Funny how close to shameful this feels.
I've made it a point of pride for some time that I focus on one book
at a time, poring over the pages endlessly until I've finished. I
have so many friends who try to read multiple books at once and I've
never been a fan of splitting my attention like that. In my
experience, it leaves too many books unfinished and prevents one from
fully falling into any individual one among the masses.
But, lo and behold, I've been unable to
finish a book for what feels like at least two months. Why? I don't
know. Yet I want to give each of these books their due. I hope that I
will be inspired to go back to a few of them at some point, but
there's no guarantee. For now, they'll each have to be content with a
mini-review, as I try to assess where they each went wrong for me.
.
The Faded Sun Trilogy
Now this was an interesting find.
Recommended by a friend, I read Faded Sun at around the same
time I was writing my piece on how alien species are treated in
different fictional pieces. Faded Sun was one of those that
provided three-dimensional aliens with their own different
complexities, personalities, and quirks, refusing to hold to a
stereotype while still benefiting from the general guidelines behind
one. In a style reminiscent of Dune (lots of sand, immense
attention to species and setting detail, complex political
machinations), I read the first book and then some of the trilogy
before I lost steam.
The problem, for me, was twofold. First
off, the pacing of the books was often glacial. The author attempts
to achieve a tone that is contemplative, wistful, and slow. She
succeeds in this in a way that is remarkable and thought-provoking,
but unfortunately for me, she succeeded too well. I got to a point
where I was anxious for the plot to move in some substantial way, for
the ramifications of characters' actions to reach some crescendo, or
for, really, somebody to do something that prevented the book
from being an effective way for me to fall asleep. I got to the part
where the human and the mri are traveling to a new world, and the
author decides to undergo a slow process wherein the human is
carefully introduced to small details of the mri culture. So, instead
of allowing the reader to pass over the flight sequence in favor of
advancing the plot, we are held captive, like the human, to a
recurrent Mri Culture 101 class that seems unending.
This would have been more permissible
if the alien culture were more interesting. Your mileage may vary on
this (for those of you who have read it), but I found the mri culture
to be more frustrating than fascinating. Here we have a warrior race
that has inexplicably managed to survive despite cultural norms and
taboos that seem counterproductive to getting along with other
species must less existing at all. I gather that we, as the audience,
are supposed to be curious by this fact, which encourages us to learn
more about them. But, for me, this made me baffled that they could be
so consistently foolish and backwards, lessening my tolerance for
cultural lessons.
I plan to come back to this at some
point since the aliens known as the regul and one of the other human
characters were quite compelling (not to mention the writing style
itself), but the incredibly restrained pacing made me want to try
something else for some time.
.
Ghost Wars
Ghost Wars is a book that
started incredibly strong but then got bogged down very fast.
Intended to serve essentially as a detailed history of foreign
influence in Afghanistan from 1978 onward, it began with incredible
focus. As you read, you get quick back-and-forths between the
decisions of the CIA, the off-and-on support of the Pakistanis, and
the developments within Afghanistan proper as the Soviets invade in
order to retain their influence in the region. There's a lot going
on, but the author managed to somehow keep a tight and effective
narrative by shining the story spotlight on one individual and event
to another.
At least, for a while. Once he
introduced the machinations and complexities of Saudi Arabia, Yemen,
India, Iraq, so on and so forth, the flow came to a halt. It has been
a while since I've actually felt a need to take notes while I read,
but I became convinced quite fast that I'd have to if I wanted to
keep up. The reader is barraged with an endless cascade of names and
is given no indication as to whether these people will be important
in the long run of the history or not, leading to an increasingly
difficult attempt to keep them all in one's memory banks that is
ultimately doomed to failure. Why do I need to care about the
particular ideology and nuances of this Saudi Arabian religious
organization when the focus is supposed to be on Afghanistan?
I was hooked and then hit a brick wall
of details and names that seemed divergent from the overall intention
of the book, leading to a loss of interest. Will I return to it?
Maybe. But only in hope that the author eventually returns to telling
the history in the personal narrative form that was so effective in
the beginning.
Go on to Part II
Go on to Part II
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