vodkafan

If you want to try a stand alone Jack Vance novel I would start with The Blue World or To Live Forever.

Hi gardengirl, I suspect that none of Jack Vance's books are in in print right now. He cut a deal with Gollanz last year before he died (or his son did) and they are all available now as ebooks. I do have quite a few still as paperbacks which I will keep , I am recollecting them again but they are hard to find now. Haven't seen a Demon Princes in paperback for years. I did like them even more on re-reading, because I was able to appreciate them more as a piece of crafted writing as well as a story. The revenge theme is actually not overstated; there is actually loads of humour and romance in the books. But yes they are FULL of exotic names , that is one of Vance's trademarks . Like I say, some people like that and some do not.

I noticed that The Casual Vacancy has gone down to £2.99 on kindle. However I had pledged when it came out that I would wait until I saw it in a charity shop and buy it from there.

I saw the film version of The Illustrated Man as a teenager. It's not horror but definitely unsettling and thought provoking. Would so much like to see that again.

Hi Willoyd, Walk The Lines looked like one I might add to my wish list, as I like London.

The Warriors

This is fantastic news!

(This review is copied from my reading blog) The Demon Princes series 4.8/6 (averaged score!) Jack Vance The Star King 6/6 The Killing Machine 5/6 The Palace Of Love 4/6 The Face 4/6 The Book Of Dreams 5/6 Sorry, have to have a quick stroll down memory lane before I can write this review, as I found this series originally when I was in my teens. Back then there was no amazon or central place where you could buy books easily, and after being hooked by the first one I read it was a case of hunting them down in bookshops in neighbouring towns and collecting them one by one over many months, none of them in the proper order . Can you imagine the excitement of finding another one, knowing I would soon be transported into a totally strange world of fantastic imagination for a day or two ? I wanted to be Kirth Gerson so bad. Anyway, this time around I have read them all in the proper order. I was a little worried that after the dull Durdane Trilogy the Princes would not be as good as I remembered them. It also gave me a chance to dissect Vance's storytelling style in a way I had not thought to do before. I need not have worried though, this series is classic Vance. The plot is very simple and linear, which suits the dogged temperament of the main character, but with enough clever and unusual turns to always hold the interest . Character development is limited, and physical descriptions are short, but Vance seems to enjoy describing colours, clothes and food in more detail. But he gives full rein to imagining utterly fantastic, breathtaking alien worlds and the human cultures that live on them, and that is Vance's complete charm; and you will either like that or you won't. He writes about these worlds with a lot of humour and each one seems crazier than the next; but they are so well thought out (in the original books they always had copious added footnotes throughout the story) that they do seem completely plausible. There is also just a bit of romance. It is set in the future approx 1500 years after man has populated a swathe of the galaxy and settled on a couple of hundred planets. A faster than light drive called the Intersplit allows travel between worlds as we would for instance travel between continents . Vance doesn't trouble himself with problems of relativity and time dilation that would ruin a story. The story throughout all 5 books is a simple one of revenge. Kirth Gerson as a small child watched the complete destruction of his home planet as it was ransacked and the entire population enslaved and taken into space by an unholy coalition of five notorious space pirates. All evil in their own rights, they had joined together for this heinous crime and thence became known as the Demon Princes: Attal Mallegate (Mallegate the Woe) Kokor Hekkus Voile Falushe Lens Larque Howard Alan Treesong. The only survivors of their depredations are Kirth Gerson and his grandfather who can only watch from hiding. Consumed by hatred, Grandfather Gerson devotes the rest of his life to training Gerson into becoming an implacable assassin with a single purpose in life; to hunt down and kill each one of the Demon Princes. The first book begins after the death of his grandfather and Gerson just starting out on his mission. Each book cocerns a different Demon Prince. Some of them are mad, some are just bad. All are dangerous. Although the basic plot is unchanged , each book is different enough to keep the interest high. I can say that enjoyed these immensely and they remain some of my favourite Jack Vance stories.

The Demon Princes series 4.8/6 (averaged score!) Jack Vance The Star King 6/6 The Killing Machine 5/6 The Palace Of Love 4/6 The Face 4/6 The Book Of Dreams 5/6 Sorry, have to have a quick stroll down memory lane before I can write this review, as I found this series originally when I was in my teens. Back then there was no amazon or central place where you could buy books easily, and after being hooked by the first one I read it was a case of hunting them down in bookshops in neighbouring towns and collecting them one by one over many months, none of them in the proper order . Can you imagine the excitement of finding another one, knowing I would soon be transported into a totally strange world of fantastic imagination for a day or two ? I wanted to be Kirth Gerson so bad. Anyway, this time around I have read them all in the proper order. I was a little worried that after the dull Durdane Trilogy the Princes would not be as good as I remembered them. It also gave me a chance to dissect Vance's storytelling style in a way I had not thought to do before. I need not have worried though, this series is classic Vance. The plot is very simple and linear, which suits the dogged temperament of the main character, but with enough clever and unusual turns to always hold the interest . Character development is limited, and physical descriptions are short, but Vance seems to enjoy describing colours, clothes and food in more detail. But he gives full rein to imagining utterly fantastic, breathtaking alien worlds and the human cultures that live on them, and that is Vance's complete charm; and you will either like that or you won't. He writes about these worlds with a lot of humour and each one seems crazier than the next; but they are so well thought out (in the original books they always had copious added footnotes throughout the story) that they do seem completely plausible. There is also just a bit of romance. It is set in the future approx 1500 years after man has populated a swathe of the galaxy and settled on a couple of hundred planets. A faster than light drive called the Intersplit allows travel between worlds as we would for instance travel between continents . Vance doesn't trouble himself with problems of relativity and time dilation that would ruin a story. The story throughout all 5 books is a simple one of revenge. Kirth Gerson as a small child watched the complete destruction of his home planet as it was ransacked and the entire population enslaved and taken into space by an unholy coalition of five notorious space pirates. All evil in their own rights, they had joined together for this heinous crime and thence became known as the Demon Princes: Attal Mallegate (Mallegate the Woe) Kokor Hekkus Voile Falushe Lens Larque Howard Alan Treesong. The only survivors of their depredations are Kirth Gerson and his grandfather who can only watch from hiding. Consumed by hatred, Grandfather Gerson devotes the rest of his life to training Gerson into becoming an implacable assassin with a single purpose in life; to hunt down and kill each one of the Demon Princes. The first book begins after the death of his grandfather and Gerson just starting out on his mission. Each book cocerns a different Demon Prince. Some of them are mad, some are just bad. All are dangerous. Although the basic plot is unchanged , each book is different enough to keep the interest high. I can say that enjoyed these immensely and they remain some of my favourite Jack Vance stories.

Hi gardengirl, I like to mix things up , especially this year there is no plan. Previous years have been more structured. Yesterday I just finished my 88th book this year! Looks like I am going to smash through my target of 104 (two books a week)

Hi Catwoman! Sounds like your career is going quite well.

Sorry that of course should be parameters but for some reason the edit wouldn't work

It wasn't bad. And very much a YA book. Ooh, I hope a big author hasn't ripped off someone else's book?! Was it any good? It also starts off with a kid dying in a game and somebody else able to control the paramaters inside the game world. The concept I liked about was that it was set slightly in the future where kids had circuitry wired into their brains so they could be connected online 24/7

Finished all 5 Demon Princes novels. Now reading Anthony Trollope Can You Forgive Her?

I read something with seemingly, almost exactly the same plot as The Eye Of Minds, it is Future Freaks by Sheila Reading, also a YA book I bought on kindle.

Hire a servant

Undercover sounds awesome. Got to read this.

I read Sophie's World and the philosophy clips were Ok but the story got increasingly silly for me. Consolation Of Philosophy sounds interesting Marie H! I read a primer on Western Philosophy a while back I forget the title but it is in my reading list around March/April and passed it on to my daughter.

Ah thanks pontalba and Marie H for the feedback. Glad you saw it the same way Marie! I thought I was a lone voice crying in the wilderness about this...

Sounds very interesting about the coaching Brian

Week 8 was a bit of a breathing space. I had a couple of days off work and concentrated on other things. For one thing I started writing and did about 4000 words. But here's the exercise bit: Thursday Walk 5 Friday Walk 5 Saturday Walk 5

Yes please do post reviews on here Rachel! Not all of us do Goodreads. What are you reading right now? edit Sorry I just seen it is Roverandum!

mrjhale, I didn't like Emma at first but she did grow on me as she changed during the book.

I really don't understand why women readers of Jane Eyre seem to go googly over Rochester. I mean,

I read Anna Dressed In Blood and I found that OK. Would probably make a decent teen horror film.