Customer Reviews

Liar'S Oath

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

 

 

Nitty Gritty Realism.... This seems to be the area that Ms. Moon gets complemented on the most for her other novels. Perhaps that is why readers seem to have such a love-hate relationship with this novel. Here we are confronted with a protagonist that is not larger than life, as are Gird and Paksenarrion, but rather is all too human. Very Real. You've heard the expression, "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions"? Well, Luap has the right to wear the "Been there, done that!" T-shirt. Paks's decisions may not have always been easy, but she had the light of Gird within her to guide her along her path, thus making those decisions seem easy and foregone. This is the story of one man who tries to fake that inner light and all of the chaos that comes about from his continual striving to do what is right without having a clue. I think that this story is a good balance to the Deed, as well as filling in past history that I was curious about

I'll agree that Liar's Oath is not the pinnacle of Elizabeth Moon's fantasy novels, but it tells a very important story, and a lot of people don't like it because they don't realize until the end that this story is a TRAGEDY.

Yes, Luap is a flawed, unworthy character who leads his followers to disaster. His story is a warning, and Moon tells it with all the style and bitter realism her fans expect from her.

I liked so much about this book! I wanted it to be a 5 star review. I can't do it.

It's well written and interesting. The characters matter and their lives matter. It should be five stars but it is not because the story does not support the rest of the excellence.

The story actually begins with a short prolog involving Paksennarion and Duke Phelan, a thousand years or more after the "time" of the story. They are discussing the mysterious fortress found in the DEED OF PAKSENNARION trilogy. From there, the story goes back to the time of Gird. In that sense, it begins before the previous story ends because Gird is still alive. He is not the central character, however. The main guy is Luap, Gird's sometimes trustworthy assistant.

The problem is the distrust between the peasants and the mage born. Luap has found a magic portal to a mysterious palace far in the west and wants to move the mageborn out there to allow them to safely train their powers. In his heart, though, he looks forward to the opportunity to set up an independent fiefdom. The palace he found was actually built by dwarves and elves. They do not use it but are reluctant to let humans in there. They warn of a grave danger but refuse to specify the nature of that danger. Luap moves out there with his people anyway and for a while they are happy but there is a great danger. It is the dark elves who delight in evil. Luap's presence has freed them and they are biding their time to make a bloody mess.

All of this reads well. The suspense is gradually built up along with good characterizations. Where the book falls down is in the climax. The dark elves are on the march and everything is resolved in a few pages with the intervention of Paks and Duke Phelan from the future. Luap gets his comeuppance and they all go about their business.

Its too pat.

Still, the book was worth reading. I just wish it had been worth ending

This book is a sort of a history or background of the world as Paksennarion knew it. It may be perhaps a bit dry a times as most histories are. But its a good story.

I discovered Elizabeth Moon when she wrote Sassinak. I loved the Deed of Paksenarrion and have have mixed (but mostly positive) reactions to the rest of her books. This, though...this was a bitter disappointment.

I love psychological studies. I usually like books with unlikable main characters. But there must be a point to the book. It must GO somewhere or DO something. This book promises and teases, but in the end, there is nothing.

This is a book that needed a fight. This book was desperate for a climax, a turning point, some action. Whether political or physical, this book just flat needed a real conflict, not the mess of never-resolved semi-conflicts with a weak deus ex machina device at the end.

This book needed a story, but it had none. It was too toothless for a tragedy, too wandering for a saga, too diffuse for a character study.

What a disappointment. I can't believe I bought this new. Never again! Elizabeth Moon is going firmly into my "used only" category until I find something of hers to be a lot more enthusiastic about.

I loved The Deed of Paksenarrion. I thoroughly enjoyed Liar's Oath. There's a definite difference. I found Luap to be an insightful main character. I disliked him, as I do many people in the world today, but that made the book more realistic. After all, important things happen to less-than-perfect people. I felt that the story dragged in some places, but all in all rate it as a worthy prequel to The Deed of Paksenarrion.

I thoroughly enjoyed The Deed of Paksenarion, but I cannot recommend Liar's Oath. The story's weak and Laup is an unlikable, uninspiring character that reminds me of a government bureaucrat who's not happy in his job but doesn't have the courage to do anything else. Gird's character, isn't around long and I never really had a sense for the purpose of the book. It isn't good enough to stand on it's own merits and I didn't find it a particularly good precursor. The book ends with a resounding fizzle and even Paks and Duke/King Keri can't save it. I haven't given up on Ms. Moon though. Her extraordinary narrative added so much to the wonderful story line in The Deed. Unfortunately in Liar's Oath it's not enough to save the weak story

While I have enjoyed most of the books put out by Elizabeth Moon I must say that this one bites the dust without exception. The tale just drags from start to finish without lifting from the drudgery. While the Legacy of Gird is a decent read this one does not have an inkling of enjoyment in it...Better luck next time Mrs. Moon

This is the second half of the prequel to the "Deed of Paksennarion" trilogy, which also comes around at the end and bites it's own tail. Where Surrender None was about Gird and the peasant revolution he led against the mage-lords, this one begins with Gird's death (just before it, actually) and focuses on Luap, previously "the luap," Gird's assistant and sort of aide-de-camp. Luap is half-mage himself, the bastard of one of the kings before the one Gird killed, and he's infected with a lingering sense of entitlement that will eat away at him all the rest of his long, long life. He's not evil, just weak -- just human, as Gird was, but in a much less heroic way. Moon gradually builds multiple character portraits with her rather slow-moving narrative, including those of the first two proto-paladins, an aging mage-priest, and a large supporting cast. None of this will make a bit of sense unless you've read the previous volume -- and preferably the whole trilogy -- so don't even think of starting here.

This novel was so bad that I threw it away after reading it and was furious that I wasted so much time. It dragged throughout the book entire. The story line just was not interesting,