Kicking off my second-favourite on-going space-opera
series (aside from my brother's books, which i am required to like -- which, luckily, is usually no prpoblem), this
was a refreshing find back when i first pulled it down off the shelf and
read the first couple pages... and discovered that i had to finish it that
same day.
While, as someone has pointed out, this *could* be read as a stand-alone
book, unlike the first books in some series, a reader who stops here will
be missing a lot of fun in the sequels and prequels that follow.
The Rosselin-Matadi clan and their friends and enemies are all marvellous
characters, but Beka's mentor and co-pilot, known only as "the Professor"
is the most amusing and frustrating of the lot, as it becomes more and more
obvious that he, somehow, is manipulating history itself.
What sets this series aside from more ordinary space opera, i think, is the
concept of the Adepts and the Mages -- both posessors of great power, who
both sense and utilise what, for want of a better word, we might call "the
Force", but in completely different and mutually-conflicting manners.
The three Rossellin-Metadi siblings, Beka, Owen and Ari, so different
superficially but so similar in their drive and inability to admit defeat
are worth getting to know, and the associates and enemies that they pick
up along the way are a marvellously-assorted crew (not all of whom are even
nearly what they appear to be).
But i must admit that the villains -- as opposed to adversaries, an important
distinction in these books -- are just a bit *too* slimy and odious.
{If i ever run into the authors, though, i intend to ask them if they were
thinking of "Rio Lobo" or of "Assault on Precinct 13" when they wrote one
important sequence...}
Recommended -- both this book and the entire series. |
