Book Description
A Storytelling Game of Stolen Lives
Prometheans are soulless corpses animated by a mysterious, alchemical force -- the Divine Fire stolen from the gods. Their hideousness forces humans, animals, and even nature itself to reject them on an instinctual level. They wander the dark places of the world, seeking what their creators denied them: humanity.
New Game set in the World of Darkness
*A whole new type of character for players, inspired by the classic Frankenstein monster and the worldwide myths of Golems
*Explores aspects of the World of Darkness unknown to the other game lines
*Strange new antagonists and mysteries to unravel for players of any World of Darkness game
Customer Reviews:
Great buy.......2007-08-17
It was very quick to arrive, however it arrived in a overly big box for the book, but it arrived in the condition of which they told me that it would be in. And I was very pleased. But next time maybe a smaller box would be better for the book so it wouldn't flop around during transport.
DARK AND GOTHIC NEW CREATURES FOR WOD.......2007-01-01
Promethean The Created is a new hardcover book for use with White Wolf's mega-popular World of Darkness RPG, and represents a broad new canvas for fans of the game. Promethean offers a new type of character to build and play...soulless corpses, reanimated with life and representing pure Greek Tragedy in their scope, or pure gothic horror...or maybe even both to players. The book bases its background on the myths of things such as the Frankenstein monster, golems, and other such constructs. First, the book does a fantastic job of providing background on these creatures as well as source books and films, giving payers a wide array of options. These created need not be pieced-together bodies of corpses. As pointed out, even creatures such as DC Comics' The Swamp Thing are considered a created being.
Chapter One is vital and provides the player and GM with the setting and background for Prometheans. This is very key as the background of these characters is perhaps more important than any other type of WOD character. All manner of sample Prometheans and methods of creation are included...from alchemical to electricity to primordial beings. You'll find yourself mesmerized for hours by the depth of research done by the game designers. I'm not sure how much of this will ever be used, but it makes for interesting reading nonetheless.
After you've read about these various types of constructs, chapter two will not get you into the character creation phase. Let's just say there's a heck of a lot more to do here than rolling a few dice. Select the character's attributes, skills, specialties, features, and various advantages. There are some excellent examples provided to get players moving in the right direction in creating their Prometheans. There's a boatload of skills and powers with which to equip your character. These include various uses of fire and electricity, but also subtler mental powers as well. This is one of the very best sections in the book and one of the best such sections I've ever read for any RPG system. The amount of detail that the eclectic nature of the promethean abilities is stunning, and even a bit intimidating.
Succeeding chapters deal with Promethean antagonists and storytelling, as well as the Promethean condition and how they affect those around them. The book is capped off with a lengthy appendix. There is so much in this 280 plus book that it's impossible to cover it all in this review. Suffice to say this is one of the most richly detailed RPG supplements I've seen in quite some time. The book is accompanied by the usual outstanding art that you've come to expect from White Wolf.
This is a grand new book in the World of Darkness mythos that opens up a whole new landscape for its fans.
Reviewed by Tim Janson
Finest Terror, not powergaming.......2006-11-07
For this new release, White Wolf again shows his incredible sense of personal introspection in a dark and insane world. The new race of monsters for the World of Darkness is a new look to the humanity, in the terms of those who seek her as a utopia; not the minds of those who preys on it (vampires), the ones who live in their society but belongs to their primal rage (werewolves) or the awakened ones (Mages).This solid effort is based more on the paradigm of the knowledge of humans making monsters, that wants to be humans.
The art is not as good as Mage or Vampire, but it makes his work. Also, the tales and the first chronicle gives you the opportunity to refresh your ideas for new campaigns in your version of WoD. Their difficulty of playing (due to the Disquiet, a natural condition of the Prometheans) can push the player to make alliances, or to make strategies to keep your condition from the eye of hunters or other creatures, at the time that you search for your goals.
After reading the book, the sensation is very similar to the one that you may feel after reading the masterpiece of Mary Shelley. Is the life an accident? is somebody authorized to play as God? Romantic, terrorific and human: this is the Promethean Mood. a Must-Have for the lovers of the good terror rpgs.
Great book... nice addition to the WoD family.......2006-09-27
Love the mood and feel of this book. Classic world of darkness stuff! These guys are true powerhouses with a sad, gloomy overtone. Kinda reminds me of the Hulk series with Bill Bixby. It might be a little depressing running a whole campaign of Prometheans, but they do make a good edition to the rich World of Darkness games.
Promethean brings a new perspective to the World of Darkness........2006-09-14
Promethean: The Created enables extremely tragic roleplaying where players take on the roles of Prometheans - created beings similar to the Monster from Frankenstein. These creatures want more than anything to become human, which involves a long and difficult journey of self discovery and personal evolution that most Prometheans fail to complete. Humanity offers the promise of eternal life (Prometheans become nothing when they die), acceptance (Prometheans exude a supernatural aura of distrust), and peace (Prometheans suffer from great mental distress).
This is not a game for everyone. For many people this game is going to be too depressing. Humans (even the supernatural) turn against the character at every turn, nature fears and rejects the Promethean, and anywhere the Promethean stays becomes a desolate Wasteland. The character will develop mental derangements during the course of play, create another lonely monster in the quest for Humanity, and even at the end of the long road may fail to become human. If you enjoy playing action and adventure games, where the heroes battle the forces of evil and ultimately save the day, then this one might be worth a pass.
However, for those who are interested in a thought provoking examination of the good and bad of human life this could be a wonderful game. It serves as an excellent vehicle to pose questions like "What is the nature of morality?", "What does it mean to be human?", and "What would you do for acceptance?" A narrowly focused game, Promethean is meant to tell a certain sort of tragic tale and the mechanics reflect this at every turn.
Average customer rating:
- most accessible text from the top alchemy scholar
- Well worth the effort & study
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Promethean Ambitions: Alchemy and the Quest to Perfect Nature
William R. Newman
Manufacturer: University Of Chicago Press
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Book Description
In an age when the nature of reality is complicated daily by advances in bioengineering, cloning, and artificial intelligence, it is easy to forget that the ever-evolving boundary between nature and technology has long been a source of ethical and scientific concern: modern anxieties about the possibility of artificial life and the dangers of tinkering with nature more generally were shared by opponents of alchemy long before genetic science delivered us a cloned sheep named Dolly.
In Promethean Ambitions, William R. Newman ambitiously uses alchemy to investigate the thinning boundary between the natural and the artificial. Focusing primarily on the period between 1200 and 1700, Newman examines the labors of pioneering alchemists and the impassioned—and often negative—responses to their efforts. By the thirteenth century, Newman argues, alchemy had become a benchmark for determining the abilities of both men and demons, representing the epitome of creative power in the natural world. Newman frames the art-nature debate by contrasting the supposed transmutational power of alchemy with the merely representational abilities of the pictorial and plastic arts—a dispute which found artists such as Leonardo da Vinci and Bernard Palissy attacking alchemy as an irreligious fraud. The later assertion by the Paracelsian school that one could make an artificial human being—the homunculus—led to further disparagement of alchemy, but as Newman shows, the immense power over nature promised by the field contributed directly to the technological apologetics of Francis Bacon and his followers. By the mid-seventeenth century, the famous "father of modern chemistry," Robert Boyle, was employing the arguments of medieval alchemists to support the identity of naturally occurring substances with those manufactured by "chymical" means.
In using history to highlight the art-nature debate, Newman here shows that alchemy was not an unformed and capricious precursor to chemistry; it was an art founded on coherent philosophical and empirical principles, with vocal supporters and even louder critics, that attracted individuals of first-rate intellect. The historical relationship that Newman charts between human creation and nature has innumerable implications today, and he ably links contemporary issues to alchemical debates on the natural versus the artificial.
Customer Reviews:
most accessible text from the top alchemy scholar.......2007-10-11
William Newman is one of the most knowledgeable experts and a key pioneer in alchemical studies, and this is his most readable, engaging, and socially relevant book. Those who wish to learn about the history of alchemy should start here, and will find references to the next logical steps in the study, but this book is also important for those who wish to understand more about the way our culture understands life using science. Many urgent issues in the philosophy of biology and medical ethics have long been the province of alchemists, which Newman demonstrates with clarity and grace, and anybody interested in these topics will find much of deep interest here. Buy it as a present for any educated person who doesn't understand why people should study Alchemy. Encourage your library to carry a copy. Well worth the price of admission.
Well worth the effort & study.......2006-07-13
I greatly enjoyed this excellent book, even though it was quite an undertaking to really absorb. It's a book you'll read a bit, then think about, then come back to, working though it and letting each bit you take in trickle through your consciousness before you move on.
As a practicing Alchemist myself, I especially enjoyed the clear explanation of our Western philosophical lineage and the Hermetic tradition that stretches back to the Greeks and before. Whether we realize it or not, here in the US at least, we are educated in this tradition, and think a certain way because of it; the tendency to look to the East for all things spiritual is unfortunate when we have so, so much native to our own culture. This book brings that line right down through the ages, and made me see that I have many more "ancestors" than I thought!
The main theme of the book, Alchemy as the language and arena for the discussion of Art and Nature, is also brought to more modern relevance than might be expected, and examining our scientific heritage through that lens is very useful philosophically. After reading this book, when I hear debates about genetic modification, artificial intelligence, and the like, I realize that these discussions have been taking place for centuries, and the ancients' explorations of these questions have much to teach us now.
Amazon.com
Even if Masamune Shirow is more widely known for creating Ghost in the Shell, it is for his magnum opus Appleseed that he became known as a master comics storyteller. And it's easy to see why. The fiction world that Appleseed takes place in--a near-future, post-WWIII utopia--is exquisitely crafted and detailed. Into this new utopia come Deunan Knute, a nomad street-smart soldier, and her cyborg partner, Briareos. This book moves at a leisurely pace as we are introduced to the characters and their new home on the island of Olympus. But once the stage is set and the pieces are in place, an action scene erupts that carries through the rest of the book. From here the central thematic conflict of the series is established: the human race's two options of (1) pursuing their every desire, thereby dragging their whole world into destruction, or (2) changing their very nature to preserve the present sterile utopia forever. This is essential reading for anyone interested in science fiction.
Book Description
Masamune Shirow`s acclaimed cyberpunk epic about ESWAT operative Deunan and her robot lover Briareos continue their work to stabilize the uneasy worldwide peace they fought so hard to establish in this fourth collection. Beautiful art and a complex and fully realized future world make this among the best of the manga titles available in the United States.
Customer Reviews:
Can it get any more confusing?.......2004-07-07
Deunan Knute and Briareos find themselves in a war between the many political factions of Olympus. The artwork, like the plot, can become very confusing, as battle after battle is fought in the streets. Just how MANY sides are fighting each other is hard to tell, as we have humans, bioroids and even machines. Who will win the city becomes a side-issue, as all the factions end up just trying to survive and keep the city in one piece.
And this is only volume number two!
Welcome to the golden cage..........2004-03-28
World War Three is over. Nuclear weapons were not used, but just about everything else was. Old nations have died out and new powers have replaced them. A nomad soldier, Deunan Knute, and her cyborg partner, Briareos, have been taken from the ruins, out of the wastes, to utopia. A utopia called Olympus, the central city of the new Earth.
Yet, even utopia has power struggles. Will mankind be changed and became something better IF nonhuman or embrace total peace at the cost of his spirit? Or will it all be destroyed again by uncontrolled emotions such as hate and greed?
Or will mankind be able to find a way, a path that combines it all? Shirow is the best artist to help us ask the question and maybe the only one who can help us answer it.
A great collection.......2003-05-08
Masamune Shirow's works are THE standard by which all sci-fi/cyberpunk mangas are written, and Appleseed is no exception. This first book is filled with action, amazing technical designs, and great characters, all of which is rounded off by a nice dose of humour (which is sadly lacking from books three and four). A highly recommended purchase.
Very Good.......2000-07-14
One of Masamune Shirow's best works. If you like manga, you'll like this.
Great.......2000-06-06
I love this book and the rest of the series. It is actionpacked but not like a [poor] Rocky or some other movie with noplot. This has all the quallitys for a great book. The drawings are great the plot is good, thats all you need and the charecters are fantastic.
I recomend this book to anyone.
Book Description
There is a missing link in human evolution about which few facts are known and surprisingly little has been written. It is not any one of the intermediate forms connecting modern man to his apelike ancestors. It is something much more challenging—the early human mind. How did it come into existence? And why?
In Promethean Fire Charles J. Lumsden and Edward O. Wilson take us down the twisting corridors through which our species traveled in the two-million-year odyssey from Homo Habilis to modern man. They ask why, out of the millions of species that have emerged and gone extinct, human beings alone took the last, abrupt journey to high intelligence and advanced culture. Lumsden and Wilson attribute the sudden emergence of the human mind to the activation of a mechanism both obedient to physical law and unique to man. This "Promethean fire" is geneculture coevolution, a mutually acting change in the genes and culture that carried man beyond the pervious limits of biology—yet restrains his nature on an elastic, unbreakable leash.
The authors' argument builds impressively from across the entire range of biological and social sciences, but their presentation is essentially lyrical. They share with the reader their reconstruction—both stunning line drawings and colorful vignettes—of how the primitive mind may have functioned in exercising cultural choice with genetic bias. Step by step, they guide us through the diverse categories of evidence, including recent studies of incest avoidance, color vocabulary, infant gaze patterns, taste discriminations, and phobias, which led them toward the theory of cultural transmission based on the importance of genetic filters in individual mental development.
Customer Reviews:
Gene-culture coevolution........2002-12-22
This book proves that there is no division between culture and biology, but that both are intertwined. As the authors state: Gene-culture coevolution is "a complicated interaction in which culture is generated and shaped by biological imperatives while biological traits are simultaneously altered by genetic evolution in response to cultural innovation." (p.20)
The authors illustrate this coevolution convincingly, mostly by the case of brother-sister incest.
In fact, this theory tells us how the mind is 'formed', but doesn't explain the origin (come into being) of the mind. The title is a little bit misleading.
It is an original work, because it broadens Darwinism with cultural aspects.
It is also an important work, because it counters the Standard Social Science Model which proposes a fundamental division between biology and culture.
Not to be missed.
Book Description
"…excellent job of describing the chemical processes and their legacies-both beneficial and unintended. She never lets any of her characters be good or bad, just human. This humanity makes her stories gripping. I highly recommend this thoughtful and thought-provoking book. McGrayne successfully describes the ambiguous effects of chemical technology and the role that human strengths and frailties play on mitigating or exacerbating those effects."—Chemical & Engineering News
"…a compelling read."—Nature
"Sharon Bertsch McGrayne's appealing collection of biographical essays reminds us how much we owe to chemistry." —New Scientist
"On your next trip to the bookstore bypass the action adventure thrillers and seek out Prometheans in the Lab by Sharon McGrayne . . . I wish that (it) were twice its length." —PopularMechanics.com
"In this striking and readable collection of nine thumbnail biographies of heroic (and troubled) figures in the history of chemistry . . . McGrayne is conscientious about showing the downside of each chemical breakthrough, and the human flaws and 'features' of each Promethean." —Choice
Customer Reviews:
amazing.......2003-05-13
This accessible but rewarding history of applied chemistry ranks among the best books I have read in years. It does the basic job: providing information, but its prose is transparent and unobstrusive, its exposition uniformly consistent and intelligible, and the narrative even builds to moments of drama; finally, it demonstrates the tension between chemistry and environmental concerns, as well as that between science, capital and society. All this without taking a polemical stance. Who would have thought so drab a subject could be rendered this important and engaging? Anybody with an interest in business, finance, industry, environmentalism, science and applied research should read it. It wouldn't hurt for some book authors to study it as well as how to tranform coal-tar into mauve, so to speak.
Intimates: Genius and madness.......2002-04-17
If you enjoyed "A Beautiful Mind," you should check out "Prometheans in the Lab." Scientific genius and mental illness are clearly not rare combinations. Like John Nash, several of the nine chemists profiled so ably by science writer Sharon Bertsch McGrayne were odd ducks who struggled with intractable mental disorders while achieving society-changing breakthroughs in their labs. McGrayne's nine subjects invented processes and products that define modern life.
Wallace Carothers, an American and the inventor of nylon in 1935, was apparently afflicted with bipolar disorder. Throughout his career he tried to contend with severe mood swings, along with other maladies. In the end, his illnesses overwhelmed him, and he dosed himself with cyanide.
Fritz Haber, a German, invented modern nitrogen-based fertilizer in 1908 and helped end Europe's millennial-long fear of famine. As a young man, he was hospitalized for "neurasthenia," after suffering sleeplessness, excitability, and nervous tension.
Unlike Nash and Carothers, Haber's illness did not progress to a chronic and profound mental disorder. But neither was his life a bed of roses. His wife's depression ended with her suicide. And while Haber's prodigious scientific accomplishments brought him fame, they also brought him infamy. In World War I, he initiated and organized chemical warfare for Germany, through the use of chlorine gas. He argued that poison gas would save lives by shortening the war. (Not all of Germany's enemies were outraged; it turned out that some influential Americans agreed with him.)
Most of the brilliant researchers McGrayne covers did not have mental illnesses. Many of them suffered from a much more prosaic and more ubiquitous "problem"- the inability to really foresee untoward consequences of their inventions. Paul Hermann Muller, a Swiss, invented DDT and in 1948 won a Nobel Prize for medicine. McGrayne's chapter on Muller includes a look at the huge plusses and minuses of the use of DDT. On the one hand, DDT saved millions of people from death from malaria and typhus. On the other side, the substance devastated wildlife, particularly bird populations, wherever it was used in any quantity. Muller apparently had a premonition that DDT was not an unmitigated good, but he didn't vigorously investigate its deleterious properties.
McGrayne is an outstanding contributor to the genre of well-researched, readable books on scientists and science for everyday people. You don't need a science background to enjoy her book; you just need to be curious about some very unusual people and where all sorts of everyday stuff-nylon, fertilizer, soap, DDT, synthetic colors, leaded gasoline and even clean water--came from.
Great stories, great read.......2001-10-17
I picked up this book because a ...review said, "On your next trip to the bookstore bypass the action adventure thrillers and seek out Prometheans in the Lab... It is one of those `story behind the story' books that are often written about celebrities and politicians [but it's about] the chemists responsible for the major chemical processes that undergird modern living.... I wish it were twice its length."
The reviewer was right. The book tells science stories you definitely didn't learn in high school. But it also dramatizes the tangled relationship between technology's benefits and drawbacks and the public's conflicting desires for new products and environmental purity. Great stories, and a great read. *****
the untold stories behind the science.......2001-08-25
I was intrigued by the title and thought I would try it...this is an amazing book that puts into perspective life before refridgeration, soap, safe drinking water, sugar, dye, and more. This book makes a clear link between scientific discovery and the subsequent ripples in society -- as well as how those discoveries impact the lives of the scientists. Prometheans also shows how complicated science can be - for every discovery that changed modern society, it brought with it a host of new issues, ills, and irrevocable changes. A great example is Thomas Midgley, the man who created Freon and tetraethyl lead. Without him we would have no fridges, freezers, cheap gas (or a hole in the ozone layer). In his chapter, you discover that the early factory workers working with lead went insane from the fumes and ended up killing each other in psychotic rages; plus the high levels of lead were polluting the environment. This led to workplace reform and an overhaul of factory safety regulations. Then there's Wallace Carothers, who invented Nylon. He suffered from depression for years, and being around potent lab chemicals and fumes didn't help his outlook any; he killed himself with a cyanide pill he'd carried around for 15 years. I am not a scientist but interested in general scientific discovery. This book was great because each scenario is presented in a historical context, each side is shown and not portrayed in an extreme negative or positive light. It's very balanced, and didn't overwhelm me with incomprehensible explanations of the hard-core science behind the science. This is great & would make a great TV series.
Book Description
Spellbound by the Faerie Queen, the woman known as Seeker has abducted human children for her mistress's pleasure for nearly an eternity, unable to free herself from her servitude and reclaim her own humanity.
Seeker's latest prey is a Merlin. Named after the legendary wizard of Camelot, Merlins are not simply those who wield magic, they are magic. Now, with rival mages also vying for the favor of this being of limitless magic to tip the balance of power, Seeker must persuade the Merlin to join her cause-or else risk losing something even more precious to her than the fate of humankind.
Customer Reviews:
You'll love it or hate it........2007-09-21
Elizabeth Bear, Blood and Iron (Roc, 2006)
Oh, Bear, you've done it again. And once again, I came along helpless for the ride.
I talk a lot about how, at times, a whole lot of wrong things come together and make something wonderfully right. My classic example of this is the band Better than Ezra, whose stuff contains everything one can possibly do wrong in crafting a pop song, and yet "One More Murder" and "In the Blood" and "A Lifetime" and a host of others are perfect little pieces of popcraft. I get that same feeling a lot when I read Elizabeth Bear's stuff. There are rules to this writing gig, you know. (If I'm letting out trade secrets, stuff it; I was never a novelist anyway.) There are about as many books of little silly things as there are volumes in the... erm, wherever they keep lawbooks about this stuff... about the importation of lettuce. (For those of you outside the U.S. who want a good laugh, the last time I stumbled across that statistic, there were 13,500 pages of laws relating to the importation of lettuce. That was a few years ago, so the number has likely doubled by now.) But then there's that holy, scroll-like document that all novelists must bow and pray to five times a day that has a title like STUFF YOU ARE NEVER, NEVER, EVER SUPPOSED TO DO IN A NOVEL, FOR EDITORS, PUBLISHERS, AND THE GENERAL PUBLIC WILL LAUGH AT YOU UNTIL THEIR SIDES BLEED. And, you know, I think in every single piece of Bear's writing I've read, she takes a rugbeater and whacks that document hard enough that one of those strictures falls to the ground, stunned just long enough for her to crush it with a (very fashionable, mind you) boot.
Now, after all that buildup, I'm not going to tell you which one she beats the tar out of in this book, because you will encounter it yourself if you read this book (on page 275 in the Roc trade paper edition), and you will either love it or you will hate it. I talked to Bear about this briefly, and I got the feeling that most people hate it. Well, bub, I am not most people. I am all for rule-breaking, as long as you provide ample evidence elsewhere in your body of work that you know the rule exists, so we readers have evidence that you are breaking the rule because you're conscious of it and you're saying "stuff it" to the rules. (Because, unlike me, you ARE a novelist.) Suffice to say I have never seen this rule broken in this particular way, in this particular place, in a professionally-published novel before. So there's a bit of culture shock involved. But if you ken what the Bear is cookin', you may end up getting as much of a kick out of it as I did.
Not that there's anything really conventional about Blood and Iron, which posits a world in which modern-day human society and Faerie live side by side in alternate planes of existence. There are paths between the two, but most humans have long forgotten that Faerie exists. Those who haven't, in general, want to make sure that Faerie and Earth never come into constant contact again. They're called the Prometheus Club, and while we don't get too much information on the higher-ups, we get the feeling that they are not terribly nice individuals. We do get to know one very well, though. His name is Matthew Szczgielniak (and forgive me, Bear, for mangling the spelling). He and his brethren (and sistren) aren't fond or Faerie because, in this world, all the stuff you've heard is true, including that whole baby-changeling thing.
Which brings us to our main character, Seeker, formerly known as Elaine Andraste, formerly human, now a hunter in the court of Faerie. Her quarry, in this book, is a Merlin-- a human, for all intents and purposes, made of magic (for you Forgotten Realms geeks, think "capable of altering the weave"). Both the Seelie and Unseelie courts of Faerie, as well as the Prometheans, are very interested in swaying the Merlin to their side of the uneasy truce that exists between all three, for the presence of a Merlin can disrupt the balance that has existed between the sides for centuries.
All of this is just scratching the surface of this deep, rich novel, which abounds in subplots, trickery, strategizing, bloodshed, mayhem, historical and mythical figures, and all the other things that make a fantasy novel with a military flavor such a good read. Oh, and there's a dragon, for there must always be a dragon. But there's not usually a battle in Times Square.
Wonderful book, this. If you like your fantasy novels with a twist, Blood and Iron is definitely one to check out. ****
Stolen by Faeries!!!.......2007-05-27
Drawing on centuries of folklore and ballads about the cruel and inhuman Sidhe, Elizabeth Bear puts it all on the table: The Ballad of Tam Lin, about a woman rescuing her true love from the clutches of the Faerie Queen; Arthurian Legend, where Arthur is taken off to Avalon and his sister, Morgan Le Fay is the Queen of Air and Darkness, Ancient Dragons that lie at the root of the world (so to speak), Water sprites that exist to lure the unwitting into death by drowning-- Plus Urban Fantasy, with Man against Nature, the dangers of the dark alleys--as hazardous as the intrigues of the Sidhe and the Unseelie Court, Madness, Revenge... and back to Arthur with a mortal Merlin. And even a dash of the Eternal Hero and the sacrifice of Kings. Oh, and werewolves.
Somehow Bear manages to juggle it all and add suspense and action, with a huge cast of characters, well-drawn and never quite two-dimensional, despite the limited attention paid to each. The tale is wound around Elaine Adraste, who has been stolen away by the diminishing race of Faeries due to her heritage of Faerie blood, and is bound to the Queen as her Seeker--the one who steals away human children. Not only spells and geas bind her, but also her own child, also kept by the Queen. And the theme extends to Elaine's mother, powerful leader of the ancient Prometheus Club, who will do anything to destroy Faerie, including sacrifice her own child.
Few people can adequately capture the cruel and alien beauty of the Faery Court in a manner that compels as well as repels, but Elizabeth Bear is one. This is a complex, epic tale that is sure to appeal to anyone remotely interested in any of the many elements involved.
Grim Faerie Tales of War and Sacrifice.......2007-05-22
For whatever reason, New York city tends to to be a favored backdrop for those writing urban fantasies involving faerie in some form. That's what originally drew me to this tale, since I have a penchant for collecting fantasy that takes place in my home setting. And I have a soft spot for contemporary fantasy with fae characters in general. Elizabeth Bear has gone about creating an epic tale that is out of legend and myth of old, from the tales of Camelot to the ballad of Tam Linn.
The Seeker was once a mortal woman, now bound to serve the Queen of Faerie and charged bringing her the half-blood children from the human world. Seeker chafes against the bonds that hold her, but has no choice when the Queen lays a new geas upon her: to seek out the new Merlin--a being who is magic-- and seduce him into service for the realm of Faerie. But Seeker will have competition in her race to win the prize. Set against Faerie are the human mages of the Prometheus club. If they can convince the Merlin to join their side against the Fae, all of Faerie may be doomed. On the brink of war, this epic story's protagonists and antagonists must make their choices and ultimately watch the story play itself out.
The premise of this story is an interesting one, certainly this is a grand scale sort of epic fantasy, rather than the more intimate urban fantasy I'm used to. I was originally going to rate this only three stars, but to be fair it likely deserves at least three and half to four stars. I've not read Ms. Bear's work prior to this book, so I can't say if this story is indicative of her usual style, but I tend to like books that are more directly about character and less grand epic. I won't hold preference against a book, so I'll rate it four stars on the grounds that I do think there is some good writing and an intriguing story here--it just wasn't quite my cup of tea. This is an especially tragic and grim story with many bittersweet, dramatic and poignant moments. The story takes itself very seriously and explores themes of sacrifice and the prices paid for victory. I found that the lack of humor in this story made it bleaker than I particularly enjoyed, although given the storyline, it may be what the author intended. I prefer more humor--and humanity--in my reading as a rule, and I think it may have helped bring out the characters a bit more.
The main characters of this story felt too much like set pieces in the game--it was hard to like any of them or really identify with any of them. Even Matthew, the human mage, seems to keep a textual distance from the readers. I kept wanting to know more about these protagonists and their lives. Most of the novel is bound up in describing events and the patterns of myth that color those events. But I kept wishing to care more about the Seeker and her struggle to choose her path. And while the POV shift from third to first person for Seeker was clearly done to accentuate the transformation of the character, the abrupt shift was hard to adjust to at first.
Only some of this epic story takes place in New York City, but the story is a fascinating revisit of the tale of Tam Linn, weaving in Arthurian legends to create something that profoundly echoes the old myths in a modern setting. There is a lot of blood and violence in this tale, but the author never uses it gratuitously--one of the points of this book is that Faerie tales are full of blood and violence, the sanitized versions for children to day are a pale imitation of those originals. It's a challenging plot line, as the author is crafting a book where no one side is in the right and all sides are fighting for survival. It's more than a little bleak, and there are enough characters and twists for the story to become confusing.
Nevertheless, this was a decent read--kept me reading straight through to the end without wanting to put it down. If you're a reader who likes contemporary fantasy with an epic feel and a sober storyline this might be just the story for you. If you prefer something light hearted or more character driven, you might find this a bit weighty and dark for your tastes. If you're looking for more urban fae fantasy to read, you might try War for the Oaks by Emma Bull or try Son of Darkness by Josepha Sherman.
Happy Reading! ^_^ Shanshad
Tam Lin revisited.......2007-04-12
Another work drawing on the myths of Faerie and on the ballad of Tam Lin, this book is chock-full of texts and subtexts on everything from love and betrayal, to the nature of subservience and pain (and let's not forget revenge!). I liked the writing style, more descriptive than in Bear's Jenny Casey books, but very fitting for such a work. I love the way so many different legends and mythologies are drawn in -- the Arthurian cycle, the Welsh mythos, werewolves, both pre-Christian and post-Christian Faerie legends, and numerous ballads.
This is not a light and happy book, and one of the themes seems to be that everything valuable in life requires a sacrifice, and therefore there are no unequivocally happy endings. I had some difficulties with differentiating some of the characters at first, but I think this may be attributable to the fact that I wasn't able to read in big gulps, but only in little bits and pieces here and there. The character development was, for the most part, excellent, although the main character's motivation was unclear to me in several places. As the book progressed, her actions and feelings (and sometimes lack of such!) became more understandable, but I still didn't always quite get it. I understood Matthew and his overseer's motivation much better. And although I understood the need for the POV shift, it was exceptionally jarring at first.
All in all, a very enjoyable read, and I look forward to the next ones!
Dark and confusing, but still worth the read.......2007-01-22
If you like strong dark urban fantasy in the same vein as Neil Gaiman's work, give this book a read. Bear's writing is strongly compelling for the most part, although this book can occasionally be a slog.
Elaine Andraste is the Seeker for the Daone Sidhe Court and it's Queen, Medb. Her mission is to go to the Iron World and procure children for Her Majesty's amusement. Her own son, Ian, is the current plaything and no doubt insurance for his Mother's best behavior.
Her next assignment---a Merlin, and the first female one to occur. But, Dr. Caren Bierce is no plaything. She's got competing offers with the Prometheus Society, a group of mages wanting to stop Faery in its track as well as the other Faery Court.
The characters are well-realized and the story is interesting. I genuinely empathize with Elaine for the most part. The pacing is somewhat slow and the plot is somewhat convoluted, but still all and all I would recommend it if urban fantasy is your thing.
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