Ahira's Hangar

I'm constantly amazed by how little known his books are. His jhereg books are great, very funny, plus they (like Asoiaf) have that element where you are constantly wondering about things. His Khaavren books are hilarious I have heard several people admit that they couldnt stop laughing. The new one just came out ive got to get it. Ill see if I can get a link to a thread at rans board where multiple people showed a great example of the humour in the pheonix guards. heh Asshai by the Shadow a new board, come discuss the darker side of ASoIaF.<i></i>

I'll read Burst, if you read Neverness, another hard 2 find book!
If the brain were so simple we could understand it, we would be so simple we couldn't.
Lyall Watson
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Who is neverness by? Asshai by the Shadow
Love endures by a bond which men, being scoundrels, may break whenever it serves their advantage to do so; but fear is supported by the dread of pain, which is ever present.-Machiavelli, The Prince.
It takes balls of steel to quote yourself.-wolflord11<i></i>

Neverness is by Zindell...scroll down to the bottom of the page and you'll see pictures of the books.

~MsMary~ "Does the walker choose the path, or the path the walker?"<i></i>

Just bought Brokedown Palace by Steven Burst, and read the prolouge, man it looks so cool! I'll be hard pressed to discipline self to finish A New Earth and My Sister's Keeper with this bad boy lying around.

You can get one of his books for free (never read it, but I downloaded it the other day).

http://manybooks.net/titles/brustsother ... eedom.html

I'm a little over three-fourths done with Brokedown Palace and I'm still not very sure what to make of it. It has, pretty much, all the elements of a very good fantasy: a unique and very interesting system of magic, possibly anti-Earthsea magic, but then again maybe not-you can feel elements of Gormenghast, Tad Williams, Patricia McKillip and, even, Gene Wolfe every now and then. All the characters are well formed and interesting but I'm not sure what the point is. Some time's it great stuff, some time's certain stuff just strikes me as bleah: why is this in there? I'll let you know if it redeems itself in the next 60 pages, I mean for god's sake it even has a cool dragon, but for now I keep asking what the hell is it?

Ok it redeems itself 50% due to a good to a great author, 30% because of it's innocence as a, seemingly simple story-ala McKillip and 20% because it actually is the 1st book in a series. It doesn't say it is but the subtitle to the book is A Tale From the East, this book is listed under the heading of "The Dragaeran Novels". Burst is an excellent writer, but if this was a standalone it would have missed the mark. Dragon and Issola are supposed to be very good and are part of the Vlad Taltos series-I may look for them while awaiting the second "Dragaeran" book.

Just finished Jhereg and it was SO entertaining I ran out and bought Yendi and Teckla the next two books in the series. Brokedown Palace is set in the same world, but it's a bit more serious dealing with the east and the fairy-like land in between the east and the Dragaren Empire. Normal humans inhabit the east and practice witchcraft. Dragareans are very tall "humans" that have a bit of a reptillian resemblance and practice sorcery. Vald Taltos is an easterner who grew up in his father's restaurant in Dragarea. As an adult he becomes an assassin and builds a very cool "Doc Savage" type of business network. Parts of Jhereg are very funny-the humor reminds me Walter Jon Williams' Drake Majistral books and Alan Dean Foster's Flix books with a dash of Terry Prachett and a dab of Douglas Adams. So what if little bits don't make that much sense Taltos is so engaging and the book is so much fun it doesn't really matter.

Here's a pretty accurate rendition of Taltos: (the little dragon like thing is his familiar Loiosh the jhereg)

Burst does have a great command of Fantasy and you can tell that Tad Williams was very much influenced by him. He studies fencing and Shotokan karate and I'm beginning to suspect that he and Stephen R. Donaldson may know each other fairly well...He is American and may live in Minnesota.