From archive (archive)
From: throopw@xyzzy.UUCP (Wayne A. Throop)
Organization: Data General, RTP NC.
Subject: The Questing Hero by Hugh Cook
Date: 6 Mar 88 21:17:09 GMT




Ripoff alert:  This is really about half of a novel, the rest of which
is to be published "later this year", as is announced twelve pages from
the end of the book (and nowhere else that I can see).  The action is
simply chopped off in mid-adventure.  One of the more blatant examples
of this odious practice, since I'd bet the book was published in one
volume in the UK, and another book by the same author more than twice as
long was published in one chunk.  Sigh.

That aside, it is a pretty good read, for a light adventure (though, of
course, I can't say yet how satisfying the ending may be).  The setting
is again a long time after a massive war between powerful factions of a
wizard's guild has feudalized the culture of the world.  Like the
earlier book, _Wizard_War_, the protagonist is searching for a bit of
thaumaturgic technology lost in the ancient war.  But the contrasts are
deep, in that our hero is a bit of comic releif compared to the hero of
the earlier work, and the tone of the peice is much, much lighter.
Slapstick, in fact.

If you've read _The_Misenchanted_Sword_ and _With_a_Single_Spell_ by
Lawrence Watt-Evans, then you have a good model of the relationship
between the two Hugh Cook books... the first is not devoid of humor, but
the second has more humor to it, but isn't (on the whole) quite as good
as the first.

In fact, it is interesting to contrast these four works... they have a
lot in common in terms of setting, background, and mood, though HC in
general has a better flair for words than does LWE.  Bottom line: Where
I rated HC's earlier _Wizard_War_ ***+ as I recall, I'd rate this one
(and likely its completion when it comes 'round) as more of a ***- or **+.

--
"Sea dragons are the true lords of the intellect, noted for their wit,
 intelligence, grace, charm, sagacity and fasion sense, for their
 matchless command of all the philosophies, for their eloquence, good
 humor and comradeship, for their surpassing physical beauty, their wise
 counsel, their profound logic and their highly developed artistic
 sensitivity."
"And for their modesty?" asked Togura.
"That too," acknowledged the sea dragon.
-- 
Wayne Throop      <the-known-world>!mcnc!rti!xyzzy!throopw