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Dread Book Review's Fall
Mar. 1st, 2006 01:06 pmHi,
So I just finished up: Dread Empire's Fall: The Praxis by Walter Jon Williams. Mr. Willams is the author of Metropoitan which I greatly enjoyed (probably the only book in the Geomancy-Punk genre). So I was hoping it'd be fun.
And it wasn't half bad. One problem is that it's the first book in a trilogy and makes no effort to seriously tie up any loose ends at the end of the first book. It doesn't exactly end on a cliffhanger, it finds a good point and stops, but there's no denying that it's not self-contained. The other problem is that it's pretty boilerplate Space Opera and it tends toward the harder side of SF. So there's no sense of wonder that really permeates the story and that makes the standard space opera tropes look a little run-down.
The basic set up is that the known universe (a bunch of systems linked by wormholes) has been conquered by the Shaa -- aliens who follow a strict philosophical/religious code called the Praxis. While the Shaa had developed the technology to become immortal, the weight of years took an inevitable toll on them. So they forbade anyone else from developing life-extending tech and slowly the Shaa have dwindled away. Then the last Shaa dies and all hell breaks loose.
It takes a little time getting up to speed, but I really clipped through the last half of the book. It was certainly better than the Honor Harrington I've read and not a complete waste of time, but I'm not interested enough right now to persue the rest of the trilogy.
later
Tom
So I just finished up: Dread Empire's Fall: The Praxis by Walter Jon Williams. Mr. Willams is the author of Metropoitan which I greatly enjoyed (probably the only book in the Geomancy-Punk genre). So I was hoping it'd be fun.
And it wasn't half bad. One problem is that it's the first book in a trilogy and makes no effort to seriously tie up any loose ends at the end of the first book. It doesn't exactly end on a cliffhanger, it finds a good point and stops, but there's no denying that it's not self-contained. The other problem is that it's pretty boilerplate Space Opera and it tends toward the harder side of SF. So there's no sense of wonder that really permeates the story and that makes the standard space opera tropes look a little run-down.
The basic set up is that the known universe (a bunch of systems linked by wormholes) has been conquered by the Shaa -- aliens who follow a strict philosophical/religious code called the Praxis. While the Shaa had developed the technology to become immortal, the weight of years took an inevitable toll on them. So they forbade anyone else from developing life-extending tech and slowly the Shaa have dwindled away. Then the last Shaa dies and all hell breaks loose.
It takes a little time getting up to speed, but I really clipped through the last half of the book. It was certainly better than the Honor Harrington I've read and not a complete waste of time, but I'm not interested enough right now to persue the rest of the trilogy.
later
Tom
