Dies the Fire (edit title)

• Rated 3 stars

“An interesting take in the post-apocalyptic realm. I kept reading to see how the characters would handle the different world and eventually felt invested in the characters and felt like I should see them through this. A tad verbose at times but it appears as if he really did his research”

• Rated 2 stars

“HOw did thus get published?”

• Rated 3 stars

“After reading the first 50 or so pages of this, I was tempted to jettison it and write a review titled "Dies the Interest", but I kept going, even though the writing seemed particularly bad. What kept me going were the characters - they felt real, gritty, interesting. The further I got, the more the writing actually improved - almost as though Stirling hit a different stride after getting through the initial chapters.

Overall, this is a well-considered view of what kind of social structures might actually evolve out of a world where the typical sources of energetic power and defensive weaponry suddenly and inexplicably no longer function, and of how people might survive such a catastrophic transition.

One nitpick is how all the characters so quickly and in unison (regardless of geographic location and lack of communication between them) begin referring to the transition as "the Change" with a capital C. Morphic resonance on the conceptual plane? Or just an overly breezy handling of the most critical event of the entire story?”

• Rated 3 stars

“One day the world is normal, the next the very laws of nature change. Electricity and gunpowder no longer work, leaving humanity without their CDs, guns, or computers along with cars and agricultural machinery. The world then regresses to the state of the middle ages, power measured in organization, leaders, metal armor, and archaic weapons. The two most prominent characters are Mike Havel, leader of a band that comes to be known as the "Bearkillers", and Juniper, leader of Clan MacKenzie. The two, strong and honest leaders in a land where honesty is being forgotten, manage to throw together a life for their respective groups. Even so, their neighbor, The Protector, has less peaceful plans in mind...

Without fail, apocalypse and world-wide destruction and the degeneration/rebuilding of society presses an interest button for me. And I was very intrigued by the idea of a world without electricity or gunpowder. What a drastic shift! What opportunity for imagination...

Dies the Fire has both good and bad elements--and it's very difficult for me to say which of those wins out at the end. At any given point in the novel, either Juniper's group or Havel's group is interesting, but rarely will both groups be interesting at the same time. Also, every character pales in comparison with these two characters, the rest being underdeveloped and often ignored. This is, perhaps, the most disappointing quality about the book: the characters are so very predictable and flat. The Protector fills the role of Undeserving Bad Guy, doing dastardly deeds; Havel is the ex-Marine hero with women falling at his feet; Juniper the mystical, kind witch. And it's a bad sign when a few words sum up the entire main characters--everyone else needs even less explanation. Especially, the portrayal of the women characters irritates me: Signe or Astrid are given little attention and often reduced to plot devices or damsels in distress. And then there's the fact every woman character is getting pregnant because no one can be bothered to find new birth control devices after the condoms and pills run out. I worry that by the second book, the women will be nothing but baby-making devices while the men become warriors. (As for the argument that Stirling was going for the Middle Age feel--what's the point of alternative history if you're going to minimize one entire gender without reason? And as for the argument of Juniper's strength--well, yes, she is, but what other woman is at all?) To an extent, Stirling has marginalized all characters that are not Juniper or Mike. It's irritating that every event with a minor character leads to the development of those two...

Another disappointing aspect of Dies the Fire was how very random the plot can be. Though Stirling attempts to write it as a "luck" plot device, the abnormal luck of the two main protagonists just doesn't jive for me. Add on to that random acts of violence and random happenings and Dies the Fire comes off laughable.

Additionally, the end of the novel makes an uncomfortable switch from attempting realistic fantasy into the mystical. I don't mind religion in my novels, but when I feel as if I'm reading a handbook for initiates...

That isn't to say Dies the Fire is dull. Rather, the story is quite readable, if one ignores those hiccups. I plan on continuing the series to see how everything develops, although it's not high on my list of priorities.”

• Rated 4 stars

“I don't exactly enjoy sci-fi's, but my brother recommended it to me and I read it. It actually turned out to be really good, because even though it was mainly sci-fi, there were still different types of genre added into the book. It was one of those post-apocalyptic books. I recommend this book for anyone that's trying different types of genres.

Michael Havel and Juniper Mackenzie are the two main characters, even though they only have a little bit of dialogue with each other throughout the entire book. Michael and Juniper shared one main characteristic that stands out: the will to survive. Imagine if suddenly everything and anything that had to do with electricity or energy or battery power just shut down. Most people wouldn't survive and that's how it was in the book. Both were confident and showed leadership. Michael made me think of Julius Caesar or Leonidas, while Juniper made me think of Queen Elizabeth (Especially in the fact that Juniper never got married or had a relationship, but she was up for one-night stands, hahhah.).”

• Rated 4 stars

“Mr. Stirling's Emberverse is impressive. I'm hoping that The Sunrise Lands is just an aberration, being merely good where as the first three books were awesome. Can be depressing (I'd be one of the 90% that didn't make it out of the first book), but still great to read.”

• Rated 2 stars

“I just couldn't connect with this even though it is a post-apocalyptic novel with at least one strong female character. ”

• Rated 3 stars

“This is a fantastic concept. It was very thought-provoking, and I loved how the people most likely to survive in this book were the SCA types, the ones who the mainstream nowadays would call flighty or "out of touch". The downside, the execution and the pacing of the book was boring at times. I felt like I was slogging through it half the time. I expected to like the Wiccan aspects more than I did, since I am Wiccan, but it was pretty fluffy and can see why others would find it off-putting. But there are some good points there about a minority becoming a majority by the strengths of their belief system and how it can translate into survival in a different world. But I probably won't be picking up any of the others in the series.”

• Rated 5 stars

“This novel is funny, grim, and shows the social aspect of humans dealing with the loss of their civilization in a way that is both amazingly and frighteningly real and believable. Stirling embeds the most minute details that make you feel like you're there -- even when you don't want to be.”

• Rated 0 stars

“Con recommendation”