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shadowkatAs an aside, I actually saw a good Doctor Who tonight. It was from two weeks ago - via the DVR. Fun devices DVR's. And much cheaper than Tivo's. At any rate - the episode was entitled Gridlock.
Was told by flist that this was a good episode. But flist also thought the Shakespeare episode was good. So, I was leery. When it comes to cultural tastes flist and I are not always in agreement. Heck you should have seen thefights discussions I got into with some of them on a discussion board. I'm not afraid of voicing my opinon on stuff nor do I tend to do it timidly. But you know that or knew that and friended me anyways. Yay, you.
Sorry, snarky mood tonight. Don't know why.
Gridlock was about well gridlock. But it wasn't a one-joke piece, it also discussed the detriments of relying on medication as escape, or trying to flee one's world. Or staying in a rut, fearful of going up. The idea of isolation. The idea of being alone. Disconnected in a sea of people. Very moving and somewhat humorous piece of sci-fi. And the acting was better than average. Tennant seemed less twitchy.
Am curious to see what Blink is like - that's the other one everyone keeps raving about.
I finished Kim Harrison's Rachel Morgan Witch Bounty Hunter Series finally. Well not finally, I tore through five books in less than three months which for me is pretty fast reading. Averaging a book every two or one and a half weeks. Since I normally do all my reading on the thirty min subway ride to and from work - that's not bad. I read these at home as well. They pulled me in and did not let go.
Harrison wrote five books to date in this series - all of which fall into the genre entitled urban fantasy - which came to a head around the time Buffy the Vampire Slayer ended. While I won't go so far as to say Buffy sparked this genre into being, I will state the show definitely influenced it. Every novel I've read or looked at in this genre seems to either reference Buffy or take ideas from it. This series being no exception - in fact the characters - Kisten and Ivy feel a lot like sane versions of Spike and Drusilla.
And in looks at least, resemble Spike and Dru quite a bit. But you can't prove it. They are their own characters.
What distinguishes Harrison's novels from most urban fantasy is the relationship between Ivy and Rachel, our protagonist. Most urban fantasy have a decidedly male-female dynamic regardless of what sex the main protagonist is. These are a bit different, which in my opinion makes them unique.
Another distinguishing factor is they are better written than most of them. Unlike Laurell K. Hamilton - Harrison does not rely on sex scenes to propell the action nor does she manipulate her characters so that we can read a great sex scene. (I can read fanfic for free on my lj if I want to read that, I have no patience for it in a book I'm paying for, possibly because I can get it for free on the net.) Laurell K did not always do this. Her best book in the Anita Blake series has very little sex in it - that's Obsiddian Butterfly in my opinion. I couldn't read any of the other ones. But she sells like hotcakes, so what do I know? Charlain Harris had much the same problem - we'd have story, then the awkward sex scene, more story, and the sex scene. To give Harris credit - she had great ideas.
But her writing style was third grade level in comparison to Harrison's. Harrison's people talk like human beings. They sound different from one another. You can see them in your head. And hear them. They are three dimensional and complicated. Harris' characters feel flatter somehow. And unlike Jim Butcher - Harrison is a little less cliche. She doesn't do the long action scenes that often bog down Butcher's Dresden books, nor does she get as religious as Butcher, leaving things a tad more open. Nor, for that matter, does she do the "gay jokes", in Butcher's novels - he makes fun of the fact that Thomas and Dresden look like gay lovers. (I don't mind this, but it is a bit tired and I've seen it done too many times.) Harrison actually has a character who is gay and goes a different route, explores it without taking the easy way out. In some ways, Harrison's writing style reminds me the most of Robin McKingly's in the novel Sunshine. She's more descriptive than the other writers. Her magic also seems more real somehow, has greater consequences, and is more difficult than Dresden. And her elves, fairies, and pixies more realistic - if that's possible.
The novels take place in Cincinnati and you can smell it. Taste it. See it. It's a alternate universe Cincy, but it is as much a character as the others.
Harrison has about ten characters who track through all the novels or are at the very least mentioned. Each is complicated and none I'd state are straight forward black and white. Her lead character, Rachel, who tells the story - and we stay in Rachel's point of view throughout it, starts out as a character who sees the world in a very rigid way - black and white. Good and evil. As she moves through the novels, her world-view gets grayer, she finds herself doing things that she swore she'd never do, going places she'd never go.
It's not like Butcher's books about a man trying to redeem himself from a dark past, Rachel is a woman who discovers she has a great deal of power and is struggling not to let it pull her into darkness, she hasn't done anything dastardly - yet.
Accompanying Rachel on her journey are her two friends, a male pixy named Jenks - who is described as a bit of a dreamboat physically, yet also annoying, loyal, and crazy. He's clearly a pixy. The writer creates the smell, size, look, and cultural background - showing that he is not human. Rachel likewise is not human - but a witch, with a different makeup.
And then there's Ivy - a living vampire who is part human and part vampire - or a vampire with a soul that can walk in daylight. Ivy is female and in love with Rachel. She prays Rachel can one day save her from a soulless existence amongst the undead. Rachel firmly heterosexual isn't sure how she feels about Ivy and struggles with her feelings throughout the series, coming to terms with them finally in the last two books.
Added to this mix are Trenton Kalamack who is a complicated bad boy - part villian, part not. The councilman and power figure. Rachel's relationship with Trenton is odd and complicated. He is set up as the villain in two of the books and an odd benefactor in the second and third ones. Kisten Felps - another living vampire, who makes cameao appearances and is mostly featured in the second novel - The Good, the Bad, and the Undead. And Nick Spargamagos - a human - who summons demons. The men in the novels remind me of femme fatales in a way - especially Trenton. The fatale who lures the hero, who may be innocent, or may not.
There's also a trio of charming and manipulative demons. The main one being Al. And a few human cops, including a very sexy black cop named Glenn.
Each character has a sense of humor. The books drip with sardonic dry wit. The main character often cracking wise to keep herself intact.
Their titles - are from old Clint Eastwood films or films in general. Dead Witch Walking.
The Good, the Bad, and the Undead. Every Which Way But Dead. A Fistfull of Charms. And A Few Demons More. And have noir/western feel to them.
The world is well-developed and consistent throughout. It's an alternate earth. In this earth - people pursued biological discoveries as opposed to nuclear or physics. The arms race was about biological weapons. And the big discovery was the human DNA or genome, how the strand was put together and how it could be manipulated. There's another world paralle to the human one - where magic comes from - called the EverAfter - in this world demons, elves, fairies, pixies, and witches lived. Now only demons do. Witches, pixies, and fairies fled to the human one and hid. Elves came later after nearly being killed off by the demons.
The elves according to the first book were killed off along with a good portion of the human race by a virus that had attached itself to a brand of Tomatoes - and became airborn.
As a result all humans fear and despise tomatoes. Also as a result of the tragedy - biological testing, genetic experiments, drugs, medical cures for cancer and the like or research in those field is against the law. Also, witches, pixies, fairies, vampires, werewolves are all known to humans - they are called Inderlanders and tolerated by humans.
It's an interesting world Harrison creates and through its creation she is able to subtly explore some complex themes, such as racism, biological testing, scientific testing,
and to what degree do the ends justify the means.
But mostly I enjoyed the books for the interactions and relationships between the lead characters, who are a humorous mismatched bunch of odd ducklings. The second to last book, Fistfull of Charms may be the most fun. It sets up the last one. But is by far the funniest of the group and at times the most moving. It furthers the relationships between our central three - Jenks, Rachel and Ivy.
Dead Witch Walking sets up the series. And the universe. And is largely an origin tale.
The Good, the Bad, and the Undead - sets up the main villain and conflict Rachel must resolve throughout the next three.
Every Which Way But Dead - sets up Rachel's relationship with two key male figures, and sets up an interesting romantic triangle
Fistful of Charms - is just fun and is the werewolf book, it takes place in Michigan
A Few Demons More - deals with the results of Fistful and pulls together all the unresolved plot threads from the previous four - in a way it is a fitting conclusion to them. As well as the most tragic.
Series? A+
The first four are better than last, which I'd give a B-, but that could just be because I was getting burnt out.
Oh - speaking of urban fantasy - The Dresden Files was cancelled by Sci-Fi. Apparently they think re-doing Flash Gordon is better bet. Figures. Not overly surprised, could tell by the lukewarm response on flist that it wasn't going to last. Don't get why. Why did they watch Bones and not Dresden? Bones bores the heck out of me most of time. But if I understood why people like what they did I would have become a marketing or sales person, and made lots of money.
Was told by flist that this was a good episode. But flist also thought the Shakespeare episode was good. So, I was leery. When it comes to cultural tastes flist and I are not always in agreement. Heck you should have seen the
Sorry, snarky mood tonight. Don't know why.
Gridlock was about well gridlock. But it wasn't a one-joke piece, it also discussed the detriments of relying on medication as escape, or trying to flee one's world. Or staying in a rut, fearful of going up. The idea of isolation. The idea of being alone. Disconnected in a sea of people. Very moving and somewhat humorous piece of sci-fi. And the acting was better than average. Tennant seemed less twitchy.
Am curious to see what Blink is like - that's the other one everyone keeps raving about.
I finished Kim Harrison's Rachel Morgan Witch Bounty Hunter Series finally. Well not finally, I tore through five books in less than three months which for me is pretty fast reading. Averaging a book every two or one and a half weeks. Since I normally do all my reading on the thirty min subway ride to and from work - that's not bad. I read these at home as well. They pulled me in and did not let go.
Harrison wrote five books to date in this series - all of which fall into the genre entitled urban fantasy - which came to a head around the time Buffy the Vampire Slayer ended. While I won't go so far as to say Buffy sparked this genre into being, I will state the show definitely influenced it. Every novel I've read or looked at in this genre seems to either reference Buffy or take ideas from it. This series being no exception - in fact the characters - Kisten and Ivy feel a lot like sane versions of Spike and Drusilla.
And in looks at least, resemble Spike and Dru quite a bit. But you can't prove it. They are their own characters.
What distinguishes Harrison's novels from most urban fantasy is the relationship between Ivy and Rachel, our protagonist. Most urban fantasy have a decidedly male-female dynamic regardless of what sex the main protagonist is. These are a bit different, which in my opinion makes them unique.
Another distinguishing factor is they are better written than most of them. Unlike Laurell K. Hamilton - Harrison does not rely on sex scenes to propell the action nor does she manipulate her characters so that we can read a great sex scene. (I can read fanfic for free on my lj if I want to read that, I have no patience for it in a book I'm paying for, possibly because I can get it for free on the net.) Laurell K did not always do this. Her best book in the Anita Blake series has very little sex in it - that's Obsiddian Butterfly in my opinion. I couldn't read any of the other ones. But she sells like hotcakes, so what do I know? Charlain Harris had much the same problem - we'd have story, then the awkward sex scene, more story, and the sex scene. To give Harris credit - she had great ideas.
But her writing style was third grade level in comparison to Harrison's. Harrison's people talk like human beings. They sound different from one another. You can see them in your head. And hear them. They are three dimensional and complicated. Harris' characters feel flatter somehow. And unlike Jim Butcher - Harrison is a little less cliche. She doesn't do the long action scenes that often bog down Butcher's Dresden books, nor does she get as religious as Butcher, leaving things a tad more open. Nor, for that matter, does she do the "gay jokes", in Butcher's novels - he makes fun of the fact that Thomas and Dresden look like gay lovers. (I don't mind this, but it is a bit tired and I've seen it done too many times.) Harrison actually has a character who is gay and goes a different route, explores it without taking the easy way out. In some ways, Harrison's writing style reminds me the most of Robin McKingly's in the novel Sunshine. She's more descriptive than the other writers. Her magic also seems more real somehow, has greater consequences, and is more difficult than Dresden. And her elves, fairies, and pixies more realistic - if that's possible.
The novels take place in Cincinnati and you can smell it. Taste it. See it. It's a alternate universe Cincy, but it is as much a character as the others.
Harrison has about ten characters who track through all the novels or are at the very least mentioned. Each is complicated and none I'd state are straight forward black and white. Her lead character, Rachel, who tells the story - and we stay in Rachel's point of view throughout it, starts out as a character who sees the world in a very rigid way - black and white. Good and evil. As she moves through the novels, her world-view gets grayer, she finds herself doing things that she swore she'd never do, going places she'd never go.
It's not like Butcher's books about a man trying to redeem himself from a dark past, Rachel is a woman who discovers she has a great deal of power and is struggling not to let it pull her into darkness, she hasn't done anything dastardly - yet.
Accompanying Rachel on her journey are her two friends, a male pixy named Jenks - who is described as a bit of a dreamboat physically, yet also annoying, loyal, and crazy. He's clearly a pixy. The writer creates the smell, size, look, and cultural background - showing that he is not human. Rachel likewise is not human - but a witch, with a different makeup.
And then there's Ivy - a living vampire who is part human and part vampire - or a vampire with a soul that can walk in daylight. Ivy is female and in love with Rachel. She prays Rachel can one day save her from a soulless existence amongst the undead. Rachel firmly heterosexual isn't sure how she feels about Ivy and struggles with her feelings throughout the series, coming to terms with them finally in the last two books.
Added to this mix are Trenton Kalamack who is a complicated bad boy - part villian, part not. The councilman and power figure. Rachel's relationship with Trenton is odd and complicated. He is set up as the villain in two of the books and an odd benefactor in the second and third ones. Kisten Felps - another living vampire, who makes cameao appearances and is mostly featured in the second novel - The Good, the Bad, and the Undead. And Nick Spargamagos - a human - who summons demons. The men in the novels remind me of femme fatales in a way - especially Trenton. The fatale who lures the hero, who may be innocent, or may not.
There's also a trio of charming and manipulative demons. The main one being Al. And a few human cops, including a very sexy black cop named Glenn.
Each character has a sense of humor. The books drip with sardonic dry wit. The main character often cracking wise to keep herself intact.
Their titles - are from old Clint Eastwood films or films in general. Dead Witch Walking.
The Good, the Bad, and the Undead. Every Which Way But Dead. A Fistfull of Charms. And A Few Demons More. And have noir/western feel to them.
The world is well-developed and consistent throughout. It's an alternate earth. In this earth - people pursued biological discoveries as opposed to nuclear or physics. The arms race was about biological weapons. And the big discovery was the human DNA or genome, how the strand was put together and how it could be manipulated. There's another world paralle to the human one - where magic comes from - called the EverAfter - in this world demons, elves, fairies, pixies, and witches lived. Now only demons do. Witches, pixies, and fairies fled to the human one and hid. Elves came later after nearly being killed off by the demons.
The elves according to the first book were killed off along with a good portion of the human race by a virus that had attached itself to a brand of Tomatoes - and became airborn.
As a result all humans fear and despise tomatoes. Also as a result of the tragedy - biological testing, genetic experiments, drugs, medical cures for cancer and the like or research in those field is against the law. Also, witches, pixies, fairies, vampires, werewolves are all known to humans - they are called Inderlanders and tolerated by humans.
It's an interesting world Harrison creates and through its creation she is able to subtly explore some complex themes, such as racism, biological testing, scientific testing,
and to what degree do the ends justify the means.
But mostly I enjoyed the books for the interactions and relationships between the lead characters, who are a humorous mismatched bunch of odd ducklings. The second to last book, Fistfull of Charms may be the most fun. It sets up the last one. But is by far the funniest of the group and at times the most moving. It furthers the relationships between our central three - Jenks, Rachel and Ivy.
Dead Witch Walking sets up the series. And the universe. And is largely an origin tale.
The Good, the Bad, and the Undead - sets up the main villain and conflict Rachel must resolve throughout the next three.
Every Which Way But Dead - sets up Rachel's relationship with two key male figures, and sets up an interesting romantic triangle
Fistful of Charms - is just fun and is the werewolf book, it takes place in Michigan
A Few Demons More - deals with the results of Fistful and pulls together all the unresolved plot threads from the previous four - in a way it is a fitting conclusion to them. As well as the most tragic.
Series? A+
The first four are better than last, which I'd give a B-, but that could just be because I was getting burnt out.
Oh - speaking of urban fantasy - The Dresden Files was cancelled by Sci-Fi. Apparently they think re-doing Flash Gordon is better bet. Figures. Not overly surprised, could tell by the lukewarm response on flist that it wasn't going to last. Don't get why. Why did they watch Bones and not Dresden? Bones bores the heck out of me most of time. But if I understood why people like what they did I would have become a marketing or sales person, and made lots of money.
