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hawkwing_lbBooks 2012: 202-204
202. Marie Brennan, Lies and Prophecy. The Book View Café, 2012. Ebook.
An entertaining, if lightweight, quasi-urban college fantasy. Were it not that it comes from Brennan, I would praise it more highly - but when Brennan's on top of her game, she makes her material shine so much more brightly than this, so that what from many others would be a laudable effort seems instead on the disappointing side.
Merely a good book, where I expected a better one. But recommended, nonetheless.
203. Kelly McCullough, Bared Blade. Ace, 2012.
Thieves and spies and assassins do politics! In a fantasy city. Sequel to Broken Blade: undemanding light entertainment in one of my preferred fantasy modes.
204. K.J. Parker, Sharps. Orbit, 2012. Review copy courtesy of Vector.
An interesting book, and a competent one, but one which - it is my feeling - tries too hard to have too many twisty complicated things going at once, and does not signal well enough which of the complicated things are resolved or recomplicated by which actions.
I enjoyed it while reading it, but I am middling-eh about it now. Should think more before writing it up proper.
So, Hunted. Have I mentioned it to you before? It is a most excellent, understated, brilliantly shot BBC/American collaboration directed by SJ Clarkson and starring Melissa George. I've watched the first three episodes, and it is the best damn espionage television I've seen to date. Better than Spooks. Better than the first season of the new Nikita, which I loved. Better than The Fixer, with which it shares an understated, almost poetic grace of visual expression. Acres better than Alias or Undercovers or Homeland. It is gorgeously shot, and superbly directed - long, slow stretches of mounting quiet tension erupt into brief flashes of visceral, physically real violence; emotional tension isn't angsty, isn't diffuse; the visual palette is beautiful; the acting is understated and affecting. George is astonishingly believable in the role of Sam Hunter, and the rest of the casting is perfectly apt.
I ordered the DVD boxset on the strength of the first episode. I never do that. It's brilliant. Go and watch it. Seriously.
202. Marie Brennan, Lies and Prophecy. The Book View Café, 2012. Ebook.
An entertaining, if lightweight, quasi-urban college fantasy. Were it not that it comes from Brennan, I would praise it more highly - but when Brennan's on top of her game, she makes her material shine so much more brightly than this, so that what from many others would be a laudable effort seems instead on the disappointing side.
Merely a good book, where I expected a better one. But recommended, nonetheless.
203. Kelly McCullough, Bared Blade. Ace, 2012.
Thieves and spies and assassins do politics! In a fantasy city. Sequel to Broken Blade: undemanding light entertainment in one of my preferred fantasy modes.
204. K.J. Parker, Sharps. Orbit, 2012. Review copy courtesy of Vector.
An interesting book, and a competent one, but one which - it is my feeling - tries too hard to have too many twisty complicated things going at once, and does not signal well enough which of the complicated things are resolved or recomplicated by which actions.
I enjoyed it while reading it, but I am middling-eh about it now. Should think more before writing it up proper.
So, Hunted. Have I mentioned it to you before? It is a most excellent, understated, brilliantly shot BBC/American collaboration directed by SJ Clarkson and starring Melissa George. I've watched the first three episodes, and it is the best damn espionage television I've seen to date. Better than Spooks. Better than the first season of the new Nikita, which I loved. Better than The Fixer, with which it shares an understated, almost poetic grace of visual expression. Acres better than Alias or Undercovers or Homeland. It is gorgeously shot, and superbly directed - long, slow stretches of mounting quiet tension erupt into brief flashes of visceral, physically real violence; emotional tension isn't angsty, isn't diffuse; the visual palette is beautiful; the acting is understated and affecting. George is astonishingly believable in the role of Sam Hunter, and the rest of the casting is perfectly apt.
I ordered the DVD boxset on the strength of the first episode. I never do that. It's brilliant. Go and watch it. Seriously.
