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dustydigger
Posted 2014-08-08 12:52 PM (#8278 - in reply to #6198)
Subject: Re: The Pick and Mix Challenge.		Quote Reply



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Location: UK		26. David Eddings - Pawn of Prophecy. I am not a great fantasy fan,but wanted to try some famous titles in the genre,but have to admit being a little disappointed in this book. I am sure back in the eighties when all the well-worn fantasy tropes were still new-minted I would have thoroughly enjoyed it. It has engaging characters a fast paced plot and is a fair page-turner,but there isnt a great deal today to differentiate it from all the others . Also I had expected this to be written for adults, and was occasionally puzzled by the almost simplistic style. Now I see it is claimed as a YA novel,though was it meant to be classed so back in the early 80s? I think I have read too many books of this type lately(Robin Hobbs Assassin's Apprentice,Raymond Feist's Magician,and Terry Brooks Sword of Shannara),and am perhaps too old and jaded to appreciate Eddings. Perhaps I will give it a year or two before trying more of the series .
Have to admit too that having recently been blown away by Susan Cooper's extraordinary The Dark is Rising,I would find most fantasy a bit lacking!
27. TJ G Ballard - The Crystal World. I followed up reading Ballard's The Drowning World with this book,and can see many similarities - the downbeat tone;the hero almost completely cut off from society,detached and without real relationships;the oblique likenesses to themes in Conrad's Heart of Darkness;elaborate descriptions of the landscape,inadequate depictions of characters; a rather token use of SF tropes used only to bear the freight of Ballard's dark pessimism.
I thought Ballard became over-enamoured with his vision of the petrified forest.There are only so many ways to say every living thing in the forest is being progressively turned to crystal. Very little happens really,people wander about the jungle at random..I didnt find people's motives very credible either.All in all a disappointment,and I couldnt raise a tear when ,like in The Drowned World,our hero with a death wish,however romantic in theory,went off to seek oblivion.I'm afraid existential ennui is so not my cup of tea,and the whole scientific(?) explanations of time''leaking'' away from the universe,leaving all creations left in a frozen stasis forever was way over my poor head.
Too determinedly literary and heavy for my tastes. One of those authors who use a form of SF for their own agenda.With enough passion,clarity of theme and ideas,such books can became classics,both within and without the SF genre - think of Brave New World,1984,and works by Margaret Atwood.This was too airy fairy,and sometimes,despite interminable descriptions of the landscape,it was a bit puzzling seeing what exactly the author meant.AS for the science,I hadnt a clue! lol.Read for various WWEnd lists and my 12x12 challenge
28. Terry Pratchett - Small Gods. .Like Pyramids,this one is a savage satire of religion,cloaked in humour,where a rather thick young man is chosen as a prophet by a god currently trapped in the form of a tortoise.The gods of Discworld have power and fame according to the number of true believers.This tortoise god has precisely one!. Amusing,but I dont really care for religious satire.

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