Reviews, reviews, reviews...
Nov. 17th, 2006 10:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alobearWork is getting in the way of my Live Journal updates - tsk!
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters - a good idea as a birthday present from my brother, but not as good as I'd hoped. It started off as basically The Woman In White from the point of view of the bad guys. An attractive conman inviegled his way into the house of an eccentric guy who didn't like people being around him and was working on mounting his collection of pictures. His neice was due to come into lots of money when she married, so the conman got a friend of his (the narrator) as position as her maid so that he didn't have to worry about the chaperone when he seduced the neice.
To begin with, it was quite well written and mildly intriguing, but all the characters were unpleasant to a greater or lesser degree, so it didn't really engage me. Things picked up when the first twist took me completely by surprise, but then the whole first section of the book was retold from a different perspective, which wasn't different enough to make it interesting. After that, the twists and turns, surprises and coincidences stacked up apace until the whole thing was just utterly ridiculous, and all the characters got less and less appealing until I really didn't care what happened to any of them. Hey ho.
The Prestige - excellent cast, clever structure, intriguing plot, but not very jolly. I figured out most of the plot as it went along, so none of the twists were a shock. However, as with Lost, I wasn't watching it to find out what was going on, and it wouldn't have bothered me if nothing had been revealed at all. What was good about it was the interaction of the characters, and the exploration of obsession and revenge and how it affects people. Recommended.
Dead Witch Walking by Kim Harrison - another fairly random birthday present, which turned out very well. I was a bit worried part way through that it was going to turn into vampire porn (a la Anita Blake), and lesbian vampire porn at that - but the temptation passed it by. Much lighter and much less icky than Anita Blake, as well, which was also good. Basically, an really fun romp, with appealing characters (especially Jenks the pixy), an intriguing plot and lots of scope for expansion. I look forward to reading the next one.
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters - a good idea as a birthday present from my brother, but not as good as I'd hoped. It started off as basically The Woman In White from the point of view of the bad guys. An attractive conman inviegled his way into the house of an eccentric guy who didn't like people being around him and was working on mounting his collection of pictures. His neice was due to come into lots of money when she married, so the conman got a friend of his (the narrator) as position as her maid so that he didn't have to worry about the chaperone when he seduced the neice.
To begin with, it was quite well written and mildly intriguing, but all the characters were unpleasant to a greater or lesser degree, so it didn't really engage me. Things picked up when the first twist took me completely by surprise, but then the whole first section of the book was retold from a different perspective, which wasn't different enough to make it interesting. After that, the twists and turns, surprises and coincidences stacked up apace until the whole thing was just utterly ridiculous, and all the characters got less and less appealing until I really didn't care what happened to any of them. Hey ho.
The Prestige - excellent cast, clever structure, intriguing plot, but not very jolly. I figured out most of the plot as it went along, so none of the twists were a shock. However, as with Lost, I wasn't watching it to find out what was going on, and it wouldn't have bothered me if nothing had been revealed at all. What was good about it was the interaction of the characters, and the exploration of obsession and revenge and how it affects people. Recommended.
Dead Witch Walking by Kim Harrison - another fairly random birthday present, which turned out very well. I was a bit worried part way through that it was going to turn into vampire porn (a la Anita Blake), and lesbian vampire porn at that - but the temptation passed it by. Much lighter and much less icky than Anita Blake, as well, which was also good. Basically, an really fun romp, with appealing characters (especially Jenks the pixy), an intriguing plot and lots of scope for expansion. I look forward to reading the next one.
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no subject
Date: 2006-11-17 06:20 pm (UTC)Glad you liked...and as previously mentioned, there are two further ones beyond the two you have.