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bhirts's review against another edition
4.0
Surprised by how much I was able to enjoy this book without ever really understanding what it was “about” until the end.
Very sad, in a good way.
Very sad, in a good way.
jimmypat's review against another edition
2.0
I kind of get the “message” of this book, but the author is laboring under the delusion that the reader cares about these characters. There is a lot of telling and not showing in this book, with very little depth of character or relationships. This might have been more interesting if it was a family saga book with more details and storytelling- but it just comes off as a lazy outline.
jyan's review against another edition
3.0
It seems fitting that a time when I'm surrounded by death that the books I've chosen to read are helping me through it. For what it's worth, this is a good one. A bit muddled, absolutely, and some elements feel weird for weirdness's sake, but by the time the ending rolls around and everything becomes clear(ish), Stewart's message comes through loud and clear in a quite profound way. When I reached the final chapters, I wished I could spend more time with these characters, the sign of something very special.
kristi_asleep_dreaming's review
4.0
A world awash in a rising tide of magic. Hard not to like. But I wish he'd spent more time with the evil twin, the character I really liked. Damien was a bit of a wash-out. I really liked the world-portrayal, the strangeness of it all, but there wasn't enough of it to carry the book on its own.
apostrophen's review
4.0
This was a book from Mr. Dude, which I shot through in a quick couple of days to and fro from work. It's interesting - a contemporarily set magical realism world, our world, to be exact, where magic has quietly been returning since around World War II.
By contemporary times, that magic is flexing its muscles. There are people with natural abilities - who are dubbed angels - and there are people who try to master its forces more externally - who are dubbed wizards. This tale focuses on an angel.
Our hero discovers his own body, and slowly has to come to terms with what that means: he's fairly sure this corpse will turn up for real in seven days, and his autopsy (of his own body) shows a spider sac growing inside the body. He's going to die. His brother, a literally marked man, asks our hero to do the one thing he has never done: embrace his angel abilities, and help his brother find out who he really is, and what happened to leave the butterfly mark on his brother's face.
Meanwhile, as the angel realizes that his abilities focus on the raising of the dead, and his family live grows more and more complicated, and the mystery about his "brother" deepens, the one-week clock continues to tick.
Solid writing (but also damned disturbing imagery) make this a book to keep an eye out for.
By contemporary times, that magic is flexing its muscles. There are people with natural abilities - who are dubbed angels - and there are people who try to master its forces more externally - who are dubbed wizards. This tale focuses on an angel.
Our hero discovers his own body, and slowly has to come to terms with what that means: he's fairly sure this corpse will turn up for real in seven days, and his autopsy (of his own body) shows a spider sac growing inside the body. He's going to die. His brother, a literally marked man, asks our hero to do the one thing he has never done: embrace his angel abilities, and help his brother find out who he really is, and what happened to leave the butterfly mark on his brother's face.
Meanwhile, as the angel realizes that his abilities focus on the raising of the dead, and his family live grows more and more complicated, and the mystery about his "brother" deepens, the one-week clock continues to tick.
Solid writing (but also damned disturbing imagery) make this a book to keep an eye out for.
arnicas's review
4.0
Reread- I love Sean Stewart’s brand of fantastical realism (or magically real fantasy). This is a world with magic but it’s about family secrets and guilt. It’s an early novel and feels like it, though.
gengelcox's review
4.0
It was Don Webb who first pointed me in Stewart's direction, but it took me quite a while before I finally picked up a novel of his. This of course was due to no active avoidance, but simply because I have way too many books to read as it is. Still, if I never got any recommendations, I would miss out on some amazing books, of which Resurrection Man is one of them.
I like fantasy based in the real world--something magical hidden under the surface. When young, I remember being fascinated by magicians, tarot cards, and voodoo. I liked science fiction, but ESP and telekinetics did not intrigue me as much as the rituals of fantasy. This was the difference between science and magic, even when both could accomplish the same effect. Later in life, this preoccupation with magic had me gravitating to magic realism in my reading, a subject which I still actively seek out.
Resurrection Man is not quite magic realism (at least in my definition of the term) because Stewart's world is not our own. It has many similarities, but the differences--angels working for the police, feng shui necessary for building placement--are striking. What makes Stewart seem like magic realism is for his style of writing about this alternate world, almost laconic, but seemingly realistic.
The plot is a strange mixture of mystery and secrets that also appealed to me, as the protagonist must deal with his own angelic nature (not as heavenly as you might think), the past of his aunt's husband, and a possible child, both born yet unborn. I liked Resurrection Man a lot, and I'm looking forward to reading another book by Stewart to see if he can capture my interests so completely once again.
I like fantasy based in the real world--something magical hidden under the surface. When young, I remember being fascinated by magicians, tarot cards, and voodoo. I liked science fiction, but ESP and telekinetics did not intrigue me as much as the rituals of fantasy. This was the difference between science and magic, even when both could accomplish the same effect. Later in life, this preoccupation with magic had me gravitating to magic realism in my reading, a subject which I still actively seek out.
Resurrection Man is not quite magic realism (at least in my definition of the term) because Stewart's world is not our own. It has many similarities, but the differences--angels working for the police, feng shui necessary for building placement--are striking. What makes Stewart seem like magic realism is for his style of writing about this alternate world, almost laconic, but seemingly realistic.
The plot is a strange mixture of mystery and secrets that also appealed to me, as the protagonist must deal with his own angelic nature (not as heavenly as you might think), the past of his aunt's husband, and a possible child, both born yet unborn. I liked Resurrection Man a lot, and I'm looking forward to reading another book by Stewart to see if he can capture my interests so completely once again.
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