Scan barcode
mducks's review
3.0
It's Elric you either love this stuff or you hate it. A fond memory of the 1970's.
bums's review against another edition
3.0
Elric at the End of Time - 4.5
The title story is an easyly the best in this collection. Elric travels to the end of time, meeting characters that I'm sure are familiar to people who've read those stories but also Una Persson who appears in the Oswald Bastable novels 9and, I assume, the End of Time series). Fun commentary on who Elric is and how moody and melodramatic a character he is.
The Last Enchantment - 3/5
This story was a fun and weird non-canonical short Elric tale as the Albino Prince of Ruins is transported to a chaos realm and has to do some quick thinking to escape. Nothing stellar but good none the less.
Sojan Shieldbearer - 2/5
These stories are passable. It's interesting to see some of the first work Moorcock ever produced but he has definitely substantially improved, even by the early 60's. Nothing very good but if you like to see an author's evolution, this will give you an idea of where Moorcock started out as a teenager.
The Essay's - 3/5
The various essays were interesting to read though, aside from the Elric one, were seemingly irrelevant to the rest of the stories within, mainly focusing on Jerry Cornelius who is only briefly mentioned in the title story. Good insight into the author and the diferent things he's been invovled in such as the New World magazine.
The Stone Thing - 3/5
Funny little short that satirises many of the tropes that Elric and other fantasy heroes of Moorcock make use of. Funny, short read.
Overall - 3/5
An uneven collection that isn't really about Elric at all. The Elric stuff is all pretty good, its just a shame that the majority of the content is based around the uninteresting character of Sojan.
The title story is an easyly the best in this collection. Elric travels to the end of time, meeting characters that I'm sure are familiar to people who've read those stories but also Una Persson who appears in the Oswald Bastable novels 9and, I assume, the End of Time series). Fun commentary on who Elric is and how moody and melodramatic a character he is.
The Last Enchantment - 3/5
This story was a fun and weird non-canonical short Elric tale as the Albino Prince of Ruins is transported to a chaos realm and has to do some quick thinking to escape. Nothing stellar but good none the less.
Sojan Shieldbearer - 2/5
These stories are passable. It's interesting to see some of the first work Moorcock ever produced but he has definitely substantially improved, even by the early 60's. Nothing very good but if you like to see an author's evolution, this will give you an idea of where Moorcock started out as a teenager.
The Essay's - 3/5
The various essays were interesting to read though, aside from the Elric one, were seemingly irrelevant to the rest of the stories within, mainly focusing on Jerry Cornelius who is only briefly mentioned in the title story. Good insight into the author and the diferent things he's been invovled in such as the New World magazine.
The Stone Thing - 3/5
Funny little short that satirises many of the tropes that Elric and other fantasy heroes of Moorcock make use of. Funny, short read.
Overall - 3/5
An uneven collection that isn't really about Elric at all. The Elric stuff is all pretty good, its just a shame that the majority of the content is based around the uninteresting character of Sojan.
ianbanks's review against another edition
3.0
While the titular Elric story is quite entertaining, it's a fairly lightweight piece, as are the other fictional offerings in this volume, including the rather good natured self-parody of The Stone Thing, the story that rounds out this collection. The series of episodic short stories that make up the Sojan collection are only there for completists or fans of Mr Moorcock's juvenilia or for people who want to track the progress of an author across his entire career. While I love a lot of the work of Moorcock, he is not that author for me. Of more interest to readers like me are the two non-fiction pieces detailing the development of Elric as a character and just how much he mirrored Moorcock's inner life and the state of play in British SF when he came to edit New Worlds. I very rarely use the expression "curate's egg" but it feels particularly apposite here.
joxertd's review
2.0
I did not like this at alk. I had no idea what was going on for the first story. It does not pick up where book six left off. Im not sure i want to continue the series.
riduidel's review against another edition
1.0
Il y a dans ce livre trois ensembles de nouvelles.
D'abord, trois nouvelles sur Elric dont la première donne son titre au recueil.
Ensuite, le paté des aventures de Sojan, un pulp datant de 58 où chaque aventure ne prend pas plus de cinq pages.
Et enfin, une courte nouvelle en forme de blague sur les héros amputés de Moorcock.
Si le dernier texte a un certain intérêt, ça n'est certainement pas le cas du premier, que j'ai eu un mal incroyable à lire (à cause d'une écriture aussi lourde et ampoulée qu'un récit du XVIIIème siècle).
Quant à Sojan, le brouillon est intéressant, mais loin d'être un texte valable.
D'abord, trois nouvelles sur Elric dont la première donne son titre au recueil.
Ensuite, le paté des aventures de Sojan, un pulp datant de 58 où chaque aventure ne prend pas plus de cinq pages.
Et enfin, une courte nouvelle en forme de blague sur les héros amputés de Moorcock.
Si le dernier texte a un certain intérêt, ça n'est certainement pas le cas du premier, que j'ai eu un mal incroyable à lire (à cause d'une écriture aussi lourde et ampoulée qu'un récit du XVIIIème siècle).
Quant à Sojan, le brouillon est intéressant, mais loin d'être un texte valable.
terminatee's review
1.0
Most of this book is not about Elric and written very poorly. What few Elric stories there are are poor also.
brian's review
2.0
A collection of essays from Moorcock's time on various magazines, as well as the titular Elric short story.
This is so-so at best.
There are a set of stories about Sojan Shieldbreaker (kind of a Conan/John Carter hybrid) and finally an odd one-off, which is possibly trying to be ironic or humorous, but fails at either.
This is so-so at best.
There are a set of stories about Sojan Shieldbreaker (kind of a Conan/John Carter hybrid) and finally an odd one-off, which is possibly trying to be ironic or humorous, but fails at either.
More...