The ultimate book about the Dutch record business. With 732 pages and lavishly illustrated this book tells the story and the highlights of the record companies, publishers, producers, arrangers and artists from 1878 to 2015. A simple recommendation: if you don't speak Dutch, it's worth learning it just for reading this. 10 out of 10

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This book ...unlike 45Cat...makes a distinction between "Bootleg" and "Pirate" but from past experiences, no matter what one suggests, an arm-waving attack will come from somewhere with a completely different take on the subject. So it has always been, and depends on which parts of the music industry you have been involved with...or not.
One take is that a Bootleg gives you the chance of hearing music that has not been authorised by the Record Company or artist.Should we accept their restrictions "Only this is what you may listen to"

Piracy is much older - Shakespeare's plays were copied by people in the audience writing down the lines. The discs for mechanical pianos were copied without permission..big selling 78's were illegally copied and distributed.

Copyright laws date back to printers rights to circulate Shakespeare's plays , or the rights to produce piano rolls and sheet music and thus have not been amended with the same speed that technology rushes ahead.

This book carries many interviews with the shady characters who produced Bootleg discs and all say a similar thing. "Why should Record Companies react so violently..they were never going to produce this stuff anyway..its not affecting their economy"
These "unauthorised" discs were never produced in large quantities and their original selling prices were not exorbitant..so the main reason for their existence was a love of the music rather than financial gain.
Many Bootleg discs were even bootlegged by other bootleggers but legallity always comes to the fore. US laws differ from Europe..so produce in Germany and sell where you want...the loopholes caused uncertainty.

There's bound to be alternative views of this industry but the book is informative

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It's common knowledge that the Beatles distanced themselves from being too involved in Yellow Submarine, and that proved to be a wise choice. Before reading this book, I had no idea there was such a tangle of film & music politics, budget issues, and unreasonable deadlines imposed. The entire project was peppered from concept to the big screen with such petty squabbles. Some even threatened to torpedo the submarine itself. Thankfully the directors, artists, animators, and production team pulled it together to deliver the wonderful film most have come to love, and appreciate. The book is well researched and written, and all the nuts & bolts are exposed, and explained. After you've finished reading the book, you understand why the Beatles made the right decision.

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The fascinating tale of the rise of Black / Death / Doom Metal.

Murder, racism, homophobia, paganism, church-burning. This is not your average music book!

Recommended even to someone who finds that style of music unlistenable. It's a fascinating to read how in a scene rooted around extremity that some were willing to take things to their logical conclusions - Murder and/or suicide.

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terry's first discworld novel - his fourth novel - is composed of four consecutive-but-more-or-less self-contained sections introducing rincewind, the discworld's most incompetent ''wizzard'' ever; twoflower, the discworld's first ever tourist; the unseen university, and its more-or-less permanent population of wizards, masters of arcane lore and who, save for the truly ambitious amongst them, who are also attempting to become masters in the art of assassinating their superiors in the uu hierarchy, are primarily interested in continuing to live their comfortably overfed lives with a minimum of effort on their own parts; the thieves' & other city guilds, whose rivalries and excesses are - mostly - balanced by an early incarnation of the patrician of the twin city of ankh-morpork whose skills in this have been sharpened by necessity, occasioned not least by the incompetence of the city guardsmen, as evidenced by the men of the night watch; and to the discworld itself, borne by the four great elephants standing atop giant atuin, the star-turtle, orbited by the sun as it (- whether he or she is a matter of deeply serious religious debate - for some -) swims slowly through space towards - what?

- terry takes a delight in gently pointing out the occasional sillinesses in the very best of fantasy he's enjoyed, nodding his appreciation by this of the pleasure their authors provided him over the decades, whilst telling a story that is all his own, that starts off with - not one, but several bangs, as the city of ankh-morpork explodes behind an incompetent wizzard escaping the catastrophe his unwanted companion, twoflower has inadvertently and accidentally triggered - both pursued by "the luggage" - twoflower's at least mildly intelligent, and apparently "mildly murderously" protective brass-bound travelling, sometimes aggressively-, even hungrily- hinged toothed timber chest, highly mobile on its innumerable tiny legs...

- contrary to his devout personal belief that the safest direction to choose is always "away" - from any and every danger or disturbance, and at as high a speed as possible, rincewind is saddled with the task of ensuring twoflower's safety and survival by the ruler of ankh-morpork - and the apparently suicidally-insane prototypical "tourist" persists, even insists, in heading for the most "picturesque" and "interesting" - for both of which rincewind rightly reads "most dangerous" - sights, company and events in any and every circumstance possible...

(re-edited 2021, to add more without committing any spoilers; maybe more to follow, still...)

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"cardboard cut-out" characters or stereotypes - and that's the two human good guys: one each dirty, smelly slob-of-a-programmer guy, and dowdy, fat "never-shaped-hersef-up" (but at least she's clean) programmer, both as smart at the work as you could wish for - are contacted by a youngster as really needs all the help that they can give - and maybe more.

- because "valentina" is an a.i. and does not and cannot own the machine on which she runs.

- the increasingly complicated twists and turns of their attempts to help "her" duly get them, and her, into ever-more dire fixes, and temptations - in the process of sorting their different ways through, all three of them mature, and in sometimes surprising ways, whilst their evil opposition is rarely purely evil, and not notably distinguished in the stupidity stakes, neither.

- much more than a western-in-inner-space, a first a.i. is a human-in-chips, or a high-tech shoot-em-up: "valentina: soul in sapphire" is possibly the first a.i. novel written by authors who realised the artificial intelligence was an emergent feature, not of the hardware - be it mainframe computer or whatever - but of the nested software suites in operation.

- and it still stands up to a re-reading, every now and then, despite the cardboard :-)

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as the management, maids, porters, guests and kitchen staff - and the ghosts in the attic - at the hotel splendide prepare for a relaxing summer's evening for some, including the grande dame arriving by chauffeured limousine - and the hard work of preparing everything just so, in the public and private rooms, and of producing perfection under the eagle-eyed gaze of the chef for others, only the lovers spooning on the top floor's balcony have noticed - and even they totally misconstrue - it's the night of the full moon...

- with individual plots starting off in the different rooms, running and up and down the staircases, and through the attics, and in the cellars, as well as in the kitchens, and moving - sometimes with difficulty, sometimes running rampant - from one site to another in the cutaway double spread cross-section views of the hotel, their interweaving makes it seem perfectly reasonable that a great ape in a voluminous dress should somehow take centre-stage for a while, for some, whilst a misguided flying saucer crashes into one tower of the hotel - and the bopping vampire disturbs someone or other's mummy, and her majesty's finest boys in blue break in to - well, make matters even worse, in fact...

- and aliens kidnap the possibly innocent chef from the midst of all the chaos caused - with what in mind, exactly ?

- and all, to what end?

- and where did the over-excited, over-sexed boa constrictor come from ?

- not to mention the passing pink elephant poling, or rather, being poled, by ?

- ah; but that would be telling...

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it's a balmy evening, and the ss splendide is taking her customers on a leisurely cruise through tropical seas; unfortunately, their chief cook is the former head chef of the hotel splendide the crew'd rescued from the sea as they were passing the place where the alien who'd abducted him had dumped him;

- and - once again - it is the night of the full moon. . .

a multi-plotted novel told in full-colour, double-page plates without words - and a second tour-de-force.

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non-fiction, espionage, politics: chapman pincher was a right-wing journalist and political commentator with excellent contacts in some parts of britain's intelligence, spy and counter-intelligence services. this allowed him privileged access to quite a few ''real-life'' espionage stories, particularly those revealing or emphasising the threat from the infiltration of the trades unions, the political party they supported, the newspapers that were generally sympathetic to them, and journals & journalists likewise - whether or not these stories were in fact true...

- he also helped break the stories of philby, burgess & maclean, three british communists working for the soviet union within the british counter-intelligence service, and eventually also anthony blunt, keeper of the queen's art collection.

- strangely, he completely missed the british secret service's plot to overthrow the democratically-elected, mildly left(''-wing'') labour government of harold wilson...
- which was eventually published by heinemann australia, despite the government's very heavy-handed threats and other attempts to suppress its breaking into general public knowledge.

- nevertheless, this is an absorbing - and largely true, if somewhat partial - overview and account of the world of espionage, especially through the nineteen forties, fifties, sixties and seventies, as seen from the eyes of a very well-connected right-wing british journalist and entertaining writer.

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thor heyerdahl's magnum opus, in which he details all the evidence for american indians' venturing into the pacific ocean from both north and south america, their use of both colonisable islands and of islets incapable of supporting human life & societies, of some of the societies they established and the development of their languages, religions, agriculture and other introduced crops and their origins, likewise their crafts and architecture - including, on some island, major sculptures and artefacts in wood, and truly monumental stone moai developed uniquely in these colonies, from traceable precursors on the main american continents...

..and also the near total lack of most major cultural and agricultural staples and other foods and animals from societies to their west in the pacific ocean and its south-eastern asian mainland, or in micronesia, or melanesia or, to their south-west, in australia.

detailed study of work published before his magnum opus, the examination of alternative possible explanations of the observed facts, detailed original research into many of these and other areas of study make this a multi-disciplinary tour-de-force, and one which should be read and understood by any and everyone before they seek to criticise his work, analyses and exploration of the possible, impossible, likely and unlikely explanations for the considerable body of evidence.

- through the rest of the twentieth century and on into the twenty-first (- and as recently as 2024 c.e. -) further evidence has come to light in the field of dna research strongly suggesting that thor heyerdahl's studies, experimental research, hypotheses and major conclusions are substantially sound, even where these - and he, himself - have been much criticised, and from time-to-time lampooned.

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superb historical novel in rosemary sutcliff's extended matter of britain sequence running from the decline of the roman empire in britannia, the attempt by carausius to establish an independently defendable roman britain, through the withdrawal of the legions, the campaigning and success of artorius - ''artos'' - later re-invented as the romantic ''king arthur'' - to halt the saxon colonisation of britain and preserve romano-british britain as both a haven and a beacon of civilisation and hope - and its eventual failure.

''dawn wind'' tells of the final catastrophic battle that saw the permanent sundering of south-west britain - devon and cornwall - from west-and-north britain - eventually diminished to wales - at aquae sulis, bath; and of the survival of one british lad and a dog from that battle, and his wandering, lost and purposeless, and his discovering another lost british refugee, surviving in the ruins, and hearing her story, and telling his; and how they fare together, looking for some reason, some purpose, and together attempt to re-establish their lives - but are taken and enslsaved by saxons; and how they fare separately;
and how, at the end, there is a glimmer of hope...

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found incomplete as well as unfinished after antoine de saint exupéry's death, the barely or unrevised-by-the-author manuscript (typescript) of ''citadelle'' was tidied up and published by gallimard in 1948, whereupon it won le prix des ambassadeurs, on the very first occasion this prize was awarded.

in it de saint exupéry sought to derive a philosophical, religious and practical firm foundation of values upon which to base one's life from his personal experiences and observations of the emptiness of modern life and the failure of modern values - or the lack thereof - visualised as the efforts of a berber lord to establish his citadel upon foundations of the shifting desert sands.

(bookcat lacks a ''genre'' of philosophy, hence a combination of personal development and society, under the over-all genre of non-fiction.)

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a good starter's field book, unsurprisingly, as bill bailey is a dedicated bird-spotter (or birder) as well as a stand-up comedian, and his photos, drawings & paintings of the birds are well done, helpful (some drawings humorous cartoons), the information on the fifty-odd birds detailed, and this ''pocket edition'''s pages are sewn in signatures, glued onto a tough flexible backing strip, and in turn bound with endpapers into a tough, flexible cover.

also includes: do's and don'ts in the countryside (and notes that access rights differ in the different countries in the yuk-of-gb-&-ni), what people'll need for days & longer out bird-watching or spotting, checklist for birds spotted, place & number for those wanting to record this and space for notes - use a soft (2B or B) pencil! - how to report sightings to the rspb and rspb birdwatching/spotting code, list of best sites in the uk for particular species/families of some birds, by english county and by other uk country, seasonal guide including year-round.

third covid-19 lockdown's tapering off, hopefully not to be repeated, i want to find myself a copy of this.

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account of an expedition to find, examine, describe and, where both possible and sensible, obtain examples of himalayan, and especially nepali, wildlife up to and possibly including the yeti°,
and to deliver and see erected (and perhaps established) an effectively corrosion-proof aluminium building provided by field enterprises educational corporation to house a school to be run by the nepalese and for the nepalese - education being one of the things very dear to sir edmund's heart, not least for the greatly increased horizons and opportunities it could offer both adults and children of the people of nepal, and which he could help provide.

(° people of and behind the expedition were not necessarily of one mind, to start with, as to whether any examples of the yeti they might come across should, or should not be caged and ''returned'' to ''civilisation''... views depending not least upon whether the yeti was, or was not a self-aware being.)

an entertaining, as well as an educational read - not least, as regarding the in many ways very different world of the middle and late fifties (- of which the early sixties were really a part -) and an antidote to too many englishmen (sir edmund was a new zealander) 's assumption of superiority & imperial privileges.

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profusely illustrated in full colour by josh kirby, with some full-page pictures, some smaller but nevertheless crossing from one page to the page opposite, and some smaller illustrations wholly within a smaller part of the one page, with text "flowed" to one side or another of them, or sometimes wholly above or below them.

the blurb on the back of the book/dust-jacket gives a good indication of what to expect - except terry gives a rincewind's-eye-view of the "adventures" eric gets them into, i.e. dangers that any sane person would run away from at top speed - not approach eagerly (aka "run towards with a total disregard for elemental (or elementary) matters of safety") - and rincewind would sooner start running from now!

a tour-de-force in illustration of this discworld short novel by josh kirby:
don't settle for the text-only p/b or mmpb unless you have no alternative.

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This ought to be on any modern national curriculum - A Must Read!

I came across a newer edition of this in a charity shop last year, and thinking that Isaac Asimov was one of those I must get a around to reading, due to his name keeping on popping up in any discussion of sci-fi, or real world artificial Intelligence / robotics of the modern / coming age.

And it does not disappoint, not due to any special gift of language Asimov had, or even his ability to spin a rip roaring yarn - there's no real poetry here - But because of the ideas presented in these stories...

Prescient, and increasingly relevant.

What these are, is not so much stories, as scenarios based around different aspects of robotics / AI, in which he works through how they work... if they work, where the problems are, and the benefits are of Robots in these scenario contexts.

To give them collectively their proper, original name... these are speculative fictions.

What ifs:

What if a politician were sneakily replaced with a robot replica... would anyone notice the difference?

(Chuckle)

...Actually they would... when the situation starts inexplicably improving... leading to the moral considerations of this situation: Run by robots?!!! .... deceiving the public... even when it's for their own good and benefit? Yikes!

Or another, where a chain of mining robots who share a collective mind start going a bit wobbly...

....Or my favourite:

...Where a robotics engineer has to send a complex AI robot to go mining on Mercury, too hot and inhospitable for humans, but the robot starts leaping about and having fun on Mercury, not doing what was wanted...

... turns out, the engineer decided to place the consciousness of his disabled locked-in son in the robot.

Most of these stories utilise a handful of the same characters to set the scenarios against:

Two hapless robotics engineers, who have to figure out what's going wrong all the time, and a senior AI / robotics scientist, who is more the Yoda of AI, and does most of the theorising, philosophising and resolving - a woman too... so some very early feminism there from Mr Asimov! -

So while this is logical theorising as story-telling, they are engaging, fun, and very interesting.

The basis of some good classroom discussion I'd have thought, around a subject more relevant to modern students than: Of Mice and Men, or Lord Of The Flies <This last is kind of redundant, as we seem to have been living it for real now for quite some time :).... :(

So maybe time to ditch some of yesterday's fusty old curriculum staples, and look more to this kind of thing.

...And even if you are not a student... read it anyway... you may have to know what it's got to say sometime soon!

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in the year 600 a.d. or as near as makes no difference, mynyddog mwynfawr, mighty and wise king in dun eidin, sent out a challenge to the whole of britain, whose warring kingdoms and quarrelsome principalities were sorely beset by the invading angles, under their jutish, saxon and anglic nobilities and royal houses: he would feast the three hundred greatest champions for a year and a day, during which they would lead the lives of heroes - his kingdom would refuse them nothing, no food, wine, mead or beer they demanded, and his womenfolk would refuse them nothing - after which he or his greatest generals, at the head of his armies, would lead them south against the invading angles of deira and bernicia, the two most powerful saxon kingdoms in the north of britain, slaughtering all who stood against them, and did not run back to their ships, and back to the angle whence their pestilential brood had come.

and the three hundred champions gathered, and they were feasted as had been promised, and no woman refused them; and, at the end of the year and a day, they set out, riding with his generals at the head of the wise and mighty king of dun eidin's mighty armies, marching south against their enemies.
and when they came upon resistance, from bands of warriors or armed, assembled farmers, or overtook folk fleeing too late, they made great slaughter; and much land was taken back from the invading foreigners.

but when the time came for the battle against the combined armies of deira and bernicia, that were so many that they were countless, innumerable and well-equipped for war - if few or none of them properly armed and mounted as champions and heroes should be - the army of mynyddog mwanfawr the wise and mighty had all but disappeared, fallen far behind the three hundred heroes, who were left to fight - which they did, making great slaughter - and to die - which they also did, eventually, as though they were mightier in arms than any of those they faced, and were all also champions, and truly heroes, the armies that they faced were too many: the odds were overwhelming; and the tale that came back of the end they had made was glorious, indeed; but it came back by courtesy - if it can be called this - of their enemy, who did not understand why they had behaved so, either.

- but why did mynyddog mwynfawr the wise and mighty, king in dun eidin, so basely betray the champions of the british? why did he devote the wealth of his kingdom and his people - aye, and his womenfolk - to feasting these heroes for a year and a day - giving not only the champions, but also the saxon, anglic and jutish chiefs, nobles and kings good warning of the whirlwind he would unleash upon the kingdoms of deira and bernicia?

- john james here constructs a superb historical novel upon the bare bones of y goddodin, using his intelligence and a gift for imagining himself into not only the champions' minds, but also that of his survivor, to tell a powerful and exciting story well indeed: but, i think even more impressively, perhaps, he comes up with a reason mynyddog mwynfawr the wise and mighty might just have had, for plotting, planning, and paying so much and then - apparently - achieving so little but ruin.

a gem.

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The book appears to be pretty comprehensive on documenting what the author set out to do, which is to list every vinyl record released by French bands between 1977 and 2000 which fall broadly into a 'rock' category. It doesn't keep strictly to it's definition, there are examples of overspill on the dates in that listed reissues and compilations tend to stretch beyond 2000 and I think it also lists records by French bands that got released outside of France. The book skips all of the boring info, the listings tend to just give the briefest description of what a band sounds like, and then lists their releases (many with pictures). Recommended

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This was posted on Amazon on 13 March 2019 by Terry Adam - I fully support his comments:

I have always said that Timothy Dalton’s portrayal as James Bond was the closest to the literary Bond and that both The Living Daylights and Licence to Kill are underrated inclusions in the 007 franchise. Therefore, I was very pleased to find, and read in one sitting, this short but fascinating book written by film lecturer Cary Edwards PhD who dissects, analyses and gives his very erudite, educated and entertaining views and positive thoughts on both films and Dalton’s performance within.

It is less a ‘behind the scene/making of’ publication and more of an academic paper/thesis on all aspects of the two films, Dalton and the Bond legacy. The chapter on ‘Context’ covering both cinematic and political, I found very interesting.

The Dalton era was unfortunately short lived but it was a watershed moment in the development and eventual re-packaging of the Bond we know and love today.

I would highly recommend this book to both film scholars and Bond fans and also congratulate Cary Edwards for championing Dalton’s all too brief, but in my personal view impactful and unforgettable, tenure as James Bond 007.

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Given their worldwide fame, tales of the Beatles are 10 a penny, so it's rare for fresh and original insights to be uncovered. But a new book, Just Like Starting Over, does just that, providing readers with a window into the bands beginnings, from a young man who was there to witness it all. Charles Roberts, of Woolton, provides a first hand account of life growing up in Liverpool and his days at the birth of the Quarrymen, right through to the beginnings of the Fab Four. His memories are truly special and his recollections of the sights and sounds of 1950s Liverpool will no doubt bring back memories for many readers who lived through what was arguably the city's most exciting musical era.

Liverpool Echo, 5 May 2018

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morgaine and nhi vanye meet, under circumstances neither fully appreciate about the other - vanye, because he has no concept of morgaine's nature, far less her purposes, and she, because she neither knows, nor can afford to care what effects she has upon the people she passes through upon her quest to close down the gates between worlds destabilising, and well on their way to destroying, the universe.
to vanye she is a legend; an ill omen, perhaps; but still someone who he, outcast from his people, can serve, and so regain honour; to morgaine, vanye is useful, offering possibly essential local knowledge and help in completing one part of her mission in the here and now, this here and now; but liable to be at best an encumbrance, quite possibly an embarrassment, in and on the other worlds she must visit, to continue closing down the gates.
- but, since she needs his help now, she accepts his offer of service - not realising that, for nhi vanye, this offer is of his service for life.

through the greater and lesser dangers of their journey across unfamiliar country, they begin to realise to some extent quite how much they have misunderstood in their initial appreciation of each other, and the relationship between them begins to change from that which either of them presumed it to be.

first uk edition of the morgaine and vanye series #1:

#1: "gate of ivrel" (first edition, u.s. 1976), q.v. for series listing and links.

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the classic story cycle set in a vision of the england that developed after queen elizabeth's assassination, and the reclaiming of the country for roman catholicism (and himself) by philip II, widower of queen mary, with sword and arquebus, crossbow and cannon ruling the european battlefield, horse, pack-horse and horse-and-cart or ox-cart transport on the rutted, muddy roads of england - though the steam-powered traction engine is beginning to make an impact; and telecommunications provided somewhat uncertainly - and only for the few - by carrier-pigeon and a limited coverage of semaphore stations, some set really isolated in the wilds, and their dedicated service of signallers.

a gem - or a bejewelled bracelet of small gems - of quietly beautiful storytelling, with adventure as well as vision - and a delicate touch.

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barely above basic literacy in some ways, though with an interesting vocabulary.
a ham-fisted attempt at heroic fantasy with, or possibly within, a master computer.

really deserves a "0" or a negative rating, save perhaps for turkey-readings to raise money for conventions' charities.

carcass of book patchily/inconsistently inked/over-inked/(mostly) under-inked, making reading the thing - or attempting to - even more of a chore.

avoid, unless collecting turkeys (see above).

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I'd seriously advise against anybody buying the 3rd edition (1994) of this book. I got it based on things I'd read suggesting it was a comprehensive review of the recorded music industry 'from tinfoil to stereo'. It wasn't. So I got a copy of the 2nd edition (1976) and found that all the later chapters had been removed in the 3rd edition. I've posted images of the contents pages from both editions so you can see how much more the 2nd edition contained. This 3rd edition may be more up to date in light of more recent findings, but it is totally Edison-centric and written entirely for the American market, ignoring Europe almost completely.

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this original anthology series was touted by roger elwood as being set to take over the mantle of frederik pohl's "star sf" (and e. j. carnell's "new writings in sf", which saw some merkin availability via bantam books' mmpbs) and to run indefinitely; the reality, as with most of elwood's mid-seventies' sf anthology "bubble", was rather different. . .

...but this quartet is still worth investigating: nearly all the authors are good, most are distinctive - they write, or wrote, in uniquely their own voice(s) - and some of these are classics - "minor gems" - more easily and cheaply obtained by picking up all four "continua", rather than searching for e.g. edgar pangborn's "still i persist in wondering" (1978), q.v. - which, though wonderful, as well as full of wonder, is getting rather rare, and consequently a little pricey.°
the anne mccaffrey novellas were later rewritten into two books of her "killashandra" trilogy, mostly the first, q.v., but in substantially different form - and with a very different, and iynshs's o, far better, ending: one that is fitting to killashandra's story and her development.

° - the pangborn stories are set in the world of "davy" (1964), q.v. and "the judgement of eve" (1966), q.v., which ought to be enough to make any lover of fine sf who's not read them salivate, at least mentally. . .

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adventures of a man shrunk by being struck by lightning to just ½" high who befriends a warrior ant; "atta" is the name of the ant:

"aside from the author's...relentless disregard of natural history...the principal irritant in this story is the hero's absolutely impenetrable stupidity..." °

° - "in search of wonder" by damon knight, 1967 advent publishers, chicago (usa)

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Connie Francis makes you feel like you are living thru these experiences of her life with her. Very in-depth from her childhood years thru her many trials and tribulations and heartaches. What a survivor! From one of the world’s most popular singers this is a fascinating read and I certainly found it hard to put this book down. A must-have for any fan of this legendary icon.

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immensely successful, commercially, but somewhat dissatisfying sub-tolkienian pentalogy; the story takes a pretty boring and unobservant farm-boy through perilous adventures towards a climactic battle, picking up more or less-unlikely companions as he goes. some of these companions are people he's previously known as pretty ordinary, commonplace adults, unaware of (i.e. never noticing) their extraordinary powers (did i mention his uninquisitive, unobservant nature?); one is an extremely annoying "princess" of a teenager (who actually is a princess), that's somehow managed to avoid being murdered for her whiny, totally self-absorbed selfishness, and another is "silk", a double-dealing, treacherous-but-lovable rogue. . .

that they eventually reach a successful conclusion to their adventures is, of course, inevitable - despite the existence of competing prophecies, or possibly competing interpretations of the same prophecy; and that the princess will prove to be a peach is predictable, if her survival unmurdered by any one of her companions - or the people they meet - was less so; but garion the stableboy - ok, farm boy - is so unimaginably boringly uninterested in the world, his companions, an enchanted sword... - not even his discovery that he's been raised by, and guarded by, two of the most powerful beings in creation suffices to raise a spark of suspicion that there might just possibly be something special about himself. . .

and it's such a waste. the five books are at least competently well written, and there was a brilliant story just waiting to be told: lester del rey° shouldn't have accepted and published this first novel at all; he should've paid the minimum acceptable advance for the rights, and sent it back to the author saying "you're telling the wrong story; it isn't garion's story of unimaginative and unimagined inevitable success against all the odds at all - it's the amoral, inventive, larcenous and entirely self-interested rogue silk's story about how, despite his best intentions, he got lured into taking dangerous, all-but suicidal risks - to achieve something good, okay, but a venture that held no possible profit for him whatsoever - and he still can't work out how they conned him into doing anything so foolhardy..."

° - eddings' editor

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the sfnal nature of "squares" is largely based upon an extrapolation of the research into and claims made for the effectiveness of subliminal advertisements and propaganda, that have proved to be far less effective in reality than was claimed for them at the time. this aside, the novel is a sociological story of political "class warfare" struggle and of the relationships between the characters cutting across their political beliefs, complicating their lives both socially, and corrupting their effectiveness as political reformers, radicals and revolutionaries (or otherwise) - themes john was to return to and develop further over the following decades in his major novels.

it is most famous now for john's having based its plot structure upon the 7/2/1892 world championship rematch, steinitz-chigorin chess game in havana, cuba, recorded (notated) & replayed step-by-step at chessgames.com.


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the concept was a good one, arguably; at least, the initial idea - and the opening passage, as it were - are funny, in their own, horrible and horrific way. almost poetic.


but the execution of the rest - and by far the greater part - is woefully poor. it presents the reader with an inadequate travelogue pretty much bereft of ideas, no further vignettes of incidents riffing off climactic scenes and/or perhaps overpowerfully-penned vistas of the original, and it fails to tell a story that makes sense even in its own, twisted terms: overall, it is what it implicitly (and falsely) accuses its inspiration of being - "bored of the rings" is an over-extended single gag, and - worst of all - it is itself a bore.

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