Victor Hugo Kebbe
The third book in the New Jedi Order series was a very frustrating reading experience. As I had promised myself that I would read all the books in this arc, I ended up reading it after several attempts. I felt bogged down at several moments. It took a while for the reading to flow satisfactorily. Later I listened to the audiobook to remember some events to write this review.
Honestly, I have mixed feelings regarding James Luceno's writing. The verbose and encyclopedic writing style ends up becoming obstacles to a more fluid or organic narrative. At some times it seems that the author's concern is to talk about the origins of the “Corellian Bloodstripes” in Han Solo's pants instead of focusing on really important topics.
As I said previously, it is not and has never been the objective of Star Wars to debate serious topics, despite them appearing in the text and moving the narrative. The book presents the struggle of the New Republic (or rather, just a few people from the New Republic, like Ambassador Leia Organa Solo) to help the various waves of refugees from the war against the Vong. This is an urgent topic that is present in our real world.
This book also provides closure to Chewbacca's death. Finally Han Solo abandons his depressive stance and decides to embody something more nihilistic. He is our hero without purpose, however, he forgets his role as a father and husband and abandons his family at such a critical moment, which is the scenario of war.
This Solo narrative about the “need to find balance” is portrayed in the book in a controversial way. Leia is presented as the always compliant and understanding woman/mother, ignoring her own more pressing needs. This is a sexist reading and unfortunately quite common in the franchise's books during the 1990s (after all, the vast majority of these books were written by men).
Another problem with this book (but perhaps it was my expectation redirected to the wrong place) is that I imagined we would have a more in-depth presentation of the religious dimension of the Vong. I say this because the main villains in this book are Vong priests and acolytes. However, this is all presented shallowly and without depth (it was a missed opportunity).
To conclude, I read this book for the first time very recently, but I didn't remember almost anything that was written. I went to listen to the audiobook as if I were encountering this title for the first time. This feeling left me quite disappointed and says a lot about this installment.
The third book in the New Jedi Order series was a very frustrating reading experience. As I had promised myself that I would read all the books in this arc, I ended up reading it after several attempts. I felt bogged down at several moments. It took a while for the reading to flow satisfactorily. Later I listened to the audiobook to remember some events to write this review.
Honestly, I have mixed feelings regarding James Luceno's writing. The verbose and encyclopedic writing style ends up becoming obstacles to a more fluid or organic narrative. At some times it seems that the author's concern is to talk about the origins of the “Corellian Bloodstripes” in Han Solo's pants instead of focusing on really important topics.
As I said previously, it is not and has never been the objective of Star Wars to debate serious topics, despite them appearing in the text and moving the narrative. The book presents the struggle of the New Republic (or rather, just a few people from the New Republic, like Ambassador Leia Organa Solo) to help the various waves of refugees from the war against the Vong. This is an urgent topic that is present in our real world.
This book also provides closure to Chewbacca's death. Finally Han Solo abandons his depressive stance and decides to embody something more nihilistic. He is our hero without purpose, however, he forgets his role as a father and husband and abandons his family at such a critical moment, which is the scenario of war.
This Solo narrative about the “need to find balance” is portrayed in the book in a controversial way. Leia is presented as the always compliant and understanding woman/mother, ignoring her own more pressing needs. This is a sexist reading and unfortunately quite common in the franchise's books during the 1990s (after all, the vast majority of these books were written by men).
Another problem with this book (but perhaps it was my expectation redirected to the wrong place) is that I imagined we would have a more in-depth presentation of the religious dimension of the Vong. I say this because the main villains in this book are Vong priests and acolytes. However, this is all presented shallowly and without depth (it was a missed opportunity).
To conclude, I read this book for the first time very recently, but I didn't remember almost anything that was written. I went to listen to the audiobook as if I were encountering this title for the first time. This feeling left me quite disappointed and says a lot about this installment.
This reading was so outstanding that I've had to read it again few days later.
This reading was so outstanding that I've had to read it again few days later.
Dream Country is one of the best collections of stand alone tales of Sandman, all of them bringing amazing stories that everyone must read. The first, Calliope, tell us about writer's block and how the Dream changed after his captivity; A Tale of Thousand Cats, the second tale, is just AWESOME, talking about the captivity of our bodies and minds... Midnight Summer's Dream tell us about our captivity of our wishes, dreams and aspirations; the final one, Facade, about of us and the captivity of old masks and identities... It's just amazing. it was after reading Hy Bender's Sandman Companion that I've learned several “secrets” (hidden layers is a better term) in Midnight Summer's Dream... Gaiman is awesome, with Sandman as his master work.
Dream Country is one of the best collections of stand alone tales of Sandman, all of them bringing amazing stories that everyone must read. The first, Calliope, tell us about writer's block and how the Dream changed after his captivity; A Tale of Thousand Cats, the second tale, is just AWESOME, talking about the captivity of our bodies and minds... Midnight Summer's Dream tell us about our captivity of our wishes, dreams and aspirations; the final one, Facade, about of us and the captivity of old masks and identities... It's just amazing. it was after reading Hy Bender's Sandman Companion that I've learned several “secrets” (hidden layers is a better term) in Midnight Summer's Dream... Gaiman is awesome, with Sandman as his master work.
Original Review (2014): I have mixed feelings about this book. Sanderson came with such an amazing setting and, despite hating all this need to every single fantasy title to have a magic-system-mumbo-jumbo, his is very original. Nevertheless, plot is quite mediocre, with cardboard characters. It is somehow a fast read, but the writer repeats several phrases throughout the book. A fine piece of entertainment, but entertainment only.
Updated Review (2024): I've been venturing into TikTok for the past few days, mainly following booktokers. After several days following these people, I realized that, in the area of Fantasy literature, many have a great appreciation for Brandon Sanderson and the entire unfolding of his production that, now unified, he calls Cosmere. Nothing against the author, but I wonder about his quite expressive popularity there. I read Mistborn in 2013 after following several recommendations and I was quite disappointed with this particular title. At the time, everyone extolled the importance of having a “coherent magic system”. At that time, it seemed, due to the amount of articles and comments about it, that this would mark the quality of the narrative, as if we needed very well-defined rules (like the scientific method) to explain the fantastic elements such as Magic in these stories. However, this is, in my opinion, the biggest flaw in the proposal: when the fantastic elements need to be explained within a pseudo-scientific rationality, it ceases to be fantastic. The various societies of the world have never needed this Western rationality to create their stories and complex mythologies. This has always been the fight between the genres of Fantasy and Science Fiction, the latter of which, in fact, relies on this idea of scientific rationality to tell captivating stories. I understand Sanderson's appeal at the time. And I also understand the success of Sanderson and his books in our Western context, which values this specific idea of rationality. With his idea of Allomancy, he created rules that seemed important at the time. But I went back to my notes on Mistborn and came across, at the time, a finely crafted “magic system” with two-dimensional characters and a rather average narrative. A “coherent magic system” does not make a book a book.
Original Review (2014): I have mixed feelings about this book. Sanderson came with such an amazing setting and, despite hating all this need to every single fantasy title to have a magic-system-mumbo-jumbo, his is very original. Nevertheless, plot is quite mediocre, with cardboard characters. It is somehow a fast read, but the writer repeats several phrases throughout the book. A fine piece of entertainment, but entertainment only.
Updated Review (2024): I've been venturing into TikTok for the past few days, mainly following booktokers. After several days following these people, I realized that, in the area of Fantasy literature, many have a great appreciation for Brandon Sanderson and the entire unfolding of his production that, now unified, he calls Cosmere. Nothing against the author, but I wonder about his quite expressive popularity there. I read Mistborn in 2013 after following several recommendations and I was quite disappointed with this particular title. At the time, everyone extolled the importance of having a “coherent magic system”. At that time, it seemed, due to the amount of articles and comments about it, that this would mark the quality of the narrative, as if we needed very well-defined rules (like the scientific method) to explain the fantastic elements such as Magic in these stories. However, this is, in my opinion, the biggest flaw in the proposal: when the fantastic elements need to be explained within a pseudo-scientific rationality, it ceases to be fantastic. The various societies of the world have never needed this Western rationality to create their stories and complex mythologies. This has always been the fight between the genres of Fantasy and Science Fiction, the latter of which, in fact, relies on this idea of scientific rationality to tell captivating stories. I understand Sanderson's appeal at the time. And I also understand the success of Sanderson and his books in our Western context, which values this specific idea of rationality. With his idea of Allomancy, he created rules that seemed important at the time. But I went back to my notes on Mistborn and came across, at the time, a finely crafted “magic system” with two-dimensional characters and a rather average narrative. A “coherent magic system” does not make a book a book.
This is one of the best Ancient History books today. Its tiny size is misleading if you think it’s a short text book: the author proposes a bold theory to rethink Ancient History as being, in fact, the history of connections and exchanges and the entire Mediterranean Sea. From this new perspective, everything needs to be rethought: Greece, Egypt, Tyre, Carthage, Persian Empire, Roman Empire, Hellenism... the theoretical gains are immense.
This is one of the best Ancient History books today. Its tiny size is misleading if you think it’s a short text book: the author proposes a bold theory to rethink Ancient History as being, in fact, the history of connections and exchanges and the entire Mediterranean Sea. From this new perspective, everything needs to be rethought: Greece, Egypt, Tyre, Carthage, Persian Empire, Roman Empire, Hellenism... the theoretical gains are immense.
