The books of 2009

1. The Sky People - S.M. Stirling

Channels on Mars and jungles on Venus, what could be more charming? This is not that kind of book, but something like it. We have an alternative history, where the eastern bloc and the western both landed on Venus and Mars. This book is about the adventures of some of the colonists on Venus and their adventures amongst dinosaurs and neanderthals. It was a good yarn and enough wide eyed wonder and pure fun with a different flora and fauna. The ending was kind of lame, and the hints of the aliens who transported proto-humans and other animals and plants to Venus wasn't that interesting. But, as an adventure story is was just what I wanted and just what it said on the tin.

2. Griffin Feathers - Ken St. Andre

This bunch of related short stories was fun to read, and actually more engaging than I first imagined. Game based fiction more often than not just isn't very good fiction. Ken can write though, and the odd and wonderful world he pictures is sword and sorcery of the rogueish and humerous kind. The story about the thieves in Khazan had a bunch of very annoying errors where "he" had become "I". Apart from that I enjoyed it. Suddenly I feel a lot for Lerotra'hh and her brutal rule in the monster empire. That Khazan dude was not very nice.

3. A Princess of Mars - Edgar Rice Burroughs

Some things you know you should read, just because. Strangely enough I happened to get hold of all of the Mars books just when I had realized that the Barsoom was something I had to read. This is simple and pure pulp science fantasy. Not to bad. This book have a dreamlike and mysterious quality I like. At it's best it reminds me of Jack Vance. It's also very much a product of an untrained author and part of an older and (face it) cruder era of storytelling. I think I will tire of the ever conquering John Carter.

4. Gods of Mars - Edgar Rice Burroughs

More melodrama, more swordfighting and daring escapes by the most unlikely turn of events. The fact that I could pick it up again in the middle of a chapter after a longer hiatus tells a lot. More mysterious races, more nefarious plots and a hero whose sense of self worth is beginning to be totally over the top. It ends with a cliffhanger, and have lost some of the dreamlike qualities of the first volume. I don't think I care to read much more of this, even though I am curious about how the author is going to resolve the cliffhanger.

5. Best of Lester del Rey - Lester del Rey

A mixed bag. Some very neat stories, some nice but very forgettable. You could say del Rey was a good craftsman, but no real artist. Entertaining, at least.

6. 1491 - Charles C. Mann

How did the Americas look before the Europeans? It's a very interesting question, and the answers in this book were quite surprising. There are signs that maybe there were humans in the foothills Peruvian Amazonas 13 000 years ago. Mind boggling! Also, imagine 30 000 - 50 000 people in big cities in Yucatan in the 1300! After reading this book I'm amazed by what they did and how they developed the land. It's also so painful to read how much of all these civilizations were wiped out by germs and viruses even before the unimaginable cruelties by the European colonizers started. I have gotten a new perspective on a lot of things.

7. The Warrior Prophet - R. Scott Bakker

So, I managed to get going with this series again, since I wanted to give it one more chance before returning the books I had borrowed. Now it turned out that the unlikable characters of the first volume became more human, and others took the place as unhuman and unlikeable. Also, they style is kind of annoying. The action is moved forward by shorter pieces and then there are long sections of inner thoughts. The most ludicrous example being a dialogue where the lines are intersperes with three to five lines of feelings and hestiations. That's not character develoment, it's just tedious. But, now it has after all started to become "fantasy" enough, so I'll finish it.

8. The Magic Cottage - James Herbert

So, the book begins by telling me what it's all about. Is this horror? Suspense? It was kind of interesting to know what was going to happen, but it wasn't very captivating. I do think it was visual, though.

9. Our Friends from Frolix 8 - Philip K. Dick

This felt like a dime a dozen Dick story. Maybe it will hold up to a re-reading, but I doubt it.

10. Polar City Blues - Katherine Kerr

Fun, exciting and fairly tight. Maybe a little bit to neat with everything wrapping up in the end and a happy love story. The appendix teaching you everything there is to know about baseball was fun, even though it had barely nothing to do with the plot of the book.

11. Om Mörkret Faller [Lest Darkness Falls] - L. Sprague de Camp

Fairly light weight entertainment, and slightly silly. Sometimes the plot don't feel that well thought out, and all the characters are pure stereotypes. Important work in the alternate history genre but not that interesting otherwize.

12. Way of the Clans - Legend of the Jade Phoenix vol 1 - Robert Thurston

This book show very clearly what's wrong with militarism. I usually don't read tie-ins, but I got it for free and was thinking about BattleTech a lot. Even though I had decided to put it down as soon as it became corny I read it all. Decent entertainment, but nothing more.

13. The Stars in Shroud - Gregory Benford

Well, I didn't get what I wanted, a galaxy wide adventure. It was ok, but nothing more. Also, the hindu culture Benford had used got to show it's most ugly aspects of cultic devotion and fatalism. Even if it was all alien manipulation is left a stale taste in my mouth. Now I'd like somethign upbeat, and action packed for a change.

14. Omega - Jack McDevitt

A very anthropological First Contact novel, without any extensive contact, just a very involved rescue attemt of another civilization without revealing what's going on. The scope of the novel was great, the aliens interesting even though they were mostly a mirror for McDevitt to use to reflect upon some of the foibles of mankind. Fairly exciting, even though the big reveal was kind of a let down. A decent read, and entertaining.

15. En Oscariansk Skandal - Sven Sörman

Sherlock Holmes in Stockholm, and he is not like he used to. Watson is grumpy, dense and moralistic while ogling the females around him. Sherlock is haughty and secretive as usual. As an interesting take on early 1900 Stockholm as seen from a Victorian viewpoint it's quite interesting. As a new take on the relation between Watson and Holmes it's also quite well done. But, some of the spirit just isn't there.