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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:44:18 GMT -5
Mean Streets
An enjoyable 'novel noir' with Benny and Chris and a return to the Megacity previously visited by Chris and Roz in Shakedown. The Roz cameo at the beginning whets the appetite and the rest of the book doesn't fail to devilver either. It'd make an interesting film, far better than most of the ones Holy Wood makes at the very least. Being an Uncle Terry book there's very little continuity to tie the book down but just enough in all the right places to maintain interest in things back home on Dellah, although the inability to mention any DW copyrights does make it difficult in recounting who and what Karne is with any level of accuracy, didn't Uncle T invent the Rutans anyway? The stories are interesting, both the initial false lead and then the final resolution of the real one, the complexity of the plot is handled in a way so as to keep it relatively simple and straight forward and yet keep the reader wanting more.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:44:54 GMT -5
Tempest
An ok story. The initial chapters tend to drag somewhat and the middle of the book slowly picks up a little bit of pace but nothign really happens until 2/3 into the book when the train is pinned down and the loony Smith tries to steal the already stolen religious figure, except it was already stolen before the train journey even began and it was only a forgery that people thought was stolen that mith intended to steal. I'm not a big for of Murder She Wrote and this is more like that than anything else, excapt maybe Murder on the Orient Express which was boring anyway. Still Benny as detective was ok, pity she never learned anythign from the previous book when she played detective and did a whole lot better.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:45:12 GMT -5
Walking to Babylon
It seems like it's taken me forever to finish this book, but I enjoyed it all the way A great mix of DW NA and Benny NA continuities referencing right back to Timewyrm: Genesys. I like The People, they're rather sweet and God is a real charmer. I guess Kate wasn't allowed to mention the Time Lords by name, but it hardly matters in the long run. Clarence is fast becoming my fave semi-recurring character, although the lack of Brax does take away from the book imho. The replication of ancient Babylon is nice, as is Benny's thoughts on culture shock and food poisoning as the main cause of death in time travellers.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:45:40 GMT -5
Oblivion
A delight to read and a book that defines the word unputdownable perfectly I loved the return of Roz (even though it's only for a short time) and the return of Chris and Jason bloody Kane are highlights too. I'm surprised that one of Jason's nightmares wasn't about his dad though, as it seemed that he was a right psychotic monster of the highest banana. Benny seemed to be in a right stroppy mood too (much more than usual), still it added to the general atmos.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:46:03 GMT -5
The Medusa Effect
The one Benny book I'd read previously, and it put me off reading another for nearly 10 years... It's not so much awful as just insanely dull, horrifically dull, nothing at all happens in the first third of the book, it's all wasted dead space. The one moment of goodness is the flashback to Jackson Hart's escape from his trial. Everything else is just a sea of endless grey without remorse or pity, reading it is the literary equivilent of a jail sentance. I had to force myself to finish it, I refused to let it go unread, several times I was sure I'd quit but I took breaks and pauses and coffee and biscuits and somehow I managed it. Far from making me want to give in, I want to go on, because I know that no other book can be as bad, it's worse than Cat's Cradle: Warhead and that took some doing.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:46:19 GMT -5
Dry Pilgrimmage
Weird, bizarre, confusing, deeply puzzling at at times outrageously brutal. This is one book that really needed some Jason Kane in it to spice things up. The concept of a detoxing Benny is interesting but it's played for comedy here and not straight up on the rocks (as it were). The biotronic cyber killinmg machine/suit is straight out of Warhammer 40K but that's not such a bad thing as at least it's done better than another weak Terminator 2 clone.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:46:36 GMT -5
The Sword of Forever
A real headf**k of a book! This book takes the concept of the novel and gives it a wedgie The sudden ending however is a bit of a let down, such a strong build up really needed a good wind down too. I half expected the revelation of 'the final insight' at one point Still it's all good fun and the Indiana Jones-esque opening sequence was good to read. Benny really needs a hat and a bullwhip imho
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:46:51 GMT -5
Another Girl, Another Planet
A mixed bag of sweets and many of them are earwax flavour! There's some good stuff in there, but mostly it's bad, long and dull. The coda seems to be a clunky attempt to set up some sort of foreboding, it may as well have painted itself green and danced about singing 'forboding is a wonderful thing' it was so unsubtle. The new cover design is nice though.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:47:16 GMT -5
Beige Planet Mars
A nice holiday (well a convention with an expense account) turns into another nightmare for Benny. A lot of murky references to The Dalek Invasion of Earth and Frontier in Space and I'm not sure I like it, it all seems so irrelevent somehow especially as explicit references aren't allowed, so the vagueness of what is allowed tends to distract rather than enhance. The generic evil villain with a refreshing cool twist (tm) archetype gets another trot out of the stables of storytelling, any more trips out and it'll die of old age imho. At least Benny gets to do some shopping for once and she gets a stalker too, but sadly it turns out to be Jason Kane. Jason as a publish author with more success than Benny is a turn up for the books and his two chemical addicted side kicks are at least interesting versions of Rosencrantz & Guildenstern. It's a well written book with some very clever scenes but there's not really much we haven't seen before.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:47:43 GMT -5
Where Angels Fear
A deceptivley subtle plot left me wondering why nothing was happening for the first half of the book and then everything just clicked into place like reaching the top of a rollercoaster and then plunging down faster and faster into the action and mania of the plot. I've never been a fan of preachy books but this one isn't too bad, in fact it tries very hard to do a Babylon 5 but never quite manages it. For a book about gods the God of the People seems to be the only one worth believing in and it suggests that the Doctor a somewhat familiar alien being with two hearts and a passion for stopping evil deeds is killed when his own conviction fails.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:48:00 GMT -5
The Mary-Sue Extrusion
Fundamentally baffeling, totally weird, completley bizarre and 90% padding. I liked it, but it did feel like it didn't quite achieve what it set out to. As enjoyable a romp as it was it often felt like it was flailing blindly at times with no real sense of direction or purpose, like it had forgotten what it was supposed to be doing.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:48:31 GMT -5
Dead Romance
A real mind frell of a book. It takes the ideas of the Gods of Dellah and the Time Lords Time Travellers and puts them through a blender and rebuilds everything from the ground up. Christine is pretty much Benny but slightly different, she's less capable and less independant than BSS but possibly more interesting too. The idea of the bottle universe and bottle earth is brilliant, I haven't read anything this cool since The Ancestor Cell. There's also references to Down and Christmas on a Rational Planet, as well as the other Gods of Dellah novels. Also this book goes on to prove once again the dichotomy of me adoring Lawrences non FP novels with total love and hating his FP novels with utter venemous fury. Maybe it's something about the Grandfather that just fails to sit right with me? Then again I like Unnatural History, The Taking of Planet Five and The Ancestor Cell so go figure!
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:49:04 GMT -5
Tears of the Oracle
A first, a novel by Justin that I really like and more importantly it's bloody fantastic! It's like Lord of the Rings meets Star Wars meets Indiana Summerfield Jones with a bit of Mad Max 2 thrown in for good measure Also Ice Warriors (carefully disguised to avoid BBC lawsuits) abound in the opening chapters and also we learn fabulous new secrets about Brax, being a certain character's older brother... Tears is even better than Dead Romanace and also deals with a lot of the fall out from said novel, namely the revival of Cwej and a possible cameo by Morty the Meddling Monk? The plot itself had me guessing all the way through, at one point Ii was totally and utterly convinced the old gambler was really the old archaeologist in disguise! With only 3 books left to go now I find myself wishing that with books the quality of Oracle, that there werre 103 more to come...
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:49:26 GMT -5
Return to the Fractured Planet
or a case study in self harm via reading a book. To call this book bad is to insult the word bad and everythign that has ever been called bad. I could wax lyrical on that meme but instead I'm going to find something positive to say, it ended and I was all the more glad for it because I know it'll make me apprecaiate other books all the more in future.
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Post by kg redhead on Jan 27, 2007 5:49:50 GMT -5
The Joy Device
If books are like sweets, some delicious soft centres and others chewy toffees then this is the candyfloss of the range, a sweet insubstantial treat that's over all too soon. I'm all for having a pause before the storm, but this goes just a little too far and plays it just a little too safe to avoid being twee and sickly. The idea of layering the stories is pretty cool, and is a reflection of the much more satisfying Dead Romance and it's nice to see Jason Kane back to his Death and Diplomacy ways, but everything else just feels like it's there to pad the book out a bit more. That said coming after the horrifically bad RTTFP it's like mana from heaven.
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