Rating: 
Summary: An enjoyable airplane book that tries, but alas, falls short
Review: I picked this book up shortly before boarding a trans-US flight, not expecting much except that it would help pass the 5+ hours trapped in coach. Suffice it to say that I wasn't disappointed, but neither was I especially enthralled. Ms. Strauss has created an interesting world, with some innovative ideas, but never really goes anywhere with it. I, personally, did not find the characters all that interesting, nor did I notice any development, despite the fact that the story takes place over the span of several years. In the end, this was just another, decent fantasy work. A good way to pass the time, but not something worth reading twice.
Rating: 
Summary: Orignal and Entertaining
Review: I picked up this book during a lull in my reading, most of the authors I like had not brought their latest books to market, and I was looking for something new to read. It's always scary trying a new author, after 20-30 pages you can usually tell whether you've wasted your money, or whether you've discovered something great--many times you've wasted your money. This was not one of those times. This book captures your attention and takes you on a thought-provoking ride. I agree with the other reviewers who noted characterization as a strength. Bron changes dramatically over the course of the book. I also felt that the pacing of the book was a strength--I lost the perception that I was reading and got caught up in the story. This is so different from a standard "fantasy" book. Strauss has given us a fully-formed original world that is worth experiencing.
Rating:
Summary: Cliche and stilted
Review: I'm not sure what all the praise is for the beautiful writing. I see no beautiful writing here. I see a stilted story that captures every dumb cliche of melodramatic fantasy. I bought this book for the same reason that were previously stated, but was very disappointed by the silly characters and the ridiculous nomenclature--The One Who Comes, Mindpower, Handpower--puh---lease! Ms. Strauss, this sounds like a bad B SF movie.
Rating:
Summary: What is good, what evil??
Review: Interesting take on good vs. evil - and the ambiguities between them. A young boy whose family is exterminated has a VERY good idea of what evil is - and makes it his lifes ambition to infiltrate the group who killed his family and destroy it. That is, until he is finally accepted into this group - and comes to understand why they exist, and what they are trying to accomplish. He becomes a revered leader. Again - until he is re-united with his brother and realizes that there IS inherent evil in the group he now leads...Extremely lyrical prose makes the book even better!
Rating: 
Summary: An engaging tale based on a familiar theme
Review: The Arm of the Stone follows in the tradition of many epic stories based on the magical powers of a mysterious talisman. What saves Strauss' book from falling into the comic book style of some other popular writers is a well crafted prose style. Although the book begins with great promise, however, the main character, a young boy named Bron, fails to develop into anything more than a two dimensional adult who almost accidentally saves the day in spite of himself. The relationships between the main characters are also somewhat shallow and did not, at least for me, inspire any deep empathy or emotion. Nevertheless, this book provides the reader with an interesting and well told tale notwithstanding it's lack of depth.
Rating:
Summary: What is good, what evil??
Review: The premise is decent, the wording of the story is also well done, but somewhere along the line the soul of the story is lost. The characters seem flat to me, there is a good solid base for excellent storytelling it just never seems to be attained. I have both this one and the sequel, I haven't read the sequel yet but I am going to give it a try.
Rating: 
Summary: Middle of the road...
Review: The premise is decent, the wording of the story is also well done, but somewhere along the line the soul of the story is lost. The characters seem flat to me, there is a good solid base for excellent storytelling it just never seems to be attained. I have both this one and the sequel, I haven't read the sequel yet but I am going to give it a try.
Rating:
Summary: Many strong points, but ultimately frustrating
Review: There are a lot of things I liked very much about this book.. The background premise (the mysterious Stone, and the division of the mindpower and handpower worlds) is interesting. The writing is technically excellent, particularly good at evoking moods. The characters are likeable. The plot setup (evil theocracy, boy with a Destiny, etc.) takes standard genre tropes and twists them into something a little out of the ordinary, and the way it was developing toward the middle of the book was both unusual and unexpected. So why did I want to throw the book across the room when I finished it? Put simply, the story Ms. Strauss chose to focus on was not the story I wanted to read. The thing that hooked me most in the early and middle sections of the book was the gradual discoveries by the 2 main characters that their childhood assumptions and goals were based on misconceptions about the Way Things Were, and that the real world, and their real places in it, involved a lot more ambiguity and compromise than they expected. The middle sections of this book portrayed very sensitively the process of disillusionment, and the replacement of illusions with genuine understanding and idealism, and I was fascinated with the way the characters were developing. Unfortinately, what followed was not a continuation, but a contradiction: the story did a jump-cut across the following 20 years, and the characters have both arrived in places that are perfectly consistent with their early illusions, not at all so with the direction they seemed to be moving in before the break. How did this happen? We get a bit of backfill and narrative explanation, but the real answer can only be, that's what had to happen because the author needed it so to make her plot work out. There are a number of clumsy elements in the final third of the book (important things happening offstage, for instance, and repetition of events from different points of view) that show a significantly lower level of craftsmanship than the earlier portions. The handling of several characters in that section was also unsatisfying, and inconsistent with what had come before. The final twist of the plot was indeed unexpected, but I wasn't in the mood to appreciate it. What I wanted, and didn't get, was the 200 pages of the Missing Years. Enough is implied and reported that it seems likely some of the missing material may have actually been present in an earlier draft of the novel -- if so, I'm afraid it was a mistake to cut it out. The imperative to bring the paths of the 2 main characters into convergence may have been overwhelming -- but I would have been much happier with the result had it been resisted, and the plot allowed to take a different shape.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating and different--not your run-of-the-mill fantasy
Review: This book was recommended to me by a friend. I must admit I didn't expect much from the cover art and the uninformative back cover blurb, but I found myself very pleasantly surprised and pleased by this book. It's a real page-turner, with thought-provoking concepts, a fully-realized world, and a gripping plot. The author's take on the prophecy that drives a good part of the action is interesting and unusual. I read the whole thing in two nights--and I usually take a week or more to finish a book. I have to say that I was surprised to see the comments of a couple of the reviewers below--that there wasn't enough character development over the course of the book, or the characters weren't fully realized. In my opinion, the characterizations are one of the best things about this book. The main characters are real, believable people, who change and grow over the course of the narrative. The hero's story--in which he starts with a dream of revenge, becomes seduced by the philosophy of those he wants to revenge himself against, and ultimately moves beyond both views to find an entirely new perspective--is especially finely-realized. In sum: highly recommended!
Rating:
Summary: Well-written and highly original--a writer to watch
Review: This is a great book. It's based on a classic fantasy theme, but it bypasses most of the cliches you see in the fantasy genre to result in a really unusual, original story. You really care about the characters, and the world, with its repressive laws that restrict all use of technology, is convincing and fascinating. Right up until the end you think the story will leave you hanging (i.e., one of those to-be-completed-in-the-next-seven-volumes abominations) but the main threads of the story are satisfyingly tied up, while leaving room for a sequel. At least I hope so. I'm already looking forward to the next book.
|
