REVIEW: Corvus by Paul Kearney

Corvus by Paul Kearney
Publishing Information: Paperback; 464 pages
Publisher: Solaris 26 October 2010
ISBN 10: 1906735778
ISBN 13: 978-1906735777
Series- Sequel to The Ten Thousand
Copy: Tyson- Out of Pocket; Yagiz- Sent by the publisher
Reviewers: Yagiz and Tyson

Back of the Book: "It is twenty-three years since a Macht army fought its way home from the heart of the Asurian Empire. The man who came to lead that army, Rictus, is now a hard-bitten mercenary captain, middle-aged and tired. He wants nothing more than to lay down his spear and become the farmer that his father was. But fate has different ideas. A young warleader has risen to challenge the order of things in the very heartlands of the Macht. A soldier of genius, he takes city after city, and reigns over them as king. What is more, he had heard of the legendary leader of the Ten Thousand. His name is Corvus, and the rumours say that he is not even fully human. He means to make himself absolute ruler of all the Macht. And he wants Rictus to help him."

Yagiz

In The Ten Thousand (review here), the first book of the Macht Trilogy, Paul Kearney introduced the world of Kuf, an intriguing world, home to different races. This great first book took us to the heart of The Empire far away from the homeland of the legendary Ten Thousand. In Corvus, the author takes us back to the land of the Macht, the fabled warrior race.

And to the readers delight, he also brings forward a familiar face: It was a great pleasure to meet Rictus again from page one. The book starts with Rictus going back home twenty-three years later after the events of The Ten Thousand.

For Rictus, the Paean was something different. He no longer joined in the singing, and had not since returning from the Empire all those years before. He had never forgotten the second day of Kunaksa, when the Ten Thousand had sung that song, believing they were marching to their doom but advancing anyway, to make themselves worthy of memory. It had kept them going that day, had reminded them of who they were.

Machts are a warrior race and they excel in this art. And not surprisingly, there are constant quarrels between cities. However, twenty three years later, Rictus is not the same man. He is torn between war and family. As he struggles to decide between two, life makes a choice for him. Sometimes it's easier that way, when the choices are made on one's behalf.

Kearney is amazingly talented in creating very realistic military scenes. The picture of the terrible face of war that he paints tugs at the heart of the reader. War is a terrible thing but it is in us, in our genes. You kill or you are killed. But everyone is somebody's son, brother or father and every single one of them has their own story that one ends in a blink of an eye.

[Fornyx] nudged a corpse with his foot. It was the man Rictus had speared through the neck. He wore a bracelet of dried grass about his wrist, the kind a daughter might plait for her father on a summer afternoon. Rictus looked away from it.

Some parts of the book reminded me of another great book that I read last year: Brandon Sanderson's The Way of Kings. Especially the Antimone's Gift, the magical black armour of the Cursebearers reminded me of Shards: Their origin is unknown, they are limited in number and offering money for one just doesn't work.

To those of you who wear the scarlet in war for the first time today, do not disgrace it, either in the thick of the fight or afterwards. The colour has been worn by both good men and bad for centuries, but it has never been worn without courage.

Not surprisingly, in Corvus, Kearney maintains his fluid and addictive style. He creates and develops some great characters in a memorable fantasy setting. The author is amazingly talented in mixing military aspects of the fantasy with drama and individuality, which, at times, gives the impression to read a mixtures of Steven Erikson and Guy Gavriel Kay.

Even though I read The Ten Thousand previously, the reader is not required to do so to fully enjoy Corvus. Although I would recommend to read The Ten Thousand before just because it is another excellent book.

Corvus has confirmed that Paul Kearney is an amazing writer. Unfortunately, and very surprisingly, he is also incredibly and criminally underrated. Corvus was one of the best books of 2010 and made the last book of the trilogy, Kings of Morning one of the most anticipated books of 2011. Just pick it up and read it. Resistance is futile.

Memorable Quotes

"A man who has a passion will always find life to his taste. A man who cares for nothing is a man already dead."

"Every legend begins with the ordinary and the everyday, as the acorn begets the oak" - Corvus

"The anvil is on its way. Brother, we are the hammer" - Corvus

"It is a fine line, sometimes, between guest and hostage. The key to it is left unspoken, buried in courtesies. The fist inside the glove" - Rictus

Plot 9/10
Characters 9/10
Style 9/10

Overall 9.5/10

Tyson

After finishing The Ten Thousand and enjoying it I quickly decided to read Kearney's follow up, Corvus. While the novel is a sequel, it was superior in nearly every way imaginable. When I read the first book The Ten Thousand I found myself really enjoying what was a great military novel. In Corvus, Kearney has taken the myth and transported it a few years into the future and tells us the story of a young man setting out to make his mark on the world. A world that at times has given him the short end of the stick. In order for the young man, Corvus, to realize his dream, he gains the support of an old warhorse that was just about to put down his spear and sword for a more peaceful rake and shovel and tend his farm and his family.

Corvus does an excellent job of bridging the gap between his two novels. Rictus the hero from The Ten Thousand returns as a man larger than life and an honorable reputation. Corvus uses this to his advantage with his own troops and his enemies. When Rictus and his famed Macht warriors take to the battlefield the tide of war changes dramatically. The mythos that surrounds his unit is palpable when you read the book.

I do not know why, as I cannot put my finger on it myself, but I found this installment a much better novel than The Ten Thousand. The pacing was top notch, the characters were well-rounded. The action and military concepts seemed plausible and made sense. There was a little bit of politics involved in the book but it took a back seat to the various battles and sieges. The book was just a great story of a winter campaign and the rise of a young, charismatic young man with a dream of uniting his people under one banner.

I believe that with Corvus Kearney is at the top of his game. Corvus is Kearney's opus. I know that the third book in the series, Kings of Morning, is coming soon, but he will have a difficult road ahead of him to write a better book then this one. Regardless, I will be there to read the next book in the series. Highly Recommended.

Plot 9/10
Characters 10/10
Style 10/10

Overall 9.5/10

The Unremembered and Cradle of the Scar Peter Orullian

With Paul Oullian's debut novel The Unremembered set for an April release from Tor, he is planning a little bit different marketing campaign. He has written six webisodes entitled "Cradle of the Scar." Part one is below.



The Unremembered is starting to look like one of the big releases for the year. Here is the blurb:

The gods, makers of worlds, seek to create balance—between matter and energy; and between mortals who strive toward the transcendent, and the natural perils they must tame or overcome. But one of the gods fashions a world filled with hellish creatures far too powerful to allow balance; he is condemned to live for eternity with his most hateful creations in that world’s distant Bourne, restrained by a magical veil kept vital by the power of song.

Millennia pass, awareness of the hidden danger fades to legend, and both song and veil weaken. And the most remote cities are laid waste by fell, nightmarish troops escaped from the Bourne. Some people dismiss the attacks as mere rumor. Instead of standing against the real threat, they persecute those with the knowledge, magic and power to fight these abominations, denying the inevitability of war and annihilation. And the evil from the Bourne swells….

The troubles of the world seem far from the Hollows where Tahn Junell struggles to remember his lost childhood and to understand words he feels compelled to utter each time he draws his bow. Trouble arrives when two strangers—an enigmatic man wearing the sigil of the feared Order of Sheason and a beautiful woman of the legendary Far—come, to take Tahn, his sister and his two best friends on a dangerous, secret journey.

Tahn knows neither why nor where they will go. He knows only that terrible forces have been unleashed upon mankind and he has been called to stand up and face that which most daunts him—his own forgotten secrets and the darkness that would destroy him and his world.

The Unremembered: Book 1 of the Vault of Heaven series is scheduled to be released 12 April 2011.

New Artwork of Peter F. Hamilton's Greg Mandel Trilogy

We now have the new artwork for Peter F. Hamilton's Greg Mandel trilogy. The trilogy will be republished in the UK in October 2011 by Tor.

The stories are set in a near-future England, centred around Hamilton's own home county of Rutland. Mandel is a former officer of the "English Army", who fought in the "Mindstar Brigade", a tactical psychic unit. He was given the psychic powers of intuition and detecting emotions, skills he uses for his new profession of psychic detective.

Mindstar Rising

It's the 21st century and global warming is here to stay, so forget the way your country used to look. And get used to the free market, too – the companies possess all the best hardware, and they're calling the shots now.

In a world like this, a man open to any offers can make out just fine. A man like Greg Mandel for instance, who's psi-boosted, wired into the latest sensory equipment, carrying state-of-the-art weaponry – and late of the English Army's Mindstar Battalion.

As the cartels battle for control of a revolutionary new power source, and corporate greed outstrips national security, tension is mounting to boiling point – and Greg Mandel is about to face the ultimate test.

A Quantum Murder

Dr Edward Kitchener, a brilliant researcher into quantum cosmology for the Event Horizon conglomerate . . . but no good to anybody now, lying dead with his lungs spread out on either side of his open chest.

The security system at Launde Abbey was premier-grade, yet a mercenary could still have got through, and plenty of people anxious to stop Kitchener’s work would pay the killer’s fee. But why would a professional waste time in ritually slaughtering the target?

Event Horizon needs to know fast, so Greg Mandel, psi-boosted ex-private eye, is enticed out of retirement to launch himself on a convoluted trail involving confrontation with a past which – according to Kitchener’s theories – might never have happened.

The Nano Flower

Julia Evans, billionairess owner of Event Horizon, has for fifteen years been the power behind England’s economic renaissance – but now she’s in trouble.

With her husband missing, and rival companies suddenly claiming to have acquired a technology impossibly superior to anything on Earth, she has no time to take notice of a single flower delivered anonymously. But this flower possesses genes millions of years in advance of any terrestrial DNA.

Is it a cryptic alien message, or a poignant farewell token from her husband? One man might discover its origin – but Greg Mandel will not be alone in his desperate search. And, as they both now discover, simply being first in the race isn’t nearly good enough when the Nano Flower begins to bloom ...

Physical Book VS eReader, Does There Have to be a Winner?

I visit a few forums and a lot of times there is a debate, what is better an actual book or a eReader? I live in South Korea and while I like my house situation, it is much smaller than I am used to when I lived in the United States. I no longer own a car and so when my girlfriend suggested I buy a book-case in an attempt to tame my ever growing book collection I jumped at the chance to use her car and head over and pick one out. The problem is even though I bought the biggest bookcase Homeplus had to offer, it was not large enough. So, I had to head back and buy another book-case to ensure that everything I had was contained in one area.

Since I made my home decor purchases I have had a goal: read all of my physical books by the end of the year. I already have the goal of reading 100 books for the year 2011 (at time of this post I have read 13 books for the year) so, why not start with what is on my shelf? Also, when it is an option I will purchase the eBook over the physical book as a new year's resolution. This is so that my tiny living space has more room and I can reduce clutter, which makes my girlfriend happier. The bad side to this resolution is once I have finished a novel I donate it to my school's library so there will no longer be any donations once I have read everything that I have.

It was then when my friend sent me the following jpeg:

Picture I am told is from Amazon.com

With that in mind I am still going after my goal, even though I have bought a few physical books since my goal came to fruition. However, it just comes down to personal preference. When all is said an done it is just a matter of convenience, I ride the subway and bus nearly every day, the Amazon Kindle is a light alternative to the physical book. The problem is that the majority of books remaining on my shelf are huge. Omnibuses? Omnibii? And large tomes like Peter F. Hamilton's Night's Dawn Trilogy where they each come at a very impressive 1,000+ pages for each installment. I have been purchasing a lot of the books currently on my shelves and converting them to eBooks when the opportunity presents itself so, that may be an option once I get to the specific book I want to read. I know that I am years away from going completely away from purchasing physical books, but I am doing my best.

Regardless of which format you choose to read, it is a simply impressive that you read.  I am curious as to what you prefer and why you have either held on to the belief that physical books are the only way to go? Or you have switched to the digital format and feel that physical books are no longer the way to read a novel? Let me know. Or perhaps you are where I am currently heading and think that perhaps there is a no real winner. After all the does not have to be a winner for everything. Leave us some comments with your opinion.

REVIEW: Blood Follows by Steven Erikson

Blood Follows by Steven Erikson

Publishing information: Hardback; 125 pages

Publisher: Night Shade Books; 25 May 2005

ISBN 10: 159780004X

ISBN 13: 978-1597800044

Standalone: Part of the Malazan of the Fallen universe

Copy- out of pocket

Reviewer: Tyson

Inside the Book "All is not well in Lamentable Moll. A sinister, diabolical killer stalks the port city's narrow, barrow-humped streets, and panic grips the citizens like a fever. Emancipor Reese is no exception, and indeed, with his legendary ill luck, it's worse for him than for most. Not only was his previous employer the unknown killer's latest victim, but Emancipor is out of work. And, with his dearest wife terminally comfortable with the manner of life to which she asserts she has become accustomed (or at least to which she aspires) -- for her and their two whelps -- all other terrors grow limp and pale for poor Emancipor. But perhaps his luck has finally changed, for two strangers have come to Lamentable Moll... and they have nailed to the centre post in Fishmonger's Round a note requesting the services of a manservant. This is surely a remarkable opportunity for the hapless Emancipor Reese... no matter that the note reeks with death-warded magic; no matter that the barrow ghosts themselves howl with fear every night; and certainly no matter that Lamentable Moll itself is about to erupt in a frenzy of terror-inspired anarchy.... After all, it's work... and working is better than not working. Isn't it? First in a series of novellas taking place in the Malazan Empire."

I was shocked to find this first edition of Blood Follows in the used book store and even more befuddled to find it in South Korea of all places. However, when I found it I latched on to and held on to it tightly until I made it to the cash register. I am a huge fan of Erikson and have not had the pleasure of reading any of his novellas until now. 

Blood Follows is the story of Emancipor Reece and how he became employed as a manservant by Bauchelain and Korbal Broach. As the story progresses we also have a murder mystery as several people, including some close to the king of Lamentable Moll. 

The focus is on Reece and his lifestyle. It appears that Reece's former employers all meet with an untimely demise and when his despicable wife finds out he has once again become unemployed he learns that he may be able to get a job that involves lots of travel. Broach and Baucelain are still as mysterious as they were in Memories of Ice. There is a bit of irony and some humor injected into the story and it was enjoyable. As for the two employers they are as creepy and mysterious as I remember them to be. While we never learn their true mission in Moll, we do learn a few things about them, but not much.

The plot of Blood Follows is airtight which may surprise some people as many find Erikson to talk in circles before finally getting to his point. But the story goes from point to point without interruption. 

Blood Follows was a quick and entertaining read and I look forward to reading the other short stories as I find them. I know that Erikson will soon be releasing Blood Follows, The Healthy Dead, and The Lees of Laughter's End in a omnibus soon but at the time of this review the information was not available. The omnibus will cover three of the four books that detail the adventures of Bauchelain, Korbal Broach, and their faithful manservant Emancipor Reece.

Plot  9

Characters  9

Style  9

Overall 9/10

February Book Releases

List compiled by Locus Online

February 2011

• + Aaronovitch, Ben • Midnight Riot • (Ballantine Del Rey)
• Abercrombie, Joe • The Heroes • (Gollancz, hc)
• + Abercrombie, Joe • The Heroes • (Orbit US, hc)
• Anderson, Poul • The Collected Short Works of Poul Anderson, Volume 4: Admiralty • (NESFA Press, cln, hc)
• Bear, Elizabeth • The Sea Thy Mistress • (Tor, hc)
• Bova, Ben • Leviathans of Jupiter • (Tor, hc)
• Briggs, Patricia • River Marked • (Orbit)
• Briggs, Patricia • River Marked • (Ace, hc)
• Britain, Kristen • Blackveil • (DAW, hc)
• Chadbourn, Mark • The Scar-Crow Men • (Pyr, tpb)
• Courtenay Grimwood, Jon • The Fallen Blade • (Orbit, tpb)
• Courtenay Grimwood, Jon • The Fallen Blade • (Orbit US, tpb)
• + Deas, Stephen • The King of the Crags • (Roc, hc)
• Delany, Samuel R. • Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders • (Alyson, tpb)
• Ellis, Warren • Listener • (Morrow, hc)
• Emshwiller, Carol • In the Time of War and Master of the Road to Nowhere •(PS Publishing, cln, hc)
• Erikson, Steven • The Crippled God • (Tor, hc)
• Erikson, Steven • The Crippled God • (Bantam UK, hc)
• Fforde, Jasper • One of Our Thursdays is Missing • (Hodder & Stoughton, hc)
• Gilman, Laura Anne • Pack of Lies • (Luna, tpb)
• Goodkind, Terry • The Omen Machine • (Harper Voyager, hc)
• Goodkind, Terry • The Omen Machine • (Tor, hc)
• Griffin, Kate • The Neon Court • (Orbit)
• Hairston, Andrea • Redwood and Wildfire • (Aqueduct Press, tpb)
• + Holt, Tom • Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Sausages • (Orbit US, tpb)
• Hurley, Kameron • God's War • (Night Shade Books, tpb)
• Kerr, Katharine • License to Ensorcell • (DAW)
• Kittredge, Caitlin • The Iron Thorn • (Delacorte, nvl-ya, hc)
• Lansdale, Joe R., ed. • Crucified Dreams • (Tachyon Publications, anth, tpb)
• Lansdale, Joe R. • Hyenas • (Subterranean Press, cln, hc)
• Lovegrove, James • Diversifications • (PS Publishing, cln, hc)
• MacLeod, Ian R. • Wake Up and Dream • (PS Publishing, hc)
• Marr, Melissa • Darkest Mercy • (HarperCollins, nvl-ya, hc)
• Martin, Gail Z. • The Sworn • (Orbit)
• McDermott, J. M. • Never Knew Another • (Night Shade Books, tpb)
• McLeod, Suzanne • The Bitter Seed of Magic • (Gollancz, hc/tpb)
• Pierce, Tamora • Tortall and Other Lands • (Random House, cln, hc)
• Priest, Cherie • Bloodshot • (Ballantine Spectra, tpb)
• Reed, Kit • What Wolves Know • (PS Publishing, cln, hc)
• Ryman, Geoff • Paradise Tales • (Small Beer Press, cln, tpb)
• Saberhagen, Joan, ed. • Golden Reflections • (Baen, anth, hc)
• Stross, Charles • Boskone Book • (NESFA Press, cln, hc)
• Swann, S. Andrew • Messiah • (DAW)
• Tchaikovsky, Adrian • The Sea Watch • (Tor UK)
• Weber, David, ed. • Worlds of Honor #5: In Fire Forged • (Baen, anth, hc)
• Williams, Walter Jon • Deep State • (Orbit)
• Williams, Walter Jon • Deep State • (Orbit US, tpb) 

Convention Etiquette

Over at Grasping for the Wind, it may have escaped your notice but there is a really interesting and informative article on the pros and cons of attending a convention.

A brief introduction to the article which can be found here:

CONVENTION ETIQUETTE FOR PROS & PANELISTS

Because I am a huge, gigantic nerd, I have saved all of my badges from every single convention I’ve ever attended, starting with IDECON II from March 14, 1981. I was badge number 8. IDECON was a one-day game convention put on by the games club of a neighboring high school. What makes me a huge, gigantic nerd as opposed to just a huge nerd is that all of these badges are lovingly taped into the endpapers of my first edition (4th Printing, May 1979) Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Players Handbook. My geek cred knows no boundaries.

That convention badge collection reads like the famous illustration of a monkey that becomes a bigger monkey then stands up straight then becomes a Neanderthal then becomes a human—an evolution from teenaged gamer geek to middle-aged gamer/book/etc. professional in 29 easy steps over the last 30 years. A magical moment came when my two Gen Con 1995 single-day (Friday and Saturday) badges gave way to my Gen Con 1996 Staff badge, boldly emblazoned STF.

The rest of the article can be found here.