« Speak the what to who now? | Main | Expletive deleted »
January 19, 2005
Reviews: (Books) To Reign in Hell
(Warning: This post will break the 3rd or 4th [depending on which sect is doing the numbering] Commandment. Also, metaphors will be mixed)
I am a sucker for a good apocalyptic tale. No, no, don't ask me why. But if the world is about to end, I want a front-row seat-- with nachos. I also think that Steven Brust is the cat's meow as far as writers go. I have no idea why it took me so damned long to read To Reign in Hell...
The basic story is the one familiar to us all: Yaweh and Satan duke it out for control of Heaven, Satan looses. And if storytelling didn't matter, that last sentence would be all you need. But storytelling does matter, and Mr. Brust has found a new an interesting way of telling the story. All elements are there from whatever demonology classes you might have taken; Lilith is a major character. And it's important to remember that Jesus was Yaweh's only begotten son. I don't really wish to say more about the plot for fear of spoiling some interesting twists. The ending, of course, is known to everyone...
From a politico-religious standpoint (my major and minor, so again, I love it) we get to witness the transformation of heaven from a State of Nature into a government. Locke would probably disapprove the manner of storytelling, but he could hardly argue with the politics of it all...
One of the reasons I am so fond of Mr. Brust, something which comes through quite clearly in this book, is his nack for showing people do clever things. A lot of fantasists, will simply state that their characters are clever, and show the results of their cleverness. But it takes real skill to show someone performing an intellectual feet in such a way that it is not only interesting, but also believable. The late, lamented Alfred Bester had this talent in spades, George R.R. Martin can show characters both being clever and being overly clever. Robert Jordan has made a fortune out of showing characters thinking they are clever only to fail miserably. Raymond Feist has never shown a hint of cleverness at all...
One other thing: where Tolkien made a career out of scenery, and Jordan introduces us to every blade of grass on every step of every journey that every character has made-- ever-- Mr. Brust tends to be rather sparing of the physical localities. Whereas the other two gentlemen are, say, photo-realistic in their approach to writing, Mr. Brust uses charcoal to give the reader a broad outline; the landscape is left to the reader as an exercise...
Rating:
5 Job: a Comedy of Justices out of 5 Cat's Laughing. Just go buy the book, read it, enjoy the theological impliciations...
Posted by Andrew at January 19, 2005 11:33 PM
Trackback Pings
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.punningpundit.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi/642
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Reviews: (Books) To Reign in Hell:
» Reviews: (Books) To Reign in Hell (Post by Andrew Cory) from Dean's World
(Warning: This post will break the 3rd or 4th [depending on which sect is doing the numbering] Commandment. Also, metaphors will be mixed)
I am a sucker for a good apocalyptic tale. No, no, don't ask me why. But if the...
[Read More]Tracked on January 21, 2005 07:01 AM
Comments
Well, if you're ranking it up there with Job (I love that book even though my own theology is rather more traditional) as your post seems to imply, I'm gonna have to check it out.
Posted by: Ken Hall at January 21, 2005 01:56 PM