READ THESE BOOKS.

[rj_anderson]

Oh, hurray, lizbee has written a fabulous review of Philip Reeve's Hungry Cities Chronicles so I can just point you to hers and not feel guilty that I haven't yet written one! Though I should also have remembered that I could point to jamesbow's excellent review, which was written ages ago, as well.

Now what I really must do is get on here and burble about my mad love for Megan Whalen Turner, but I want to re-read The Thief first to see if I like it better the second time. (I already know that the second and third books in the series are, unquestionably, LOVE. I just didn't warm to the first one for some reason.)

Comments

[rj-anderson.livejournal.com]

Hee! I like your husband's description. Admittedly there is a disturbing element to the romance -- how many romances do you know of where the hero is literally terrified of the heroine, and with good reason? But fortunately Turner supplies some backstory about Gen's feelings and the reasons for them that have nothing to do with the loss of his hand, and that makes things a little better.

It's still disturbing, though, I will admit. Even now I wonder if I might be a little skewed to like the romance as much as I do, considering.

As for the change of career following a major injury, I'd already been through that with Miles Vorkosigan and it didn't make me like him any less (in fact I enjoyed him more in his new career), so I actually looked forward to that bit. To me it deepened the series and Gen's character to have him learning new skills and stealing less tangible goods, so to speak.

[my_daroga]

Well, when he described that to me, I thought, "Hey, that sounds entertaining." Which, you know, indicates that we may have some differences of opinion. What, a married couple?

So I'm placing a hold on the next one at the library/work, and I'll try to remember to come back to this discussion or post about it and let you know.

Seems I need to check out this Vorkosigan fellow, too.

[rj-anderson.livejournal.com]

Miles (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miles_Vorkosigan), for your reference. Megan Whalen Turner actually mentions Lois McMaster Bujold's writings as an influence in her endnotes to The Thief -- I'm not surprised.