The Maquisarde

Rating:
Summary: dirty US hippy-author loves the french
Review: A completely unrealistic portrayal of the french.

If I were a french woman, the FIRST think I would notice about myself was that I had hairy legs and hairy underarms and that I was stinky. Not that I was some brave, cute and sexy "resistance" type trying to fight the "evil" world government. The french wouldn't know evil if they appeased it. Which they do - every day. Get over yourselves, you smelly stupid hippies! The french are NOT sexy. The french are scum on top of a sewer hole.

Oh, and a representative of a government shooting a french person with a gun on an unidentified boat is supposed to somehow be bad? Huh? All french people need to be shot.

Do you know what else is in this book? A space station populated by crippled multi ethnic retards. I kid you not. The space station is populated by dirty smelly "lets all live in peace" women who like to save little children. Little children should all be cooked and eaten, not saved.

Now, if I were writing this book, the hero would have been American, and he would have had a death ray flute that kills all french people and children. Take that author-hippie!

This author-hippie needs to hug more trees in order to improve her low IQ. Oh, that's right. You CAN'T improve your IQ by hugging trees.
Ooooops, there goes the hippie master plan.
Try to concentrate on making fire, author hippie.
USE SOME TREES.

Rating:
Summary: Some of Marley's best work to date--a fine sci-fi novel
Review: I actually liked "Maquisarde" better than "Glass Harmonica", Marley's award-winning novel. The premise, a resistance against an evil corporate-government entity is not unique, but this is a well-handled rendering of the subject. The novel is in some ways reminiscent of Marge Piercey's "He, She, and It" though without Piercey's richness in creating a future world.

Ebriel, a French flutist, loses her family in a shocking event which is covered up. She goes on a heroic quest to bring the perpetrators to justice, and her personal experience of persecution and her resulting rebellion are really the core of the novel. As usual, Marley brings her own knowledge of music to provide detail and context to her work, a nice touch as always and gives a flavor to the writing that I enjoy. I just couldn't put it down.



Rating:
Summary: An Exciting Page Turner
Review: I started this book and couldn't put it down..The main character is admirable and strong. The theme is thought provoking and includes romance, mystery and intrigue. I highly recommend it.

Rating:
Summary: Good, but
Review: I've enjoyed Marley's work before, but this one left me a bit disappointed. Mostly that was because I was reading it during the days of the Beslan tragedy, when real resistance/rebel fighters took real lives. This book was just too tv-like for me by the end. Everything was neatly wrapped up - sure there was work left to do, but it was just work, not the Big Struggle.

I will say that Marley writes well, and I will continue to read her books.

Rating:
Summary: Splendid Evocation of a Bleak Future
Review: Louise Marley's "The Maquisarde" is among the best novels I've read set in the late 21st Century. With respect to style and tone, it most closely resembles John Shirley's "A Song Called Youth" cyberpunk trilogy, especially since it deals with many of the same issues which Shirley wrote about years ago. "The Maquisarde" is a compelling saga about French flutist Ebriel Serique, who loses her husband and young daughter in a terrorist attack which she blames on the military leader of the International Cooperative Alliance (InCo), comprised of North America, Europe, Korea and Japan. It is the late 21st Century and the world has been divided into the industrialized powers which comprised the alliance and the rest, most of which are ravaged by disease, poverty and the lingering effects of nuclear conflict (most notably between India and Pakistan). Ebriel undergoes an amazing transformation from a splendid classical musician to a committed revolutionary terrorist determined to aid those who are not InCo citizens. Marley's dismal, yet still optimistic, view of the late 21st Century is one of the best examples of world-building I have come across in science fiction, and her heroine Ebriel is surely among the most captivating.

Rating:
Summary: Timely Nudge
Review: Once again Louise Marley presents us with a timely subject and nudges us to consider the possible outcome of fanaticism. The Maquisarde begins with an act of terror which is so easy to identify with after 9/11! Ebriel Serique is a fully-realized character who leads us through an emotional journey of loss, grief, rage, and finally a search for justice. Underlying all of Ms. Marley's stories, as in this one, is the reminder of how precious a resource are our children. A good, thought-provoking read!

Rating:
Summary: Description doesn't do it justice
Review: When I first read the publisher's description of this novel, I was afraid it would be depressing, but it's not. It's a great story about an unforgettable set of characters whose voices kept returning to me after I finished it. And the future world seems so possible . . . as if it's just a heartbeat away. A great read, and a fast one. Highly recomended!

Rating:
Summary: Description doesn't do it justice
Review: When the fossil fuels were used up, the world fell apart. Some countries used nuclear weapons on their neighbors while other places used biological weapons. The stock markets crashed and international trade was severely crippled worse than what happened during the Great Depression of 1929. The American and European polities along with Todakai (Japan and the Koreas) joined together in the International Cooperative Alliance, an isolationist organization that has quarantined all nations that don't belong to their organization.

Commander General George Glass of Security Corps rules the alliance with an iron fist and he is the person that Ebriel Serique blames for the death of her husband and child. She is determined to kill him and joins the international resistance movement to achieve that goal. When the time comes to kill her enemy, she finds she cannot do it but she is determined, with the help of some powerful and invisible allies, to see that his regime is toppled from power.

This is the story of a woman who undergoes a metamorphous from an elitist into a revolutionary, a person who comes to symbolize to the world that there is a change needed in the world order. Louise Marley has an uncanny ability to make the reader feel that the events in THE MAQUISARDE are really unfolding sort of like turning the pages of the Neverending Story. The heroine makes mistakes, learns from them, and gets a second chance at happiness. Readers will admire her grit, determination, and courage, but mostly appreciate Ms. Marley's ability to paint a picture of a world turned much colder and nastier than Dickens worse nightmare.

Harriet Klausner

Rating:
Summary: colder and nastier future than Dickens worse nightmare
Review: When the fossil fuels were used up, the world fell apart. Some countries used nuclear weapons on their neighbors while other places used biological weapons. The stock markets crashed and international trade was severely crippled worse than what happened during the Great Depression of 1929. The American and European polities along with Todakai (Japan and the Koreas) joined together in the International Cooperative Alliance, an isolationist organization that has quarantined all nations that don't belong to their organization.

Commander General George Glass of Security Corps rules the alliance with an iron fist and he is the person that Ebriel Serique blames for the death of her husband and child. She is determined to kill him and joins the international resistance movement to achieve that goal. When the time comes to kill her enemy, she finds she cannot do it but she is determined, with the help of some powerful and invisible allies, to see that his regime is toppled from power.

This is the story of a woman who undergoes a metamorphous from an elitist into a revolutionary, a person who comes to symbolize to the world that there is a change needed in the world order. Louise Marley has an uncanny ability to make the reader feel that the events in THE MAQUISARDE are really unfolding sort of like turning the pages of the Neverending Story. The heroine makes mistakes, learns from them, and gets a second chance at happiness. Readers will admire her grit, determination, and courage, but mostly appreciate Ms. Marley's ability to paint a picture of a world turned much colder and nastier than Dickens worse nightmare.

Harriet Klausner