airplane reading notes
Apr. 21st, 2010 11:45 amThe Night Watch, Sergei Lukyanenko, on ![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
franzeska's recommendation.
My personal ranking of "books called Night Watch" goes Sarah Waters > Sean Stewart > Lukyanenko (I seem to have missed the Pratchett). This could have been predicted beforehand, since the presence of vampires is an automatic minus as far as I've concerned. Here the vampires are somewhat incidental and not sexy, and thus only a small minus. The Lukyanenko is actually closer in concept to Stross's Atrocity Archives. Both books feature young systems administrators who are working for secret bureaucracies concerned with the supernatural, who embark on their first actions in the field, and who fall in love with scholarly young women whom they're recruiting; both books have a linked short-story plot structure. The main differences are in tone: Lukyanenko's hero is less geeky, and is fatalistic in an aggressively Russian way rather than a sarcastically British way.
Oath of Fealty, Elizabeth Moon.
Sequel to the Paksenarrion books, largely focussed on the commanders from her old mercenary company. Lots of stuff about the trials of being a grownup; I give points to Phelan for not wanting to marry someone half his age (I'm betting his wedding ends the third book of this new trilogy). I think I detected a layer of the Society for Creative Anachronism, over the basic D&D bones of this universe; did anyone else have a similar reaction to the actual oath of fealty?
franzeska's recommendation.My personal ranking of "books called Night Watch" goes Sarah Waters > Sean Stewart > Lukyanenko (I seem to have missed the Pratchett). This could have been predicted beforehand, since the presence of vampires is an automatic minus as far as I've concerned. Here the vampires are somewhat incidental and not sexy, and thus only a small minus. The Lukyanenko is actually closer in concept to Stross's Atrocity Archives. Both books feature young systems administrators who are working for secret bureaucracies concerned with the supernatural, who embark on their first actions in the field, and who fall in love with scholarly young women whom they're recruiting; both books have a linked short-story plot structure. The main differences are in tone: Lukyanenko's hero is less geeky, and is fatalistic in an aggressively Russian way rather than a sarcastically British way.
Oath of Fealty, Elizabeth Moon.
Sequel to the Paksenarrion books, largely focussed on the commanders from her old mercenary company. Lots of stuff about the trials of being a grownup; I give points to Phelan for not wanting to marry someone half his age (I'm betting his wedding ends the third book of this new trilogy). I think I detected a layer of the Society for Creative Anachronism, over the basic D&D bones of this universe; did anyone else have a similar reaction to the actual oath of fealty?