Jump to content

Devices and Desires


Jaxom 1974

Recommended Posts

Devices and Desires

Has this been mentioned? Any opinions? I picked it up because the price was right and I'd seen a coule devent reviews, but hadn't heard anything about it here abouts. Usually the Board has good sense about stuff like this.

Thought I'd ask.

I loved it. Delightful characters, dry gritty humour, great lines, dark enough to rival with GRRM and Barker, one of the main theme is that love is a very bad idea. No magic. Lots of craft & technique to replace it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm not sure about whether it is groundbreaking or not. I did think the first two books are a bit special. Particularly as many fantasy readers today go on and on about how "gritty" and "real" they like their reads as well as gush over the supposed morally gray characters that some other new authors put forth (but really only are white hats in shabby clothing).

I like this particular work of Parker's because it actualy has a plot. A really good plot. Any twists are natural and not overly contrived. Never a moment that I get to one and think that the author tricked me which is another peeve of mine. Twists do have to be contrived. But if the author has to employ a certain subterfuge that becomes grossly apparent when the twist is revealed? I tend to lose my interest in the read. Also the plots in this series, while life threatening and dire and tension filled, are never laden with moral imperatives or messages. There is a "real" sense within the world and setting in the events that Parker portrays. And a wonderful sense of irony and sly wit. The main characters all hover on the extremely unlikable. Yet never turn me off as sometimes such efforts by other authors do. Parker is still able to maintain a balance that as the characters do stupid and even more often, incredibly self-serving things, we also have enough insight to realize the motivation most of the time and understand it without being spoonfed the "whys" of the matter.

Parker also writes rather tightly. Looking back at the end of the read, I never feel like a word was wasted. That there was any sort of padding in any way. Every scene has a purpose. Yet it is done so in a way that I don't notice the seams if you will.

All in all, I would say there is plenty special, at least for me, about a book that comes off as extremely entertaining and rather intelligent as well as creating some of the best morally grey characters that are out there in the genre. Halfway through the second book, I had already changed "sides" so to speak about five times. And loving every minute of it. Certainly much of the paeans I hear about Lynch and Abercrombie are actually realized, again maybe just for me, in Parker's work at a level that actually seems more than just a fresh gloss of paint on a rusty old bucket. But I think the actual moral ambiguity of Parker's characters, something that many seem to like in Lynch and Abercombie, is actually much more grey and ambiguous than anything the new flavors of the month are putting forth. And I can see that being a turnoff. I mean in Parker's first series, the "hero" does one of the most reprehensible acts I have read and yet still remains a character to fascinate if not sympathize with. The level of carnage wrought in this new series so far is kind of like someone writing a fantasy about Stalin and making it fun and entertaining and has the reader sometimes almost rooting for Stalin.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's nice to hear more positive buzz about the novel. I've had it sitting on my "to-read" pile for a while now and it was bumped up quite a few notches when Steven Erikson recommended it to me.

Gyrehead's words, especially, make me eager to read the novel. I always like hearing that an author doesn't waste any words. This is especially impressive when a novel is as long as Devices and Desires.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I found Parker's Fencer Trilogy to be broadly a worthwhile work, with an interesting line in moral bleakness (a major and vital character is killed so casually in the final book that I had to read the section again to make sure I understood what happened; only Paul Kearney has ever offed a character even more off-handedly before) but that also made it difficult to care about the plot. When (nearly) everyone dies and nothing the characters do really changes anything, what's the point? The writing was good, the battles were great and the artifice side of fantasy was very well handled. There was some hugely OTT character developments which felt very artificial though (I think gyrehead's reference may have been the most notable).

I have the Scavenger and Engineer trilogies on the to-read list, but, it has to be said, they are some way down that list.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thank you. Apparently Parker is a she, according to Wikipedia. It appears tha authors using initials instead full names are in most cases female. Another trend which may be saying something about prejudices of genre readers (or perhaps publishers?)

Yeah. When I saw it was an initial I bet it was a woman and was right. Hideously frequent in this field. Note that CS Friedman now goes by Celia Friedman in her most recently published books, so I guess once you reach enough notoriety you can drop it...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Another author on my ever increasing 'to read' list. Any recs on where I should start? Should I go from the top with the Fencer trilogy, or jump on with the Scavenger books, or start with Devices and Desires?

I'm usually a huge advocate of starting with an author's first published work and moving forward. I like taking in the progression of the author's writing as well as the stories themselves. I think in most part due to having read a first book and thought it was meh at best; gambling on the second book and being surprised at the increase in quality and by four or five books into their work, consider them a firm must-read author. So it can be a bit of a shock reading the most recent effort and then going back to their freshmen year as it were.

However a couple of other issues have to be taken into consideration. First, I think Devices and Desires is the most palatable of Parker's work to date. There isn't quite the ruthlessness as the other two series had (though we still have one book and she may well destroy them all). And I think the prose is more fluid. Second, Devices is avaiable and the third book comes out this December in both the US and the UK. So now is a good time to pick them up. In the US finding her other books might be hard and a bit more costly. As well, with the launch of Orbit US by Little Brown, Parker's backlist may see a new US publication sometime real soon. And going by the new UK trend, there might be reprints in Omnibus form which means not having to track down out of print volumes (though I think all are in print still) or varying covers if that peeves you. So there is definitely benefit to picking up the new series if you live in the US or Canada.

UK? I'd probably hit the used bookstores to find the first Fencer book and see if you like it and go from there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would add that I found Colours in the Steel - the first novel in the Fencer Trilogy - to be the best book in the trilogy and a first-rate stand-alone fantasy novel in its own right. The main storylines are all completed with just a few lingering elements left for the second and third novels.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...