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timinbc's review against another edition
1.0
OK, maybe I shouldn't have skipped book 5. But this one was at hand so I tried it.
Forty pages in, I gave up.
Got tired of "Baron X's illegitimate nephew, having drugged the uncle of W's great-niece in a misguided attempt to influence Y's decision not to interfere with Z's infiltration of Y ... cut to new location Guns! Action! Army-type communications! Wow! ... cut to another WTF location, where a mysterious character is examining runes OOPS! They killed him, because he knew too much about A's uncle's cousin's vizier's security chief's plan to embarrass B's security chief into revealing the location of C's secret hideaway, no not that one the REALLY secret one, except that little does he know that The Guys From The Other Side found it last week and There's A Bomb!
Ah, the hell with it. I'm glad I skipped #5. This series is out of gas. No biggie, I had already stopped caring what happened to any of them anyway.
Forty pages in, I gave up.
Got tired of "Baron X's illegitimate nephew, having drugged the uncle of W's great-niece in a misguided attempt to influence Y's decision not to interfere with Z's infiltration of Y ... cut to new location Guns! Action! Army-type communications! Wow! ... cut to another WTF location, where a mysterious character is examining runes OOPS! They killed him, because he knew too much about A's uncle's cousin's vizier's security chief's plan to embarrass B's security chief into revealing the location of C's secret hideaway, no not that one the REALLY secret one, except that little does he know that The Guys From The Other Side found it last week and There's A Bomb!
Ah, the hell with it. I'm glad I skipped #5. This series is out of gas. No biggie, I had already stopped caring what happened to any of them anyway.
riotsquirrrl's review against another edition
3.0
So this book is about 1/3 guns & explosions and 1/3 characters recounting the plot so far to one another. I think that the author finally realized that he needed to do more to help readers remember who everyone was. I'm also not sure what to do with the fact that Dick Cheney is referred to exclusively as WARBUCKS without using his name. I can only surmise that it is a fig leaf of deniability and that Stross wasn't *really* talking about Cheney. Still this was a 1800 page revenge fic against the George W. Bush administration. Like, clearly. I also desperately hope that the dialog between the military/nsa/FBI types is an exaggeration because all of it, with the copious number of gratuitous ACRONYMS and CODEWORDS for everything and their general insufferability was just A Lot.
The ending is too pat and the characters are kind of wooden but the series was almost compulsively readable. There are also a lot of resonances between this book and other, currently unfolding world events, unfortunately.
Ugh yes I probably will go and read the next 3 books in the series.
The ending is too pat and the characters are kind of wooden but the series was almost compulsively readable. There are also a lot of resonances between this book and other, currently unfolding world events, unfortunately.
Ugh yes I probably will go and read the next 3 books in the series.
eastofthesunwestofthemoon's review against another edition
4.0
3 1/2 stars. It wrapped up some questions but left way too many unanswered. It's a decent book and a decent addition to the series, but it certainly doesn't feel like the climactic story in the arc.
titusfortner's review against another edition
4.0
I seemed to enjoy the end of this series more than most people. It probably helps that I know there is a new series picking up the story of my favorite character, rather than leaving her as she was at the end of this book. The book was a bit cartoonish in parts with its anti-hawkishness, but it worked for the story.
mjfmjfmjf's review against another edition
4.0
Pretty good book but not an especially good end-of-series book. I just kind of wanted more. But I read so many books between starting and finishing this reread it's hard to be specific.
spinnerroweok's review against another edition
4.0
Stross really hates the Bush administration. It's a good book, but it still leaves a lot of questions unanswered. This volume of the story doesn't focus on characters like past volumes which I thought was the strong point of the series. It does spend a lot of time turning conservatives and members of the Bush administration into cartoon super villains. I really think that if Stross had gone less evil super villain and presented those characters more sympathetically, it could have really been an effective exploration of the morality of using nuclear weapons. Instead, it was too cartoony. Still, it's a page turner. I finished it on one day. I recommend this series.
joedye's review against another edition
doesn't feel like an ending of a series. Many threads are left open or unresolved.
onceandfuturelaura's review against another edition
3.0
Come not between President Rumsfeld and his wrath.
steveab's review against another edition
3.0
Yes, I finished all six books in Charles Stross' Merchant Princes series. And I'm glad I did. Truly, the series had its high points and low points. Stross had a great concept: a modern 21st century woman tech journalist suddenly caught up in medieval kingdom. No, silly, not time travel, but parallel universe.
By the second or third volume, the strong tug of hard science fiction had pulled Stross back from the alure, especially these days, of fantasy. I figure any career-minded SciFi writer today has to tackle the strong women, fantastical on Earth, romance and danger realms sweeping science. Stross, whose books I generally really like, jumped right in.
Midway through, another theme emerges and i won't say much except, as others have noted, Stross layers over the medievalism a strong antipathy to current US global conservative politics, with cataclysmic results. I caught myself checking my "what else is new" reaction against what I suspect will be less sympathetic reaction among some readers. So be it; its great to see clear positive politics, even if apocalyptic, in modern science fiction.
In favorite books of yore, back to Canticle for Leibowitz , or films such as Dr Strangelove or On the Beach, the self-destructive perfidy of US (or US and Russian) leadership was more satirical or detached. Here its up front an personal, as much as a series of 24.
THroughout it all, the central character of Miriam Beckstein (not her real name...) and central pals and co-conspirators, male and female, all shine as engaging characters you want to know more about.
Be warned, and enjoy.
By the second or third volume, the strong tug of hard science fiction had pulled Stross back from the alure, especially these days, of fantasy. I figure any career-minded SciFi writer today has to tackle the strong women, fantastical on Earth, romance and danger realms sweeping science. Stross, whose books I generally really like, jumped right in.
Midway through, another theme emerges and i won't say much except, as others have noted, Stross layers over the medievalism a strong antipathy to current US global conservative politics, with cataclysmic results. I caught myself checking my "what else is new" reaction against what I suspect will be less sympathetic reaction among some readers. So be it; its great to see clear positive politics, even if apocalyptic, in modern science fiction.
In favorite books of yore, back to Canticle for Leibowitz , or films such as Dr Strangelove or On the Beach, the self-destructive perfidy of US (or US and Russian) leadership was more satirical or detached. Here its up front an personal, as much as a series of 24.
THroughout it all, the central character of Miriam Beckstein (not her real name...) and central pals and co-conspirators, male and female, all shine as engaging characters you want to know more about.
Be warned, and enjoy.
curgoth's review against another edition
3.0
Audiobook re-read.
I enjoyed this a lot more than I remembered from the first paper read. I still have a hard time connecting with Miriam as a character, but the thriller and political aspects carry the story. It's also weird to look at the GWB era of US politics as "relatively sane". The reader is also decent, handling both Mike Fleming's Boston accent and the consistent Germanic Hochsprache accent.
I enjoyed this a lot more than I remembered from the first paper read. I still have a hard time connecting with Miriam as a character, but the thriller and political aspects carry the story. It's also weird to look at the GWB era of US politics as "relatively sane". The reader is also decent, handling both Mike Fleming's Boston accent and the consistent Germanic Hochsprache accent.