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A review by roxanamalinachirila
Assassin's Creed: The Ankh of Isis Trilogy by Éric Corbeyran
2.0
I would have rated this book higher, had it not been so remarkably unaware of the rules of its own universe.
So, Assassin's Creed is based on the neat premise that you can access your ancestors' memories through some sort of genetic mumbo-jumbo. As pointed out very clearly in the second game in the series, this means that the moment your ancestor has a kid who's your ancestor, your memories jump towards the kid, they don't stick with the parent. Which makes sense.
The Ankh of Isis starts with Abstergo thinking that the main character's ancestor died in battle. Because he was in battle and he got wounded really badly. Erm... then who would carry on the line?... Hell if I know. It doesn't help that Desmond gets really badly shaken by the death of said ancestor a bit later on (thankfully, they remembered to make the ancient guy's wife pregnant to keep the line going).
Then, the ultra-secret assassins hide in Monteriggioni, the home of Desmond's ancestors which they enemies, the templars, have known about since at least the Renaissance.
People have been carrying out the same family names or name themes since ancient times, let's not forget about that: the descendant of a guy named for a vulture is named for a vulture; the descendant of a guy named for a hawk is named for a hawk. The descendant of a guy named for a raven is called... well, Crow. I assume that at some point the last of the line of Raven, a woman, dashed madly around the world looking for someone with the right name. Alas, no ravens, but she still found one of the Corvus family.
The trilogy ends with the ancestor Raven guy's recorded message saying that the ship he was on, carrying a very important object, is sinking. The object will be lost forever and he will die in the shipwreck. They must have put the recorded message on a lifeboat, then, because by my thinking it was supposed to have been at the bottom of the sea, with his bones and the very important object.
Gah, inconsistency much. (also, talking about Ravens, Vultures, Hawks and Eagles at the end was getting a bit silly - I assume Desmond was eventually descended from too many birds, so he flew a lot of Miles, which is how he got his last name)
It also messes with the Assassin's Creed universe, sticking close to the games in some places and inventing entirely new things in others. It felt odd, since the universe isn't large enough yet to require rewrites, or to accept them easily. I'm not sure why the writer found it necessary to do things the way he did.
Overall, not very impressive, although I did have a bit of a laugh with fridge logic. The art is okay, the story could be better if done better, but then, couldn't that be said of almost any book?
So, Assassin's Creed is based on the neat premise that you can access your ancestors' memories through some sort of genetic mumbo-jumbo. As pointed out very clearly in the second game in the series, this means that the moment your ancestor has a kid who's your ancestor, your memories jump towards the kid, they don't stick with the parent. Which makes sense.
The Ankh of Isis starts with Abstergo thinking that the main character's ancestor died in battle. Because he was in battle and he got wounded really badly. Erm... then who would carry on the line?... Hell if I know. It doesn't help that Desmond gets really badly shaken by the death of said ancestor a bit later on (thankfully, they remembered to make the ancient guy's wife pregnant to keep the line going).
Then, the ultra-secret assassins hide in Monteriggioni, the home of Desmond's ancestors which they enemies, the templars, have known about since at least the Renaissance.
People have been carrying out the same family names or name themes since ancient times, let's not forget about that: the descendant of a guy named for a vulture is named for a vulture; the descendant of a guy named for a hawk is named for a hawk. The descendant of a guy named for a raven is called... well, Crow. I assume that at some point the last of the line of Raven, a woman, dashed madly around the world looking for someone with the right name. Alas, no ravens, but she still found one of the Corvus family.
The trilogy ends with the ancestor Raven guy's recorded message saying that the ship he was on, carrying a very important object, is sinking. The object will be lost forever and he will die in the shipwreck. They must have put the recorded message on a lifeboat, then, because by my thinking it was supposed to have been at the bottom of the sea, with his bones and the very important object.
Gah, inconsistency much. (also, talking about Ravens, Vultures, Hawks and Eagles at the end was getting a bit silly - I assume Desmond was eventually descended from too many birds, so he flew a lot of Miles, which is how he got his last name)
It also messes with the Assassin's Creed universe, sticking close to the games in some places and inventing entirely new things in others. It felt odd, since the universe isn't large enough yet to require rewrites, or to accept them easily. I'm not sure why the writer found it necessary to do things the way he did.
Overall, not very impressive, although I did have a bit of a laugh with fridge logic. The art is okay, the story could be better if done better, but then, couldn't that be said of almost any book?