Kalki

Kalki (Gore Vidal)


A book that is, unfortunately for me, simply far too of-its-time - this book is so 70's it hurts, and having missed that decade, I could almost feel my hair getting rustled as most of the book flew straight over my head. I've really enjoyed some of Vidal's historical novels before, and I think perhaps I'm going to stick to those in the future.


Grade: N/A

Resurrection Day

Resurrection Day (Brendan DuBois)


Ooooh, I did not like this book. The setting is interesting - it's the 1970s, and America is still reeling after a nuclear exchange during the Cuban Missile Crisis. In this world, the US got hit by enough nukes to destroy Washington DC, NYC, Florida, and, um, Omaha, Nebraska, losing 10 -12 million people, while the USSR was completely destroyed in return.
The problem is the execution. There's a passage I just couldn't get past where our hero is explaining to a Brit that America feels guilty, comparing the nuclear exchange to when a neighborhood bully throws trash into your yard and in return you shoot him, murder his family and burn his house down. My problem here is that the person saying this had his entire family killed in the incident he describes as "throwing trash in your yard". On top of that, a big part of his character is that he was in the Army doing radiation cleanup and saw horrible things that haunt him to this day. So would he be comparing all of his family dying and the haunting, terrible aftermath that makes up his largest character trait as throwing trash in someone's yard? What?
One more complaint and I'm done. The author hints that England is getting ready to invade the US, taking advantage of the US' weakness even 10 years on after the bombs and missiles fell. However, the author also states that the US is now the only nuclear power left in the world, with all the other countries having voluntarily given up their nukes. I couldn't get past this either: England is going to militarily challenge and attempt to invade the world's only nuclear power? What?
(To be fair, maybe the Brits have some counter measure, like they secretly have their own nukes - but the author attempts to build tension by hinting at this invasion, and since he does not address the nuke issue, this comes off as a damp squib and frankly a waste of pages.)
Take a pass on this one.


Grade: D-

"Fall of Giants"

Fall of Giants (Ken Follett)

I made it 300 pages into this before giving up. This is a historical novel about a bunch of different families starting just before World War I, and it turned into a real slog rather quickly. I couldn't put down a different Follett book, The Pillars of the Earth, and I really feel the difference is a simple one: Pillars of the Earth has one, single overarching narrative thread that may touch many people and subplots, but keeps everything tied together; Fall of Giants is missing this, and is instead very, very loosely woven from five or six threads that barely rub up against each other. Almost every character's thread is interesting, but jumping away from them to dive into another, almost totally unrelated one kills all the momentum, and eventually makes the book a chore to read. I'd recommend taking a pass on this one.

Grade: C-

"Kushiel's Dart"

Kushiel's Dart (Jacqueline Carey)

A big fantasy novel about a courtesan who's tossed into a high-stakes world of political intrigue in late medieval fantasy Europe. For the first 300 pages or so this was really hard to put down; Carey's great at world-building and weaving exposition, and the world she's made is pretty interesting. Unfortunately the book eventually slows down and starts dragging, hamstrung by two issues, one big and one small. The big one is that it's simply too, well, big - the paperback comes in at a hair over 900 pages, and it's not hard to suggest some useless parts that could be cut (my recommendation would be the entire Master of the Straits storyline, which not only adds almost nothing to the story, but feels very out of place having a super-powerful wizard in a very low-magic setting). The second issue is that the characters are not always fleshed out as much as one would hope; our heroine and the main cast mostly come off pretty well, but the head antagonist is barely more than a sketch.
All in all, I guess this is a good beach book, but it's hard to really recommend seeking it out unless you pass it on the shelf at the library.

Grade: B

"Vengeful Spirit"

Vengeful Spirit (Graham McNeill)

I'm scared to start a Graham NcNeill book now; when he's good he's great, and when he's bad, he's infuriating. I'll cut to the chase here: Good McNeill showed up for this book, and the biggest flaw has nothing to do with his writing; it's the fact that we're deep in the Hersey now, but the story's possibilities are still limited by knowing the ending. The reader knows there's no way that Horus is going to die during the course of this book, neither is the titular Vengeful Spirit going to be destroyed.

That being said, McNeill mostly works around this by drawing on the now well established setting of the Horus Hersey (over 30 novels!) - to the point where even giving a basic sketch of the book's story risks running into spoiler territory, as a pivotal character thought dead returns in first few pages. The tradeoff here is that McNeill is able to sidestep the majority of the predetermined ending problem, but in turn the book is almost totally inaccessible if you haven't been reading the Heresy up to this point.
In short, if you've read enough of the series that you'll catch the book's references, it's an easy recommend; otherwise, take a pass.

Grade: B

"Glass House 51"

Glass House 51 (John Hampel)

I don't really know what to make of this book; it kind of reads like a boring fever dream, if such a thing is even possible. I'll freely admit I didn't make it very far, giving up after the author introduced 15 characters in 10 pages over the span of a confusing, painful exposition dump about a company called AlphaBanc that's getting ready to become the world's most powerful E-bank, but this serial killer nerd called the Gnome and I'm sorry, I seem to have slam-dunked this book into the donation pile and picked up something else to read. Might be worth seeking out if you want to read something bonkers, but not for me, I'm afraid.

Grade: D-

"The Talon of Horus"

The Talon of Horus (Aaron Dembski-Bowden)

I'm getting real tired of reviewing ADB books; I don't know what to say anymore. Is this a great book? Yes. Should you read it? Absolutely. Is this one of the best W40K novels out there? You betcha. What more is there to talk about??
I guess I can go over the setting real quick; this book picks up just after the end of the Horus Heresy, looking at the heretofore unseen time when the defeated traitor forces are warring amongst themselves in the Eye of Terror, carving out meaningless little empires and not getting much done besides feeling sorry for themselves and blaming each other for everything going wrong. Our hero is one of the Thousand Sons who ends up taking part in the founding of the Black Legion, and if you understood that sentence you should know enough 40K to really enjoy this book. That brings me to the only caveat I can give, which is that this not for beginners; everyone else should pick it up immediately.

Grade: A+

"The Greenlanders"

The Greenlanders (Jane Smiley)

I feel bad not being able to get into this book; it's got excellent reviews, but when it came time to actually crack it open, I barely made it ten pages. I've read that it's supposed to be in the style of a Norse saga, but for me I just found it to be horribly dry, written in snore-inducing this happened, then that happened style. Here's a little taste (page 233):

Another thing that happened after this hunger was that Bjorn Einarsson Jorsalfari declared his intention of remaining year round at Thjodhilds Stead, which was in Kambstead Fjord, at the back of Hvalsey Fjord, instead of spending part of the year at one farm an part of the year at the other, for he hadn't enough men to make something of both farmsteads, and he preferred the location of Thjodhilds Stead, for it gave his ships easy access to the sea but also to Gardar and Brattahlid. For this reason it happened that Gunnhild Gunnardottir would be within a day's walk of her own home when she went to stay with Solveig for the summer...

Did you follow that? I didn't, because I fell asleep halfway through it. Maybe I've just read too many fast-paced novels, but it takes so long for anything to happen that I couldn't stop my attention from drifting away. I'm sure a more patient reader can find a lot to enjoy here, but for me it's going regretfully in the donation pile.

Grade: D

"The Dark Knight Manual"

The Dark Knight Manual: Tools, Weapons, Vehicles & Documents from the Batcave

Almost exactly what it says on the cover; this is a book about the, uh, tools, weapons, and vehicles Batman uses in the Christopher Nolan movies. The star of the show is actually the "documents" of the title, which are neat feelies (think of the letters from Griffin & Sabine, if you've ever read those); being able to flip through the police report on the Joker or Harvey Dent's hospital file is really neat.
My only caveat is that there's not a ton of material here; the MSRP of $40 is just a bit much, working out to $20 an hour if you're a slow reader (I finished the entire book in two bathroom breaks). Pick it up if you see it in the bargain bin, otherwise it's a little tough to recommend.

Grade: B

"The Klingon Art of War"

The Klingon Art of War (Keith R.A. DeCandido)

A look into the culture and backstory of the Klingons from Star Trek, this book is presented in-universe as an ancient collections of precepts for how to live an honorable life, annotated with commentary by a modern Klingon.
And it's pretty good! I always appreciate when a group like the Klingons that can too frequently be boiled down to "angry" and "hits stuff" gets fleshed out, and they're in capable hands here; I guess it helps the book's readability that the Klingons are a culture that values conflict as a way to better themselves, so it's rare to go more than a few pages without something interesting happening. You don't need to be much of a Trek fan to enjoy this book, but if you are, you'll be rewarded with a few "I remember that!" moments from the TV shows.

Grade: B

"Star Trek: Destiny"

Star Trek: Destiny (David Mack)
Review by N. Web

As I said in my review of The Good that Men Do, one of my biggest
problems with the Star Trek literary universe is that its status as
canon is questionable at best.  Perhaps this is either good or bad,
because having a bad, ridiculous story as part of official canon can
lead to serious problems.  But, at the same time it can also lead to
authors not taking much of a risk for fear of disrupting established TV
and movie canon.  Which, as "These are the Voyages..." shows, sometimes
probably deserves to be disrupted.  Star Trek Destiny is a huge risk, as
far as I'm concerned.  But one that ultimately succeeds.

Star Trek Destiny also tackles one of the biggest problems in the
established canon, that being the Borg.  Much has been made over the
years of the "nerf"-ing of the Borg in Star Trek.  It seems as though
the Borg were always meant to have been seen as indestructible, and
indeed in "The Best of Both Worlds", they were only defeated through a
fluke.  Over the years in canon, the Borg seemed to lose their
unbeatable quality and in Star Trek Voyager pretty much became relegated
to Monster of the Week status.  Even the crew of the NX-01 Enterprise
had a turn at the tee.  So, how does an author manage to make the Borg
seem threatening again?  This radical of a solution doesn't seem like it
could possibly work, but in the end I was ultimately left more satisfied
than I have been with any Borg story since at least "Endgame" (the
against-all-odds inexplicably good series finale to Voyager), and maybe
even since "The Best of Both Worlds."   Massive spoilers to follow,
perhaps you don't want to read before finishing the book.

Verdict:  Highly recommended.




*** spoiler space ***


For David Mack, it seems the solution to the problem of the Borg was to
ultimately get rid of them.  But, it does make sense.  In order to
prevent the perpetual nerfing of the Borg or the perpetual power creep
that the Federation would have to go through in order to constantly
defeat them; perhaps the best solution really is to just eliminate them
entirely to prevent not only over-use of the Borg, but further
degradation of the "canon."  David Mack takes a gamble, and ultimately
wins, as far as I'm concerned.  The send-off they get is equal parts
relieving and moving.

Mack manages to tie together all four post TOS Star Trek series and a
large amount of established literary universe into three novels that not
only give the Borg an origin story, but an end story that manages to be
quite thought-provoking and moving.  Of course, the main stars are the
TNG cast, with almost everyone other than Ezri Dax relegated to small
parts and cameos, and the Enterprise crew is entirely off camera even
during the parts that take place during the 22nd century.  Captain
Hernandez ultimately becomes quite interesting, and ended up once again
making me wish that Enterprise had continued past Season 4.

I found myself less interested in the characters that were created in
the literary universe, but as the story went on I grew more familiar
with them.  The story is very evocative, and I found Mack manages to use
the prose to generate genuine dread, fear, creepiness and ultimately
relief throughout the tale.  It's to his credit that when I was done I
immediately began looking into more Star Trek literary universe ebooks
on Amazon.  David Mack's new series seems to be a three parter about
Geordi attempting to rebuild Data, and I'm already thinking of
purchasing it.


Stray observations:

This seems to be sticking with the "Bashir and Dax broke up post DS9"
book canon.  Also very weird that Bashir, O'Brien, and Nog are not
appearing in this film at all.  At least Garak shows up.

Speaking of, it would have been nice to see more of the Federation's
allies involved other than the brief cameos Garak and Martok and a lot
of generic ambassadors have.

Geordi doesn't have a lot to do, though a short romance is shoehorned in
for him, which I feel like he deserves at this point.

I like the idea of Worf as Picard's first officer, but isn't he supposed
to be the Ambassador to the Klingon Empire?  Worf also gets a short
romance shoehorned in.

I had one small gripe in that Picard seems to have dropped back into his
jerk mode he was in for most of Star Trek First Contact.  Which, I
thought the point of the movie is he gives up on the White Whale.  Maybe
I missed some kind of a relapse he had in the literary universe, but I
couldn't get over his inability to function for 2.9 books because of the
Borg.

"Blood Angels Omnibus"

The Blood Angels Omnibus (James Swallow)

This omnibus collects two novels and a short story. Normally I'd review the novels separately, but they're basically two halves of the same tale, and if I had read the first novel by itself, I probably would have been pissed at the cliffhanger ending. (I also don't know that I have much to say without giving away the first book's story.)
Collected as a omnibus, the two novels work great; I have yet to read a bad James Swallow book, and the streak holds here. Swallow's villains are always more interesting than his heroes, and this omnibus stars a particularly loathsome piece of filth pitted against our (somewhat forgettable) heroes. I don't want to say much more except that this falls into solid good-not-great territory; it's a easy recommend for W40k fans, but if you're not familiar with the setting, I'd recommend Swallow's excellent Fear to Tread first, which covers the same chapter of Space Marines and serves as a very nice introduction.

Grade: B+

"Honour Imperialis"

Honour Imperialis (Aaron Dembski-Bowden, Rob Sanders, Steve Lyons)

A W0K omnibus about the good ol' Imperial Guard. I'm going to review all of the novels one by one.

Dead Men Walking (ADB) - This is probably the worst ADB novel I've read yet, meaning it's just good and not great. Honestly, by the time I got to the end of the omnibus, I'd forgotten almost everything that happened in this novel; I do remember there were some great action scenes, and I was also kind of gobsmacked that the book contained literally zero female characters. (The Imperial Guard's omnisex - unlike the setting's popular stars, the Space Marines - so there's really no excuse.) That said, I don't want to be too tough on the book; it's exactly the kind of above-average but not spectacular book that fits perfectly in a omnibus like this.

Grade: C+

Cadian Blood (Rob Sanders) - This author wrote one of my all time favorite W40K novels in Atlas Infernal, and he's written probably the best novel in this omnibus. My big issue with Cadian Blood is the same problem I had with Atlas Infernal : The author keeps jumping around the chronology of the story, cutting between our heroes being interrogated in prison and earlier scenes running around fighting Orks. This is annoyingly confusing, all the more so as some characters are introduced in the flash-forwards before we meet them in the earlier parts, which make up the bulk of the book. Still, this is pretty good - it's not quite as bonkers as Atlas Infernal, but this novel is the star of the omnibus.

Grade: B

Redemption Corps (Steve Lyons) - Remember when I said that Cadian Blood was bonkers? This book has Imperial Guard guys charging Necrons on horses. I couldn't imagine this without laughing.
That's pretty much the high point. This is a good-not-great book, unfortunately weighed down by making the focal point of the beginning of the book a frankly boring romance between two goofs I was hard-pressed to care about. After this problem is disposed of, the novel falls into the W40k trap of having too many POV characters, although in fairness it's not nearly as bad as some other books (cough, cough). I'd recommend just skipping all the parts with the two lovers, at least until the second half of the book - once the Necrons warp in the book gets a lot more interesting.

Grade: B-

After the main attraction there's four short stories - one really good ADB one, one not so great Steve Lyons one, and two pretty good ones by (cough cough) and (mumble mumble). All in all, this is one of the stronger W40K omnibusses out there; there's not a single miss here, and while none of the novels themselves are superstars, all three of them for $9 is a great deal.

Total Grade: B+

"A Natural History of Dragons"

A Natural History of Dragons: A Memoir by Lady Trent (Marie Brennan)

This book stumped both Hams to come up with a clever and witty opening, so I'll just recommend it from the both of us.

Oh, you wanted to know what it's about? FINE. This one you can judge from the cover; it's a natural history of dragons, written as part memoir, part natural history. Dragons are presented as being very real animals in a fictitious world that bears a strong resemblance to Victorian-era Earth with the names switched around. Here there are no talking dragons or majestic rideable dragons; these dragons are presented in a realistic fashion, and you'll probably find yourself both fearing them as they attack the main characters and fearing for them as in turn they're hunted by poachers and have their habitats invaded by smugglers.
This book is the first in a series, covering the main character's first interest in dragons up though the end of her first adventure (complete with sequel hook). Writing her memoir - the book in your hands - allows the author to drop in asides that both flesh out the setting and the main character herself, who is now a crotchety old woman who doesn't give a fig. Given the faux-Victorian setting, there is some anachronisms about women having a place in the home; beyond this I'm not sharing any more plot details (it's only $12 on Amazon or free at your local library).

Grade: B+

"The Good that Men Do"

Star Trek Enterprise: The Good that Men Do (Andy Mangels & Michael A Martin)

(Guest post by N. Web)

As I'll probably explain in my upcoming review of Star Trek: Destiny, one of

my main problems with Star Trek literature is its inherent questionable canon

status, to the point where the series can tend to look like elevated

fanfiction. And where I felt that Star Trek: Destiny was a great (statuesque)

example of proving that the literary Star Trek universe is worth looking into,

I was sadly kind of disappointed with this story, even though I had good

expectations for it. Granted, those expectations were along the lines of

"Well, they couldn't have done a worse job than 'These Are the Voyages...'"

(the series finale of Star Trek: Enterprise) did, but that's not a high bar to

clear if we're being real here.

A brief summary of background: Star Trek: Enterprise was the last Star Trek series on television, and it's four-year run was the only since the original series to end in cancellation. The series is well-known rather derisively amongst fans of the series as kind of a bad one, and largely one that went unwatched by much of the fandom. I personally felt the same way for much of the series' original run on UPN (or was it the CW by that point? Does anyone care?) However, by seasons 3 and 4 of the series, the tone shifted from one of "silly situation of the week" drama along the lines of Voyager to one more of "long-form interconnected story" that Deep Space Nine rather perfected during its run. By the time Enterprise hit Season 4, it had a new showrunner, had ditched the "Temporal Cold War" storyline that never made any sense to begin with (the previous showrunners have stated that the sinister Future Guy was supposed to have been Captain Archer's future self, if that makes any damn sense); and it finally felt like the series was running on all cylinders, leading into what surely would have been an awesome multi-season conflict with the Romulans preceding the founding of the United Federation of Planets.

Except the show was confirmed to not be renewed just before the season ended, giving them enough time to hastily put together a finale which has proven to be the last hour of Star Trek on television in what is going on ten years now. They brought back Rick Berman and Brannon Braga for the finale, writing a ridiculous framing device wherein Commander Riker, during his The Next Generation days (I'll save a comment about how much he should not have aged since then), is visiting the holodeck to witness Enterprise's last mission before the founding of the United Federation of Planets (which itself is a time-jump to 5 years after the previous episode of Enterprise.) The disservice this does to the cast and story of Enterprise notwithstanding, this episode is also notable because in a ridiculous contrivance, Enterprise's chief engineer and one of the three primary characters on the show, Charles "Trip" Tucker is killed protecting series recurring character Andorian Commander Shran's daughter from pirate kidnappers. It makes no sense and seems to only serve to further dilute fans' final memories of the franchise with ridiculous forced drama, reportedly the character was killed off "to get people talking." Suffice to say, the episode is not well-remembered by fans.

Telling statements from Memory Alpha:

"This is the only series finale in the Star Trek franchise where the actual

ensemble crew of the series do not appear, but rather, their holographic

copies."

"The only exterior shot of the NX-01 Enterprise in this episode appears in the

closing montage."

"Rick Berman described this episode as a "valentine to the fans"."

"At a 2009 Star Trek convention, Jonathan Frakes simply said this episode

"stinks.""

"In 2013, eight years after the airing of this episode, Brannon Braga apologized to the entire cast of Enterprise for it and said he thought Rick Berman and himself made a "narcissistic move" in trying to make the episode a "valentine" to Star Trek. He also called it "a crappy episode.""

So, without Star Trek on TV, it's up to fans to fix it. The Good that Men Do serves largely as a fix-fic. Hilariously enough, the holodeck framing device which did a disservice to the cast of Enterprise is ultimately an easy way to ret-con Trip's death, because the program Riker was using was a lie, based on a false account of history! Weirdly, this revelation is presented to us by the framing device of old Jake Sisko and old Nog, discovering these recently unclassified files about Trip Tucker's "death." In reality, Trip faked his death so he could go undercover in the Romulan Star Empire and help the proto-Federation's efforts against Romulus.

What seems strange is that what is to me a delightful appropriation of a bad

episode to righteously upend a wrong done to the fan community ends up being

kind of unsatisfying. I read reviews of this book on Amazon before purchasing

it and all were largely positive, but one negative review stood out to me in

that it was criticizing the book because people were constantly crying. I

wasn't as upset for Archer wanting to hug T'Pol and Trip constantly as this

reviewer was, but man, I have to say, Trip, Archer, and T'Pol spend quite a

bit of time throughout this book misty-eyed. T'Pol, a damned Vulcan,

literally breaks down in tears on two separate occasions. The Denobulan

doctor Phlox, in on the conspiracy, almost cries thinking about not-dead Trip

Tucker. I know there's a lot of emotion and drama involved in faking one's

death, but c'mon.

What I liked:

During his fake death, Trip remarks at how ridiculous and unbelievable the

circumstances surrounding it are. Take that, canon!

Who's a good boy? It's Porthos! He's a good boy!

Things that bothered me, in order of annoyance:

At one point Trip is paired with another undercover human operative, who espouses the really deep observation that the universe is just so vast and amazing, that it makes you wonder if God did it. No, not just any God, the Christian one, apparently. Trip is written as conceding the very deep point that it really makes you think, don't it.

While undercover as a Romulan, Trip recognizes that another, potentially hostile Romulan is actually the same person as a Vulcan captain he met months before. Nothing comes of this. We never find out if he was a Vulcan operative undercover in the Romulan Empire or vice-versa. It just hangs out there.

Characterization. Yikes. T'Pol is all over the place, and Shran is stuck in default ANGRY until the final chapters of the book when he realizes what an idiot he's been. This mistake costs him nothing other than some internal guilt, and then he is subsequently rewarded. The most complex character is a Romulan nobody cares about.

Why doesn't Trip tell T'Pol about his fake death plans immediately? He eventually does anyway, I feel like this is just more unnecessary drama insertion, but what do I know?

Although this isn't much different than the television show, I would have hoped that Sato, Reed, and Mayweather would have gotten more time focused on them. Mayweather in particular was quite invisible. Again, just like the TV show.

Again, not to overly criticize Star Trek literature as "elevated fanfiction", but I was quite often reminded of fanfiction that loves to pepper in foreign words that the author knows just to prove their cred. Right, senpai? I can sort of understand doing this for Klingon words everybody knows (I don't expect "Q'apla" to be translated), but every tenth word out of a Romulan character was italicized, and even the Andorians were occasionally complaining about how others didn't have any ZHAVEY, which I assumed was "honor." This is even more ridiculous when Romulans were constantly counting down things, which it was obvious they were numbers, and yet during at least the third countdown in the Romulan language (nerd voice: That's RIHANNSU!) Trip is translating in his head to English for the viewers at home.

Along these same lines, the questionable fanon of the Andorians having four genders and declining population growth is brought up. Further, this book takes the bold step of declaring the Aenar extinct in the 2400s. I'm less annoyed with the fanon gender theory (even though this was not represented in the considerable time spent on the Andorians in the Enterprise TV series) than I am about suddenly declaring the Aenar extinct. (especially when they exist in Star Trek Online.)

"The Bounty Hunter Code"

The Bounty Hunter Code: From the Files of Boba Fett (Daniel Wallace, Ryder Windham & Jason Fry)

I feel silly saying that a book with a sticker price of $99.99 is only for fans of the series, but here we are; this book comes in a really cool case (you put in a fake ID card and the hard lid opens while lights go off), but the books inside are a little bit slim. The main attraction is the Bounty Hunter Code, and it's pretty entertaining, but unless you're interested in a social history of the Mandalorian clans, I don't know that there's really much here to entice you. There's also a 48 page autobiography by Cradossk, a guy so obscure I had to look him up on Wookiepedia. (Turns out he's Bossk's dad!!)
Overall, this is a fun little set of books with a cool case; but even at Amazon's half price of $50 - let alone the MSRP of $99 - this is pretty hard to recommend unless you're a Star Wars nut.

Grade: B

"The Gildar Rift" (Space Marine Battles series)

The Gildar Rift (Sarah Cawkwell)

This is a SPACE MARINE BATTLES book, and at this point I feel like the series could honestly be renamed "Pretty Good 40K Novel Light On Plot" as most of the books fit into that category. This one does too; it's pretty good, mostly action, and a little light on plot and characterization (although the loyalist chapter the book is about, the Silver Skulls, are unique enough to set them apart from generic space marines). Honestly, I mostly got this book out of curiosity at seeing a female author handling the sausage-fest that is 40K. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but what I got is one of the better Space Marines Battles novel, and one that's easy to recommend with the above caveats in place.

Grade: B

"Path of the Eldar Omnibus"

Path of the Eldar Omnibus (Gav Thorpe)

Normally in an omnibus, I like to review each novel separately; I'm not going to be doing that in this case since the author has written three novels that all describe the same basic events from three point of views.
This is an interesting idea, but I unfortunately I don't think it quite works. The first book is pretty interesting, but the second and third suffer from already knowing what's going to happen. It doesn't help that the main characters of all three books are kind of obnoxious - the first book's hero is a self-obsessed creep, the second book's hero is a arrogant know it all, and the third book's hero is basically the villain of the piece, a truly loathsome dickbag I was hoping would get some kind of comeuppance for his frankly vile actions (admittedly, this reaction really kicked in once he started capturing ship crews to be used as slaves). The book isn't terrible; there is a lot of interesting Eldar background material, and for once they aren't being used as punching bags to show how cool and strong someone else is, but I can still only really recommend this to W40k nerds. (Or, if you're curious, I guess get it out of the library long enough to just read the first included novel; you won't miss much.)

Grade: C+

"Helsreach"

Helsreach (Aaron Dembski-Bowden)

Like most of the SPACE MARINES BATTLES series, this book is basically a novel-length, ummm, space marine battle. That's not a bad thing - the best ones, which include this book, have enough character development to give the reader someone to root for before they spend 300 pages hitting Orks in the face with a crozius. This particular book lands firmly in the good-not-great pile, although I have to say it's towards the top of that particular heap; ADB manages to pull off the often-attempted but rarely successful technique of following around a bunch of different POV characters. That being said, this is still a novel-long battle; go in knowing what you're getting and I think it's a pretty solid bet you'll be happy with it.

Grade: B+

"On Such a Full Sea"

On Such a Full Sea: A Novel (Chang-rae Lee)

I really wanted to like this book, and for the first 70 or so pages, I did; The setting of a ambiguously radiated future where Western civilization has declined seemingly more of malaise than anything else and been largely replaced by Chinese settlers is really interesting, even if our heroine doesn't have much of a personality.
The problem is that eventually I would like the scene to be set and the story to begin, and this never really happened. The author is unable (or, I suspect, just unwilling) to actually tell the story; for each page of our heroine's journey out in the wilds, you'll get a page about the city our heroine left, and while some of these are interesting, I eventually became deeply annoyed at cutting away from the main plot to meander through four pages about the weird uncle who used to live upstairs. By the time I was a third of the way through the book and realized that the plot was never going to be able to pick up any momentum this way, I bailed.
I'd recommend checking out of the library and going about 100 pages; if the author's elliptical style and refusal to get to the point aren't driving you crazy, you're set.

Grade: C-