The Year Of Our War

Rating:
Summary: A fantastically imaginative creation!
Review: A very enjoyable read from start to finish with so many original ideas. Jant is a very engaging character, one of those rogues that you can't help but liking even when they do one stupid thing after another. Steph Swainston has definitely got real skill with words- it was almost like reading poetry in places (albeit very modern poetry!)- aswell as being a compelling storyteller. The only problem was it ended just as things got really exciting! I look forward to more!

Rating:
Summary: The Empress Has No Clothes
Review: Don't be fooled by the hype already surrounding this book. It is being touted as the next big thing in Fantasy. In fact it is a poorly written mess, which leaves you with almost an absolute zero upon completion.

Of course they won't let you rate a book zero stars, but to be fair it did earn the one star. The main character is done extremely well. It is almost as if the book were an exercise to build that one character with things like other characters, plot, dialog and good storytelling a last minute after-thought.

The main character, is a drug addict, former pusher, murderer, outcast half-breed who has learned to survive by being a liar, a whiner and a manipulator. He is also a rapist. He is everything you would not want to spend time with. Yet the author makes him seem human, and at times vulnerable and while not likeable you become interested in spite of yourself.

Unfortunately the rest of the characters are flat, and one dimensional. Each is given 3 names/titles and they are used interchangeably so you are never sure who is who. The dialog is pretty bad and mostly powered by non-sequiters. So not only don't you know who is talking most of the time, you also can't figure out what they are talking about.

The plot is not really fleshed out, it sort of meanders along but you don't really care because all you want is for the book to end. There is a war, then when that isn't really of interest anymore there are internecine rivalries among the warriors, then when that gets old there are flashbacks, and a feud develops between some of the rivals. Through it all the main character just wants to rape the woman of his dreams, again; get drugs and stay high; manipulate his friends; and keep his immortal status at any price.

The story is set in a fantasy land turned rotten, with giant bugs inexplicably taking over the landscape. There is also another fantasy land that is only open to those who overdose on drugs, or those who die of a drug overdose. It starts out very cute and smarmy - like HR Puffen Stuff on acid. Later the author tones it down but the place seems to exist only for the author to show what wonderful and creative ideas she has. It really doesn't have any part of the plot until just before the end of the book when a giant plot element is set in the middle of it. Something so big that not to see it way back when the place was first described would be like somehow not being able to see the Empire State Building when you were standing on the street in front of it. Talk about Deus Ex Machina.

The book has gritty, bloody and very real human moments. It is not traditional fantasy, but just because it avoids the clone settings and plots, the tired cliches and the overused tropes doesn't make it a good book in and of itself. There has to be merit in the work, and there really isn't much here. Perhaps if the author is given a few years to work on developing her skills she will be able to produce a decent read, but this is not it.


Rating:
Summary: gripping epic fantasy
Review: For two millenniums the Insects have swarmed, trying to destroy the Kingdom of Awia though the Insect Wall has kept them confined to the Paperlands. Still they keep trying to breach the wall and regain what the humanoids took back from them. Ultimately they want to turn all of Awia followed by the Plainsland and Morenzia into lands of paper tunnels and hives. War is a way of life.

The immortal King Dunlin Rachiswater of Awia and his Circle of fifty knights keep a vigil at Lowespass, near the Wall and one inside Insect territory. The assaults have increased lately and the monarch and his court are very concerned. Mercurius "Jant" Comet is a junkie with a criminal past who has the ability to journey to the alternate realm of Epsilon where he has built a castle that could prove to be the final escape once the inevitable Insects doom Lowespass and the surrounding lands as even the King anticipates that will one day happen.

This entertaining fantasy hooks the audience from the onset and never lets go as readers will wonder if the Insects will overwhelm the Kingdom and if yes what then. The story line is exhilarating as the action-packed tale moves quickly yet provides fans with a deep look at an intriguing society where immortals live, but are from perfect as the "hero" shows. Steph Swainston writes a fantastic gripping epic fantasy while paying homage to the Roman and Greek Gods.

Harriet Klausner


Rating:
Summary: Sadly Sadly
Review: I am afraid this tome just isnt very good. The idea is promising, but the plot is a mess and the characters are thinner than a supermodel on a diet. I stopped reading about a third of the way through. Read the Algebraist - its much better.

Rating:
Summary: This is a really good book!
Review: Steph Swainston has created a vivid and original non-Tolkien fantasy world which is very much in the school of China Mieville. The Emperor, and his meritocratic coterie of immortals lead the war against the implacable, possibly purely instinctive, Insects whose territory (the Paperlands) encroaches upon the various nations. Our protagonist is the literally Mercurial Comet, flying messenger of the Olympian Immortals and junkie. The nations and Immortals become divided in the face of a renewed push by the Insects, and Comet is tasked by the Emperor to solve the problem, under threat of having his immortality revoked and given to someone more deserving (the Emperor grants immortality to a limited number based on particular skill). I'm looking forward to a sequel.

Rating:
Summary: lots of potential for a great story but.....
Review: This book tries to take too many directions. The characters and situations are compelling but, just when it's about to hook you, The Year of Our War goes off on another sub-plot.
I would really like to see a more focused look at the world that Steph Swainston has created here. The Year of Our War only gives a teaser of this world.

Rating:
Summary: Overhyped, overblown
Review: This is a book which has been much hyped in the SF news literature, and some critics have given it extremely generous praise. I am sorry to say that much of this praise has been far too generous.

It is true that this novel is based on several fascinating conceits: a world being invaded by alien beings who are slowly but inexorably expanding their domain despite all attempts to stop them; the invasion is fought by a group of near gods raised to immortality by an emperor. The novel is told, in first person view, from one of those near-gods; a very flawed and addicted Mercury-like individual.

However, the fantasy land in which these conceits are set is totally unrealized, which means that readers have little investment in what happens to it. Moreover, the vast majority of characters in the novel are little more than names on the page; only two characters are fully realized, and neither one is particularly attractive. Moreover, the novel has in it a strange parallel universe world that is not well explained or fully fit into the setting. It is at best distracting.

I wanted to like this novel quite a bit, but in the end, I found that it lacked what a fantasy novel needs above all else: a verisimilitude of setting and characters that will anchor you to the created world and cause you to care about what happens within it.



Rating:
Summary: good, hope for better sequel
Review: This is a good book, but the criticisms do ring true. The novel moves to quickly for some, and interchanges between subplots almost randomly.

However, it should be noted that it is an interesting and good book, just that its been overhyped far too much. What some will like is that the book is about politics and people more than magic. I like the idea of fifty Immortals who are the best at what they in the battle against the Insects, and how this ranges from Doctor to Sailor to Archer.

Swainston does have flaws, but it is definitely a new look at fantasy.