What a long strange review it's been

Hi,

So I finally blasted through the tail end of Epiphany of the Long Sun by Gene Wolfe. This is the second volume of the Long Sun series. This volume contains Calde of the Long Sun and Exodus from the Long Sun.

I reviewed the first volume about a month ago. I've been busy with some other stuff, but really, the book just wasn't doing it for me. I think the big problem was that the cast of characters quickly blossomed and the author broke them up into small groups and jumped from group to group. A fine literary device, except he'd get a group into trouble, cut away for awhile and when he came back, the group was now past the danger and somewhere completely different and then you had twenty minutes of exposition (often rather vague and confusing) and then it'd be time to set up a cliffhanger. Also, groups of characters had an annoying habit of nearly meeting up to exchange stories and then they'd just miss each other for one reason or another.

Silk, the main character in the book has a lot of interesting meditations on various topics, but they often seem rather incongruously placed.

Finally, there are plenty of things that are left unexplained and mysterious and many of them are handled well, but there are a number of plot points (some that got a considerable page count place on them) that just go nowhere. It's like those bits in Shakespeare when you go "hold on, what about that one guy who was supposed to do that thing?". Gone and you never hear from them again.

All in all, it's a very troubled series. Lots of great ideas, but some very muddled execution.

later
Tom

What a long strange review it's been

Hi,

So I finally blasted through the tail end of Epiphany of the Long Sun by Gene Wolfe. This is the second volume of the Long Sun series. This volume contains Calde of the Long Sun and Exodus from the Long Sun.

I reviewed the first volume about a month ago. I've been busy with some other stuff, but really, the book just wasn't doing it for me. I think the big problem was that the cast of characters quickly blossomed and the author broke them up into small groups and jumped from group to group. A fine literary device, except he'd get a group into trouble, cut away for awhile and when he came back, the group was now past the danger and somewhere completely different and then you had twenty minutes of exposition (often rather vague and confusing) and then it'd be time to set up a cliffhanger. Also, groups of characters had an annoying habit of nearly meeting up to exchange stories and then they'd just miss each other for one reason or another.

Silk, the main character in the book has a lot of interesting meditations on various topics, but they often seem rather incongruously placed.

Finally, there are plenty of things that are left unexplained and mysterious and many of them are handled well, but there are a number of plot points (some that got a considerable page count place on them) that just go nowhere. It's like those bits in Shakespeare when you go "hold on, what about that one guy who was supposed to do that thing?". Gone and you never hear from them again.

All in all, it's a very troubled series. Lots of great ideas, but some very muddled execution.

later
Tom