Customer Reviews

Ally (Wess'har Wars)

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Ally doesn't live up to the standards set in previous chapters of Karen Traviss' Wess'har Wars. This may be due to padding out an otherwise shorter series to sell more books, or perhaps to overwork. Since the publication of the first two Wess'har novels in 2004, Traviss will have through the end of 2007 published an additional 3 Wess'har novels, plus 5 Star Wars novels - with 3 more novels already scheduled for 2008.

Ally disappoints largely because it doesn't go anywhere, covering much the same ground as in Matriarch, which when it finished left us anticipating the eqbas arrival on Earth. By the end of Ally, they're just packing up.

The title refers to partnerships formed among competing factions to protect common interests, the outcome of Ally's most common activity - talk. Having taken the decision to intervene on Umeh, the eqbas matriarch Esganikan finds herself looking at a decade-long occupation, followed by a potentially equally lengthy assignment to Earth, when she'd most like to go home and start a family. To speed things up and get her off Umeh, she allies herself with a new species, the skavu, ruthless reptile-like bipeds Shan Frankland describes as Eco-Jihadis. The skavu are so fierce and so feared that the Bezer'ej wess'har and the isenj set aside their differences, allowing Esganikan to leave for Earth (skavu in tow) secure that the restructuring of Umeh will be properly managed. What Esganikan doesn't yet know, however, is that the ecological balance on Bezer'ej is once more threatened by c'naatat, which Lindsay Neville has given to the bezeri to save them from extinction. In their own private alliance, Aras and Shan promise not to reveal to Esganikan the c'naatat infection provided Lindsay keeps the super-powered squid from reproducing.

While the plot is rather thin, Ally continues to deliver on character development. Perhaps the most endearing person in this volume is Aras, who struggles courageously with conscience and the need for forgiveness and reconciliation. While observing that a lasting sense of betrayal is characteristically human, he is confounded that Deborah Garrod has been able to forgive him for executing her husband. Perhaps, he thinks, he can do the same for the isenj who tortured him while a prisoner of war. And so he visits Umeh to see if perhaps he can relieve himself of the demons that have tortured him for most of the past five centuries.

Traviss also includes more of her cutting observations on humanity. When Eddie Michallat insults a human as a "stupid cow," his adolescent wess'har companion Giyadas is intrigued by his word choice: "So by comparison with what you think of as an inferior species, you insult her. And you also make her not human, and so not worthy of respect." She's also critical of Eddie's excision from his reports of some of the most brutal images of the war: "When you look at something, you remove all that doesn't affect you. You see what you need and feel, nothing else. You see nobody else." This propensity to demean and ignore other sentient creatures is also found, Aras observes, in the commercialization of animal images, such as plush toy Pandas. "... there are many kinds of human who ... [love] the abstract ideal while abusing and destroying the living object."

And finally Traviss continues to develop the big themes that make this series so compelling - the interdependence life, the insubstantiality of reality, and the ability of the mind to condition itself for good or bad - ideas that dovetailed quite nicely with recent readings on Buddhism. As Aras observes: "There is no such thing as continual improvement. Just change."

Hopefully, the final volume, Judge (April 2008), will be a change for the better.

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With Ally Karen Traviss delivers the fifth entry in her Wess'har Wars series. The aliens are now one step closer to Earth and the Wess'har will cleanse and rebalance life on Earth...which will result in significant loss of human life (but salvation for the other forms of life on the planet). Shan Frankland, once a police officer, a "copper" in her words, once a human much like any other, is, and has been for several books, much more than human. She identifies much more with the Wess'har and due to her infection of c'naatat Shan is nearly immortal. She can die, but even stepping out in the vacuum of space is not enough to kill. Shan's ideas about conversation and the value of the lives of non-humans fall in line with much of Wess'har. She is also married to a Wess'har, Aras, who is also infected with c'naatat and has been alive for five hundred years, and to a human soldier, Abe, who suffers the same fate. Shan knows that she cannot return to Earth ever because humanity should not have access to c'naatat.

But this is only one aspect of what is going on and only identifies who Shan Frankland is. There is war on Umeh, the home planet of the isenj, and the Wess'har have been invited to restore Umeh to a natural balance, but they have not been given full permission to cleanse the planet as they would wish. So, there is conflict on the planet as some of the isenj revolt against the isenj leadership, but in that revolt they pit themselves against the Wess'har and ensure the destruction of the isenj. On Bezer'ej, the world known as Cavanaugh's Star, there is a different problem. The world is in balance and though the bezeri have been nearly exterminated by a couple of humans and a big mistake, there are still survivors and Lindsay Neville, the guilty party here, was infected with c'naatat to serve the survivors in the oceans. Lindsay wonders if that service could be to save the bezeri by infecting these creatures, once thought harmless but recently discovered as overhunters who have destroyed eco-systems, and bringing them on land.

There is less a sense of discovery and raw excitement than there was in the first entries of the Wess'har Wars. This is only to be expected as Traviss is telling an ongoing story and not introducing the reader to an entirely new culture and worldview. One thing that Traviss does well to keep her novels fresh is that each novel introduces something entirely new and shattering which changes everything for the next novel. Earlier in the series it was infecting Shan with c'naatat, infecting Abe, the near destruction of the bezeri, killing Shan (which obviously didn't work), the planned invasion of Earth by the wess'har, and infecting Lindsay and Rayat. Because c'naatat is nearly impossible to eliminate (but it is possible), having more characters infected each with different views on life and what should be done with c'naatat, everything changes. All of this helps keep the series fresh and leaves the reader to end a novel with something shocking and spend the next year wondering what will happen next.

So what about Ally? Well, Traviss gives us our shocking event which changes everything. Something about Ally felt far more compelling than the previous volume, Matriarch. Perhaps it is the sense that in Ally something is really happening and the overarching storyline of bringing the Wess'har to Earth may actually happen in the series. There has been a sense of stasis in recent volumes where there was a bit of a question of whether or not Traviss would actually write about the Wess'har getting to Earth. Real progress on that storyline has been made now. Add this progress to the already fascinating ethical discussions and actions of Shan, the Wess'har on Umeh, the bezeri, and the possibility of Earthly invasion and what we have is an improvement in the series and a step back to what we had in the first three novels. There is simply a greater sense that things are happening in this novel than in the previous one and this leads to greater satisfaction with the novel.

-Joe Sherry

I really enjoyed the first three books of the series, especially Shan Frankland's gradual immersion in an alien culture and her unlikely but compelling romance. In "Ally", the fifth book of the series, the focus is more on the unfolding ecological/political/military conflicts over Umeh, Bezer'ej and (to come) Earth, which I personally found readable but less compelling than what went before.

To some extent the series is starting to suffer inevitably from its length; there are a number of minor human characters from earlier volumes who are referred to and I had some trouble remembering them all. There number of subplots woven together, some of which I found interesting but others less so. The only truly interesting part of "Ally", to me, concerned the developing story of the bezer'i, which got comparatively little attention. (The bezer'i could have been developed into more interesting characters; I find them an exception to the rule that Traviss's alien characters are always so interesting, as contrasted to her human characters who, except for Shan and Ade, I find rather dull.) The rest of the story, devoted to troubles on Umeh and the introduction of the menacing Skavu, seems to be little more than a lead-in for volume six. These events make the threat that looms for Earth all the more worrisome as we see what happens to Umeh, but most readers will have been well aware of the extent of the danger by the end of "Matriarch".

Of course I'm going to buy and read "Judge" when it comes out. But "Ally" is the least compelling book in the series so far.

I had been worried after the fourth book, "Matriarch", that this series was losing steam. Bogged down by a lot of regurgitation of facts and backstory, I felt like Traviss was just padding out the books needlessly and I was beginning to fear that it would only get worse through the last two volumes. Fortunately, "Ally" was a step back in a much better direction. The pace of the action picked up considerably again, with multiple storylines that were engaging and kept me looking forward to reading more. We begin to really get a sense of what could lie ahead for Earth as the environmental "remediation" efforts begin in earnest on Umeh, with billions dying as part of the Eqbas efforts towards "balance". Lindsay Neville takes the remaining bezeri onto land, a fascinating development in the storyline until its clear that these aquatic predators do not intend to change their ways, not even after the near extinction of their species.

So if you were beginning to get tired of the series after "Matriarch", I do recommend sticking with it to give "Ally" a read. I hope the series will continue at least at this level of enjoyment through the last book, which is next on my reading list.

This book, in fact the whole series (6 books in all), to be very entertaining. They are well written with good character development. The story line is very original. I actually have read all of the books twice now and probably will read them again. I just wish Ms Traviss would continue this series or write another one. I have also read most of the Star Wars books she has written and in my opinion, Ms Traviss is an excellent author.

So, why does it only get 4 stars from me? It's something I call the time test. If it takes me more than 2 months to read something, it probably isn't all THAT compelling. This work does indeed cover much of the same ground as the previous books. It's still good, and still very much worth the read. It is not, however, Traviss' best work. I tried to think of the major plot points and couldn't come up with much. It's a lot of waiting and staring down and developing the cultures. The newbies, Skavu, struck me as stereotypically psychopathic, which is unusual for Traviss, who tends to excel at well fleshed out cultures. The two flavors of Wess'har are nicely developed, and she's done a lovely job of pinning down the flaws in humanity. Her descriptions are apt and lively. The language is fluid if a bit crude. If you're not a Karen Traviss fan, shame on you. If you are, you probably already bought the book anyway. If you aren't but plan to be, get cracking reading.

"Ally," is the latest in Karen Traviss's "Shan Frankland" saga, and as with all of the entries in what I suspect will be, when it concludes, one of the finest sf series ever created, it amazes: Amazes because of the number of new ideas on cultures and their effect on their native ecologies that the author tosses out. Amazes because of the thought she's put into the story and the characters. Amazes because, although the action doesn't move very far forward from where things left off in "Matriarch," the author manages to spin out 388 fascinating pages to keep us engrossed while we wait for the long-planned expedition back to Earth, where the alien Eqbas intend to solve the planet's ecological disasters, whether the inhabitants want them to or not.

In this tale, the Eqbas clean up the Isenji planet, Umeh (and they show very tough love indeed as they go about it), aided by their allies, the seriously whackadoo Skavu; the creepy Rayat findds yet another way to become useful, while Linday and the Bezer'ej go through more changes; and of course Ade, Aras, and Shan continue to love and squabble.

In telling the tale the amazingly assured Ms. Frankland makes you rethink, yet again, what you thought you knew. But, hey, she does that in every volume of the series, of which this is the fifth.

Naturally, new readers would be well advised to begin at the beginning, with "City of Pearl," and move on from there.

Traviss is one of the most interesting SF author writing these days. Ally is a wonderful read, but if you haven't read the earlier books in the series itisn't the place to start.

If you like your SF to come with complex storylines, interesting aliens, multi sided characters and plots that are as fun as a roller coaster ride, and make you stop and think about things in the real world, look up City of Pearl and give this series a try.

It won't disappoint.

Then when you've devoured the Wess'har books and are still hungry for more check out Traviss's Star Wars Republic Commando books Hard Contact (Star Wars: Republic Commando), Triple Zero (Star Wars: Republic Commando). They will change how you think of media tie in books forever.

Seriously.

In the latest sequel in the series we learn much more about the different alien races as the story unfolds. The sequel is as captivating as the previous titles.

A warning to new readers: I would highly recommend to read the series in order.

Overall an excelent book.

This is another great book in a great series. It left me waiting in anticipation for the next one.