cavalary's reviews
269 reviews

Unusually for me, read it in Romanian, so things may have gotten lost in translation and I may have failed to make some connections or even pay enough attention at times. Still, sure seems well written and properly researched, though the notes that weren't just references should have been footnotes, as I had to keep looking at the notes section every few pages to see whether there were any of that kind connected to what I had just read. It does a great job of presenting how introverts function and why, including details that may be somewhat surprising, stresses their strengths and advantages, and definitely properly presents the problems with the Extrovert Ideal and shaping society according to it. If it'd have stopped at that, it'd have been a truly outstanding work.
Unfortunately, it doesn't stop there. I may even mention how the author rather discards what may perhaps be at the outer edge of introversion and gears the book toward a need for balance, but I'm mainly referring to all those parts focusing on how to go against who you really are if you're an introvert, even more so if it's for a career or organized education, focusing on those as a person being a huge problem in itself in my view. There was also the comparison between the Western Extrovert Ideal and typical Asian behavior, which to me was a comparison between two deeply flawed views and behavior patterns. Or the compromise between "Greg" and "Emily", which seems in no way fair or even tolerable for "Emily" to me. But most infuriating of all were all the parts of the chapter about children telling parents how to make their children behave less like what comes natural for them, stressing the need for methods that are much more considerate than the norm in no way excusing supporting the view that people must change themselves to fit society's ideals at least to a significant degree instead of the other way around. Yet somehow, despite gritting my teeth because of that, I can't quite take away that fourth star.

It's just a short story, but since it's on Goodreads I guess I might as well write a little comment, even if it doesn't have anything to do with the Temeraire series other than the fact that it also involves a newly hatched dragon, the start of her relationship with the human she chose, and just a little bit of fighting. It even takes place in an entirely different period, during the time of the Roman Empire, and I must say I'd quite like that setting to be explored more in this sense.
That said, the dragon definitely is interesting and makes all the difference, reminding of a feeling that was at times lost later during the Temeraire series. On the other hand, the human elements, which in this case also include the captain, or more exactly the one who would be called the captain in the Temeraire series, definitely are still particularly annoying, humans being humans. Still, the story's so short that there's no time for that to be an actual problem.

This is such a short story that it feels odd to even rate, not to mention write something as well, but since it ended up on Goodreads and it actually does involve the characters from the Temeraire series, I guess I might as well.
One particularly nice thing about it is that it only involves dragons, so the human filth otherwise marring the series doesn't get in the way here. Other than that, pretty funny while definitely staying in character and making sense, so it could have simply been a short scene in one of the books. That's pretty much all I can say.

I'll start by pointing out that seeing "A Tale from the Canon of Tarn" leads one to believe it's a novel that takes place in the setting of an existing series, yet there is no series and this actually seems to be the author's first and, so far, only book. And then there's the fact that it's listed as having 456 pages, but only has the equivalent of about 150. So it's a good thing I picked it up when it was free, or I'd be feeling quite cheated.
Can't complain about the writing though, and it's also quite visual despite being so short, being filled with detailed descriptions that let the reader get a good idea about the part of the world that is presented. That's a tiny part, however, and most of the action takes place within a matter of hours, the rest being concentrated in a few brief but crucial moments that follow. So what is there is quite good, but there's far too little of it, and this also fails to provide enough of a chance to actually connect with the characters, or for them to develop in any meaningful way for that matter.
On that note, Dagger's powers and Anna's skills are a bit too much considering their age and lack of proper training, and the part that details fitting them with gear is quite odd, considering the circumstances. Also, quite a number of Dagger's actions and movements don't seem right, considering how he sees and knows things. Maybe not major issues in themselves, and maybe that also goes for the fact that the author seems to have been inspired to a fair extent by Temeraire, some themes from A Song of Ice and Fire, and probably also some other series I couldn't identify, or for the odd choice to include a sketch along with the description of the Dallanar Sun when it just has placeholders instead of the portraits and the tear at the center is not inverted, but, again, there just isn't enough content for the problems not to stand out.

If I’d try to describe this book in one word, it’d be “immature”. In case of some of the characters, at least before certain points, that makes sense, but the term applies to pretty much everything: Writing style, presentation, dialogues, some behaviors of characters which definitely shouldn’t behave in such a manner, a fair number of events and, in a way, the manner in which everything develops. In addition, it reads more like a series of moments, almost a collection of connected short stories in a way, due to how much time passes between the events that are presented and how locations change and apparently important elements seem to simply get dropped in order to move on to something else.
Still, it’s not a bad book if you take it for what it is, and it does openly present itself as heroic fantasy, therefore not aiming to match the more notable fantasy works released since, as those tend to fall under epic fantasy. You won’t find deep immersion, particularly detailed worldbuilding, notable bits of wisdom, characters to truly care for or other reasons to get emotionally involved, but it does its job to provide another fix of adventure for someone looking for it, and set it in a world that’s not our own. As such, teenage guys seem to be the target audience, but maybe that’s just what fantasy was back then.

Oddly, seeing as the two are actually a single book which was split for this extended edition, Magician: Master is noticeably better than Magician: Apprentice. The first few chapters are more or less the same, "immature" remaining perhaps the most accurate way to describe pretty much every aspect, but chapter four suddenly takes everything to a different, higher level. While reading it, it struck me as something which must have been written by an entirely different person, and a much more skilled one at that.
After that it goes up and down and dedicating more than two chapters to the aftermath makes for a rather anticlimactic finale, but there are a fair number of good sections in between and, on average, it remains a clear improvement. The genre even switches from heroic to epic fantasy, though the story remains focused on a few characters and some small areas, a short scene towards the end underlining just how small. The action is still terribly rushed, a whole lot is still skipped and details are still lacking, harming depth, immersion and character development, but somewhat more attention seems to be paid to the parts taking place in Kelewan and the overall impression is of one book that had everything not essential to the story itself cut out of it, while I was saying that Magician: Apprentice at times seemed more like a collection of connected short stories. A few bits of wisdom may even be said to have been thrown in as well.

Kept thinking of Betrayal at Krondor while reading this. In spite of technical limitations, made more notable by the fact that I played it several years after release, I definitely remember how well it managed to generate the feeling of immersion, and that I described it as "playing a book" when mentioning it to someone a decade or more later. Now I wonder how my impression of that outstanding game would have changed if I'd have played it after reading some of the relevant books... And if it's not a case of a game being better than the books...

After the improvement and the greater scope of Magician: Master, Silverthorn marks a rather brutal return to immaturity in pretty much every aspect and, for the most part, a simple heroic fantasy adventure. It's quite forced as a sequel at first, but eventually it finds its way and elements start to connect, albeit not necessarily in a smooth or, at times, even reasonable fashion, so it eventually grows and opens the way to another bigger story, but it does not contain it.
Expectations are very different today, or at least mine are, but, keeping them in check, I wasn't exactly bothered by anything while reading it and it actually went faster and smoother than I expected. Taken for what it is, assuming teenage boys as the target audience once again, recognizing the fact that the fantasy genre has improved massively in the decades since it was written, and not expecting details that aren't absolutely necessary to the action, carefully developed and developing characters, or significant depth or wisdom, there's not much that can be said to be particularly wrong with it. That's just far from being enough, however.

After Silverthorn, my expectations for A Darkness at Sethanon may have been quite low, but it hardly seems possible not to be surprised and amazed by it either way. The prologue sets the stage and, while the early chapters otherwise remind of the rather immature heroic fantasy from before and the supposed "surprises" are all too obvious, the story eventually transforms into an epic of great intensity and mind-boggling scope, dealing with the fate of the entire universe, touching upon the concept of other dimensions, and going all the way to the beginning of time and back. The pacing does vary due to the alternating points of view, but overall it becomes more and more alert and new elements, including actual surprises, keep being thrown at the reader as well. It would provide excellent material for a movie, or in fact for a few of them, and some scenes may even require this, being almost too much to be left to the reader's imagination... Though, at the same time, some may be impossible to properly portray in a mere movie as well.
That said, there are many flaws, starting with an unexpected number of typos, especially considering the fact that the edition I read was printed decades after the initial release, plus that, at least in this edition, there are also two places where the space indicating a new scene is missing and said new scene starts so abruptly that I wonder whether at least its first paragraph may not be missing as well. Yet those are minor matters, far more important being the fact that too much is skipped, too many questions are left unanswered, too many things seem unexplained or to not quite add up not because the author is withholding information for later use, but because he doesn't know it either. The book is far too short and, while they appear to have greatly improved by the time it was written, the author's skills not sufficient to do justice to such an audaciously ambitious scope and setting... Then again, I'm not sure that anyone's could ever be.

This may be a rushed review, but there wouldn't have been that much to say either way. Hammers in the Wind is pretty average, or perhaps a better term would be common, in terms of writing and action and has little of note in terms of depth, worldbuilding or characters. For those reasons, coupled with the fact that it's quite short but split in a relatively large number of chapters, which in turn are usually split into sections as well, it reads pretty quickly at least.
While I did notice some spelling and grammar issues, I wasn't that bothered by them, though of course the fact that the book gave me few reasons to actually care for it may largely explain that. What did bother me, on the other hand, was the fact that events, decisions and revelations tended to just happen, without carrying the weight they should have carried, and plenty of things don't quite seem to follow. That's usually a matter of how it all feels, perhaps in large part due to that lack of impact I mentioned, the issues not being easy to quickly verify, but a few obvious continuity errors that struck me were how Boen was close to 50 in the inn but 60 on the ship, how in the last chapter Maleela was surprised by a certain character's identity despite quite clearly knowing who he was and what he had done both before and immediately after, or even how the next book in the series is titled Wrath of a Mad King at the start of the excerpt but, correctly, Tides of Blood and Steel at the end of it.

Reading a classic wasn't likely to turn out well, and it didn't, but for some reason I found myself remembering taking a long look at the old Romanian edition of Ivanhoe that was among those given away after being set aside for this purpose some time ago by my dad, and grabbing the free Kindle edition as a result. But then I also checked the Library and saw that they had it in English as well, so I borrowed that instead... And then struggled with it for almost two weeks, rather having to force myself to keep reading. But I'll nevertheless admit there's some value to be found in it if, without being strict about realism, you have the right amount of interest in the period depicted and, more importantly, make plenty of allowances for that during which it was written.
Now there's not much left to say about a book first published just shy of two centuries ago, and even less after the expert introduction and notes found in this edition, which also point out historical errors and anachronisms I otherwise wouldn't have been aware of, but I will mention that needing to keep flipping back and forth due to the notes being at the end instead of at the bottom of the pages definitely didn't help. Past that, just a quick and incomplete list of issues, in random order: The author tends to skip back and forth in time, which may be confusing. With few exceptions, Rebecca likely being the most notable, characters lack depth, to the point that plenty may be best referred to as caricatures. It's odd that the book's titled after a character that's presented and does less than quite a number of others. There are frequent lengthy and particularly convoluted descriptions and explanations, likely to bore and even confuse. Speech is particularly forced and theatrical. For that matter, I guess the whole thing can be seen more as a play... But, returning to those necessary allowances, maybe that raised far fewer eyebrows back when it was written.