Rating: 
Summary: Good but not quite great...
Review:
Wraethtu had an airy, disconnected from hard reality feel that is totally missing from Wraeths. That is not necessarily bad, I happen to think that the Dune books but Herbert's son are fun to read even if they do not climb to the literary heavens with the originals. I liked this book but it is much more like a modern novel as opposed to the original series which to me read much more like the experimental, techno-fiction of its time. Reading Wraethtu felt more like a spiritual exercise and this felt like reading a book. A good book.
Perhaps I am being misogynistic but I don't care that much about the Kamagrian. I have always been confused that most of Constantine's vocal following are women (or use female psuedonyms). I always want to remind them that she pretty much killed all women off. Not such a distinction after the first generation of incepted hars are gone, I suppose, but still.
Rating: 
Summary: Wraiths of Will and Pleasure
Review: "Wraiths" is an excellent, and welcome, addition to my favorite story of all time. I have been a huge fan of Storm's since I read the original printing of the Wraeththu trilogy back in '91. While her other books are placed proudly on my bookshelf, none of them will ever match the magic of Wraeththu. I noticed a couple of fans panning the book, and while I can't say they're wrong I can comment on it. For one thing, the magic of Wraeththu is, even more than most literature, a very personal thing. I, for one, was never so taken by the individual charcters, as much as I was by the world of Wraeththu, as a whole. I can see, then, how a switch from the 1st to 3rd person, as well as a change in writing style, might irk some fans, as she leaves behind her baroque, introspective narration, for a sparser and more focussed prose. Still, none of these things bothered me; if anything, I prefered Wraiths to the orginal three books. Part of that is that I usuallly prefer 3rd person storytelling to 1st. The other is that I absolutely loved the protagonists in Wraiths! I never really identified too much with Pellaz, Swift, or Cal (the heros of the trilogy); they were either too good, too bad, or too perfect. Ulaume, Flick, and Lileem, on the other hand, all wormed their way deep into my heart, especially Lileem. They are all outcasts (relatively speaking, that is) yet they manage to rock the world in their own way. The relationships and politics were at least deep as in the original books (I loved reading Flick's confrontation with Seel...and the Kamagrians, the part about some of them excising their Ouana-lims, I almost died laughing!) Of course, this is just my opinion. As I said, I particularly loved Lileem (she's the first of all of Storm's characters that I've really identified with), so perhaps if I hadn't I wouldn't feel quite as strongly about the book. However, I did, and I do, so I guess that's just that. Anyway, thanks Storm. Keep 'em coming. Please.
Rating: 
Summary: A blessed addition to my favorite story
Review: "Wraiths" is an excellent, and welcome, addition to my favorite story of all time. I have been a huge fan of Storm's since I read the original printing of the Wraeththu trilogy back in '91. While her other books are placed proudly on my bookshelf, none of them will ever match the magic of Wraeththu. I noticed a couple of fans panning the book, and while I can't say they're wrong I can comment on it. For one thing, the magic of Wraeththu is, even more than most literature, a very personal thing. I, for one, was never so taken by the individual charcters, as much as I was by the world of Wraeththu, as a whole. I can see, then, how a switch from the 1st to 3rd person, as well as a change in writing style, might irk some fans, as she leaves behind her baroque, introspective narration, for a sparser and more focussed prose. Still, none of these things bothered me; if anything, I prefered Wraiths to the orginal three books. Part of that is that I usuallly prefer 3rd person storytelling to 1st. The other is that I absolutely loved the protagonists in Wraiths! I never really identified too much with Pellaz, Swift, or Cal (the heros of the trilogy); they were either too good, too bad, or too perfect. Ulaume, Flick, and Lileem, on the other hand, all wormed their way deep into my heart, especially Lileem. They are all outcasts (relatively speaking, that is) yet they manage to rock the world in their own way. The relationships and politics were at least deep as in the original books (I loved reading Flick's confrontation with Seel...and the Kamagrians, the part about some of them excising their Ouana-lims, I almost died laughing!) Of course, this is just my opinion. As I said, I particularly loved Lileem (she's the first of all of Storm's characters that I've really identified with), so perhaps if I hadn't I wouldn't feel quite as strongly about the book. However, I did, and I do, so I guess that's just that. Anyway, thanks Storm. Keep 'em coming. Please.
Rating:
Summary: Every bit as good as the original series. Fits right in :)
Review: Honesty, I was prepared to be disappointed in this book. Having read Wraeththu Chronicles, it seemed impossible to top them or even get near to their level again. Even the original series seemed ephemeral, like some writer's good luck that just wouldn't quit for the length of three books. But no, she's just that talented, is Storm Constantine. I seethe in jealousy. This book, Wraiths, is wonderful. It fits seamlessly into what we already know of the Wraeththu story. It is not some contrived effort to extend a good thing. Instead, Constantine yet again switches her focus to reveal parts of the same great events that fell between the cracks the first time around. And the second. And the third. There are more protagonists in this volume and the author speaks from all their points of view. The ones old fans would recognize are Flick, Ulaume, Pellaz, Mima, Seel, Cobweb and Swift. There are also new and very important people. I don't want to give anything away. I'll just say that Wraiths is every bit as good as the original series. It flows as effortlessly and is every bit as satisfying to read.
Rating:
Summary: Every bit as good as the original series. Fits right in :)
Review: Honesty, I was prepared to be disappointed in this book. Having read Wraeththu Chronicles, it seemed impossible to top them or even get near to their level again. Even the original series seemed ephemeral, like some writer's good luck that just wouldn't quit for the length of three books. But no, she's just that talented, is Storm Constantine. I seethe in jealousy. This book, Wraiths, is wonderful. It fits seamlessly into what we already know of the Wraeththu story. It is not some contrived effort to extend a good thing. Instead, Constantine yet again switches her focus to reveal parts of the same great events that fell between the cracks the first time around. And the second. And the third. There are more protagonists in this volume and the author speaks from all their points of view. The ones old fans would recognize are Flick, Ulaume, Pellaz, Mima, Seel, Cobweb and Swift. There are also new and very important people. I don't want to give anything away. I'll just say that Wraiths is every bit as good as the original series. It flows as effortlessly and is every bit as satisfying to read.
Rating:
Summary: Wraiths of Will and Pleasure
Review: I really enjoyed the original series and I really wanted to love this book. But... The initial scenes of this novel, which starts during the original series, focusing on other characters, are fantastic. But sometime around the capture of Flick and Ulaume by the Uigenna -- an event which should have been highly dramatic, but felt glossed-over -- the writing, for me, began to deteriorate. It becomes increasingly expositional and "telly", until by the end we're getting stuff more or less on the level of "Pell did X. Flick felt Y." There's a reason why writers are instructed to "show not tell": the effect of so much exposition is to flatten the plot arc, lose the sensuality, and distance the reader from the initially very appealing characters. I'm not crazy about some of the directions Constantine takes this. I don't care about the Kamagrian, and I'm much less interested in the Wraeththu as otherworld-exploring ascended master sort of people than I am in them as crazy, sensual, magic barbarians. I would, though, have liked the author's treatment of her chosen material much more had it not been so expositional.
Rating:
Summary: wonderful read
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed this book, maybe not as much as the original trilogy, but still it's a great book and fills in the first trilogy quite nicely.
My only problem is a HUGE issue for me. I've no idea why it's bothering me so much, but here it is. In Cal's story, he tells us that Pell has no idea about Opelaxian and parage society (according to Opelaxian), that Kate was incepted in secret, without Pell's knowledge. This is in blatant contradiction to what happens in this book. Am I missing something?
Rating:
Summary: Disappointing for prior fans
Review: I've been waiting a bit anxiously for this book. I fell in love with the first Wraeththu trilogy years ago, and still consider those books to be some of the best ever written, anywhere. But given that, I couldn't see how Ms. Constantine could possibly capture the exoticism and pure wild originality of the first books. Her writing style has changed drastically over the years, and I have to admit I haven't enjoyed her recent works as much as the earlier stuff. But for her, and for Wraeththu, I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. Sadly, my fears have proven true. "The Wraiths" isn't in the same league as the first Wraeththu trilogy---not by a long shot. To be fair, however, not all of this is a bad thing. The new story has more speculative fiction elements and logic than the first one did, which may make it more accessible to the mainstream SF/F audience. It seems to deal more forthrightly with the characters' main issues, so that we aren't taking 3 books to realize that an event which occurred on page 100 is actually important. The story is told in a very succinct, very compact manner, which I guess is a necessity because this is the story of three different main characters---Ulaume, Flick, and their adopted Kamagrian daughter Lileem---and their interactions with many more characters. So from a plain storytelling (and probably a marketing) point of view, this is an improvement. But what disappoints me is that many of these changes remove the sense of wonder and emotion that the first books gave me. I miss the intimacy of first person. I miss having a single character to identify with throughout the whole novel---changing perspectives from character to character (sometimes within the same section) is distracting and makes it hard for me to care much about any one of them. I miss the wildly poetic language of the first novels, from which entire passages still linger in my mind. In this book there were only a few memorable lines. I miss the struggle of the characters to accept the reality (and potential) of their hermaphroditic nature. For example, in the earlier books they debated changing gender-specific language to suit their new existence, but in this book the debate has apparently been resolved through the use of odd constructions like "anyhar" and "nohar" (which seem unnecessary given that they're replacing words which were gender-neutral to begin with. I found this really puzzling, and a bit distracting). But most of all, I miss the mystery of Wraeththu itself, as much of what was left nebulous and strange in the first novels is now "explained" in this book. Was it really necessary to bring genetic engineering into the picture? Did we really need a description of Wraeththu genitalia after all this time? I don't like knowing in explicit detail what happened to Pellaz's body during the time between his death and rebirth. That feels like following the Tooth Fairy home to see what she does in her spare time---unnecessary, and demystifying. And why has the magic system of the first books---the castes and all the necessary details---been practically ignored in this book? There *is* still magic in the story; Lileem discovers an alternate world, and Flick explores the Wraeththu gods, and at one point there's a grissecon (which feels somehow anticlimactic). But it's not much, and it's treated in an almost prosaic fashion. I feel as though a beautiful, powerful fantasy novel has been turned into a colder, weaker sci-fi novel, perhaps in an attempt to please people who disliked the first trilogy. And while I enjoy both fantasy and SF, this is not a good (or necessary, IMO) change. However, I notice that the official title of this book has a subtitle which refers to it as the *first* volume of the Wraeththu histories. So if there's a sequel in the offing (and there needs to be---this one lacks closure), hopefully it will be better. Storm Constantine is still my favorite author, and I still believe she's one of the most brilliant writers on the planet. Because of that, it's possible that my hopes for this novel were too high. But I can't help it; I know what this writer is capable of, and it's more than this. So I'm going to hold out high hopes for the next book as well. May the Aghama (or Opalexian, whichever) make it a better one.
Rating:
Summary: Yes, you should read this book!
Review: If you have read the first wreaththu series then you should read this book. It takes place between books 2 and 3 and as such, fills in a few blanks from the series. What I like about this book is that it plays up some of the minor characters from the first series as well as intruduces a few very interesting new ones. The mysterious Kamagrians are also explained and expanded in this book. Is this book as good as the first series? I don't think so. There is freshness and naturalness to the writing of the original series that is lacking here. Part of that might be the use of 3rd person objective in this book rather then first person as in the previous Wreaththu books. The first person gives an immediacy and power to the writing that this novel lacks. Another writing quirk in this work that I found really annoying after a while is that the author changes words like no one and any one, someone to Nohar, anyhar, somehar, even when the phrase is not a direct character thought or part of dialogue. These changes did nothing for the book, just jarred the reader out of the story. Still, I have no problems recommending this work to fans of the first series. The story is a good tale and the writing is solid even with the quirks. I found the book enjoyable if not as mind blowing as the first series and look forward to books 2 and 3 in this series.
Rating:
Summary: Return to Armorica, 15 years later
Review: So 15 years ago (good god), I picked up the beginnings of the original Wraeththu trilogy and fell very much in love with the characters, the style of the author, and so forth. When I found a hardcover of the third about 3 months later, I bought it and then gave it to a friend so I wouldn't read it out of order... and waited 6 more months for the second book to publish in the US.
Since then, Storm's done a lot of different things in her books. Some of these books I've been less than thrilled by, others I have been completely floored by. About 5 years ago, I noticed that her narrative voice had changed a lot, and in March of this year I consumed the most recent trilogy that she's written (the Magravandian Tapestry), and found myself surprised to find that not only is she writing again in the style I most enjoy- but her writing in that style is far stronger than it once was. And so she returns, 15 years later, to the same storyworld that first captured my mind.
I'm writing this about 100 pages into the book: her new writing style is much stronger; much more human in scale. Before she often wrestled with these huge metaphysical contexts and her characters were, while not badly drawn or uninteresting, secondary. This batch of characters (thus far secondary characters from the first trilogy) are far more strongly drawn- and far more accessible. I eagerly look forward to more. And more and more (this is the 'First Book of the Wraeththu Histories', per the frontispiece).
As the dedication states, this book is for all of us who would claim to belong to that world.
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