The beginning of a long and wondrous ride
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The very beginning of this book is a struggle because Mr. Wolfe plunges the reader into an almost (but not quite) alien world with a culture, lingo, religion, and social structure that has to be learned before the story makes sense. Through the process of learning this world, which parallels the main character's growing re-understanding of his own world, Mr. Wolfe starts the reader on a roller-coaster ride that doesn't stop but keeps accelerating through three more books. Warning: Buy all four before you start the first one! You won't to wait for number two. For all related books, search under Gene Wolfe's name for all titles with the word "sun" in them. Gene Wolfe's use of language and symbolism and metaphor reminds me of Herman Melville's writing.
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I dont know, this just doesn't seems like a book
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So what do we have here. Patera Silk, young man (23 years old) in a role of a saviour of a human kind. So that is a good guy. We have typical bad guy named Blood. We have a woman of a "unmoral" behaviour called Orchid. We have corrupted but still kind man and good friend called (I didn't read the english version so I don't know what is his name) after some bird. We have an old fencing teacher, who is insane but still dangerous. And that is about it. We have all kind of stereotype characters which interfere among themselves in a VERY slow pace book. It seems to me that Wolfe tried to give us a deeper insight in a philosophy of a human behaviour, it also seems to me that he didn't succeed in it. This is just a book you can read at the beach (beware of falling asleep) and forget about it the next day. It is not fantasy, it is not SF, it's a mixture of something that tried to evolve from those boundaries but failed at the first attempt. I don't know, maybe the second book will be better.
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Well written, attention to detail shows thought but slow
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I read quite a lot of books in this and other related genres so I found this book to be above average in its use of the english language and indeed the imaging and inter-relationships of the society to be quite detailed and well thought out. However its not a fast pace book and it can be quite slow going. Although the pleasure of reading makes up for its slight lack of "biff, bamm, kapow" it makes a very good base for the second book. which, justifies the effort of reading the first as the story picks up the pace and hidden (although hinted at) secrets are revealed. its worth the effort, but I wouldn't put it on my top ten list and its not for every reader.
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Typical Wolfe, fantasy prose at its best.
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Typical Wolfe, Patera Silk does what he thinks is best. He is not Conan The Barbarian physically, but perhaps mentally. He represents those of us where the spirit is willing but the flesh is not. As with most Wolfe, I do not know what is going on, but do not care, the ambiance is superb. If you like Wolfe, you will love these.
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