Bruce

This was my first experience with Karen Miller's work. I enjoyed both books in this series very much. This is Fantasy with characters I could understand, a lot of raw emotion, and a rich background story only hinted at. Looking at the other books available, I can see that the history behind the Innocent Mage is out there as well. Miller breaks a couple 'rules' of writing and does it very well. She writes in dialect, and she calls real things by made up names. These rules are meant to be broken, but it takes a good fantasy writer to do it. She succeeds. The narrator of these books handled the dialect very well but does not return to read the series that comes after, and that may be a difficult switch. I was looking for long fantasy novels where I could get involved with the characters and not have my attention wander. Miller gave me that and I will continue to read her novels. The only criticism I have is that she seems to be dancing around a religious allegory and that was a bit distracting. I may be confusing the basic progression of "The Hero's Journey" with religious allegory... something to think about. It may also just be my imagination, and if so, she has touched on an issue in Fantasy I strongly believe in. We have to be able to believe in the character's world before we can believe in them. If it is too alien, we shouldn't just be dropped into the deep end unless we already know how to swim. That doesn't say it very well, but I've read books where I've drowned, and a few brilliant works that I have learned to swim in. I prefer to wade in and swim out to the deep end when I'm comfortable. These are well worth the time to listen to.

This book exceeded my expectations. The performance is excellent and consistent. The story comes to the end the original author wanted. Anything else I write would contain a spoiler. Anyone who has read the other 13 does not need me to make a sales pitch. If you are considering starting with Book 1, by all means do so. Your questions will be answered in due time. This was a tremendous effort on the part of Brandon Sanderson, his editors, and Robert Jordan (the writer) can rest peacefully knowing his saga was completed. I think this Posthumous collaboration is a one of a kind event. It should give all long running series author’s pause to think. What if you do not live to write an ending? In this case the R.J. knew he would not, and cared enough about the work and his readers to find someone he knew could finish it. Thank you. I give very few 5 star ratings. I do so here knowing how hard it was just to make this book possible.

I can't review Jack L. Chalker's work. I knew the author and am too biased. I am thrilled to see it is coming out on audio since so many of his novels are out of print. The Dancing Gods Trilogy is not representative of his body of work. It was his experiment with humorous fantasy. The Well of Souls books, the Changewinds books, and many others would be a better starting place for a reader new to Jack's amazing and often twisted imagination. I would like to see all of his work come out in audio form. He told me once that he never intentionally wrote Trilogies other then this one. All his books were just so long that the publishes insisted he break them up. The performance was fine. It wasn't stellar, but it was OK.

The night of May 1st - May 2nd, 2011 was a turning point in my life. I spent it with strangers (who are now friends.) Some of them were veterans, others musicians, and most of them were conservatives. (I am not.) I have told the story many times. I cut the date into the back of my guitar with a knife. There are several eerie points where the Seal's story parallels my civilian experience. I was in North Carolina playing music around a campfire. The Seal team staged in North Carolina and deployed to Pakistan over approximately the same period of time. I was camping at an organization for veterans. I've never been a part of the military. Fortunately, before I went to sleep that night I interviewed myself on a night-vision camera so I would remember the feelings and experiences. I called the video "A surreal day." Nobody else involved has seen that video yet, so it is not online. I needed to hear this story. I do not see any harm coming from it. I'm still processing my emotions from that night, and I find no way to feel any remorse whatsoever about cheering and celebrating the death of 4 human beings. It was revenge, cold, distant, but visceral and necessary after 9-11.

"No Easy Day" is (my opinion) a totally appropriate book and its only flaw is unabashed product placement. In this case the authors did need a safety net and I really only noticed it because I'm a writer. There are a few lines of inflammatory language that anyone who lived through 9-11 has probably wanted to say. I would have left that out, but that would make the term used apply to me. Oh well, I'd make a lousy Seal. The political slant is tame compared to most Facebook posts. At several point the authors point out glaring leaks that could have exposed the Seals involved. This book is careful to fictionalize and confuse personal details. The good it does, particularly the final paragraph, should out weigh any damage done. Nothing except for the actual operation was not common knowledge as far as I can tell. Some bits were pure fiction intended to misdirect anyone trying to use the book to track down people for revenge-revenge. We still have troops in Afghanistan, and there are POW's and MIA's who need to come home. For those who didn't have an experience like mine, I hope this book raises awareness that nobody should be left behind.

Larry Niven told me that if I read "Fleet of Worlds" and "Fate of Worlds" all my questions about Puppeteers would be answered - and then he changed the subject. That made me laugh so and I came up with another question about something else and he answered that one. This was about 6 years ago. I didn't much care for "Ringworld's Children," and "Fleet of Worlds" was awkward. Niven and Lerner wrap up many of the Tales of Known Space here, take a couple of subtle pokes at society along the way, and there is pretty much all the Puppeteer Action you could want. I finally got my answers, they just had to travel at sub-light speed to get to me or something... (About the same length of time New Horizons is taking to get to Pluto/Charon.) It was worth the wait. I have to give the book a 5 star rating for story because Mr. Niven gave us an ending to a story that unfolded along a road with many forks. I had forgotten about some of the characters and knowing what happened to them, "In the end" was satisfying. Niven cares about his fans, and this book shows it. It is also less awkward then the last collaborations I have read. This book flows very nicely and is full of action and surprises. Again, thank you Larry for giving us a conclusion.

I found a lot of this book derivative. It amazes me that writers will continue to borrow or imitate famous writers or borrow names, parts of plots, etc. Paying tribute to a favorite fantasy story or author spoils a story for me because it pulls me back into the real world. Not everyone minds this, but I do. HOWEVER - The author is very good at writing about people, relationships, and matters of the heart. That kept me going. I would recommend these books for that reason. I can't give the books more then 3 stars, and they could have earned 4 or 5 had they not been flawed. Once again, I wonder why and editor did not suggest a re-write. The derivative parts could have been re-worked fairly easily and made the books so much better.

I don't care for Ron McLarty's narration of his story. Anne Rice chose to write in 3rd person and I have to respect this decision. She is a master of First Person. The choice of third person, and the choice of this narrator who is not incompetent, just not the right person for the job, leads to a distracting problem. Every time a character muses/is thinking/wondering, the audio version makes it sound as if the character were asking me a question. I began shouting "Why Ask ME?" by Part 2. Considering Anne's characters are about the most introspective and navel gazing bunch of monsters there ever were, it really is an issue. If you are choosing a first book of Anne's to read, this isn't it. It is a good book, but it has faults. We all, I think, are happy that she returned to Horror, and I am too biased to comment more on this book. It is worth reading, and is much better then a lot of the deluge of paranormal "novels" out there today.

I don't know if this book was written for John Glover to read or if it was adapted for him. I loved the book, I want more please. Butcher's puns, jokes, and references are something I continue to be amazed at. They WORK and with any other writer/genre/etc., they would just be annoying and bad writing. For some reason they are so much a part of the "Dresden Files" that I think the books would not work without them. I have to wonder if this entire book was written just to give John Glover the chance to reprise his unforgettable line from "Brimstone" "....and it was a LONG TIME AGO." (If you haven't seen the episode, Glover plays Satan and has developed a crush on a female soul (Who has a remarkable resemblance to "Karen Murphy Turned Into A Demon," or at least as I imagine her) and this results in an escape from Hell. The main character says to the Devil, "You love her, don't you" (Or something like that) and Glover, as Satan responds, "I only ever loved GOD, and that was A LONG TIME AGO!" This is all my opinion and conjecture, but I'm pretty sure I'm right. If not, I still loved the book, and only Glover could have stepped in. I would like to see a return to the original narrator, but being a fan of John Glover, it was easy for me to cope with the switch. I'm giving this a 5 star performance, and I don't do that very often.

This was my first experience with Karen Miller's work. I enjoyed both books in this series very much. This is Fantasy with characters I could understand, a lot of raw emotion, and a rich background story only hinted at. Looking at the other books available, I can see that the history behind the Innocent Mage is out there as well. Miller breaks a couple 'rules' of writing and does it very well. She writes in dialect, and she calls real things by made up names. These rules are meant to be broken, but it takes a good fantasy writer to do it. She succeeds. The narrator of these books handled the dialect very well but does not return to read the series that comes after, and that may be a difficult switch. I was looking for long fantasy novels where I could get involved with the characters and not have my attention wander. Miller gave me that and I will continue to read her novels. The only criticism I have is that she seems to be dancing around a religious allegory and that was a bit distracting. I may be confusing the basic progression of "The Hero's Journey" with religious allegory... something to think about. It may also just be my imagination, and if so, she has touched on an issue in Fantasy I strongly believe in. We have to be able to believe in the character's world before we can believe in them. If it is too alien, we shouldn't just be dropped into the deep end unless we already know how to swim. That doesn't say it very well, but I've read books where I've drowned, and a few brilliant works that I have learned to swim in. I prefer to wade in and swim out to the deep end when I'm comfortable. These are well worth the time to listen to.

This books got on my nerves very fast. Jim Butcher's Dresden Files books are great, and this book tries to fill a similar niche. Instead of backstory, we have a few paragraphs of narrative explaining how he got a sword. Vampires, werewolves, Sucubbi, and a smart-mouthed protagonist. The only good thing about the story is that the author is a good writer, but this book should not have been published at all.