Customer Reviews

Patrimony: A Pip & Flinx Adventure (Pip & Flix Adventures)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Alan Dean Foster has taken the MacGuffin technique to an extreme level. For approximately three decades spanning 13 novels we have been teased with the MacGuffin i.e. Flinx's father's identity. It is only important to Flinx and does nothing for the individual stories in each novel or the overall fight against the great evil. Now that we FINAlLY have resolved this MacGuffin we can move on to the main order of business viz. looking for the Tar Aim Krang and figuring out a way to combat the galaxy destroying great evil.This book does not compare with the quality of earlier novels such as BloodHype or the End of Matter, seems more like a repeat of mediocre novels like Running from the Deity or Trouble Magnet. Most likely it could have been a couple of introductory chapters of Flinx Transcendent. I have been a fan of the Flinx saga spanning decades but my patience is running short. No more forays into different derivates of the Midworld story, we need to get on with the main plot.

Supposedly this is the penultimate Pip and Flinx novel. Alan Dean Foster is presumably winding up for some sort of grand finish that will hopefully leave all of the fans who've stuck with the series through the years, satisfied. Based on this novel, frankly I doubt it will happen, but I am willing to plug on and let myself be surprised.

Over the last few years Pip and Flinx have become, well... mechanical. There seems to be a formula to writing one of these novels and Foster doesn't seem to bother trying to break it. In each novel recently there is the "New World" with "A New Species of Alien" there is the "Evil man / Bounty Hunter / Criminal Mastermind" who is out to get Flinx, and there are a number of highly formulaic action sequences. This book has all of these things. If you were expecting a return to the quality of earlier Pip & Flinx novels you will be disappointed. If you were expecting the book to greatly advance the plot you will be disappointed.

However I did notice one interesting difference between this novel and past Foster novels. In no other book have I ever seen Foster kill off so many secondary characters i.e. people who befriend Flinx. I wonder if Foster is preparing himself for his next book? If so he might be better served trying to retrieve the joy he must have once had in writing a good book. The final Pip & Flinx book should be a labor of love, not just a job that he spends a couple hours a day on and doesn't really give a damned about.

Patrimony (2007) is the thirteenth SF novel in the Flinx series, following Trouble Magnet. In the previous volume, Flinx lands on Viseria and intervenes in a conflict between street kids and an Underhouse master. In the resulting fight, he meets a dying man who claims to be the last member of the Meliorare Society who hasn't been mindwiped. He also states that he knows Flinx's father and mentions the planet Gestalt.

In this novel, Flinx and Pip arrive at Gestalt on the Teacher. The ship control and shuttling landing procedures are very informal. Then Flinx encounters a dangerous animal on the landing field, but is rescued by an administrator with a big gun.

Gestalt is not much like any other planet of his experience. Although the humans are living among the Tlel, their relationships are quite casual and mostly friendly. However, some Tlel have philosophical differences with each other that can also endanger humans.

Although his first inquiries are fruitless, Flinx begins to look for local humans that match the Meliorare Society profile. He has a few false leads, but finally identifies one person who might be his father. He arranges for a flitter and a native guide.

In this story, a local personage of quite evil disposition discovers that an offworld visitor matches a wanted notice from the Order of Null. Norvin Halvorsen starts tracing Flinx, but is always a step behind his quarry. Finally, Halvorsen is forced to use other means of tracking his prey.

Halvorsen attacks the flitter containing Flinx, Pip and Bleshmaa, the native guide. Flinx manages to damage Halvorsen's flitter and cause it to return to base. Yet Halvorsen's last shot forces down Flinx's vehicle.

Flinx's flitter finally crashlands in a river. Bleshmaa is severely injured and Flinx is wounded. They are stranded far from civilization.

A group of hunting Tlel are discovered by Pip. They discuss whether to shoot Pip, but finally decide to follow her. When she leads them to Flinx, they check him out and carry him back to their village.

This story follows Flinx in his introduction to the villagers and his appreciation of their ways. A few of the villagers take him onward to his former destination, but find dangers on the way. Flinx is amazed at the nature of the dangers and disappointed to find that the Tlel have violent disputes over philosophy.

Naturally, Flinx has not considered that violence within the Commonwealth and with external enemies -- such as the AAnn -- is often over matters of philosophy (or morality). The humans and the thranx get along so well because they have similar philosophies of life. They are just dissimilar enough to not rub each other raw.

This tale finally answers Flinx's questions about his father. Of course, it doesn't provide any final solutions to his problems. The next installment is Flinx Transcendent. Read and enjoy!

Recommended for Foster fans and for anyone else who enjoys tales of developing youths with strange talents and excellent friends. Any reader who is new to this series will want to start with the first volume: The Tar-Aiym Krang.

-Arthur W. Jordin

I've been a reader of all the Flinx series books and I must say this one is disappointing. While the question of Flinx's father is finally answered, there was not really any Flinx & Pip action to speak of. The book is mostly filler and bad filler at that. This is really a short story that was stuffed to make it novel size.

Another in the line of Flinx books that tells us little and takes us nowhere. This is beginning to feel like a really bad video game in which you are forced to accept numerous annoying side-quests to pass a single door and get on with the story...

GET ON WITH THE STORY Mr. Foster!

Flinx has something to do, we've know that for a LONG time. How about we get on with it already? These last few books feel thrown together more to keep people reading and money flowing than any urge to expand the story. We resolve some of Flinx's parentage which was something but hardly enough to justify what's really just a large novella.

Here's to hoping the next book goes SOMEWHERE. Because if it doesn't it will be the last Flinx story I read...

...in the continuing saga of Pip and Flinx. Those of us who started reading this series decades ago will enjoy the story, but be disappointed by the lack of real development in either the bigger story or the character of Flinx. The last couple of books could have been put together into a larger volume. I would either wait for the paperback or get it from you local library. I can't wait until the author writes something like earlier in the series.

At last, I thought, Philip Lynx is going to discover his father and the guy will finally be happy. No such luck. The beginning of this is pretty formulaic--Flinx finds Gestalt, the name of a man fitting the age and description of his father, and --with a friendly alien--goes on his search. A hired hitman is also on his trail, and his shuttle is shot down, the friendly alien killed and Flinx left to wander in the snowbound wilderness. Picked up by more friendly aliens, he survives when they perish in an avalanche and he is carried to safety by the man he has come to find. The man admit working on the project which created Flinx but is he really the donor the genetic material which became Philip Lynx? In the background, the alien doomsday weapon is still hovering.... The interaction between Flinx and his probable father and between him and the aliens is entertaining but it's too short with plenty of narration in between--my usual complaint.

Unfortunately, this book is not that different from the last few Pip and Flinx novels--boring and formulaic. This series used to be a 'must buy' and I'd get each new book in hardcover. The last 4-5 books have been so bad I now get them out of the library for a quick read to see if the author has decided to breath life back into the series. Until Alan Dean Foster stops phoning these in, the Pip and Flinx novels aren't worth your hard earned money. Visit your public library for this one.

A well crafted adventure that explains and ties off the loose end of Philip Lynx's parentage and sets up the next adventure. I enjoyed reading it, and look forward to the next installment.

I keep hoping that Foster will regain the touch he had with the early books in this series. Unfortunately, I keep being disappointed.

For a couple of books in a row we were spared the "Flinx lost in the wilderness beset by deprivation and predators until he is on death's door but saved by impossible coincidence" sequence that Foster has become so fond of. Unfortunately, he must have REALLY missed it, because he uses that tired word filler not once, but TWICE in this poor effort.

On the verge of disclosing interesting things about an alien race, be evidently got brain tired, because here he kills off an entire group of them in a completely meaningless episode just so that he can launch into hopeless wilderness journey number two.

The timing of events (and logic) is forced and completely out of sync. A 'bounty hunter' who wants to be on Flinx's trail leaves long LONG after Flinx, and finds that Flinx' skimmer can't be tracked because Flinx has had the foresight to have the skimmer's tracker removed. Yet the bounty hunter, after spending another night waiting to leave, suddenly in just a few hours not only catches up with what appears to be a couple of DAYS worth of travel time, but is right on Flinx's tail, and is convinced enough it is Flinx to open fire on the skimmer with no checking whatsoever to determine if he has the correct quarry in his sights! LOL

Worst of all is the 'meeting' with Flinx's "non father". After spending several books devoting Flinx's efforts to finding this man (and of course obtaining the crucial clue by again, unbelievable coincidence), the actual meeting/confrontation is unbelievably short, bitter, and violent.

The plotting of MANY of Foster's later Flinx books is just insultingly lazy and thoughtless. Churning out one piece of drivel after another for the sake of doing nothing but soaking his fans yet again is not a noble or ethical product of authorship. Foster should be as ashamed of himself as I am of him.