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tarugani's review against another edition
4.0
I picked this up on a whim from the library because it was short and I've been meaning to try Elizabeth Bear. Vampires aren't *really* my thing, but I still enjoyed it and would read more.
I was going to say that it was a bit confusing, but of course, I realized when I came here to Goodreads that it's the fourth book in a series. So reading the others would probably help.
I was going to say that it was a bit confusing, but of course, I realized when I came here to Goodreads that it's the fourth book in a series. So reading the others would probably help.
mateyy's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
angiediane's review
4.0
The only problem was that it was far too short. My main disappointment was that it felt as if the book cut off just as the story was really getting good. More story, please!! Although I have read that Bear will not be writing any more of the New Amsterdams. Sad face.
sarahbotreads's review
4.0
I really enjoyed _Ad Eternum_, but the common theme to me for these novellas is that I'm way more interested in the stuff happening off-screen, and that's true here, too. I wanted to know more about the hotel (John Wick style), and what happens with the university. I did enjoy the new characters that were introduced here.
mackle13's review
3.0
Jumping back to the future, as it were, we find Sebastian returning to New Amsterdam for the first time since the events of the first book - and after the passing of Lady Irene.
He returns to a place where it is no longer just to exist as a wampyr, but which is not entirely accepting of them, either, and a lot of the tension in the story hinges on that.
He also meets a new group of potential friends - all sorcerers and one perhaps immortal - but an encounter with an old friend (from 'Seven for a Secret'), and his recent past, leaves Sebastian uncertain of his future - or if he even wants one...
My biggest issue with this story is that it's another one that ends too quickly, leaving you with a sense of incompleteness... I do hope that there's more eventually. (According to a timeline at the beginning of [b:Garrett Investigates|16158784|Garrett Investigates (New Amsterdam, #5)|Elizabeth Bear|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1353323651s/16158784.jpg|21999306], this is the latest, chronologically, of the stories.)
But I would like to see more of Sebastian and Ruth together, and also more of Damian. And I wonder what it would be like for Sebastian to actually become...
He returns to a place where it is no longer just to exist as a wampyr, but which is not entirely accepting of them, either, and a lot of the tension in the story hinges on that.
He also meets a new group of potential friends - all sorcerers and one perhaps immortal - but an encounter with an old friend (from 'Seven for a Secret'), and his recent past, leaves Sebastian uncertain of his future - or if he even wants one...
My biggest issue with this story is that it's another one that ends too quickly, leaving you with a sense of incompleteness... I do hope that there's more eventually. (According to a timeline at the beginning of [b:Garrett Investigates|16158784|Garrett Investigates (New Amsterdam, #5)|Elizabeth Bear|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1353323651s/16158784.jpg|21999306], this is the latest, chronologically, of the stories.)
But I would like to see more of Sebastian and Ruth together, and also more of Damian. And I wonder what it would be like for Sebastian to actually become
Spoiler
a teacherthecyrulik's review
4.0
New Amsterdam books always leave me so tired of living, so exhausted and a little disappointed (but not surprised) with humanity as a whole. I guess I'm getting second-hand feelings of don Sebastien, who is a very poor thing.
expendablemudge's review
4.0
Rating: 4* of five
The Publisher Says: For centuries, the wampyr has drifted from one place to another. From one life to another. It's 1962, and he's returned to New Amsterdam for the first time since he fled it on pain of death some sixty years before. On the eve of social revolution, on the cusp of a new way of life, he's nevertheless surrounded by inescapable reminders of who he used to be.
For a thousand years, he's chosen to change rather than to die. Now, at last, he faces a different future....
My Review: This entry in Bear's New Amsterdam alternative history series, in which vampires exist and majgicqk works, and the world's various political powers have a variety of different uses for it, is a doozie, but a shortie. It's only 90pp long.
Don Sebastien de Ulloa, as the wampyr was styled when first we met him, returns to New Amsterdam (our New York) to begin a new chapter in his life. Abby Irene, a forensic sorceress who figured prominently in the series, has gone to her sorcerous reward. Unsurprising, since it's now 1962, and she was over a century old. Don Sebastien/Dr. James Chaisty/Jack Prior, as he now styles himself, is recognized on his transAtlantic jet flight by Dr. Damian Thomas, a sorceror with a plan to open a magical university in New Amsterdam: Its first, and he hopes Jack Prior (such a sweet hommage) will join their faculty and share his many centuries of knowledge with the students. What will he get in return?
A home. For so long as he wants it, for once, instead of so long as it's possible to hide his true nature. Universities, you see, outlast people, cultures, politics, nations...damned close to eternal, as it would seem. And a magical university is going to be able to protect our wampyr as long as he needs to be protected. They're sorcerors. They got this.
It's a tempting offer, but a millennium of survival habit, of keeping moving at all costs, is hard to overcome. A team of persuasive sorcerors, a meeting with the “Comte de Saint-Germain,” and the demise of Don Sebastien's other living arrangements as well as plans made with a certain werewolf, still don't convince him. But Dr. Damian Thomas...love...connection...that still seduces him after a millennium of watching human loves wither and die.
It is this sense of hopefulness, this willingness to answer the call to connect despite a weariness and a sadness and a misery of loneliness bred by a millennium's solitary wandering, that makes these 90pp so powerful. Why “live”? Why keep feeding and surviving? Because, well, because love and connection...they never stop mattering. Don Sebastien, older than anything else in the world that walks on its own feet (maybe), he still wants to be in it and with it and experience it.
Still.
Isn't that an amazing and a beautiful thing? I think it is, and that's why I read these books.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
The Publisher Says: For centuries, the wampyr has drifted from one place to another. From one life to another. It's 1962, and he's returned to New Amsterdam for the first time since he fled it on pain of death some sixty years before. On the eve of social revolution, on the cusp of a new way of life, he's nevertheless surrounded by inescapable reminders of who he used to be.
For a thousand years, he's chosen to change rather than to die. Now, at last, he faces a different future....
My Review: This entry in Bear's New Amsterdam alternative history series, in which vampires exist and majgicqk works, and the world's various political powers have a variety of different uses for it, is a doozie, but a shortie. It's only 90pp long.
Don Sebastien de Ulloa, as the wampyr was styled when first we met him, returns to New Amsterdam (our New York) to begin a new chapter in his life. Abby Irene, a forensic sorceress who figured prominently in the series, has gone to her sorcerous reward. Unsurprising, since it's now 1962, and she was over a century old. Don Sebastien/Dr. James Chaisty/Jack Prior, as he now styles himself, is recognized on his transAtlantic jet flight by Dr. Damian Thomas, a sorceror with a plan to open a magical university in New Amsterdam: Its first, and he hopes Jack Prior (such a sweet hommage) will join their faculty and share his many centuries of knowledge with the students. What will he get in return?
A home. For so long as he wants it, for once, instead of so long as it's possible to hide his true nature. Universities, you see, outlast people, cultures, politics, nations...damned close to eternal, as it would seem. And a magical university is going to be able to protect our wampyr as long as he needs to be protected. They're sorcerors. They got this.
It's a tempting offer, but a millennium of survival habit, of keeping moving at all costs, is hard to overcome. A team of persuasive sorcerors, a meeting with the “Comte de Saint-Germain,” and the demise of Don Sebastien's other living arrangements as well as plans made with a certain werewolf, still don't convince him. But Dr. Damian Thomas...love...connection...that still seduces him after a millennium of watching human loves wither and die.
It is this sense of hopefulness, this willingness to answer the call to connect despite a weariness and a sadness and a misery of loneliness bred by a millennium's solitary wandering, that makes these 90pp so powerful. Why “live”? Why keep feeding and surviving? Because, well, because love and connection...they never stop mattering. Don Sebastien, older than anything else in the world that walks on its own feet (maybe), he still wants to be in it and with it and experience it.
Still.
Isn't that an amazing and a beautiful thing? I think it is, and that's why I read these books.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
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