Lowly’s Book Blog

I will admit when I started this book, I expected little more than a very average sword and sorcery adventure. And essentially that is what this book is, but Beth Vaughan has created a leading character that seems to jump off the page and attach herself to the reader. I will openly admit I really like Red.

Red Gloves is the nickname for a very unusual mercenary. Red and her sword sister Bethal arrive in the country of Palins looking for work. This land is on the verge of civil war, so well paid work seems likely. That is until Red is recognised as The Chosen, the prophesied new ruler of Palins. 

OK, so the plot summary is nothing new. Even the plot devices have been seen before, e.g. a common farmer who is really a lord in hiding, or the rebel forces that are gathering and training on another planet, or even the religious leader who is a skilled magician. All this and more is very typical of sword and sorcery fantasy.

But I will admit, I like Red. She is a no-nonsense woman who is very used to getting her own way. Her lifestyle is thoroughly mercenary and she is very happy that way. None of this weak, insipid female character who depends on magic to get her out of tight spots. Red will simply grab her sword and go for it. But Red has a secret, and one that makes her very human, even vulnerable. This adds a layer of complexity to her character that helps hold the reader’s attention.

But my next question is, are we every going to get the story of Black Gloves?

It seems like it has been a long time since I have read some ‘real’ scifi. Recent reviews have been as much ’social commentary’ as scifi. But House of Suns is classic space opera.

The story takes place literally millions of years in the future and hundreds of years in time. In this imaginary future, several wealthy individuals have long since created hundreds of cloned personalities. Each of these groups of clones is referred to as a House or Line. Our story concerns the 1000 clones of the Gentian Line, and more specifically two members of this Line, Campion and Purslane. Once every circuit (of the Milky Way) the Gentian Line gathers for a meeting, to exchange memories and learning, before they each set off on another circuit. But this time Campion and Purslane are late, very late. As they approach the planet designated for the meeting, they pick up a distress message that tells them that the planet was under attack and likely to be utterly destroyed within days, along with the vast majority of the Gentian Line. Campion and Purslane together rescue a few survivors and escape to the emergency gathering point where they find only 40 or so other survivors. 

The gathering allows guests, and a few of the guests also survived, including three members of the Machine People race. The action is centred on these Machine People and their response to the Gentians.

I could easily go on. That’s the thing about a space opera, vast time, vast space and lots of action. This book is a real page-turner, especially for fans of this genre. Planets are destroyed, Gods are challenged, ships blown out of the sky, kidnapping and murder abound.

However, as with a lot of the spacy scifi, action and adventure are so thick and fast that there is little or no time for character development. Admittedly the reader gets to know Campion and Purslane well because each of them narrate alternate chapters. But the whole sidebar about Abigail Gentian? A waste of space.

I did like the fact that this tale included robots, but this time robots without the programming that includes Asimov’s Three Laws. At times it seems that Asimov’s Three Laws of Robotics are the foundation of every single robot and android in science fiction since the 50s. House of Suns could easily be seen as a cautionary tale for those who choose to ignore the established wisdom.