This is the 8th book in the series. When I read the one before this one (#7 in the series) I thought "Great! They got the sword, they got back home. The next book will be the final battle and that will be it. A nice and tidy end to the story." Instead this is almost a digression back tracking and telling the stories of what some of the secondary characters were doing while the main characters were on the quest. While amusing these stories don't drive the main story forward.

Now people who look at my book list are going to say "But Gouty, you read tons of serial novels, like The Sharpe's series." Yes, they are very long serial books, but in the case of the Sharpe's books each book is independent of the others; i.e. one can pick up book 6 in the Sharpe's series and not need to know anything of 1-5 to enjoy the book. In S. M. Stirling's Emberverse series (of which this is a part) each book is growing increasingly dependent on the previous books to explain things which I think is dragging the series back.

I think Mr. Stirling could use a bit of advice from Dave Chappelle:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfgojI...

Thanks
-Gouty