By Schism Rent Asunder by David Weber
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Book Reviews of By Schism Rent Asunder
Book Review: Sappy Stuff
Summary: 4 Stars
The other reviews have covered the ground well, leaving me only to mention the sappy romantic element Weber introduces in "Schism", perhaps with the intention of making the series more popular with women. Who knows, if this succeeds, he may get his female readership into double figures.Book Review: Good Read
Summary: 4 Stars
I am almost through the second book. I've enjoyed it but would like to see a more active role and action taken by Merlin. I hope I live long enough to read the whole series because I think the premise is fascinating.Book Review: Spare me the MEETINGS!
Summary: 3 Stars
I have enjoyed Mr. Weber's work for years, and own every solo book he has ever written (and most of his collaborative efforts), having read many of them several times over. "Off Armageddon Reef" was superb, and left me eagerly anticipating the next episode. Perhaps therein lies the problem.
I was so excited that I didn't realize until about three-fourths of the way through "By Schism Rent Asunder" (delightfully lyrical title, btw) that nothing - nothing - was HAPPENING! The storyline's pace is positively glacial, and you would need calipers to measure the plot's progress in the first three HUNDRED pages. Instead, the reader is treated to an interminable series of meetings. Call them councils if you like, but they are MEETINGS nonetheless. The characters talk - ad nauseum - about what they're GOING to do and WHY they plan on doing it. Unfortunately, nobody ever gets around to - you know - actually doing anything. Just like meetings in the real world.
Now don't get me wrong: expositive narrative is quite valuable as a literary tool, and I respect Mr. Weber's stupendous imagination, to have crafted such a detailed and finely-honed fictional universe. Nor do I have sophomoric expectations of "non-stop" action, or action for its own sake. But this book is, sadly, lacking, or perhaps lackluster. It feels ... incomplete, and I get the feeling that the next book will move the storyline forward much more rapidly. Perhaps he was rushed to a deadline? Regardless, it might have been better to restructure the plot during the editing process, or perhaps wait and release both this volume and the next simultaneously.
Digression: Those similarly familiar with Mr. Weber's body of work will easily recognize the conceptual similarities between the Safehold series and the (much shorter, but highly recommended) Heirs of Empire. Does Mr. Weber anticipate tying the two together? Could Safehold be a - very - remote prequel?
Book Review: Book 2 of the Safehold saga
Summary: 3 Stars
Book 2 is a good continuation of a great premis begun in "Off Armageddon Reef": a remnant of humanity has fled to a remote corner of the galaxy to hide from an implacablly hostile race that exterminates any intelligent species it finds. To avoid detection by electronic emissions, the colony establishes an 18th century society and a 15th century religion that borrows heavily from old time Catholicism. The memories of the colonists are selectively wiped of any traces of technology and human history. After 800 years of pastoral existence, an android that carries the total intelligence and personality of one of the original humans awakes and sets about secretly lifting humanity out of its torpor without revealing too much too soon. Much of the first book is about naval battles that will appeal to fans of Patrick O'Brian (like me).
The second book continues the story without really acquainting the reader with the prologue -- if you haven't read the first one, you will not get much of the second. Unfortunately, "Asunder" is close to becoming what finally turned me off the Honor Harrington series: FAR too much behind-the-scenes political intrigue. Weber is fascinated with Macchiavellian maneuvering by kings and princes, to the extent that it becomes tedious. Pages and pages of it. I don't read these books for geopolitical intrigue. If the next one continues this trend I will drop it as fast as I dropped Honor Harrington. It would be too bad, because the underlying story is fascinating.
Book Review: The Sekrit Sequel to Heirs of Empire
Summary: 3 Stars
This was a Weber book. His personal story thumbprints were all over it. And it was totally hypnotic and I lost a ton of sleep to it, because the story just zips along. The characterization is about par. The story, well... I think if it occurrs on a planet far far away, we could maybe FILE THE DAMN SERIAL NUMBER OFF. Earlier in the book I said it was O HAI REFORMATION? Yeah, it is, and the Big Bad Evil church is not even disguised. They have priests and bishops and mass and all the things a person expects from the actual historical Holy Mother Church. Which was irritating, because although there were bones thrown to the good guys in the church, there weren't a lot, and it ended up feeling like an anti-Catholic polemic, even if it wasn't meant as such.
If you liked the empire-building in the Belisaurius books, you may enjoy this (different authors, similar feel). If you are interested in war-by-trade, it's not bad. If you wanted more Heirs of Empire, this is the series for you.
Avoid if you are allergic to anything that looks like religion, if you are bored by empire-building, or if you are vulnerable to losing sleep to books that are gripping but not great.
Will be buy the next one? Yup. But I wish I found Tor as easy to buy ebooks from as Baen. I buy ebooks, I buy paper books, I buy the same book twice, and everyone wins.