Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Raj of ages.

Having had it recommended to me by eleventy-three different people, I am finally reading The Peshawar Lancers by S.M. Stirling.

It's a novel setting for a tale, sort of "The Far Pavilions goes steampunk"...
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24 comments:

Jeff the Baptist said...

I liked his homages to Edgar Rice Burroughs (although the first was better than the second), but haven't felt like diving into his massive Change series. This sounds interesting though.

7:38 PM, March 23, 2010
Hunsdon said...

Two "flashing sabers up" from this lancer. Sigh, it's just nice to read some good "boy's own" fiction again, innit?

7:40 PM, March 23, 2010
Anonymous said...

I agree--at least two flashing sabers up!

Peshawar Lancers was one of the first Stirling books I read, wish I hadn't given it away, now I've got to buy another...

cap'n chumbucket

7:44 PM, March 23, 2010
NotClauswitz said...

19th Century vintage railways were not uncommon even thirty years ago in India, more surprising is that they ever changed over to diesel when oil cost so much.

8:38 PM, March 23, 2010
kahr40 said...

Can't say I read anything by Stirling I haven't liked.

8:55 PM, March 23, 2010
Mattexian said...

That was certainly a good read, with Gurkas vs Ninjas and Cossacks. It's a stand-alone novel (tho related to the novella "Shikari in Galveston", set in same timeline, but other side of the world, in our savage lands). The Change series is pretty good, tho I'm wearing thin on waiting for the fourth book in the second set (first set was a trilogy, set in the immediate future; second set, I was expecting another trilogy, is set with the next generation grown up and going on a quest).

9:45 PM, March 23, 2010
The Infamous Oregon Lawhobbit said...

I'd go with Jeff on this one, for what my anonymous internet opinion is worth. I generally like Stirling, but the Change and the Island series (serieses?) just haven't done it for me.

10:31 PM, March 23, 2010
Firehand said...

I love this book

10:35 PM, March 23, 2010
GuardDuck said...

I've read the island series and am on the first book of the second part of the change series now.

I've enjoyed all of his writings so far.

Peshawar is next.

10:55 PM, March 23, 2010
militant_marmot said...

It's a good 'un. Highly recommended.

11:22 PM, March 23, 2010
Drang said...

I enjoyed the Nantucket series. Peshawar Lancers was good.
I must be odd man out, though, as there have been a few of his that just did nothing for me. There are a few other authors--Turtledove comes to mind--who are hit-or-miss in my opinion. All a matter of taste.

11:49 PM, March 23, 2010
PresterSean said...

I just couldn't get into Peshawar- maybe I'll give it another go.

1:12 AM, March 24, 2010
Fuzzy Curmudgeon said...

I liked Peshawar, but there's something about Stirling's storytelling that gets on my nerves.

It's to the extent that I think Jerry Pournelle's Falkenberg's Legions series suffers at the point where he starts collaborating with Stirling (Prince of Sparta).

Maybe it's that I like closure on my bad guys -- usually closure without predjudice -- and Stirling will let a bad guy escape time after time, no matter how implausible the escape may seem.

7:44 AM, March 24, 2010
Tam said...

I'm generally not the biggest S.M. Stirling fan. Too many lesbian bondage ninjas, although there haven't been any in this book. (I'm only 150 pages or so in, so there's still time...)

I enjoyed the Nantucket series because it was an interesting conceit and because I'm incurably fascinated with the time period presented, also, it had Werder rifles.

7:55 AM, March 24, 2010
Themadlemming said...

Lesbian bondage ninjas you say? Hmmmm....

8:42 AM, March 24, 2010
Anonymous said...

I totally concur with your criticism of the main flaw in Steve Stirling's work, Tam, though he can usually tell a story. You might like his Sky People as well, if you're enjoying this tribute to pulp.

cheers, erich martell

10:25 AM, March 24, 2010
Bram said...

I have not read this one yet. Is it like every other Stirling book? With an ending that is really a tease for the sequel?

10:29 AM, March 24, 2010
perlhaqr said...

I'd really dig on another book in the Peshawar universe.

12:59 PM, March 24, 2010
Unknown said...

I'll second the recommendation for the Sky People books. Peshewar Lancers is fun escapism

3:03 PM, March 24, 2010
steve said...

You say "lesbian bondage ninja" like it's a bad thing...

The Change books are very good, and get progressively weirder as the series goes on (unlike the Island books they are related to), and there is only one lesbian ninja as a very minor character.

8:03 PM, March 24, 2010
Firehand said...

Yeah, it's the 5th Millennium series that has all the lesbian ninjas.

8:46 PM, March 24, 2010
Ian Argent said...

Loved Islands and Peshawar; can't get past the opening of any of the Change books - they wig me out for some reason.

10:00 PM, March 24, 2010
Beaumont said...

Peshawar was a good book. It's too bad Stirling couldn't follow up on it, instead of the interminable string of Celtic-mystic, Gaia-worshiping, lesbian-ninja manure he's been shoveling the last few years. Methinks the fella is a wee bit disturbed.

11:12 PM, March 26, 2010
Ian Argent said...

Peshawar is a complete story, though. What I wish he'd do is a second Islands trilogy; that he left plenty of threads for.

WV: recou - what the (right|left)-wing dictator does to his (left|right)-wing predecessor in a banana republic

10:12 AM, March 27, 2010

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