Reviews

Children of Earth and Sky by Guy Gavriel Kay

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timinbc's review against another edition

5.0

I am a little sad today. Not because this book had a sad ending - it didn't, it had a wonderful ending.
I am sad because I hope I have many years left but I may well never again read a book as good as this one. It may be the best I have ever read, and I read a lot.

I've read most of Kay's work, and enjoyed it, and admired it. But this goes beyond. It makes me think of my beer-drinking experiences. I like Belgian beers and I have tried many dozens of them. But there are two - Trappist Rochefort 10 and Westvleteren XII - that are just so far above the others that even the best of the others is a slight disappointment. This is such a book.

It's set in a fascinating environment - almost eastern Europe in the 1400s, well researched and adapted. But it's jammed with Really Interesting people. People who feel completely real. People with flaws, people who make mistakes. People who make you NEED to know what happens to them.

Some say the way to write a story is to invent great characters, drop them in a setting, and see what inevitably has to happen to them. This is like that. Almost every character ends up at least once in a situation that's completely plausible in the given setting, but completely changes the character's life. Each one reacts in a way consistent with what we know so far; each one now has a new hand to play, and so things develop.

My one tiny, tiny complaint is that Danica is one of those annoying characters who can shoot an arrow left-handed and blindfolded in a hurricane and knock the pip out of a playing card held by a bird with a broken wing 300 yards away. Too many fantasies have that.

It's going to be hard to go back to the standard top-selling multi-volume fantasy full of sorcerers and giant armies, 40-page battle scenes full of intestines and beheadings. This one has battles and nasty stuff, but it's not slathered on, it's there because it's necessary for us to know what happened; it's going to shape the characters involved.

For the last 80 pages or so, I was dreading the expected "sadly, this was not to be" for about half of the remaining characters. Kay chose otherwise, hooray, and this time at least it was exactly the right choice.

Maybe this book has too many

Spoiler

good people in it, or too much focus on them

, but somehow I was exactly ready for a book like that.

Just imagine hearing this:
"Hello, I'm Neil Gaiman and I'm going to read you 'Children of Earth and Sky.' "
(or possibly GGK himself, but I have never heard him read)

I will read this book again and again, wrapping it around myself like a favourite blanket.
I will drink an expensive Belgian beer as I do so.
Sometimes the world turns as it does and we are granted such things.

Thank you, GGK.

zubatus's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious slow-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

gasket's review against another edition

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adventurous informative mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

jjcopper's review against another edition

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adventurous reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

banjax451's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Was this my favorite book by GGK (certainly in my top 5 favorite authors)? Probably not. For about the first third of the book I was struggling to come to any sort of conclusion as to what the theme(s) of the novel were. About midway through, it picked up and by the end I was very satisfied. In a lot of ways, this is the true sequel to the Sarantine Mosaic novels - while there are other GGK novels that are set in this same "our world, turned a quarter to the fantastic" shared universe, neither Children nor Lions deal directly with the events of the Sarantine novels. It isn't a true sequel - we're 800 years in the future - but the events of those books (and their settings) have direct impacts upon the events here. And that, in a nutshell, is (I think) what GGK is talking about here. How the smallest and most random of events can change the destiny of people one has never met.

What elevates GGK is the prose. His prose is so fantastic - borderline poetic at times - that I'm willing to forgive whatever faults I might find here and there. He is truly a wonderful writer and I will always look forward to what's next (only 2 of his books left to go!).

mrbear's review against another edition

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3.0

This book suffered from many of Kay's standard shortcomings in his lesser novels. The plot lacked any real drive in the sense that although the characters were developed and progressed through the world doing things, for the most part their doings were completely secondary to the depiction and romanticization of the world around them. Kay's stronger works (like the Lions of al-Rassan and the Sarantium series) have this latter element while still maintaining sufficient intrigue in the plot.

Therefore although the book was compelling enough to finish quickly, and certainly better written than many other novels of its kind, I can't possibly recommend it except to those who have read and enjoyed Kay's better works and know exactly what to expect.