His Majesty’s Dragon

Summary: Temeraire by Naomi Novik is a combination of Fantasy and Historical Fiction. The book follows Captain Laurence and Temeraire, his dragon, whose egg he captures from a French Ship. Laurence is forced to give up his Naval career and join the aviators, who have a reputation as a rough bunch, set apart from the rest of the military. The consensus from people he knows is that he has had to make a dreadful sacrifice for King and Country, but as Laurence comes to know Temeraire, he not only comes to terms with his changed circumstance, he dives in whole heartedly.

Thoughts: I enjoyed the book a lot, already ordered the Book 2 in the series(though I have gotten Mistborn Book 3, and The Alchemyst Book 2 on the To Read pile). Both Capt. Laurence and Temeraire are interesting characters. Laurence’s reactions to events that are inconceivable in the time and place are what really makes him such an admirable character. He meets a Dragon who is his instructor, he finds out women in the aviators are captains too, his reaction to a fellow captain who neglects his dragon, all of these sequences inform his character, and its a tremendous character. He is moral, but not unbending, he is a proper prig, but only till he is comfortable with someone. Temeraire the dragon on the other hand is more like our typical fantasy hero, who is uniquely gifted(at least in the western world), picks up things very quickly, asks the questions about society at large, that normally a fantasy hero asks, such as why do they fight for duty, an has mysterious powers that come into play at a very convenient time. He could easily be Belgarion, Rand al’Thor or Paul Atreides.

Another aspect of the book that really makes it compelling is the time period. The Napoleonic Wars are the perfect setting for this story. It gives us the British Army Officer with the stiff upper lip, who is in constant danger because of the tense times, but comes through in grand fashion.

One final point. This book is incredibly visual, and its tough to imagine the scale at which these dragons are imagined. Some of the lager dragons are as high as a 10 story building, and require huge crews to be able to fight. They are used as messengers, bombers, transports, fighters, or all at the same time. I really enjoyed the similarities between the way fighting and working on a dragon is similar to fighting and working on a ship. I’ve never read the Aubrey-Maturin Series(Master and Commander with Russel Crowe was based on them) but am now pretty keen to look through those.

I’m glad I did. This was one of the funniest, most poignant, stories I have read.

It’s the story of a journalist who gets what should be a dream assignment. A long profile of an encounter victim, and his life. To get started he meets with his daughter Muneeza, who was nicknamed Sancho by her father. She talks to him about her and her father’s life. I’m not going to say more because its probably best to come to the story with few expectations on where it will lead.

Its short, I finished it in 2 sittings, the first time I got about 20 minutes into it on a weeknight. And than on Sunday evening I picked it up at about 7pm and by 930 I was finished. It’s a quick read which will appeal to readers who don’t like the epic books. It is however not a simple book. The story hits on class, caste, religion, globalization, urbanization, mall culture, journalism, the media, freedom and so many other things. Abir and Muneeza are fully fleshed out three dimensional characters, there is a naturalness to their meetings that I’ve found rare. The Police Inspector is also a very interesting character, and I like how Abir comes to really understands this guy. The final important character in the book is Bombay. Amit Verma does a fantastic job of showcasing the city, both its frustrations and its promise.

I highly recommend this book.

David Eddings (1931-2009) is one of those authors who first got me into fantasy literature. I always thought he was underappreciated as an author. His books were light and fun, but they were a tremendous amount of fun. I have read three of his series, The Belagariad which introduced us to Garion, Polgara and Belgarath, The Mallorean which is a sequel to the series, and the Elenium which is a different trilogy. 

Before Harry Potter these books were probably the best Young Adult type books available to get kids into reading. There are so many of my nieces and nephews that I have given these books to who are now hard core readers.

Another very interesting book he wrote was The Rivan Codex. Actually I am thinking of the introduction to that book, but for anyone who wants to read about how to go about writing a Fantasy book its an invaluable tool, with excellent insights into the process.

UPDATE: Tor.com has a great tribute.

Brief reviews of some of the books read this monsoon follow:

Spirit Gate by Kate Elliot (3.5/5)

I liked the concept of the Eagle riding Reeves. It promises to be a much larger story than what we have seen so far, and I am very much looking forward to the rest of the books. This had the feel of setup.

Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson (5/5)

This was awesome. Just awesome. I am so glad this is the author finishing up Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time. Most visual and exciting magical system I can remember reading about. I’ve always thought for Fantasy to be good, Magic needs to be logical. Wave your hand and crazy shit happens is not fun. This is as detailed, as “scientific” as I can imagine a magical system be.

Orphans of Chaos by John C. Wright (3/5)

I don’t like it when its tough to keep track of who is who. For a book as short as this was, it seemed unnecessarily confusing. Every character has at least a couple of names, which are used interchangeably. This annoyed me to the point where it took away from my enjoyment. This was disappointing, as the story seemed funny. It was a set up book, and Im not sure if I would seek out the rest of the books.

Through Wolf’s Eye’s by Jane Lindskold (4/5)

The first book of the Firekeeper series. Reminiscent of David Eddings style. Lots of humor. Simple Story. A little cliched, but using cliche as short hand, rather than filler. Unforgettable characters in Lady Blysse and Blindseer.

Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (4.5/5)

I am not a big fan of Doctorows non fiction writing. I agree with a lot of his basic ideas regarding Open Source, DRM etc. but he is an absolutist when it comes to these issues  and can come off as condescending. I thought his slamming audible.com for DRM on the This Week in Tech podcast, (during an audible ad no less!) was in extremely poor taste. That stridency has helped with this book though. Its set in the world of tomorrow and is the story of how a couple of kids get caught up in a Homeland Security roundup, how badly they are treated and how they get their revenge. It has interesting rants on privacy, burritos, xboxes, and biometrics among other issues of the day.

Mistborn 2: The Wells of Ascension (4.5/5)

Second book in the Mistborn Trilogy by Brandon Sanderson. I didn’t enjoy it quite as much as the first book, but it was a fun read. More political, than the action kung fu style of the first book. In this volume we see how Vin grows into her power. There is an incredible set piece, where Vin goes berserk and causes an unholy amount of destruction. We have been often told but for the first time in this series we really understand how powerful Mistborn are.

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch (5/5)

Funniest, bloodiest, goriest, book I’ve read in a long long time. Locke Lamora is the leader of a gang called the Gentleman Bastards (Love that gang name, I will use some variation for my fantasy basketball team this year). He is the Thorn of Camorr, a Venice like city set in the middle ages. There is some magic going on here, but it has little to do with the story. This is the story of a group of con men, who get in deeper and deeper. The ending is extremely satisfying, and I worry about what that says about me, being satisfied by as violent an ending as I have ever read.

Red Seas under Red Skies by Scott Lynch (4/5)

Its not as good as the first book, but than again few books are. The surviving Gentlemen Bastards head to a new city, to take on the owner of the largest gambling house in the world. Than the Military Dictator of the city decides to involve them. And before we know it Lockes captaining a Pirate Ship. Badly.

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (4.5/5)

I don’t think I’ve ever read a book with a cooler summary at the back

I have stolen princesses back from sleeping barrow kings. I burned down the town of Trebon. I have spent the night with Felurian and left with both my sanity and my life. I was expelled from the University at a younger age than most people are allowed in. I tread paths by moonlight that others fear to speak of during day. I have talked to Gods, loved women, and written songs that make the minstrels weep. My name is Kvothe. You may have heard of me’ So begins the tale of Kvothe – currently known as Kote, the unassuming innkeeper – from his childhood in a troupe of travelling players, through his years spent as a near-feral orphan in a crime-riddled city, to his daringly brazen yet successful bid to enter a difficult and dangerous school of magic. In these pages you will come to know Kvothe the notorious magician, the accomplished thief, the masterful musician, the dragon-slayer, the legend-hunter, the lover, the thief and the infamous assassin.

Kvothe is a prodigy, and this first book is about his growing up, how he becomes an orphan on the streets, makes it to The University, and the starting of how he becomes a legend. I really liked the structure of the story, the moving from third person to first person. I was also impressed with the chapter break ups. Each chapter was a chapter. A short episode in itself. One thing that I don’t like about a lot of Fantasy novels, is the incoherent(at least to me) chapter structure. There are obviously exceptions, but for the most part it seems like authors or editors try and make the chapters more or less equivalent in size, rather than the chapter trying to be organisational. But its not the structure, its the characters that make this a great read.

So as you can see I’ve had some fun over the last few months. I cant remember such a good streak of reading, where I’ve hit no duds whatsoever.

Image from flickr

Every time I look at Sandersons blog though, I can see that he gets these books in the same way i did. I had remarked earlier about how he agreed with one of my keys to being a WOT fan. And now I see another point of agreement. The person who first told me about the series recommended I read it years ago, before Path of Daggers came out. I never got around to it till right before the release of the 11th book Knife of Dreams. When I spoke to him after I started reading, he told me how its starting to get too much for him. Too long, and the pace has started to slack off. I loved the series all the way through(though I would have to say if books 7,8,9 and 10 were 2 books instead of 4 it would probably be even stronger). We have very similar reading tastes, so we tried to break it down. What we came up with is almost exactly what Mr. Sanderson talks about in his post on Crown of Swords:

I object to complaints about pacing.  I thing the pacing across the series has been even, and I certainly didn’t find this book to be any slower than previous volumes.  However, perhaps that’s because I’m able to read these all through without any wait in-between.  One thing that is happening is that as the series grows longer, the viewpoints per character grow less and less frequent.  There are enough main characters with important plots that we can’t spend an entire book focusing on just two or three of them like we did during the early books.

These books are so detailed, that it becomes difficult to enjoy that detail if your struggling to remember specific plot points while your reading. If the whole story is fresh it works better, and the details become something one savours.

Anomander+Rake, originally uploaded by amitmdoshi.

Saw this on Pat’s Fantasy Hotlist. Love the Malazan books, and this looks awesome.

I think this is the jump readers need to make to really enjoy this series.  They can’t get so attached to Rand, Mat, Egwene, and Perrin that they aren’t willing to experience the powerful characterizations of other people in the world.  Those who can’t make this jump tend to complain about the series loosing focus.  Those who do make the jump get a story with more complexity and depth than you find in some of the other fantasy series, which stick to the more traditional plot structures and characterizations.

Brandon Sanderson Blog: WOT Read Through: THE SHADOW RISING

As a huge wheel of time fan who hasnt had a chance to read Brandon Sanderson yet(The books are in the mail) this entry makes me so happy. This nails what Ive always thought is the dividing line between people who think WOT is the best thing ever, versus people who cant stand it.

It was the first set of Fantasy/SciFi books that I read, and I’ve never gotten as immersed in a book as I was in this story. Not 1 book, but 12 enormous books(11 in the main series and 1 prequel).

Unfortunately Robert Jordan passed away in the middle of writing the final book in the main series. His widow, who was also his editor for all the books, selected Brandon Sanderson to finish the last book. Sanderson is going to be writing some of his thoughts about the series of books as he runs through the entire series in preparation. He just posted his first set of impressions on The Eye of the World. He talks about foreshadowing:

I know how difficult it is to foreshadow across an entire series, and am frankly astounded by how well Mr. Jordan laid the groundwork for his future books.  Min’s prophesies are one great example, but equally potent is Mr. Jordan’s use of mythology and story as a means of preparing the reader for events such as the Great Hunt, future interactions with the Aiel (and the People’s relationship with them), and the coming of the Seanchan.

If you havent read these books its impossible to realise just how difficult and incredible a job this foreshadowing is. This is a massive story, the scope of which Ive never come close to seeing anywhere else. Its 3.1 Million words. compare that to the average length of a novel which is around 100,000 words.

He talks about 2 kinds of foreshadowing above, Prophecy and Myth. Theres another thing RJ did, which delighted rereaders in particular. A throwaway line, will wind up alluding to significant events, character arcs in the future. One that comes to mind is Mat telling Rands father how he is interested in war. Theres another line by Moiraine about Egwene becoming the Amyrlin Seat.

Robert Jordan really was an incredible author.

Something that makes me happy reading this and all of Sandersons post on the Wheel of time, is just how much he gets the series. Based on my first few sampling of his blog, I’m encouraged, that he will give this series the finish it deserves. I have also ordered the first book of his Mistborn series, which I understand is darker, but will hopefully give me more reason to be excited about A Memory of Light.

Finally and most importantly we have been promised the identity of Asmodeans killer. I cant wait for 2009.

There are 5 books in the series:

Pawn of Prophecy (Belgariad)

Queen of Sorcery (The Belgariad, Book 2)

Magician’s Gambit (The Belgariad, Book 3)

Castle of Wizardry (The Belgariad, Book 4)

Enchanters’ End Game (The Belgariad, Book 5)

The basic premise of the books is a quest in which Garion, Mister Wolf, Aunt Pol, and Burnik leave Faldors farm to find the Orb of Aldur which has been stolen. The Orb is what protects the West from being overrun by the Angaraks of the East. They are joined by Barak and Silk, who are companions of Mr. Wolf. As they set out on the journey, Garion realises that Mister Wolf is Belgarath, an ancient sorceror, and his Aunt Pol is his daughter, who is thousands of years old. They are joined by other characters, some annoying, some interesting and fun. Mandorallen, was initially irritating, but he grew on me, similar to how he grew on his companions. Relg, I never liked at all. Garions love interest Ce’Nedra’s a brat, very much in the same vein as Robert Jordan’s Elayne character, or George Lucas’ Princess Leia for that matter.

I think my nephew who is just now starting to read the genre(loves Harry Potter, Eragon, and the first young adult version of Robert Jordan’s From The Two Rivers will really enjoy this. For a older audience, its lightweight fun. Ive got to say I was never bored, but I was also never really immersed in the book the way I was when reading George RR Martin or Robin Hobb or Robert Jordan

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Update: Saw a post by Govindraj Ethiraj, on a similar subject