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I just finished Stiletto by Daniel O'Malley. A few thoughts: -I like the return of Myfanwy Thomas but it feels like the book over-relies on her in order to bridge the two books and it becomes apparent that the author isn't confident enough to let this book stand on the new characters, Pawn Felicity Clements and Grafter Odette Liefeld who are welcome additions to the series. -There's a major difference between the narrative structures of the two books. Sure, the first book hand alternating sections featuring letters from Myfawny's past self but it serviced the plot of an amnesiac woman being lead by her past self through a supernatural counter-terrorist organization. Here, there's major world-building with no consequence to the central conflict and once you figure out its redundancy it stops the momentum of the story, like a roller coaster suddenly stopping and then starting over and over again. To wit, the crystal shard serial killer and the battle at the church in the small town would have been better served if it was re-contextualized as part of the unknown entity undermining the Chequy/Grafter alinance. Heck, even Marcel's WWII backstory is just a giant Chekhov's Gun and would've felt less unnecessary if there was more room for it to properly develop. -In short, whenever I describe this series to other people, I describe it as "if X-Men were part of British counter-terrorism" and the comparison is apt. This series is fun, dynamic, and features supernatural factions like a comic book series. But this sequel has issues juggling way too many plot points in the air like a comic book series. I enjoyed myself, but not as much as the first. I hope the next sequel gets better focus and tighter editing than this one. Benny the Snake fucked around with this message at 06:45 on Jul 18, 2016 |
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Jul 18, 2016 06:41
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I also just finished Stiletto and I pretty much agree with the rest of you guys. It was fun but ultimately not quite as good as The Rook. For me, my biggest complaint is that the grafters kind of seem like a joke after having their master plan dismantled by an amnesiac Rook in the first book then being handed their asses by a bunch of their own kids. It'd be one thing if they were characterized as hyper competent badasses in their own individual fields right from the beginning, but they're not even really talked about until the final confrontation. At the beginning of the book they aren't even really described at all except that there is a mysterious age gap in the Grafters population, so it's not even as though they are the most exceptional of their class, they are literally the only Grafters of their age group other than Odette. I guess I feel like the 1000 year old Ernst should probably be able to put 5 millennials in their place That said I did think it was a fun book even if I thought the villain was pretty underwhelming.
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Jul 18, 2016 08:53
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Oh nice, I didn't realize Stiletto would be out this year. Khizan posted:I'll sum up the entirety of the important bits of Fool Moon and save you the trouble. "Dresden saves some werewolf college students and they become his friends" I still think he was trying to go for the traditional werewolf/vampire sex audience ,and that he was as surprised as everyone else when it became a hit fantasy series.
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Jul 18, 2016 11:26
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Just finished Who Killed Sherlock Holmes this weekend and it was pretty good. It's not really urban fantasy, but I found a sci-fi book called Helix (no relation to the terrible TV series) about Earth's first outside-the-solar-system colony ship. Opening chapter was about how hosed the Earth is and a guy saying goodbye to his daughter (as she was getting ready to leave to go to the colony ship, she got picked to be part of the crew) before getting ready to commit suicide. It was pretty loving dark and I had to put the book down until I'm ready to keep reading. That or I'm getting unusually depressed for this time of year.
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Jul 18, 2016 12:21
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Inspector 34 posted:I also just finished Stiletto and I pretty much agree with the rest of you guys. It was fun but ultimately not quite as good as The Rook. For me, my biggest complaint is that the grafters kind of seem like a joke after having their master plan dismantled by an amnesiac Rook in the first book then being handed their asses by a bunch of their own kids. It'd be one thing if they were characterized as hyper competent badasses in their own individual fields right from the beginning, but they're not even really talked about until the final confrontation. At the beginning of the book they aren't even really described at all except that there is a mysterious age gap in the Grafters population, so it's not even as though they are the most exceptional of their class, they are literally the only Grafters of their age group other than Odette. I guess I feel like the 1000 year old Ernst should probably be able to put 5 millennials in their place He did though, didn't he? Sure, it took a while, but that seems more Ernst's style anyway. He's a slow fella (see also the heart plan in the Rook) and doesn't quite seem to have a proper concept of time anymore, except when it comes to appointments. He's a scientist and a strategist, not a proper warrior or soldier.. I agree with the rest of your assessment re; the villain, though. But I loved Stiletto, even with the meandering. Criminal lack of the human kinetic bombardment Monica Jarvis-Reed, though. She was by far and away my favorite minor character in the Rook, with the most awesome use of an invincible body I've ever seen.
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Jul 18, 2016 18:38
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Daniel O'Malley strikes me as a comic book nerd. I mean, The Checquy Files remind me a lot of X-Men and Rook Myfanwy Thomas of Kitty Pryde. I know that Ben Aaronovitch is diping his toes into comic books, I think O'Malley would do good doing the same, maybe.
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Jul 18, 2016 21:08
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Wade Wilson posted:It's not really urban fantasy, but I found a sci-fi book called Helix (no relation to the terrible TV series) about Earth's first outside-the-solar-system colony ship. Mind providing a link? Sounds interesting
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Jul 18, 2016 21:57
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^^ Stilleto spoilers: Yeah I mean technically they won in the sense that the merger went through. But losing an entire detachment of Chimeras, two chapter houses (however many deaths that means...), and at least 3 mobile surgeries makes it a pretty costly victory. I guess that's kind of the point though since otherwise there wouldn't be much reason to fear the Antagonists, but for me the end just reads as Grafters being unable or unwilling to protect their brainphone network. I mostly read before going to sleep at night so sometimes I don't catch everything if I happen to doze through a chapter or two, but given how things went down and how nicely the timing worked out, are we meant to believe that Myfanwy and Ernst hashed out a plan to get Odette captured so that they could activate her implant? Or were they legitimately trying to send her to safety and the Antagonists were just one step ahead yet again? I prefer to think the former. I don't think they outright said as much but as I said, it wouldn't surprise me if I just glossed over the explanation. Inspector 34 fucked around with this message at 22:11 on Jul 18, 2016 |
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Jul 18, 2016 22:06
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Kloaked00 posted:Mind providing a link? Sounds interesting https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/173701.Helix?from_search=true
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Jul 19, 2016 02:20
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Inspector 34 posted:^^
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Jul 19, 2016 02:56
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Benny the Snake posted:Yup, she was a living weapon and grafted by Erst to trigger the moment she saw everyone at the same time. As Felicity told her, "you're a Pawn now, a weapon, a stiletto to be used to stab at the heart of the enemy." It's hosed up but it makes sense how Erst would use her like that. Yeah. I really felt like this should have been called "Pawn" instead of "Stiletto"
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Jul 19, 2016 03:01
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Ah, alright I guess I just need things spelled out for me sometimes. I got that that's what ended up happening, but I was kind of more under the impression that they were just lucky that the timing of it worked out before the museum attack rather than them proactively using her as bait.
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Jul 19, 2016 04:17
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I actually thought it was pretty obviously Ernst's intent given all the lecturing about not drinking hot fluids and the constant references to how much her throat ached in the aftermath of her modifications.
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Jul 19, 2016 12:19
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ConfusedUs posted:Yeah. I really felt like this should have been called "Pawn" instead of "Stiletto" I bet Pawn was the working title.
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Jul 19, 2016 12:36
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I think he's said he didn't want to lock himself into naming all his books after chess pieces. The part in The Rook where the whole chess thing is explained in 1 page, followed by 10 pages explaining how dumb it all was, remains one of my favourites.
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Jul 19, 2016 19:01
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Just finished Who Killed Sherlock Holmes?, the third Shadow Police/Fallen London book. It was a lot better than the second one, and actually deals with a lot of the hanging threads from the earlier books. I really wish they had been able to use Benedict Cumberbatch the way they did Neil Gaiman.
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Jul 23, 2016 05:01
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Is there a thread for Cinder Spires? I finished it after a long road trip a bit back and goddamn was that some cog-foppery YA bullshit that pissed me right off and I really want to rant about it in detail.
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Jul 23, 2016 08:16
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This is the Spire thread too. Also for a Steampunk branded book there was surprisingly little steam engine/cogs everywhere! stuff in it, it was mostly magic crystals.
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Jul 23, 2016 09:03
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I thought the world itself is interesting enough that want I to see where this goes, but didn't really care for any of the main characters expect the cat (mostly cause I got one and yea, if he could speak that's totally him).
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Jul 23, 2016 21:42
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Avalerion posted:I thought the world itself is interesting enough that want I to see where this goes, but didn't really care for any of the main characters expect the cat (mostly cause I got one and yea, if he could speak that's totally him). Yeah I enjoyed the world and some characters like Grimm were pretty good. Some of the writing wasn't the best and some character writing was a little weak & YAish+little cringy (Bridgett, that other chick I forgot). But the cat owned (and I expected to hate a loving talking cat when I first read about it but ended up being my favorite character)
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Jul 23, 2016 21:53
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Yea I went into the book thinking "talking cats wtf" and ended up loving the cats. I expect the second time around the main child characters won't be so insufferable, entitled, and juvenile.
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Jul 23, 2016 23:08
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Xaris posted:Yeah I enjoyed the world and some characters like Grimm were pretty good. Some of the writing wasn't the best and some character writing was a little weak & YAish+little cringy (Bridgett, that other chick I forgot). I felt that by the ending most of the characters had found their stride. But those cats had me sold on it from the start.
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Jul 24, 2016 00:16
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Cats with thumbs and matches is the tag line that sells that book, too bad the rest of the cast deserves to be burned.
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Jul 24, 2016 03:37
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Gilok posted:Just finished Who Killed Sherlock Holmes?, the third Shadow Police/Fallen London book. It was a lot better than the second one, and actually deals with a lot of the hanging threads from the earlier books. Thanks for the reminder that this was out.
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Jul 24, 2016 06:27
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Xaris posted:Yeah I enjoyed the world and some characters like Grimm were pretty good. Some of the writing wasn't the best and some character writing was a little weak & YAish+little cringy (Bridgett, that other chick I forgot). Overall, Cinder Spires was pretty disappointing, but I've learned not to expect much from Butcher's series beginnings.
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Jul 24, 2016 09:36
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I think Grimm was going for stoic and came off a little flat for it. If you want to see a better done version of that character check out His Majesty's Dragon. I didn't like Cinder Spires. I didn't hate it either. I am entirely  on the book. It felt like YA material, the main cast was a bunch of kids without a lot of depth, and the characters didn't really get together quick enough for me. I don't remember their names, a few months after having read it, only their archetypes. Spoiled Rich Girl, Perfect Soldier Boy, Quiet Strong Girl, and Cat-Prince. Which is not good, because I usually remember names. I remember names from Alera, and I didn't even finish Alera or like it. I didn't even remember Grimm's name (AKA Self Insert Airship-Captain) until you guys posted it and then I was like "Who?" and then I remembered.Forgettable is not what you want the first book in a new series to be. And I am a huge Butcher fan-girl so I'm pretty disappointed that it didn't click. The cat-politics were fun and the only really memorable thing for me.
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Jul 24, 2016 09:57
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mrking posted:Yea I went into the book thinking "talking cats wtf" and ended up loving the cats. I expect the second time around the main child characters won't be so insufferable, entitled, and juvenile. Me too! I almost didn't read it because of "talking cat Mafia" and the cats are the reason I'll pick up the second.
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Jul 24, 2016 11:29
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I just read all the 20 palaces books and now I'm sad it won't be finished 
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Jul 24, 2016 15:24
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Darkrenown posted:I just read all the 20 palaces books and now I'm sad it won't be finished He did say he'll write a new novella after the current book and maybe try to wrap some poo poo up.
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Jul 24, 2016 16:21
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Megazver posted:He did say he'll write a new novella after the current book and maybe try to wrap some poo poo up.
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Jul 24, 2016 16:52
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Gilok posted:I really wish they had been able to use Benedict Cumberbatch the way they did Neil Gaiman. I assume that he got too much feedback that readers hated real people being in the books, and that's why poor old Jonny Lee Miller ended up as a woman.
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Jul 24, 2016 17:08
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Darkrenown posted:I just read all the 20 palaces books and now I'm sad it won't be finished I originally read them in release order and never really got the hype for them. Earlier this year I started with the prequel and everything just clicked and now I'm in this boat as well. I feel like that the prequel not getting published until later (despite it having been written first I gather) really hurt the series. I'm looking forward to the supposed wrap up novel/novella though.
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Jul 24, 2016 19:08
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Yeah, I was fairly lost in the first book, although it wasn't too bad. Read the 2nd next and it was fine. Then I noticed there was a prequel and read it third and things made so much more sense, which was good because the actual third book would have been a lot harder to get into without the prequel.
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Jul 24, 2016 22:28
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Twenty Palaces is proof that in media res only really works if you get around to the actual beginning inside one novel, one and a half at most, instead of dragging it out indefinitely. I understand that he was wanting to work from the POV of a minimally-informed character slowly learning how the world works, but the readers don't want to be as completely clueless as the main character. e. It also helps if your main character wants to learn how the world works. Ray always struck me as a guy who just didn't care about the world around him, he was just looking for a good excuse to get Annalise and the rest of the Society off his rear end so he could go back to being a petty criminal with his one or two neat magic tricks. rndmnmbr fucked around with this message at 07:23 on Jul 25, 2016 |
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Jul 25, 2016 07:17
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Just finished this book and it feels like it's supposed to be the beginning of a series (mostly about exploring all of the other worlds on the Helix), but nope. It's a one-off. I got a lot of "this seems an awful lot like Frank Herbert's Lazarus Effect, Jesus Incident and Ascension Factor books, but with less loving" from it.
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Jul 25, 2016 20:43
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rndmnmbr posted:Twenty Palaces is proof that in media res only really works if you get around to the actual beginning inside one novel, one and a half at most, instead of dragging it out indefinitely. I understand that he was wanting to work from the POV of a minimally-informed character slowly learning how the world works, but the readers don't want to be as completely clueless as the main character. I was actually aggravated that Annalise kept getting her rear end handed to her while Ray saved the day.
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Jul 25, 2016 20:45
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Wade Wilson posted:I was actually aggravated that Annalise kept getting her rear end handed to her while Ray saved the day. To be fair, it's because the bad guys (rightly) assume she's the more dangerous of the two, so they typically gun for her with everything they got. If they don't, she (literally) tears them apart. Annalise is ruthless and crazy powerful. Ray tends to slip in under the radar and do something just stupid enough to work.
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Jul 25, 2016 20:50
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I missed this, but 'The Hum and the Shiver' is pretty good rural (modern) fantasy. It's a bit like a Hogben story taken seriously, but with elves instead of atlantean mutants.
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Jul 25, 2016 23:34
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rndmnmbr posted:Twenty Palaces is proof that in media res only really works if you get around to the actual beginning inside one novel, one and a half at most, instead of dragging it out indefinitely. I understand that he was wanting to work from the POV of a minimally-informed character slowly learning how the world works, but the readers don't want to be as completely clueless as the main character. I'm not even sure what you're talking about. Ray is portrayed in the first novel as a dude who has glimpsed the terrible truths behind the world and decided that he wants to get the gently caress back to his old life and forget as much of this as possible, definitely not learn more--he is only prevented from doing so by Annalise. His long-term character arc (when the series ended) was turning that around, because it turned out he really hates all these lovely wiizards and horrors from behind time and space.
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Jul 26, 2016 07:12
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anilEhilated posted:I just want to see a pre/sequel to A Key, An Egg, An Unfortunate Remark. Yeah, it's got no real mystery or suspense or original ideas, but it's just so goddamn nice. Yeah same, I liked that book a lot. It was really cool to see an older woman as the main character.
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Jul 26, 2016 23:39
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