The Well of Ascension and the Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson

Books 2 and 3 of the Mistborn saga. Great stuff. 

FTW by Cory Doctorow

Interesting "Young Adult" novel which combines a good story with a political tract. Doctorow uses a story set in the near future world of mmorpg gold farmers to share his left of centre views on globalisation and the exploitation of workers. There is a tonne of economic theory in there too. Even if you don't entirely agree with Doctorow's political stance it is still a pretty good read. It is also interesting to see gold farmers as heroes for a change given the fact that they are more ussually spoken of with derision by many mmorpg gamers and bloggers. Chinese players in particulary are subject to a considerable amount of racist abuse because of the gold farming issue. 

Mistborn: the final Empire byy Brandon Sanderson

 A new fantasy series for me and a very enjoyable one. Brandon draws a masterful picture of a segregated society with an enslaved underclass who are kept underfoot by an unthinking nobility. The whole structure is held together through the godlike powers of a malign immortal ruler. The book tells the story of a revolution plotted by a rare defiant group of downtrodden ska (the underclass) who wield the magical powers of Allomancy and art supposedly denied to their class. .

It is good stuff and a great read.  The necessary magical system  (Allomancy) is a bit over explained to my liking but that is a personal preference. Fantasy requires some form of magical power and you can either make it all a big unexplained mystery (as was popular with earlier writers like Tolkien) or you can try to classify and categorise the whole business turning it into an invented science. Sanderson has very much gone for the latter.

I am looking forward to the remaining two volumes in the trilogy. The only reservation I have is that if the rebellion succeeds then segregated society that formed such a core feature of the setting will collapse. I wonder will Sanderson be able to make the world which replaces it as interesting to read about.

Northern Lights Trilogy by Philip Pullman

I actually red the first volume of this trilogy more than ten years ago when I picked it up at a newstand before boarding a transatlantic flight. I guess I was initially taken aback when I realised that it was actually a kids books but the more I read of it the darker the story became and I quickly realised this was superior children's fiction - in the same league as Harry Potter or maybe even better.  It took me a decade to get around to reading the next two books but 11 year old daughter is a complete book worm so when I saw a single volume collection of the trilogy on sale in a local book fair I thought:" Why not?. If I don't like it she probably will."

As so much time had passed I started again with book one and kept reading to the end. I really enjoyed the series for its imagination, for its writing and for its sheer audacity  but ... I don't know whether I want my daughter to
read it or not. It is a great great story but it is also an extremely subversive one. The whole plot of the book is actually about overthrowing God. The Christian Churches are very clearly portrayed as the bad guys. It is actually very cleverly done with many references to Christian mythology.

Its not that we are a particularly devout family. To tell the truth I probably don't believe any of that stuff myself but my daughter is at a very young very impressionable age and she does still believe. She might enjoy the book immensely but then again it could confuse her or upset her. On the other hand I am not big into censorship without explanation so if she expresses an interest in the book I will discuss it with her and if she still wants to read it I can be on hand to talk about the ideas in the book if required.

Oh and as for the books themselves: The first volume (Northern Lights) is the tightest and best and sadly the storyline gets a little too unfocussed in the final volume (The Amber Spyglass) but nevertheless the trilogy should really be read as a single work and taken together it is a genuine masterpiece.

Raiders from the North, Empire of the Moghul by Alex Rutherford

Alex is writing a series of book about the rise of the Moghul empire that flourished in the Indian subcontinent from the 16th to the 19th centuries. This first books charts the rise of the first emperor Babur who was born the heir to a minor kingdom but claimed descent from both Timur and and Ghengis Khan and who longed to live up to the legacy of his ancestors.

One of the problems of historical fiction, particularly about a period that is not particularly well known is that there is a danger that readers will mistake fiction for fact. Thank fully Rutherford includes a historical footnote which fills the reader in and it appears that his inventions are mostly limited to those areas that are not covered by known history. Babur himself was actually an enthusiastic diarist so there is a lot of source material for this first novel.

An enjoyable read that opened my eyes to a period of history I previously knew nothing about.

The Steel Remains by Richard Morgan

I have read a couple of Morgan Sci Fi novels before but this is his first fantasy that I have read. Enjoyable setting in a world where godlike alien races once held sway but have recently left. When one of these races wants to return a mixed bag of three heroes must save the day. The roughest, toughest of these heroes also happens to be promiscuously homosexual which is unusual enough for a fantasy novel. The book has quite a few explicitly described man on man sex scenes so be warned if that is not your cup of tea. Personally I find the homosexuality a little bit at odds with the characters otherwise brutishly violent nature but nevertheless I probably enjoyed his novel more than Morgan's sci fi work.

Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett

Pratchett brings Soccer or at least a version of it to Discworld. Not my favourite Discworld novel . The allegory is a bit too strained.