25 replies to this topic

[polishgenius]

This one seems to have got some pushing by the publisher, and releasing a debut book as a hardback certainly implies confidence by them, but has curiously little internet presence- I'm not sure why. Dunno if it's out in the US yet, if it's not that could explain it.

Anyway, it's about a legendary assassin taking on an apprentice against the backdrop of a city struggling against an invading empire marked by cruelty and nihilism. Obviously, to those who have read Brent Weeks Night Angel books, that'll sound familiar, but it's a different beast. There's little magic, for starters, the whole tone of the story is more serious, and he has a 'no-one is safe' attitude that would make GRRM proud. There's also a difference in that the assassins aren't politically or personally motivated- basically, they're a sort of hands-off protection by having clients wear a seal that tells the world that if they die, the order will pursue vendetta against them, whatever the cost, until they die.

It's got an interesting way of pacing. He's got the main plot of the book, and that's quite a narrow focus, but he also takes time to set out wider implications for the series he's building. This means that the pacing feels deliberate, especially for a book that's quite slim by genre standards at 400 pages long, but never slow (some could find that Buchanan takes slightly too much time over the wider world. I didn't find that, but I generally have patience for such things, so just something to bear in mind).

I should note that the blurb (front flap, not back cover) covers nearly half the book, and while it's quite a reasonable one- it'd be difficult to entice the reader while saying less, and it didn't impact the enjoyment for me (it's the premise, doesn't cover anything that could be construed as a twist, it's just a slow-build book), although the results of certain events are obvious in advance because of it- I know that might bother some people, so don't read it if it could.


Anyway, Buchanan is a dab hand with an action scene- this is the sword and dagger type of assassination, and he's very good at it- knows how to build tension, and has built an interesting world- he manages, in a mostly magic-less world, to make guns and swords and airships in the same setting feel eminently plausible, and there's a detail to the worldbuilding that gives it life - his real strength, I think, is in character. He doesn't have to spend long with a person for us to get to know them, and he manages to give even what could have been a hysterically cartoonish villain a bit of depth.



To summarise; a worthy addition to the badass assassin subgenre, and the start of what looks like it could be a notable series. It's the third debut I've read this year (NK Jemisin and Paul Hoffman being the other two) and it's the best one by a fair bit. Highly recommended.

Edited by polishgenius, 08 May 2010 - 05:25 PM.

[Jhogo]

Good to know. I've heard a couple of things about this through various blogs, but I'll be holding off before picking it up. I'd like to hear more.

[MattD]

There's an excerpt -- a prologue and the first chapter -- available at the author's website. I was unimpressed by the prose.

[RedEyedGhost]

polishgenius, on 06 March 2010 - 05:40 AM, said:

To summarise; a worthy addition to the badass assassin subgenre, and the start of what looks like it could be a notable series. It's the third debut I've read this year (NK Jemisin and Paul Hoffman being the other two) and it's the best one by a fair bit. Highly recommended.

Great review, and it's not the first very positive review I've seen for this book (and I haven't seen any bad reviews yet). Although, I'll still wait for a few more to come out before buying it

[Werthead]

I have this one on the stack, but was put off by the mediocre cover art (which is way too reminiscent of The Left Hand of God). Having taken a break from fantasy for a few books, I might bump this up the queue then.

[Jhogo]

Werthead, on 07 March 2010 - 07:48 AM, said:

I have this one on the stack, but was put off by the mediocre cover art

*rolls eyes* Like that matters.

[polishgenius]

MattD, on 06 March 2010 - 10:52 AM, said:

There's an excerpt -- a prologue and the first chapter -- available at the author's website. I was unimpressed by the prose.

The prose is pretty much neutral, I think - there's no flair or particular elegance to it or anything, but neither did it clunk. It's just there to get the story across - I found it a bit like GRRM's, in that respect, perhaps a bit less graceful. I suspect some may find it slightly over-descriptive, but it's nothing like overwhelming, I don't think.

Werthead, on 07 March 2010 - 07:48 AM, said:

I have this one on the stack, but was put off by the mediocre cover art (which is way too reminiscent of The Left Hand of God).

What with a purple cover of a hooded-and-cowled assassin with a drawn blade on a book about low-fantasy assassination stuff, that thought did cross my mind. It's a different sort of book though, Hoffman's is a lot about the prose and tone whereas pacing and building the plot and the world seemed to fall by the wayside a bit, whereas as I say for Buchanan it's the opposite, the structure is something he obviously considered fairly strongly and the worldbuilding is detailed.

[Sheep the Evicted]

Ser Renasko, on 07 March 2010 - 11:16 AM, said:

*rolls eyes* Like that matters.

I know that the cover is rarely ever the authors fault, but it DOES matter. For instance i feel embarrassed to buy/borrow a book that is so obviously fantasyish - especially if it has a man weilding a a sword and attemtping to badass on the front cover - and i would never buy/borrow it unless it got very good reviews indeed. Guess i'm shallow.

For my part i read the excerpt and i agree with PG - the prose was neither great or awful but the story was pretty interesting and i think i will pick it up based solely on the fact that i tend to like books PG likes.

[Gigei]

Ser Renasko, on 07 March 2010 - 11:16 AM, said:

*rolls eyes* Like that matters.

Are you kidding? Have you never had a WoT book in your hand (the one with the Sweet covers) while people point and laugh and ask why you are reading a book about midgets?

[Sheep the Evicted]

Gigei, on 09 March 2010 - 04:12 AM, said:

Are you kidding? Have you never had a WoT book in your hand (the one with the Sweet covers) while people point and laugh and ask why you are reading a book about midgets?

What gets me is the polite contempt which you can see by the twitch at the corner of their mouths. The exact same look on my face when i see people reading the da vinci code.

[Jhogo]

The day I begin to feel bad for what the cover of a book looks like will be a very sorry day indeed.

[polishgenius]

Sheep the Evicted, on 09 March 2010 - 10:36 AM, said:

The exact same look on my face when i see people reading the da vinci code.

You're a better man than me. There's nothing polite about my contempt for the Da Vinci Code.

[pat5150]

If anyone is interested, I have an exclusive extract of this on the Hotlist. Follow this link.

Cheers,

Patrick

[pat5150]

False alert.

A reader revealed that the excerpt has been available on the author's website for a while, so I took it down...

Patrick

[Jhogo]

Oh well.

[Gigei]

Sheep the Evicted, on 09 March 2010 - 10:36 AM, said:

What gets me is the polite contempt which you can see by the twitch at the corner of their mouths. The exact same look on my face when i see people reading the da vinci code.

I hate when people come up to me and say "hey is that a good book/what are you reading, is it good?" and you hesitantly show it to them and they either politely pretend not to hold you in complete contempt or they start the mockery when they see the midget romance cover.

[Myshkin]

Just finished this, and I pretty much agree with Polishgenius (except that I would rank it slightly below Left Hand of God on my list of 2010 debuts). It did remind me of Brent Weeks' trilogy, except a little more grown up, and substantially less sloppy (and I liked Weeks' trilogy). The prose is workmanlike, and one of the few problems I had with the book were the rare occasions when Buchanan would try a little too hard with the prose. Although there is a scene near the end of the book where the prose is wrought beautifully, and really evokes some strong emotions. The characters I think were Buchanan's strong point; you really got to know and care about them in a relatively short amount of time. The worldbuilding was well done IMO; Buchanan managed to give the reader a good feel for the world without falling prey to hundreds of pages of infodumps and backstory. All in all I really liked Farlander, and think that Buchanan is a writer to watch.

[Werthead]

This was a superior debut fantasy novel. Mostly traditional, but enough twists and flourishes (especially at the end) to make it pretty compelling. Definitely one of the better debut books of the year, certainly in the traditional secondary world fantasy category.

Quote

Fifty years ago, the Holy Empire of Mann was born when a nihilistic urban cult conquered the city of Q'os. In the decades since then, it has overrun the shores of two continents, conquering all the lands of the Mideres Sea aside from the islands known as the Mercian Free Ports and the powerful Alhazii Caliphate to the east, the source of the Empire's gunpowder.

For ten years the Empire has besieged the Mercian city of Bar-Khos. Despite the Empire's military power, the walls of Bar-Khos have continued to defy them, but the city is overflowing with refugees and keeping the supply lines to the east open is becoming increasingly difficult. One refugee, Nico, is driven to thievery by starvation and poverty, but finds that his latest choice of target was rather ill-chosen...

Meanwhile, the son and heir of the Holy Matriarch of Mann has killed a woman protected by the Roshun, the vendetta assassins pledged to avenge the death of their clients. Despite the prince-priest's power and guards, the Roshun are pledged to vengeance, even if carrying out this task will plunge them into war with the greatest and most ruthless nation in the world.

Farlander is the first volume of The Heart of the World, a rollicking old-school epic fantasy with a few modern twists. Even the map recalls the 1980s output of Raymond E. Feist (i.e. when he was still good), whilst the political set-up, the religious fundamentalist 'evil empire' (though it is drawn in somewhat more depth than that) and the 'callow young apprentice assassin hero' are all somewhat familiar. However, as with Joe Abercrombie's The Blade Itself the author here succeeds in making you believe you're reading something very familiar indeed when the story suddenly spins on a dime and throws you off on a different course altogether. There's relatively little magic, its role in the story being replaced by various forms of technology (including possibly organic bio-tech in the form of the Roshun seals) such as cannons, gunpowder rifles and airships which are rationed from the mysterious Islands of Sky, which give rise to smoke-and-cordite battle sequences reminiscent of Buchanan's fellow Northern Irish fantasy author Paul Kearney.

Characterisation is strong, with Nico an engaging (if somewhat familiar) protagonist and Ash an effective older mentor character past his best but still capable of dispatching hordes of city guard extras when required (if there's a film, expect him to be played by Liam Neeson). Other characters are more interesting, such as Kira (the mother of the Mannian Patriarch), but are kept intriguingly off-screen, hopefully to play larger roles later on. Buchanan writes with an effectively ruthless but concise style (one benefit of rising paper prices is that what would once have been flabby 600-page fantasies are now kept to a lean 350 pages or so, which is welcome) which is still gripping.

Complaints are few. There are a few characters clearly present only because they play a role in future books, but have little to do here (although this early set-up may be preferable to them just showing up out of nowhere later on). The incongruous mix of gunpowder technology, mysticism (there's no magic, but a few prophetic dreams crop up) and swords-and-shields also probably needs a little more explanation than what we get in this first book, but these are mostly minor issues.

Farlander (****) is a solid, engaging opening novel in a new fantasy series which initially appears to be playing it safe before throwing the readers some pretty big curveballs in the closing acts which are refreshingly realistic and leave the story on an enticing cliffhanger. The book is available now in the UK and on import in the USA.

[Brady]

I thought this was OK, but nothing special. And then I got to the end, and it sort of knocked me off my feet.

Spoiler

Even when he was on the bonfire, I still thought Ash would rescue Nico somehow. Even ned's death didn't surprise me as much as this. AGOT was always more of an enseble, whereas in Farlander, Nico was undoubtedly THE main character. And his storyline was very traditional character arc ... right up until he was tortured and killed.

The slaughter of the Roshun was not as much of a surprise. When Che was sent on his mission, I thought maybe we'd end with a scenario where Ash, nico, and the other two guys were the last Roshun left, carrying out a final vendetta against the entire Empire.

I also liked that Ash is an old man with disabilities that don't conveniently dissapear whenever he needed to kick some ass. And that the 'good guys' took a bit of a beating, losing limbs and such.

That being said, it still had it's problems. Apart from Ash and Che, none of the POV characters were particularly interesting. The world also felt a little shallow and generic, even with the guns and cannons and airships.

I'm still not sold completely, but I'm intrigued enough to check out the sequel.

[Horiötha]

Hmm, should I read this?