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Antiphon (2010)

by Ken Scholes(Favorite Author)

3.99 of 5 Votes: 3

ISBN

0765321297 (ISBN13: 9780765321299)

languge

English

genre

Fantasy

publisher

Tor Books

series

The Psalms of Isaak

review 1: The Psalms of Isaak is a bizarre series. I remember being distracted by the names of a couple of the characters in the first book, but now the characters have sort of adjusted my preconceptions around their names--that's pretty hard trick to pull off for any writer.I've barely started this book, so here's a quick primer on what these books are: They're mostly fantasy, but not your standard-issue swords-and-sorcery stuff. There are a few familiar tropes to wrap your mind around, but nothing in any form you'll have read before. It takes a while to even grasp the shape of this world, and the only exposition you get leaks out with the the story itself. Tantalizing in its unfamiliariaty--the history of the world, even though it's obviously no mystery within that world, weighs h... moreeavily on the story. Something Big Happened and there might still be reverberations in its current time.So keep reading.Well, this got better and stayed good. The story gets bigger and bigger, without falling into the usual fantasy problem of character overload. No shark-jumping to keep things Exciting. A very satisfying read, and I'm excited for the next book. That's a pretty rare thing when pretty much everybody is writing multi-book epics--there's a point where you feel like you've subscribed to a periodical rather than reading a story.
review 2: I really, really wanted this book to shine. Unfortunately, it took me almost a year to read it, which says a lot about it. I enjoyed books 1 and 2, but not until about the last 60-100 pages did I really feel like this one engaged me.Through most of the book, I felt like nothing was going on, or that I just had no idea what was going on because maybe I didn’t get the clues that must have been dropped along the way. Plus, too many PoV characters. I get one chapter with someone, then am on to the next. Maybe I just don’t like this style of book, anymore.Also, what I would have thought would be the centerpiece--the action, the spectacles--I didn’t feel like I got a good image of it. Key action--especially at the end--seemed to take place off-screen. I didn’t get to SEE what I wanted to see. I just got a detail or two as other characters thought about other stuff. Really disappointing.Not until the end did I feel like the book was working toward something. Throughout most of it I had no idea what the point of the book was. I think that, if I had known at the start that they were working for X and Y, and that the bad guys were specifically trying to stop X and Y, I would have enjoyed it more. But so much is shrouded in secrecy and mystery that I was just left wondering what was going on and why I didn’t have a clue about anything. I suppose it’s fine for the characters to feel like that, but not me, the reader. I don't know that keeping me in the dark is worth it, in the end.I may or may not read the next book. Probably will. There’s so much to love in the series. I hope the plot doesn’t meander, and that the cool stuff isn’t glossed over. less

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