Avery
This book had so much potential! Everything I could ask for -- a magic system based on formal logic, descent into mythological hell, creative justification for the use of chalk in drawing pentagrams... the first few chapters had me very excited.
Unfortunately, it wasn't only the characters that experienced a descent into hell -- everything got worse from there. The pacing felt pretty inconsistent, there's lots of time spent on early relationship anxiety, and a number of times where an impossible situation was solved by a random stroke of fate. I won't say much about the ending other than it felt cliched and not worth the effort to finish.
The cool magic system didn't end up getting used to the degree that I had hoped either. The paradox-based spells are kind of all one-off paradox name dropping, rather than really feeling integrated into the story, or having much continuity. Feels like there was a lot of unexplored potential here, especially given the author's willingness to explain everything.
The book's concept of hell is ..really.. cerebral, there's not much in the way of horror at all. This kind of makes sense in context but might not be what people are expecting going in.
Katabasis basically ends up being a long love/hate rant about higher academia that felt a bit raw, like reading someone's diary. The characters seem to provide an avenue to explore some strange ideas around work ethic, women in academia, abuse of power, etc.
I wish I could read another book in this universe with a less self referential plot. Like, have things that actually happen, and the characters just happen to be "analytical magicians".
This book had so much potential! Everything I could ask for -- a magic system based on formal logic, descent into mythological hell, creative justification for the use of chalk in drawing pentagrams... the first few chapters had me very excited.
Unfortunately, it wasn't only the characters that experienced a descent into hell -- everything got worse from there. The pacing felt pretty inconsistent, there's lots of time spent on early relationship anxiety, and a number of times where an impossible situation was solved by a random stroke of fate. I won't say much about the ending other than it felt cliched and not worth the effort to finish.
The cool magic system didn't end up getting used to the degree that I had hoped either. The paradox-based spells are kind of all one-off paradox name dropping, rather than really feeling integrated into the story, or having much continuity. Feels like there was a lot of unexplored potential here, especially given the author's willingness to explain everything.
The book's concept of hell is ..really.. cerebral, there's not much in the way of horror at all. This kind of makes sense in context but might not be what people are expecting going in.
Katabasis basically ends up being a long love/hate rant about higher academia that felt a bit raw, like reading someone's diary. The characters seem to provide an avenue to explore some strange ideas around work ethic, women in academia, abuse of power, etc.
I wish I could read another book in this universe with a less self referential plot. Like, have things that actually happen, and the characters just happen to be "analytical magicians".