Messenger by Lois Lowry (2.5 stars)

The Giver quartet continues. This one steps well out of the norms of the previous two books and adds lots of fantasy. People can see the future, the forest comes alive to trap and kill you etc.

By far the strangest thing that happens is that the high technology world of The Giver, the medieval sew-fest of Gathering Blue, and Village (where Jonas ends up) are all linked. As in, they are all within multi-day walking distance and set in the same time period.

This is incredibly jarring. A technology discrepancy between rich and poor is common in the real world, but it seems implausible that the rich from Gathering Blue's medieval society wouldn't have gained more technology via trade or force given how close they are.

This book followed the formula from Gathering Blue: heavy on the symbolism, light on the plot. This time the former is about what we give up in pursuit of material possessions and physical perfection.

At least Trade Mart was an interesting, ominous side-bar. I wish the story had developed more in that direction.

2.5 stars.

Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry (2 stars)

I was so impressed by The Giver that I resolved to read the whole quartet. Having done so, my advice is don't bother, none of the others are nearly as strong. Gathering Blue may actually be the worst. Or perhaps it's just that the contrast with The Giver is still so fresh.

In any case, Gathering Blue is that incredibly boring book you're forced to read in English class so you can explain all of the vague symbolism and wax lyrical about how Kira was going to change and revitalise society through the power of art.

But if you ignore the deeper meaning and just look at plot: a girl with a bad leg in a medieval society survives her mother's death, gets a somewhat sinister government patron, learns how to dye threads, fixes a dress, and might add some new stuff to the dress one day. Note that I said might.

On top of being weak on its own, the novel doesn't even have the benefit of providing resolution of the events from the end of The Giver, or even obvious relationship to them.

2 stars.

The Giver by Lois Lowry (4.5 stars)

From the foreword it's obvious that this is quite an extraordinary book. Here's just some of the things that people have said to Lowry about it in letters over the years:

One couple wrote to me about their autistic, selectively mute teenager, who had recently spoken to them for the first time—about The Giver, urging them to read it. A teacher from South Carolina wrote that the most disruptive, difficult student in her eighth grade class had called her at home on a no-school day and begged her to read him the next chapter over the phone...A Trappist monk wrote to me and said he considered the book a sacred text. A man who had, as an adult, fled the cult in which he had been raised, told me that his psychiatrist had recommended The Giver to him. Countless new parents have written to explain why their babies have been named Gabriel.

I didn't read it in school, but I could tell by the end that this must be an English curriculum book, and sure enough, it is. It's a fantastic and thought provoking Young-Adult read, but definitely for older kids, there's enough adult concepts in here to make some schools nervous enough to ban it.

Many reviews casually spoil some of the great reveals in the book. I want to mention some of them now, so stop reading if you don't want to be spoiled...

Lowry does a masterful job of easing us into this dystopian future. We see a safe and orderly society with a sinister undercurrent gradually become more and more disturbing as Jonas and the reader gain awareness of how it functions.

Despite it being expected for some time, the reveal of the infanticide is both shocking and disturbing. But the moment I was moved by most was a more unexpected plot reveal.  That is, when you realise that not only are these people denied choice of almost any form, but they are even denied colour. It's amazing how much emotion this revelation brings, and how it is delivered with a simple sentence:

You're beginning to see the color red.

This part was inspired by a painter that Lowry met that she says clearly had a much deeper ability to experience colour than she did. She wished that he could have somehow magically given her the ability to see colour in the same way. His picture is on the front of the book.

Some people complain about the ending, but those are always the same people who complain when everything isn't neatly tied up.

4.5 stars.

Sand Omnibus by Hugh Howey (3.5 stars)

Hugh Howey creates another intriguing post-apocalyptic world, this time modern civilisation has been completely covered in sand, and "sand diving" to retrieve artifacts from the time of high technology is a lucrative but extremely dangerous occupation. I loved the sand divers: Howey delivered a light technology explanation, and great construction of the divers' society with its own rules, indoctrination, and language. The multiple different names for types of sand was a nice touch.

While I didn't get hooked as strongly as I did with Wool, I felt like Sand was a more measured and mature series. There weren't books I hated or incredibly implausible plot devices required. Having said that, there seemed to be some puzzling incongruities with technology: they had mechanical pumps powered by generators to bring up water from wells, but were still using a bucket brigade to move accumulated sand away from the wells...?

This is a society that is brutally oppressed and is steadily being crushed by remote actions we never really find out about. The dumping of sand that rules this future Colorado seems to be deliberate, but in a completely dispassionate and careless way.

I would have had a lot more respect for the novel if the protagonist had died in the desert. A willingness to kill off a major character to prevent the need for an unlikely rescue shows author's grit.

Good read for those who liked Wool.

3.5 stars

Messenger's Legacy (Demon Cycle side story) by Peter V. Brett (2 stars)

This is a side-story character background filler for Briar Damaj who just appears and plays a crucial role in The Skull Throne. His background was rightly cut from the main novel. This will be slightly interesting for fans of the main series, but you aren't actually missing anything if you don't read it. The bog where he lives is an interesting place, with some newly described demons and a new defence against them.

2 stars

The Skull Throne (Book 4 of the Demon Cycle) by Peter V. Brett (3 stars)

This book is actually about the daylight war, i.e. the war between humans, whereas The Daylight War was mostly about the war with the demons, go figure. Minor spoilers ahead.

Brett obviously wanted to explore the political implications of Arlen and Jardir being out of picture while working on their pet project. He intends for any travel to the core to be the subject of the final book, and I assume the climax. But taking two of the most important characters essentially completely out of the story made it sag.

Having said that, full credit to Brett for killing off a major character and some secondary but still important characters. Some people are speculating that the major character isn't really dead. I really hope that isn't true since the story would lose any credibility it currently has.

While the addition of Inerva's POV in the third book was powerful for the story, Ashia's POV that we get in this one was....meh. It felt very formulaic, and it seems unlikely to be important. But hey, what do I know, maybe it will be. In fact, while some interesting things happened, it was mostly setting the scene and putting the pieces in place for the final book. Necessary perhaps but it won't be the book that people rave about from the series.

3 stars.

The Daylight War (Book 3 of the Demon Cycle) by Peter V. Brett (3.5 stars)

Brett continues with his formula, adding another deep POV via a long series of flashbacks, this time for Inerva. Some people resented this and just wanted the story to move forward more. I think it was actually quite well done, bringing a lot of depth and another interesting perspective on the events we are now familiar with. It's very rare to have a three-dimensional picture of a story through such carefully constructed backstory.

Some minor spoilers ahead.

At some point Inerva is forced to draw on the power of her dice, destroying them in the process. Because of the backstory we know just how desperate this act is, and what it costs her. Inerva's political success looks effortless from Jardir's perspective, but Inerva's own perspective shows us just how tenuous her hold on authority is, and the risks of each of her daring power plays.

Inerva's story starts out as the female equivalent of Jardir's: plenty of physical and emotional violence, and a streak of ruthlessness needed to survive and lead the others. It gets more interesting as it moves from physical violence into political machinations and magic.

There's still plenty of cringeworthy portrayal-of-women moments that range from the amount of pages devoted to "pillow dancing" (i.e. the masters course in porn-star techniques that is mandatory for Dama'ting), and just the term "pillow dancing" in general, to silly impracticalities like having to walk down into the basement and unwind 10 feet of silk to go to the bathroom. Between Inerva displaying her pillow dancing skills for Jardir, and Renna and Arlen going at it:

He had thought their consumation would be gentle, but his bride had pounced like an animal the moment the flap fell, her aura lit up with lust.

it felt a little too much like a romance novel for my liking.

By this stage Leesha, Arlen and many others have gained lots of knowledge about how to create powerful warded weapons, many defensive techniques, and even use demon bone to power things. But they haven't released this knowledge at any sort of scale, it's one special shield here, a bit of bone there, mostly to give advantages to their friends. If they really cared about the populace why isn't every warder in the country supervising the creation of hundreds of cloaks of unsight? Sure some of this ward-tech is too dangerous for wide availability, but there are some wards every man, woman, and child should be wearing every day.

In this novel we get some insight into the mind demons, and a few POV sections which is good, although they remain fairly mysterious for now. Arlen goes around introducing himself to everyone and playing up his hick accent like some sort of reluctant politician who has been told they need to be more approachable.

The epic battles with the demons were great, LOTR-scale fights. But there was lots of bizarre decisions and inconsistencies. Like Rojer deciding the most dangerous part of a risky recon mission was a good time to take a piss. And Arlen sending his friends out to their probable deaths, on said recon mission, then, when they get back, just deciding to just teleport up in the air and take a look for himself. Either he's dumb or he's trying to get his friends killed? And why isn't every single person who is fighting wearing wards? At least the archers should have the damn wardsight wards, surely?

“Shoot the windies!” she cried. The Haveners lifted their bows to comply, but their fear was palpable, shaking hands that needed to be steady. Even with the light of the greatward, the night sky was dark, and they could not see the demons glowing as Renna did.

I really wish Brett would kill off a main character. None of the main cast dies and it's improbable given the constant life-threatening danger they face. There's this point where Jardir is dodging boulders thrown by demons that crossed the line into improbability:

Every demon on the field was focused on him now...Jardir leapt aside, but was struck even as he landed by another stone dropped from above...He was given no respite, as rocks the size of melons began to fall like rain around him. But as fast as the stones fell, Jardir was faster, dodging them like lazily drifting bubbles of soap. Even as he dodged the barrage from above, the rock and wood demons on the ground continued to hurl whatever they could grasp in their talons at him: rocks, trees, even a few of his own men.

No matter how awesome an athletic ninja you are, when enough demons throw rocks at you, you will die. Which is what should have happened in that scene. There's also a fair bit of "deus ex Crown-of-Kaji" going on, like when he needs to bust through some wards himself.

Still providing lots of entertainment.

3.5 stars.