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Age Of Ra (2009)

by James Lovegrove(Favorite Author)

3.28 of 5 Votes: 4

languge

English

genre

Fantasy

publisher

Solaris

series

Pantheon

review 1: I wanted to like this book. I love mythology, sci-fi, fantasy and dystopian futures. This should have been right up my alley.Somehow the Egyptian Gods now rule supreme. All other religions/Gods have been destroyed. David Westwynter is a soldier fighting for the Gods he believes in.This book moves very slowly at first. I enjoyed the parts with the Gods and those scenes were few and far between.The Lightbringer shows up in Freegypt, the only secular land left on Earth. He tells his followers to rebel against the Gods. I loved his railing against organized religion.The story all falls apart quickly. At the end, Ra comes down to earth to try and end organized religion. I liked that part just fine. There was way too much romance in this book for my taste. I couldn't s... moretomach it.
review 2: Military fiction with Egyptian gods. Lovegrove has created a rich universe that feels as if he has only scratched the surface with his story. The setting alone, and his handling of a world given over to the Egyptian gods, is wonderfully done and reading this book is well worth it just for seeing how he has handled this unique situation within his story.Much like the other reviews of this book, I feel too that the story takes a long, long time to pick up the pace. The first half of the book takes a lot of slogging through to finally get the action moving, and unlike other authors (such as Abnett), the information Lovegrove is presenting just doesn't hold one's attention for long. However, if you can make it through the first half of this book, it's worth it, as once the action starts moving it really gets going and is a pleasant read. Lovegrove's characters are an interesting mix. The gods themselves come across as the most interesting people in this book, their actions and personalities coming across both stronger and more characterized than the actual humans themselves. The gods and their rivalries, Ra's obsession with peace and his attempt to gain it help to keep the readers interested in the storyline, especially through the first half of the book.The human characters however, fell short as far as characters go for me. David, the protagonist, doesn't come across as all that complex, and often acts like a child in situations that one would think someone with military training would have better control over themselves. Yet time and time again, his social anxiety with 'real' people, and his issues with the Lightbringer constantly seem to trend towards childish behavior. It felt off to me, and it may have had to do with David's constant monologues about the flaky women he liked in his old life, and situations with his brother growing up. Had we been treated to these thoughts once, that would have been fine, but instead they constantly come up and detract from his overall change in characters.The military action in 'The Age of Ra' is handled masterfully and has the right level of detail one would expect in something like this. Lovegrove has treats us to rich descriptions of what is happening each battle, without bogging things down with mass amounts of details. His weapons, especially the ones that used Ba, gave the story a different feel without turning it into a sci-fi story.So, if you like military fiction with a twist, this is probably a book for you. I enjoyed it enough I bought the next of Lovegrove's books. less

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