lightreads (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lightreads) wrote2008-12-16 05:12 pm
lightreads) wrote2008-12-16 05:12 pm
Entry tags:
Codex Alera series by Jim Butcher
The Furies of Caldaron, Academ's Fury, Cursor's Fury, Captain's Fury, Princeps' Fury
So at the end of a lot of the Harry Dresden books there's this author biography that talked about how Butcher has loved epic fantasy since he was a wee thing, and how he wrote it for years but never got published, and it was urban fantasy that broke him into print. But what he really loves is epic fantasy, because he imprinted on Lord of the Rings and he just, OMG, he loves it.
Which tells you most of what you need to know about this series. Epic fantasy where the good guys win through ever-mounting odds, male virtue is constructed almost entirely through soldiering, and did I mention the long lost prince who rises to bring hope and goodness to the threatened realm?
Man, these were awesome finals reading.[1] I mean patriarchy blah flat female characters blah moral complexity of a high school history discussion blahcakes. But the valiant battles fought against vast evil! The inspiration of the faint-hearted and self-interested by a great leader! Man, if these had been around when I was twelve or so, they would have been the best things ever. As it is they were, uh, well. Shockingly addictive and compulsively readable (2500 pages in twelve days, if you must know).
[1] See, the thing I need for good finals reading is a series, because I want my brain to get into a particular universe groove and just run on it. Changing books mid-finals takes too much brain I need elsewhere. And it's got to be a lot of reading, to carry me through. And I've got to want to read it at any given moment where I might need a breather, because I have this overfocusing problem where I study study study, and then when I take a break I can't actually switch my brain over to anything that isn't tax law and I go a little crazy because I'm too tired to keep studying but too rabbited up in the head to do anything else. This series totally wins on all fronts.
So at the end of a lot of the Harry Dresden books there's this author biography that talked about how Butcher has loved epic fantasy since he was a wee thing, and how he wrote it for years but never got published, and it was urban fantasy that broke him into print. But what he really loves is epic fantasy, because he imprinted on Lord of the Rings and he just, OMG, he loves it.
Which tells you most of what you need to know about this series. Epic fantasy where the good guys win through ever-mounting odds, male virtue is constructed almost entirely through soldiering, and did I mention the long lost prince who rises to bring hope and goodness to the threatened realm?
Man, these were awesome finals reading.[1] I mean patriarchy blah flat female characters blah moral complexity of a high school history discussion blahcakes. But the valiant battles fought against vast evil! The inspiration of the faint-hearted and self-interested by a great leader! Man, if these had been around when I was twelve or so, they would have been the best things ever. As it is they were, uh, well. Shockingly addictive and compulsively readable (2500 pages in twelve days, if you must know).
[1] See, the thing I need for good finals reading is a series, because I want my brain to get into a particular universe groove and just run on it. Changing books mid-finals takes too much brain I need elsewhere. And it's got to be a lot of reading, to carry me through. And I've got to want to read it at any given moment where I might need a breather, because I have this overfocusing problem where I study study study, and then when I take a break I can't actually switch my brain over to anything that isn't tax law and I go a little crazy because I'm too tired to keep studying but too rabbited up in the head to do anything else. This series totally wins on all fronts.
no subject
I totally grok finals reading - my problem was I ended up using Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time - and it was just too damn long....
no subject
Oh and hey, apparently they've asked someone to finish Wheel of Time. Brandon Sanderson, I think, whom I haven't read yet.