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86th out of 150 books
—
65 voters
Expiration Date (Fault Lines #2)
by
Tim Powers
Los Angeles is filled with ghosts -- and half-ghosts, and ghost hunters, and ghost junkies -- chasing each other in a mad quest for immortality. As a series of disasters strikes Los Angeles, a young boy inhales the last breath of Thomas Edison, and becomes a precious prize in a deadly hunt for the elusive vital spark. Brimming with the wild imagination and heart-stopping e...more
Paperback, 384 pages
Published
March 20th 2007
by Orb Books
(first published 1995)
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Terrible. I give each book a minimum of 100 pages. This one made it no further. It sounded like a good premise, but in reading, I wondered if it would ever get there. I had no clue what was going on or where the book was going by the 100th page.
The characters are all interesting and not completely flat. 10 year old Koot is very 10. The evil characters are very evil. The electrician guy seems interesting.
However, none of that was worth continuing on in a plot that wasn't interesting. I read the b...more
The characters are all interesting and not completely flat. 10 year old Koot is very 10. The evil characters are very evil. The electrician guy seems interesting.
However, none of that was worth continuing on in a plot that wasn't interesting. I read the b...more
I liked this, but not as much as Last Call. It took a little too long to get into the action of the story, there were too many narrators at the beginning (a few of which we never hear from again) and I felt that it didn't gel as a story until well after page 100 or so. That's a lot of pages for a reader to be wondering "I'm not exactly sure what's going on here and how it relates to the other threads of the story being told." Powers does a lot of the old "write about something that your readers...more
I tried to like this book, I really did. It seemed to have all sorts of things going for it that I usually like - strange supernatural/fantasy events taking place within the ordinary real world, and a bunch of different story threads that eventually tie together into a cohesive tale. Both of those usually lend themselves to books that I enjoy, but I think both of them were a little overdone in this case. After a while I started to get frustrated, and I decided it just wasn't worth sticking it ou...more
I recently read Tim Power's [B:]Expiration Date[/B:] and was fairly disappointed. A lot of elements of his modern fantastic setting were great, and certain sequences were amazingly gripping, but the overall effect was sorta, I don't know. Boring? I never really related to the main character's struggles, and many of the side characters were unappealing and even a little boring. The writing was decent, and would have been fine in service of a better story, but as it was felt flat.
It's weird. His...more
It's weird. His...more
3 stars. i dunno why i find Tim Powers difficult to read, in spite of his excellent powers of invention. but somehow i always have to plow through them doggedly, which sorta takes the fun out. in spite of, here, the most marvelous conceit, of ghosts more real than the living world, prized by collectors, pursued by ghost junkies who want to swallow them, taste the vintage. should be a romp, and he takes the whole concept to every possible conclusion. but i still like his books more in retrospect...more
In this book like his others, Tim Powers displays an astonishing creativity and an ingenious blending of fantasy with historical fact. Unfortunately, the author introduces so many characters and delays the explanations for what is going on so long that the reader is left confused for about half the novel. For a novel this long, that is a considerable amount of time feeling frustrated and remembering a great deal of yet unconnected information.
Once things begin to make sense, though, the reading...more
Once things begin to make sense, though, the reading...more
SF. Classic Tim Powers. He takes the world we're familiar with, in this case Los Angeles in the early 90s, adds in some speculation, some science, and even a little fantasy, and suddenly you've got an L.A. filled with ghosts. Some people can see these ghosts, some people hunt them down and suck them up to gain their energy, some people kill for them.
That sounded like the back of a book jacket. Moving on! Enter the ghost of Thomas Alva Edison, 61 years dead, incredibly powerful, and newly release...more
That sounded like the back of a book jacket. Moving on! Enter the ghost of Thomas Alva Edison, 61 years dead, incredibly powerful, and newly release...more
I probably should have given up on this one but I didn't because I liked the characters from Last Call and I knew that the characters from this book were going to, in the third book, meet the characters from that one. I just really wasn't into the characters here, though. Or the plot. Or...well, just about all of it. I might have enjoyed it more if I knew anything about or had ever been to Los Angeles, too. It wasn't actually a bad book, just really not for me.
I love Tim Powers' novels, and what I love about this one is the intersection of Thomas Edison's life with the secret world of ghost-hunters. This book is far too complicated to summarize in a few words, or even more than a few, but the core of the story is that a boy with the unfortunate name of Koot Hoomie Parganas has accidentally freed the ghost of Thomas Edison, and several people want to kill him and consume Edison's ghost. That's right, consume; in this secret history, ghosts can be eaten...more
Another thoroughly underwhelming showing from Tim Powers. A real pity. The core concept is both interesting and sustainable, much the same as that of Last Call was, but the entirety of the package is far from satisfying.
Though Powers has an undoubtable hand for descriptive writing, and a stock of interesting and clever stories to work with, he seems incapable of satisfactorily pulling it off. Both this novel and Last Call would have been far more successful as novellas or even short-stories. As...more
Though Powers has an undoubtable hand for descriptive writing, and a stock of interesting and clever stories to work with, he seems incapable of satisfactorily pulling it off. Both this novel and Last Call would have been far more successful as novellas or even short-stories. As...more
Of the three books in the Fault Lines trilogy, I think this is the strongest. It's hard hitting and not for those with weak stomachs, but his primary viewpoint characters are sympathetic and believable.
One of the things I've noticed about his works is the way they draw on real-world facts (generally about various famous people, but also scientific news items and other things we see as true) to strengthen the sense of reality about everything we read in his books. For example, much of what he say...more
One of the things I've noticed about his works is the way they draw on real-world facts (generally about various famous people, but also scientific news items and other things we see as true) to strengthen the sense of reality about everything we read in his books. For example, much of what he say...more
I can't recommend this one unless you are on a mission to read every Tim Powers book. It is an interesting story and as usual, Powers comes up with clever supernatural elements woven into the regular world of L.A. with its endless series motels, strip malls, and homeless people. This will entertain you, to be sure, but it didn't satisfy me. I kept asking, "why? Why all the twists? Why am I reading this?" It could be that this genre of "Urban Fantasy" just isn't for me, though I keep trying.
8/14/11 update: I'm only on page 47. You know me - I read incredibly quickly, so this is very unusual given that I've been working on this thing for almost two weeks now. I'm just having a difficult time getting into the story so far. Not that it isn't interesting... it just isn't quite compelling yet. Tim Powers is a strong writer, and I know he won't disappoint, but still. Meh. Also, just a minor annoyance - the main character complains that everyone calls him by this awful nickname Kootie, bu...more
I'd read this before, but it got misshelved among some new acquisitions, so I picked it up again, and was 50 or so pages in before I remembered it. I decided to finish it again anyway, because at that point I was hooked.
This is a great urban fantasy, set mostly in a Los Angeles only slightly different from our own - that might be our own if only we noticed a few secret truths. Ghosts roam the streets, some powerful and aware, others mindless and just barely held together, while people hunt, cap...more
This is a great urban fantasy, set mostly in a Los Angeles only slightly different from our own - that might be our own if only we noticed a few secret truths. Ghosts roam the streets, some powerful and aware, others mindless and just barely held together, while people hunt, cap...more
This is part of the loosely-organized "Faultlines" series, of which Last Call is the first one. The connections between the two seem scant in this book - this one concerns more the history of LA and the ecology of ghosts - but we can see some connections in the character of Loretta de Larava, whose odd behavior reminds us of some of the preparations the aspiring "queens" in Last Call go through.
Great writing and great scene creation and a storyline that compels you to keep reading. Occasionally Powers overcooks the descriptive detail of the LA streetscenes, which somewhat tedious for those that don't know the places and area - but other than that it's a novel approach to ghost story writing that instantly sets your mind the challenge to prove/disprove the plausibility of the central concept ie. can you consume ghosts?
So this turned out to be an interesting and gritty piece of urban fantasy -- it took me forever to get to that point, though, since the book started in a way that I personally hate, jumping from unrelated character to unrelated character without explaining their connection to the plot, or even the rules of this universe. As it is, I felt like things only started to come into focus and really pick up halfway through, and the fact that the climax of the entire book was in the epilogue was totally...more
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Another Tim Powers book, expanding his own weird little genre. Most alternate history consists of plucking a gem from history and fitting it into another setting. "Hey, Al Capone's fighting Nazis!" Tim Powers finds baroque pearls in the ocean of history, and strings them into dark and terrible necklaces, looped with unsettling twists and coils. It's not the juxtaposition of the historical elements that's interesting, instead it's the thread that links them together.
Allusive asides and hints abou...more
Allusive asides and hints abou...more
If Atwood was ghost writing Pynchon and they managed to get William Gibson as their editor, then maybe, just maybe, there would be another book as uncannily brilliant as this.
One could list the topics (life, death and afterlife; recreational drug culture; mercenary telephone exchange operators; palindromes; Thomas Alva Edison's lost years and peculiar relationship with Henry Ford; the time-space continuum; Harry Houdini and more), or observe that it has provided a reading of Carrol's Alice book...more
One could list the topics (life, death and afterlife; recreational drug culture; mercenary telephone exchange operators; palindromes; Thomas Alva Edison's lost years and peculiar relationship with Henry Ford; the time-space continuum; Harry Houdini and more), or observe that it has provided a reading of Carrol's Alice book...more
I first read this book when I was pretty young. I picked it up at a book store randomly (I think I liked the cover) and it totally blew my mind. I donno if it's because of my age when I read it but I was just wrapped up in this thing.
I found it really hard to actually care about the fate of any of these characters. Not sure why - maybe it was because it seemed like any one of them could die (or something equivalent for the ones that were already dead), any moment. So I didn't want to invest any feelings towards any of them.
The world Tim Powers created was certainly interesting, and I liked how it was fed to the reader in bits and pieces. I didn't like how it seemed every time you were given enough clues to piece together so...more
The world Tim Powers created was certainly interesting, and I liked how it was fed to the reader in bits and pieces. I didn't like how it seemed every time you were given enough clues to piece together so...more
Jun 02, 2010
Lynne Collins
is currently reading it
Doh! I read the first, and then the third in the Trilogy (dang ex-hub steering me wrong! but Right in the first place). Now, I am reading the second. Powers is muy lyrical, complex, mystical, and intense. Good stuff.
Meh - the description of the book sounded good, but it didn't catch my interest after the first 40 pages. Too many books for me to read to take time to muddle through this one....
I so enjoyed this, ghosts of the kind you wouldn't expect, ghost hunters of the even more unexpected, imagination and eccentricity and violence all rolled up together.
Rollicking read.
This is the first Tim Powers book I've read. I think I missed the one before it that it is a sequel of, but it reads well on its own.
This is the first Tim Powers book I've read. I think I missed the one before it that it is a sequel of, but it reads well on its own.
Ik vond het geen leuk boek. Na 130 pagina's kwam het verhaal nog steeds niet op gang. Ik ben uiteindelijk gestopt met lezen omdat ik mijn aandacht er niet bij kon houden
Once again, historic facts get mixed into a paranormal world, this time ghosts and those that would consume them. Unfortunately the rules that govern ghosts are so complex that the narrative never gets beyond the surface details, and the ending doesn't make enough sense. Add in a character that at first disbelieves what is happening and then somehow becomes an expert off panel, and the book is a mess.
Yes, it's a somewhat interesting premise, but it's all flash and no substance. The characters an...more
Yes, it's a somewhat interesting premise, but it's all flash and no substance. The characters an...more
Somehow manages to be expertly written yet completely unengaging at the same time? Points for the creativity and vivacity of the language, but minus 100000 for glacial plot movement and the endless carousel of superficially-quirky-but-actually-cookie-cutter characters, most of whom I couldn't bring myself to give two hoots about. Plus, the whole "thomas edison's ghost is on the loose and spiritually piggybacking a prepubescent boy and all the ghost junkies wanna piece of him! OH LOOK RANDOM ACTS...more
1 like · like · see review
A boy inhales the ghost of Edison? Only TP could make that work.
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Timothy Thomas Powers is an American science fiction and fantasy author. Powers has won the World Fantasy Award twice for his critically acclaimed novels Last Call and Declare.
Most of Powers's novels are "secret histories": he uses actual, documented historical events featuring famous people, but shows another view of them in which occult or supernatural factors heavily influence the motivations a...more
More about Tim Powers...
Most of Powers's novels are "secret histories": he uses actual, documented historical events featuring famous people, but shows another view of them in which occult or supernatural factors heavily influence the motivations a...more
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