From archive (archive)
From: haste+@andrew.cmu.edu (Dani Zweig)
Organization: Carnegie Mellon
Subject: The Faithful [Cybernetic] Companion at Forty [Decades]
Date: 6 Dec 88 16:47:06 GMT




"The Warlock's Companion", by Christopher Stasheff  (Ace, 12/88, $3.95) is the
latest contribution to the Gramarye series.  The author is getting tired.

The skeleton of the book is a dull and unconvincing encounter between the
Warlock's family and some ghosts.  Dull, unconvincing, and too short to fill a
whole book, so it is fleshed out with some stories of the D'Armand family, as
told by Fess.  Not particularly good stories, mind.

Readers who haven't read "The Warlock In Spite of Himself" should run out and
get that book -- it's marvelous -- but shouldn't feel obligated to read all the
sequels; they're not on the same level.  Readers who have faithfully been
reading all the sequels may wish to get this one, for the sake of completeness,
but should be warned that it's pretty poor stuff.

It's not that there are no more good stories to be told in this universe.  The
impression I get is that the author has just gotten very tired of it.

-----
Dani Zweig
haste+@andrew.cmu.edu