From rec.arts.sf.reviews Fri Sep 4 15:07:58 1998 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!feed1.news.luth.se!luth.se!feed1.news.rcn.net!rcn!howland.erols.net!sunqbc.risq.qc.ca!newsswitch.lcs.mit.edu!news.media.mit.edu!not-for-mail From: robotech@eyrie.org (Robotech_Master) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews,rec.arts.books.reviews,alt.books.reviews Subject: REVIEW: Anne McCaffrey's The Unicorn Girl: The Illustrated Adventures Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 02 Sep 1998 18:44:34 -0400 Organization: Superguy Listserv: http://www.eyrie.org/superguy/ Lines: 97 Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: tinbergen.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.3/Emacs 19.34 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2100 rec.arts.books.reviews:2549 alt.books.reviews:47840 The Unicorn Girl: The Illustrated Adventures Review Copyright 1998 Chris Meadows It was probably a bad idea to give "Anne McCaffrey's The Unicorn Girl: The Illustrated Adventures" a title so close to "Acorna: The Unicorn Girl," but I suppose it couldn't be helped. This confusingly-titled book is a less worthy successor to the one it follows up, and leaves a somewhat disappointing aftertaste when it is over. "The Unicorn Girl" is actually made up of a novella, "Trouble in Kezdet," and two short stories, "Pony Girl" and "Acorna's Serum," as well as two sidebars with brief informative blurbs on the planets and people of the "Acorna" universe. All three stories are written by different writers, and none of them by Anne McCaffrey and Margaret Ball, the writers of the two full-length "Acorna" novels. The quality is quite uneven, and none of the stories compares very favorably to the original. "Trouble in Kezdet," continues from where the original novel left off, and deals with Acorna's search for the elusive Dodger, who has rescued many kids from the harsh working conditions of Kezdet's sweatshop labor. "Pony Girl" has Acorna make an appalling discovery on the gambling space station of Kismet, and "Acorna's Serum" deals with Acorna going to earth to try to help stop a deadly plague. Oddly enough, considering that the subject matter of the Acorna series so far has included children being sent to whorehouses and dying of veneral diseases, the writing in "The Unicorn Girl" seems to be at a much more _juvenile_ reading level than "Acorna." This might be at least partly due to the high level of exposition of past events, especially in "Trouble in Kezdet," the fairly simplistic plots, the depictions of the heroes and villains in even more polarized shades of black and white than in "Acorna," and the use (possibly _over_use) of various cliches (the Oliver Twistian references, the chain of events leading up to the climax of "Trouble in Kezdet," and so on). Of the three tales, "Trouble in Kezdet" (but shouldn't it really have been called "Trouble _on_ Kezdet," given that Kezdet is a planet, not a city?) is really the only one worth reading. The short stories suffer from a failing common to many short stories--there is simply not enough time to develop a decent plot or characterizations. All three of the stories are predictable, and all leave a few annoying loose ends dangling, some more obvious than others. I imagine the loose ends might be partly meant to set up for future "Acorna" short story anthologies (as the book's introduction not-so-subtly hinted--"It is hoped this collection will be the first of many intended to keep her symbol alive and make certain she is not forgotten"), but some omissions seem just plain sloppy. Given that "The Unicorn Girl" bills itself as "An Illustrated Novel," and claims that illustrated novels are "A New Art Form For A New Age" -- which in itself is a rich load of fertilizer, given that almost _all_ novels used to be illustrated, and even in this day and age there are still a few that have been -- it is only fair to look at the quality of illustrations in the book. The art is nothing to write home about; frankly, I'd rather have my imagination than some of these pictures. Oddly enough, there are almost no decent new color pictures of Acorna herself--the ones on pages 8-9, 12-13, and 97 are the only ones that seem to be there--and the black and white ones by John Ridgeway are very unflattering. Both the cover picture and the picture opposite the title page, which was derived from the cover to "Acorna" by the same artist, are not even accurate depictions of the way Acorna is described in the books. To add insult to injury, the cover blurb is not only misleading but sometimes downright _wrong_--we are most certainly not shown "Acorna's heartbreaking search for her home planet" or "Acorna's first love affair...with a human," no matter what it says, and "Acorna's fight to stop a deadly plague on [...] Earth" actually amounts to little more than contributing tissue samples and is not even the primary conflict in the story, for that matter. "Anne McCaffrey's The Unicorn Girl: The Illustrated Adventures" was a nice try, but it's just not as good as the original. I mildly recommend it, mainly to Acorna completists and mostly because of "Trouble in Kezdet." [Permission granted for newsgroup distribution & associated archival, and to share with other people as long as you don't charge for it. All other rights reserved, but feel free to ask.] %A Mickey Zucker Reichert %T Trouble in Kezdet %A Jody Lynn Nye %T Pony Girl %A Roman A. Raineri %T Acorna's Serum %B Anne McCaffrey's The Unicorn Girl: The Illustrated Adventures %I HarperPrism %C New York %D December 1997 %G ISBN 0-06-105540-9 %P 136 pp. %S The Unicorn Girl %V Book 2 %O Hardbound, $22.00, printed in color Chris Meadows aka | Co-moderator, rec.toys.transformers.moderated Robotech_Master | Homepage: robotech@eyrie.org | PGP: robotech@jurai.net | ICQ UIN: 5477383 From rec.arts.sf.reviews Sat Nov 14 23:26:01 1998 Path: news.ifm.liu.se!news.lth.se!newsfeed.sunet.se!news01.sunet.se!news99.sunet.se!uninett.no!howland.erols.net!cpk-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!cam-news-hub1.bbnplanet.com!news.gtei.net!bloom-beacon.mit.edu!senator-bedfellow.mit.edu!usenet From: hklaus6073@aol.com (HKlaus6073) Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.reviews Subject: Review: Spirit Fox, by Reichert & Wingert Followup-To: rec.arts.sf.written Date: 12 Nov 1998 14:26:54 -0500 Organization: AOL http://www.aol.com Lines: 37 Sender: wex@ronin.media.mit.edu Approved: wex@media.mit.edu Message-ID: NNTP-Posting-Host: ronin.media.mit.edu X-Newsreader: Gnus v5.5/Emacs 20.2 Xref: news.ifm.liu.se rec.arts.sf.reviews:2168 SPIRIT FOX by Mickey Zucker Reichert and Jennifer Wingert Review Copyright 1998 Harriet Klausner The war of the Gods has finally ended, leading to peace among the mortals. The "joyous reunion" has led to the people of the High Marchlands outlawing law. Weapons are put aside and serenity hugs the land. In this serene environment, Kiarda is born. Like many of her people, the noble lass is linked to a fox, but the animal dies before the duo bonds. The spirit of the deceased creature merges with that of Kiarda inside the infant's body. Her father, Lord Stane hides this information from everyone including his daughter. Years later, the peace is threatened by an outside army led by vicious mages, willing to use the forbidden magic to destroy the animal linked people. At the same time, Kiarda has become a shapeshifter. Stane unfairly accuses the man she loves of raping her, forcing him to flee. However, Kiarda has no time to ponder her beloved because she must risk her life to save her people from the power of an enemy who feel they have justice on their side. SPIRIT FOX is an interesting opening entry to a new fantasy series. The intriguing premise is well designed, but the authors have tried to provide too much detail in one novel. Thus, the story line occasionally loses sight of its central theme. Mickey Zucker Reichert and Jennifer Wingert are clearly talented authors, whose work will generate excitement amidst genre fans, especially younger readers. Harriet Klausner %T SPIRIT FOX %A Mickey Zucker Reichert %A Jennifer Wingert %I Daw $D Dec 1998 %O $23.95 %P 368 pp. %G ISBN 0-88677-806-9