all be familiar archetypes, they’re fun ones, and so we can enjoy them for what they are.
