series:Greatwinter

You are currently browsing articles tagged series:Greatwinter.

Eyes of the Calculor

1 August 2009 in Novel | 2 comments

By Sean McMullen.
Begun 22 May 2009; finished 29 May.

I had the misfortune of reading Sean McMullen’s Greatwinter trilogy out of order — The Miocene Arrow before Souls in the Great Machine — and have finally read Eyes of the Calculor almost 3 years late, when I’d forgotten much of the previous two books. But memories began to come back, and I was able to recall the backstories to some degree and understand the entire series as a whole. As these novels run together with little pause, I recommend that you don’t do as I did, and instead read the series in quick succession before you forget the details (of which there are many).

The Greatwinter trilogy is about a future-Earth where the human race, after a series of apocalyptic catastrophes followed by a long “dark age”, has rebuilt into a agrarian, semi-technological civilization. It is a saga spanning continents, cultures and numerous characters, and could be best described as a future-Earth geopolitical epic.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags:

Souls in the Great Machine

29 August 2006 in Novel | No comments

By Sean McMullen.
Begun 10 Aug 2006; finished 22 Aug.

This entire review contains details about the plot that could constitute as spoilers.

I’ve now read the first book of Sean McMullen’s Greatwinter trilogy, Souls in the Great Machine. (The Miocene Arrow is the second novel but I read it first.) I can now say with confidence that Greatwinter is the most innovative and creative series I’ve read since Primary Inversion (by Catherine Asaro) about 6 years ago. McMullen’s future-Earth, both familiar and alien at the same time, is a feat of world-building, and I’m in love with it. While I enjoyed the setting and scope, the characterization leaves something to be desired: the novel would be far more superior of the characters were more fleshed and open. But, on the whole, it is a great novel and a fabulous world that I’d like to experience again.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: , ,

The Miocene Arrow

9 May 2006 in Novel | No comments

By Sean McMullen.
Begun 28 Apr 2006; finished 07 May.

There’s nothing like reading a series in order, where characters and plots are introduced in their proper places, and confusion and spoilers are minimized. Therefore I was supremely peeved upon discovering that The Miocene Arrow was the second book in Sean McMullen’s Greatwinter trilogy, the first being Souls in the Great Machine. That didn’t last long, though: a bit of rereading, and an initial cast list, helped me pick up the setting, and I was quickly immersed in the story.

The setting is Earth in the fortieth century. A series of events that took place in the twentieth century had plunged humanity into a technological and social Dark Age: electric power had been abolished, a vast population of humanity and animal life wiped out, and a phenomenon known as the Call dictates and limits humanity’s progress. In America, where The Miocene Arrow is set, human civilization is confined to high-altitude, mountainous strongholds, and steam, diesel and alcohol power all technology and vehicles, themselves limited in size and power. The American havens are governed by a quasi-feudal political system, where hierarchy and chivalry rule, and warfare takes place in tightly controlled duels.

Such is the setting and the people, which are then turned upside down by Australian spies (some of whom are introduced in Souls in the Great Machine, which itself is set in Australia) — total warfare and an Industrial-Age arms race ensue, and eventually we gain revelation of a plan more sinister than American civil war.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: ,