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NeilNjae
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(Quote) Good point. Even the Professor succumbed to loss of intelligence. Why is Ulysse immune? (And does it matter? I think not.)
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(Quote) I don't think it is. It's not meant to be an easy, disposable read. I think Boulle was going for something with more impact; the satirical fairy tale idea. Whether he succeeded at that is another question. But it means I'm not judging this …
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I can see the changes made for the film being features of the adaptation: films are about visuals and action, rather than introspection (generally). I agree with Aldiss that making the story be only about Earth makes for a stronger ending.
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For me, the key message wasn't about "who is human?" so much as "how should we treat non-humans?" I think the core of the book was how the apes treated the humans when they were exactly what we would call "animal" in th…
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I've only seen the 1968 film, and that was a long time ago. I can't remember if there was any subtext in the film, or if it was action-adventure all the way. That said, the reveal that the film took place on Earth seemed shocking at the time, so the…
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Odysseus the traveller is a clear one. I've no idea what the surname was meant to signify. As for the character, he's a bit of a blank slate. But then, that's his role in the story: he's there as the eyes and ears of the reader as we explore the sa…
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All the descriptions of space travel were implausible, but I skipped past that as being someone from the 60s not paying too much attention to the hard SF tradition. For me, where it went from "believable" to "unbelievable" to &q…
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I'll confess my ignorance. What do you mean by "a recursive story"? Is it that there's the main tale within a framing story?
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I think I saw the "twist", of Jinn and Phylis being apes, in the first section. I think that's why the frame story didn't add anything to me. I expect it was meant to be here to change what we thought of as the "fantasy" in the s…
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I didn't get the introduction in my Kindle version, but I agree it's definitely satire. The book very much points out the horrors of our treatment of animals. But I think Boulle deflated that at the end of the book by saying the apes started by most…
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If most of us have read it, there's plenty else to read. Perhaps _Nettle and Bone_ by T. Kingfisher? I've wanted to read some of her serious adult fiction for a while (she's very good at the lighthearted stuff).
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> @RichardAbbott said: > Discussion still ongoing about Harkfast but this is a quick reminder that August is Planet of the Apes selected by @Apocryphal . Also, @NeilNjae do you have a title chosen for September yet? Given that I'm in Trans…
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> @RichardAbbott said: > Discussion still ongoing about Harkfast but this is a quick reminder that August is Planet of the Apes selected by @Apocryphal . Also, @NeilNjae do you have a title chosen for September yet? Given that I'm in Trans…
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> @clash_bowley said: > The sudden ending bothered me in an 'I was left hanging, now we'll never know..." sense, but far stronger was the relief that I didn't have to read more of this story. Thank God this was written before fantasy nov…
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A good point about the violence. The setting is is very much one where lives are nasty, brutal, and short. The closest we get to compassion is the lacklustre camaraderie between Ruan and his band. It's all very downbeat. And if this is Arthur retold…
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I liked how Harkfast is portrayed, the wise and manipulative druid. I liked the alternative take on the Arthur myth, making it a very small and personal story with the mythic element applied by the narrator and reader.
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Yes, the book was obviously intended as the first of a series. One or two more would have finished off the story. As the the Arthur connection, the book seemed like a "gritty" retelling of the Arthur story, with Harkfast as Merlin.
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The book gave me the impression of a competent author with a decent range (no one writes like this all the time). But I'm not in any rush to read more, even a sequel to this.
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The characters didn't seem like well rounded people. Ruan was arrogant, Harkfast even more so. The others were there to be servants, and that's all they were.
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Agreed. I think it was a novel of it's time of writing.
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I'd guess the first book didn't make enough money to justify writing another. A shame, but that's the life of a professional author.
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It's racism. Compare to how the Roman is described as tall and noble. A more interesting question is whether Rae shared these views. I see no evidence either way.
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I'm with @Apocryphal here: Harkfast is the controller of events, at least at the beginning. Ruan is starting to assert his independence by the end of the book, but only just.
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I disliked the style. It wasn't so much the archaic words as the sheer volume of words, giving the impression that every little thing was of great symbolic import that needed to be described in excessive detail lest any reader be in the slightest do…
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(Quote) Insightful comment! Yes, Temeraire is the outsider to the Regency culture. How many of the other dragons are also outsiders, or are they part of the established order? Alternatively, if you read the dragons as anthropomorphised wooden saili…
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I was thinking about all the times Laurence calls Temeraire "dear" and other such terms of endearment. I think the relationship is meant to be more than just platonic friendship. I'm not sure what to make of the fact that both Laurence and…
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One world-building miss I stumbled across... had no-one ever thought of using dragons as troop transporters before? We had plenty of hints of the dragons' abilities to carry loads over distance (with the aerial rescue of the wounded dragon), so sure…
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It could make a decent enough RPG setting, using something like Beat to Quarters as a system and having the dragon being one character among the ensemble. Also, the idea of the dragons being strategically important assets means that there will alway…
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It's interesting that the series doesn't stick with the military exploits plots that it seemed to be driving towards. I would expect the book series to follow the same overall trajectory as the Sharpe and Hornblower books. In any case, I'm not in a…
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Genre labels are flexible things with porous boundaries, so I'm not bothered by confusion with attempts to categorise this book. It's a book, it's nerd-troped Napoleonic naval, it'll attract people who like dragons in their stories. Someone along th…