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Summary: Essential books to read
Review: The book of the new sun is a great read and well over due for a re release. Each book sets up riddles which are all resolved in the last. He's truly a genius of the written word this writer.
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Summary: The most sophisticated genre series ever written
Review: The Book of the New Sun, starting with the Shadow of the Torturer (its first volume), is the most sophisticated work in the Science Fiction stable, and one of the most beautifully written of all modern novels - set in a far, far future, where technology has evolved and degenerated to become almost Baroque ornamentation, it seems to describe a feudal or Medieval world. However, one of the many pleasures in this book is the way that our assumptions are taken and re-combined, giving the whole thing much of the intruige and fascination of the most intricate detective story. The characters are vivid, immediate and haunting - their problems believably distant but painfuly immediate - and the written style of the novel is always seductive and a pleaure. Everybody, everywhere, should read this - if only as one of the best example of "post-modern" fiction of all time.
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Summary: Perhaps the best fantasy series ever written.
Review: The tetrology "The Book of the New Sun" ("The Shadow of the Torture","The Claw of the Conciliator","The Sword of the Lictor", and "The Citadel of the Autarch") is my favorite series of all time. It has a fantastic, original storyline, and is beautifully and intelligently written. I've read through the series three times, and each time I notice new facets that I missed the previous time through. I can't recommend the books in this series strongly enough. In my opinion, "The Book of the New Sun" deserves to be known and revered as much as, if not more than, "The Lord of the Rings".
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Summary: Perhaps the best fantasy series ever written.
Review: The tetrology "The Book of the New Sun" ("The Shadow of the Torture","The Claw of the Conciliator","The Sword of the Lictor", and "The Citadel of the Autarch") is my favorite series of all time. It has a fantastic, original storyline, and is beautifully and intelligently written. I've read through the series three times, and each time I notice new facets that I missed the previous time through. I can't recommend the books in this series strongly enough. In my opinion, "The Book of the New Sun" deserves to be known and revered as much as, if not more than, "The Lord of the Rings".
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Summary: An Alien World Called Urth
Review: This first volume of "The Book of the New Sun" establishes the setting of the overall story. It's a first person account told by Severian, who starts off as an apprentice torturor. He lives in the Matachin Tower with the Torturor's Guild in the city of Nessus. He is soon exiled for being merciful to one of his "clients" - a woman he had fallen in love with. He has to make a journey to the city of Thrax, where he will serve as the Lictor. "The Shadow of the Torturor" is the beginning of that journey.This story is set in a future so distant that our own world is almost completely forgotten. All that remains of our civilization are a few artifacts and legends. To Severian and the other people of "Urth", our own world is as ancient and remote as the prehistoric age is to us. Urth is now an unbelievably old planet, circling a dying sun. It is littered with the remains of past civilizations. New plant and animal life exists of the strangest kinds. There are the relics of technology so advanced they look like magic. What I find so appealing about this book is that Gene Wolfe succeeds in creating an alien world so ancient, fantastic and magical that you often forget it's really our own planet. The strange new people are distant descendents of us. Many of the book's influences come from Jack Vance's "The Dying Earth". When reading "The Shadow of the Torturor" and the other books in this series, you have to give it your complete attention to fully appreciate what is happening. Sometimes it's tedious, but overall it's rewarding. These books will challenge your observation.
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