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Shadow & Claw (The Book of the New Sun, #1-2)

Gene Wolfe

Start date: February 8, 2011

Finish date: April 5, 2011

Discussion: 2011 Reads

Discussion leader: Jlawrence

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2011 Reads

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What Members Thought

Jun 25, 2007 John Wiswell rated it it was ok

This is a handy volume, with the first two books of the series together. That's especially useful to someone new to Gene Wolfe since the first book (Shadow of the Torturer) does very little to establish a plotline and ends extremely abruptly. Your curiousity for what happened after the end is sated by flipping over to the second book (Claw of the Conciliator), which does more with plotlines, though it is still a wildly tangential book. This is not a plot-hound's series. It's not even a particula This is a handy volume, with the first two books of the series together. That's especially useful to someone new to Gene Wolfe since the first book (Shadow of the Torturer) does very little to establish a plotline and ends extremely abruptly. Your curiousity for what happened after the end is sated by flipping over to the second book (Claw of the Conciliator), which does more with plotlines, though it is still a wildly tangential book. This is not a plot-hound's series. It's not even a particularly good character-hound's series, at least in the first two books. It's studded with interesting characters, but they scarcely develop and are mostly interesting for what they are in a moment. But if you can get over your obsession with plotlines and simply follow the characters as they go out and do things (and more often, have things befall them), this is an interesting series. It's thick with religious symbolism, and its first person narrator is preachy as all get-out; worse, as the first person narrator is also the main character, his reflections leave little emotional feeling for how he develops on his journey, and where he does develop it's so blatantly exposed as to have little emotional impact. Mind you, his situation changes (drastically, though not nearly as dangerously as we'd imagine for someone who has to carry a sword for the majority of two books). His world is very interesting, one of the best post-apocalyptic worlds you'll find, particularly as it's not merely a few days "after," but a few billion years "after." The first book is almost all about setup and introduction (and some extremely convenient happenings, which would have been more forgivable if we'd seen more payoff to those setups in either of these two books); the second starts poking the dominos, yet despite the allusions to grand designs behind the Claw and certain characters, we don't see many of the dominos fall either. Instead, what awaits you at the end of the second book is another abrupt ending, which is particularly disappointing since it happens in the middle of the most interesting scene in the series up until that point. ...more

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Jun 17, 2010 Brittany rated it really liked it

Shelves: sciencefiction

I can understand why people rave about this book, and I can see why people hate it, too. I thoroughly enjoyed most of it, though there were a few factors that churned my stomach a bit.

First the positive: This was a dense, intense, vividly written and imagined universe. It's Earth, a long time in the future, as we're approaching the death of the sun. A mythology has grown up around the dying sun, in fact, complete with prophecies of a New Sun that will herald the dawn of a newer and brighter era, I can understand why people rave about this book, and I can see why people hate it, too. I thoroughly enjoyed most of it, though there were a few factors that churned my stomach a bit.

First the positive: This was a dense, intense, vividly written and imagined universe. It's Earth, a long time in the future, as we're approaching the death of the sun. A mythology has grown up around the dying sun, in fact, complete with prophecies of a New Sun that will herald the dawn of a newer and brighter era, hence the name of the tetrology. The world is rich and well-rendered. Wolfe has managed to capture the atmosphere just right, using lovely archaic words and hinting at aspects he never fully fleshes out. However, the reader is able to glean (from geography, some of the legends, and a glorious glimpse of a maned wolf (Chrysocyon brachyurus, the first I've ever encountered in a novel) that the story takes place (or at least begins) somewhere in South America, near the Amazon River.

The story follows an apprentice torturer, Severian, as he makes a series of decisions that drastically change his life. In the process, he has a series of remarkable adventures, but he's certainly no assistant pig keeper. This book is much darker than your average hero quest. Of course, given Severian's vocation, this isn't a surprise. All the sex and the blatant sexism was a bit of a surprise (though it's hardly the first overtly sexist SF classic).

Here is a list of all the females, above the age of puberty, that Severian met on his travels and did not immediately fall in love with/lust after: . There you go. That says a lot. All the women are beautiful, though of course in different ways, and Severian spends a lot of time ruminating over how their beauty differs and what different feelings each woman engenders in him. I get the feeling these are meant to be deep, insightful inner monologues, but they're shockingly sexist, shallow, and they really alienated me from Severian, who I otherwise pretty much liked. He has sex (sometimes quite upsetting, only questionably-consensual sex) with as many women as possible, as quickly after meeting them as plausible. All this coupling got in the way of the otherwise engaging story and plot.

People have complained about the vocabulary and, while I understand their complaint, I don't agree with it. I loved all the old words, looking them up was fun, and they went along way to creating the haunting, alien, dissonant atmosphere that made the book so intense.

Occasionally, the plot would take an inexplicable turn that seemed to make sense to Severian, but never really did to me. However, I'm fine being a little lost at points in a book. I rather enjoy it. Someone said this wasn't a good beach book; I completely disagree. The perfect beach book is one that is dense, absorbing, intense, and fully transports you to a completely alien world where you have to puzzle out everything that's going on around you.

I will certainly read the next two books, though I hope Severian maybe begins to interact with women as if they are actual human beings at some point. ...more

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Jan 24, 2011 Adrienne rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fantasy, unreliable-narrator, assassins-thieves-etc, science-fiction, owned, first-person, dense, post-book-withdrawl, sword-and-laser

Rereading.. Gulp!

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Do you know what's crazy? Six months later and I'm still thinking about this series. I guess that means I have to upgrade it to five stars.

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I'm not exactly sure what to say about this series. Or rather, the first two books of the series. I don't really like the main character (as a person or as a character), I don't really like the plot, but I'm very intrigued by it all. The world has a very fantasy feel, but this is actually science fiction. Oh, and it's told by an unrelia Rereading.. Gulp!

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Do you know what's crazy? Six months later and I'm still thinking about this series. I guess that means I have to upgrade it to five stars.

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I'm not exactly sure what to say about this series. Or rather, the first two books of the series. I don't really like the main character (as a person or as a character), I don't really like the plot, but I'm very intrigued by it all. The world has a very fantasy feel, but this is actually science fiction. Oh, and it's told by an unreliable narrator!

Anyway, the book is filled with obscure and archaic words, making it the first book I can remember in a long time that had an overabundance of vocabulary I don't know. Google was often more useful in finding their definitions than the OED. (And also, an iPhone if you want to read on the bus.) But they're all derived from actual words or roots, and they give the world a foreign yet familiar feel.

The main character is Severian, a member of the torturer's guild until he gets kicked out, who tells us how he came to be "backed into the throne." (He mentions this at the end of the first chapter.) Well, that's an interesting premise. He is seemingly unaffected by his line of work, but there are conversations that lead me to think he's just not telling us how it does affect him. Those, however, are few and far between. There's that unreliable narrator for you. He also doesn't seem to understand what love means, as he claims to be in love with pretty much every woman he meets. And for some reason, they're all drawn to sleep with him. Ooo-kay. That annoyed me.

In addition to the crazy vocabulary, there's just a lot going on in the prose. Nothing is straightforward. There's a lot that Severian doesn't understand or doesn't for his own reason tell us. There are also contradictions in his story - but you have to be paying attention to find them. Yay, unreliability! (Unfortunately?) it also means you probably have to read the books a few times to actually understand what's going on.

I also had some science-y problems with the premise of the world and the conversation with Father Inire, but I guess I'll wait until I read the whole series. Oh, the day I find a sci-fi novel with which I have no science-y problems will be a glorious day! (Maybe Ender's Game, but I read that before I was a scientist, and anyway that does have the (view spoiler).)

However, I am continuing on with the following two books in Sword and Citadel. ...more

3 likes · Like · see review

Feb 05, 2011 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it really liked it

Shelves: sci-fi-fantasy, read2011, sword-and-laser

I wouldn't have read this without the prompting of the Sword and Laser group, nor do I think I would have gotten even close to absorbing the complexities if I had been reading it on my own. All the hidden bits about the previous civilization, all of the unreliable narrating, all of the hints Wolfe gives the reader... these must really only be unveiled through multiple readings of the entire four volumes of The Book of the New Sun. I have to admit that I am not that patient, but appreciate the or ...more

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May 19, 2016 travelgirlut rated it did not like it

Shelves: unfinished

I made it 85.6% of the way through this and I just couldn't drag myself any farther. I didn't come into this book completely ignorant of Wolfe's style. I've read Nightside the Long Sun and found it different and interesting and was hoping to find something similar here. But it was not to be.

I liked the main character, Severian, in the beginning, when he's still trying to figure out his role in the torturer's guild, but once he's out on the road, his ignorance combined with his odd sense of self- ...more

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Jan 18, 2013 Chris C rated it liked it

The premise and world building are interesting but muddled. If I could, I would give this book a 3.5 and feel that the plot reminds me more of a King Arthur-esque travel through a dark, shadowed world of imagined horrors and real ones. If anything, the occupation of the protagonist is one of the few things that one can relate to in the book and if anything is a solid anchor of reality in an otherwise confusing morass.

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Nov 11, 2009 David Schrimpf added it

Shelves: unfinished

I've tried to read this book 3 times. It starts out pretty interesting but the story never really gets going. For some reason, I still want to try again. ...more

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