April Book List
May. 2nd, 2009 04:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lurkerwithoutApr 4th: L. Sprague deCamp - The Best of L. Sprague deCamp: A collection of deCamp's short fiction. Includes "Gun for Dinosaur", one of the better time travel stories around...
Apr 6th: Eve Forward - Animist: One of only two books by Forward, which is a pity. In this one, Alex a rookie animist sets forth to prove himself and buy his freedom from the Animist's College. But first he must locate and bond with an animal companion. After a bought with a fever, he ends up bonded to a young ship rat, what would normally be considered a useless match. But when he gets drawn into the war between a greedy king and a mad one he soon learns to value his companion...
Apr 8th: Forward - Villains By Necessity: After the Great War, the forces of evil were defeated thanks to the Heroes. And now, years later, evil is on the wane everywhere. But it seems that a world given over entirely to Light is just as doomed as one consumed by Darkness. So the last few remaining villains must find a way to work together without killing each other, escape the agents of the Last Hero and find a way to bring the Forces of Darkness back into the world. I really wish Foward would write some more books...
Apr 10th: Jim Butcher - Turn Coat: Butcher's latest Harry Dresden novel. The Warden Morgan has turned to Harry for help. Morgan, who once dedicated himself to proving Harry a dark magus and then executing him, has been framed for treason and murder by the White Council. And he's turned to Harry for help. Another excellent book in the series, even if the actual traitor was a bit too easy to guess. And where this book leaves Harry's half-brother Thomas at really sucks...
Apr 11th: Robert Parker - Now and Then: The 35th Spenser novel. Spenser is hired by an FBI agent to find out if his wife is cheating. But after Spenser turns over the results three people end up dead and now he can't let the case go. He has to get the man responsible caught and punished...
Apr 13th - 14th: Stan Nicholls - Bodyguard of Lighting, Legion of Thunder and Tempest of Warriors: Nicholls promises to "change how you look at orcs forever". Except not really. One his orcs are fairly generic militaristic humanoids bearing only superficial resemblance to any other fantasy series' orcs. Two the book lacks any kind of tension. No matter what the situation is you never worry that the small company of orcs are ever going to fail. Invade a town of trolls? No problem. Steal on of the pieces of the magic McGuffin from a town of human zealots? Let me take a nap first. Sneak into the half-submerged fortress of a monsterous and sociopathic sorceress so you can harvest her tears? Give me a challenge. And lastly the leader of the orc band doesn't have anything going for him that explains their success. He turns down new recruits, refuses to lead a revolution against their former leader (who by the way, seems to have read the Evil Overlord List and then decided to do the exact OPPOSITE of everything on it. I was shocked she didn't turn into a snake), hunts for the magic McGuffin mostly because he has no other plan and his tactics for the most part consist of "run at them and hit them really, really hard". Such a waste of $10...
Apr 17th: Tamora Pierce - Bloodhound: Happily I had the second Beka Cooper book to wash the taste of the last three out. Beka, no longer a trainee, balances trying to find a workable partner, a new relationship and investigating a counterfitting ring. The Dogs of Tortall sub-series is very much my favorites from Pierce right now...
Apr 19th: Rob Thurman - Deathwish: So I find out at the end of this one that Rob is short for Robyn. Which drops me back down to like three male Urban Fantasy writers I enjoy. Butcher, DeLint and delFranco. I guess Martin Millar and A. Lee Martinez might count for the sub-genre. Still, mostly women, not even counting the Gothic Romance ones. Anyway, in this book Cal and Niko Leandros have to deal with Cal's Auphe (think elves meet sharks and really evil) cousins as well as some jealous and amoral vamps. This book also splits the story between Cal and Niko...
Apr 21st: Douglas Coupland - jPod: Honestly? Just reread Microserfs and All Families Are Psychotic. This book just seems like a bunch of Coupland's tropes and character concepts mashed up together and then poorly developed...
Apr 22nd: A. Lee Martinez - Gil's All-Fright Diner: A scrawny vampire and his redneck werewolf pal have to stop a teen-age witch from summoning a nasty Elder God Thing in a nowheresville small town...
Apr 26th: Melissa Scott - Trouble and Her Friends: After the new anti-cracker (a V.R. internet hacker) law went into effect, Trouble retired from the shadows and left her partner and lover behind. But when a new player starts using her old handle and stirring up trouble, she's forced to take measures to bring them down...
Apr 28th: Harry Harrison - The Hammer & the Cross: Alternate history where the priests of the Norse pantheon become a serious rival to Christianity thanks to a lowly peasant who may be touched by the gods...
Apr 29th: Harrison - One King's Way: Shef, now co-king over England goes into battle with his enemies, the deadly viking chieftan's; the Ragnar'ssons. A battle that puts him on a journey across all of northern Europe...
Total books: 15
Apr 6th: Eve Forward - Animist: One of only two books by Forward, which is a pity. In this one, Alex a rookie animist sets forth to prove himself and buy his freedom from the Animist's College. But first he must locate and bond with an animal companion. After a bought with a fever, he ends up bonded to a young ship rat, what would normally be considered a useless match. But when he gets drawn into the war between a greedy king and a mad one he soon learns to value his companion...
Apr 8th: Forward - Villains By Necessity: After the Great War, the forces of evil were defeated thanks to the Heroes. And now, years later, evil is on the wane everywhere. But it seems that a world given over entirely to Light is just as doomed as one consumed by Darkness. So the last few remaining villains must find a way to work together without killing each other, escape the agents of the Last Hero and find a way to bring the Forces of Darkness back into the world. I really wish Foward would write some more books...
Apr 10th: Jim Butcher - Turn Coat: Butcher's latest Harry Dresden novel. The Warden Morgan has turned to Harry for help. Morgan, who once dedicated himself to proving Harry a dark magus and then executing him, has been framed for treason and murder by the White Council. And he's turned to Harry for help. Another excellent book in the series, even if the actual traitor was a bit too easy to guess. And where this book leaves Harry's half-brother Thomas at really sucks...
Apr 11th: Robert Parker - Now and Then: The 35th Spenser novel. Spenser is hired by an FBI agent to find out if his wife is cheating. But after Spenser turns over the results three people end up dead and now he can't let the case go. He has to get the man responsible caught and punished...
Apr 13th - 14th: Stan Nicholls - Bodyguard of Lighting, Legion of Thunder and Tempest of Warriors: Nicholls promises to "change how you look at orcs forever". Except not really. One his orcs are fairly generic militaristic humanoids bearing only superficial resemblance to any other fantasy series' orcs. Two the book lacks any kind of tension. No matter what the situation is you never worry that the small company of orcs are ever going to fail. Invade a town of trolls? No problem. Steal on of the pieces of the magic McGuffin from a town of human zealots? Let me take a nap first. Sneak into the half-submerged fortress of a monsterous and sociopathic sorceress so you can harvest her tears? Give me a challenge. And lastly the leader of the orc band doesn't have anything going for him that explains their success. He turns down new recruits, refuses to lead a revolution against their former leader (who by the way, seems to have read the Evil Overlord List and then decided to do the exact OPPOSITE of everything on it. I was shocked she didn't turn into a snake), hunts for the magic McGuffin mostly because he has no other plan and his tactics for the most part consist of "run at them and hit them really, really hard". Such a waste of $10...
Apr 17th: Tamora Pierce - Bloodhound: Happily I had the second Beka Cooper book to wash the taste of the last three out. Beka, no longer a trainee, balances trying to find a workable partner, a new relationship and investigating a counterfitting ring. The Dogs of Tortall sub-series is very much my favorites from Pierce right now...
Apr 19th: Rob Thurman - Deathwish: So I find out at the end of this one that Rob is short for Robyn. Which drops me back down to like three male Urban Fantasy writers I enjoy. Butcher, DeLint and delFranco. I guess Martin Millar and A. Lee Martinez might count for the sub-genre. Still, mostly women, not even counting the Gothic Romance ones. Anyway, in this book Cal and Niko Leandros have to deal with Cal's Auphe (think elves meet sharks and really evil) cousins as well as some jealous and amoral vamps. This book also splits the story between Cal and Niko...
Apr 21st: Douglas Coupland - jPod: Honestly? Just reread Microserfs and All Families Are Psychotic. This book just seems like a bunch of Coupland's tropes and character concepts mashed up together and then poorly developed...
Apr 22nd: A. Lee Martinez - Gil's All-Fright Diner: A scrawny vampire and his redneck werewolf pal have to stop a teen-age witch from summoning a nasty Elder God Thing in a nowheresville small town...
Apr 26th: Melissa Scott - Trouble and Her Friends: After the new anti-cracker (a V.R. internet hacker) law went into effect, Trouble retired from the shadows and left her partner and lover behind. But when a new player starts using her old handle and stirring up trouble, she's forced to take measures to bring them down...
Apr 28th: Harry Harrison - The Hammer & the Cross: Alternate history where the priests of the Norse pantheon become a serious rival to Christianity thanks to a lowly peasant who may be touched by the gods...
Apr 29th: Harrison - One King's Way: Shef, now co-king over England goes into battle with his enemies, the deadly viking chieftan's; the Ragnar'ssons. A battle that puts him on a journey across all of northern Europe...
Total books: 15
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Date: 2009-05-02 09:47 pm (UTC)It seems like even more sympathetic versions of orcs simply take the racial stereotype presented by Tolkien and updates it as a cultural stereotype. With no irony, they cast the orcs as "noble savages," modeling them on romanticized and borderline offensive images of Native Americans, Africans, or Mongols[1]. I guess it's an improvement over Manichean racialism, but I feel like the fantasy genre can do better. Someone in fantasy should look to science fiction as a model on how to address "difference" and come up with more interesting goblinoids.
[1] The precursor of this is obviously Edgar Rice Burroughs' John Carter of Mars: after fighting some Indians, a cowboy wakes up on a planet of war-like greenskins.