Customer Reviews

The Protector's War: A Novel of the Change

5 star:		(30)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(37)
2 star:		(23)
1 star:		(22)

 

 

I have been impatiently waiting for this book ever since Dies the Fire came out. I have to say I am disappointed. There are parts of the book that are WONDERFUL and there are what appear to be huge chunks missing from the plot and from the story, as if the editor (or Stirling himself) took an axe to the manuscript.
Lakaeditn is an old Hawaiian illness peculiar to extremely successful authors, similar to lakanookie, a disease peculiar to geeky kids.
What I think is that this book should have been edited much better.
For example, the book abruptly switches from Stirling's normal, and very well done, linear exposition mode, to retrograde exposition where the point of view starts to shift and then returns to the omniscient editor. Each time this happens, the book seems to start over. It is as if Stirling wrote four or five versions of the same book, and then shuffled the pages of the ms. together and sent it to the editor.
The thing that bothers me the most is that the book could have been and should have been one of the best books Steve Stirling has ever written. His writing style has improved, and his infatuation with kinky sex for the sake of kinky sex has been reduced to normal levels.
In addition, the bad guys become less like scary sociopaths and cardboard villains, and become real people. To be able to make us care about the Lord Protector and his wife, and about King Charles III is terrific writing.
Now I can go back to waiting to find out what really happens in the Protector's War, which still hadn't started by the epilogue.

Walt Boyes
The Bananaslug. at Baen's Bar

First of all; for a book about a Protector's War, there's very little war. There are just a few skirmishes and a kidnapping. The rest of the book was a babbling tangle of political infighting and conversations--as well as a predictable arrival of love interests from England. I do enjoy descriptive writing, especially when it involves the Northwest; however, much like Conquistador, there's simply too much of it sometimes, and it tends to take away from the plot. I do enjoy knowing that zoo animals now comprise the wildlife of this new world, but hearing it ten zillion times does get slightly old.

This book was a labour to finish. I kept expecting something to happen; and something actually did, on the final few pages, and then I was left hanging. That's a cruel device I thought this author might be above inflicting on his readers. It cannot hurt you to read this if you're want for something to keep your brain occupied (but active and engaged... I am doubtful those will be inspired by this book); however in truth, you probably won't miss much between Dies the Fire and Meeting at Corvallis (chapters of which have already been posted online)if you decide to skip this book. I'm sure other postings and reviews will summarize the new characters and drudging, and tiny forward movement of the continuing plot.

SM Stirling is one of my top 5 sci fi authors. I honestly liked this book very quite a bit.

The Good:

The introduction of the British characters and the story of their travel from England to America. SM Stirling's clear writing style. Mr. Stirling's always great battle scenes.

The not as good:

The key to some of the complaints here stem from the pagan folks becoming one of the dominant forces in society. I found myself skipping through most of the sections invovlving the Wiccans and the invoking of their various entities, it really stretched my disbelief to the breaking point. The consolation is that this is fiction and in fiction anything is possible.

Overall:

This book has a lot to reccomend it by. It continues the saga of all our pals from Dies the Fire. I would have preferred the focus to be less on the Wiccan folk though. They're kind of annoying.

This book is so silly it deserves laughing at. So if you're a fan that reads Stirling uncritically, then stop reading now. Don't get me wrong, I read some of his stuff years ago that was excellent, and I generally quite like military S. F. and out of time stuff. But in that series people and practical problems and dealt with them in a practical way. This is nothing like that.

The scenario is this. Something has happened that stops stuff exploding, cannibalism is rife, and rugby has gained a goalkeeper who wears a helmet, so we're all cast back to mediaeval times. Well that's it in a nutshell -- not necessarily a bad idea, although the physics are suspect to say the least, so we might classify this as fantasy rather than science fiction.

The problem is not with the scenario, but what he makes of it. Parts of Oregon seem to be run by Wiccans and the sort of people who go to Renaissance fairs. Middle America will love this. They even say things like "Merry met" and " Ho, Samkin" and stuff. The archery instructor, who used to be with the SAS, says "let the grey geese fly"!!. Just as well he is tough, because otherwise someone would hold his head under water until he promised not to say that any more.

Not only that, but England is being run by King Charles the third. What ever gave him the idea that the Pom's would revert to tugging the old forelock to the gentry, particularly those who end a sentence with "what". Charles can't even pick his clothes up of the floor for god's sake, and I tell you what, homoeopathy ain't going to do much for a sword cut across the guts. I suspect it would be more a case of "throw another prince on the barbie." What is it about Americans and the British aristocracy - every second book a right has kings and emperors, lords and ladies - they should be glad they got rid of them. And Stirling shouldn't try northern dialect, it doesn't work chook, sorry.

This applies to the Aussies too. While I am genuinely appreciative of having people from my part of the world included in the book, I can't imagine any Australian saying "it's a big drongo of the ship". He'd be next on the barbie after Big Ears. Thank God he doesn't get started on us Kiwis.

I'm afraid the rest of the book i.e. fighting , which what we all sign up for, is merely okay, and largely derivative. Been done better. Stirling seems to think for instance that someone with a home-made bow can put 90% of their arrows inside a 2 inch strip at 250 yards. I suspect not - to say the least. And if I'm going to be picky about military matters, the SAS don't use the SA80. If you're writing military science fiction it pays to get that sort of thing right, because many of the people who read it are going to be knowledgeable, and anal retentive about that sort of thing. All in all, he's lost the plot. This book is worth reading perhaps if nothing better is available, but there is far better stuff out there.

I was really looking forward to this because I enjoyed Dies The Fire so much but this just wasn't very good. For starters, I hated the jumping around in the second half of the book, partly because the first half was fairly linear and then out of no where, time suddenly starts jumping around. I could get past that if the story had been more interesting but this is clearly just an extensive set up to "A Meeting In Corvallis". There's no war with the Protector, and one of the few positive things I can say is that I liked that the Protector was fleshed out a little and not just a raging badass. The Wiccan stuff on it's own didn't bother me at all, but I do find the mass conversion of the area somewhat impplausible. Everyone just abandoning Christianity leaving just a minority in the Mackenzie lands seemed unlikely considering that Sutterdown had a much higher population than the Mackenzie clan. Signe as a jealous murderous bitch didn't do much for me either and the endless cutesy referencing of Tolkien just grated on me. (I know Tolkien is popular, but it's not that popular and not that beloved) Over all I think society is a lot more resilent than to completely collapse into mythology in under ten years.

Well, I really didn't want to write a negative review of an S. M. Stirling novel; Mr. Stirling lives just up the road from me, is a fellow Newfie and shares many interests such as martial arts and history. I have enjoyed his books for many years.

That said, `The Protector's War' was really a disappointment. A disappointment because Mr. Stirling doesn't appear to have read any of the Amazon reviews of the first book in this series, "Dies the Fire." Large numbers of reviewers, myself included, commented on our dislike of all the Wiccan claptrap, of the negative portrayal of Christianity, and especially of the all-too-convenient emergence of handy characters and skill sets just when needed.

In volume two of this trilogy-to-be, these flaws are compounded by semi-flashbacks and a glacial pace of action. Really, we don't need to know about every trailside weed, especially if that knowledge comes at the cost of a molasses-like plot. Honestly, pretty much nothing happens in the first half of the book that couldn't be dealt with in a recap-forward and a couple tightly written paragraphs.

Yes, "The Protector's War' has strengths. It does a good recap, it is meticulous, and it is honest. All the favored characters from the first volume are back, and we are nicely brought up to date with the nine-years later plot. Also, although the editors didn't do great on this book, they restrained the author's tendency to write a lot of unconventional sex into his books.

I do hate to bust chops, but I really suggest Mr. Stirling go to some ghost towns (there are plenty near his home), abandoned industrial sites, old farms, and on some nature walks. Sorry, but nature does not reclaim buildings, roads, and infrastructure at a fraction of the speed he postulates. Who among us hasn't found a forty year old building still standing or a decades abandoned road quite passable. And that's in temperate climates!

Somewhere buried in this sprawling mess of a novel is a compelling story, but in all of the hours I spent reading it I couldn't find it. Sure there are some intriguing characters and scenarios (the best of which are the British characters and their unique perspective of the various warring factions of the Willamette Valley) but overall the story gets bogged down by absurdity. Stirling pushes the envelope of believability and in the process ruins the dramatic elements of the story. Like many other readers I suspect, I was rolling my eyes at the religious posturing of the Wiccan Mackenzie clan, but the biggest issue was the over reliance on Tolkien. I get that Stirling loves The Lord of the Rings, and so do I and many others, but the religious reverence with which he treats the novels is disgusting. The number of elements like these are too numerous to list, however some that I found to be rather numerous were that so many hundreds if not thousands of people would be so willing to forget their humanity, their faith, their nationality and then decide to all wear kilts.

Maybe I'm being too harsh on Mr. Stirling, granted I hadn't read the first book in the series, and there is certainly some engaging stuff here which is why I gave it two stars (evidence to that is the fact that I finished the novel) but there's too much fat that got in the way. Hopefully the next novel spends a bit more time in the editing stage to cut away all that cheesy dialogue and rambling incantations. Read at your own peril.

I love S.M. Stirling and alternative history in general. But when he wrote the Islands in the Sea of Time novels, he at least made distinctive breaks so that each book stood on its own. This book can not stand on its own. Too many major questions are left unanswered. It may encourage us to buy the next book, but I am frustrated that I am left not knowing if some of the major characters developed by Stirling will even be ALIVE in the next book.
Unlike another reviewer, I do not have a problem with the culture developing so quickly after the Change in both governments and beliefs. But while I can see that the Wiccans might believe one thing, and Christians another, the credibility of the story was hurt by the near factual basis of divine intervention by the Wiccan deities. We don't see the Holy Trinity intervening when the Bearkillers invoke Jesus - why should we see the Lord and Lady as actual characters interacting with Juniper? He would have been better to leave it to us to decide if the Wiccan religeon is true or not.
All in all, I enjoy his writing and am enjoying this series - but am frustrated by some of the turns this book took without actually reaching the climax.

I was really looking forward to this book and I read all of it as soon as I obtained it, but it did not capture my imagination the way "Dies the Fire" did. The first 10 to 12 Chapters were first rate, but I felt the whole Wiccan religion side of the story was way over done. I really liked the details in the first book about re-learning old ways, or the re-inventing of weapons and technology that would work under the new realities, but that was pretty much ignored in this book. I really liked the new English characters and how they added world wide perspective of the effects of "The Change" to the story. I also hated how the story ended before the premise of the title "The Protectors War" even started. I'm hoping the next book in the series will provide more action and adventure and do a better job of capturing the original book's magic.

Getting better with this one... Readable if not high enjoyment.
It may not be really 3 stars, but compared to the first one, it
sure seems like it.

Stirling fixed some of the prior problems
-- toned down the SCA and Wiccan love-fest
-- and the frequent convenient coincidences....

And added some new improvements
-- the characterizations seem much better done here
-- the effect on islands and the wider world is brought in
-- beginnings of military manuvers seem better done...

Though there are still a couple remaining
-- a bit of a slow pace for me,
-- and still going on a bit over what's for lunch all the time

The biggest new oddity is that time flows oddly.
Not just that the flow of the text is a bit choppy cutting
back-and-forth, but that the time portrayed does not seem to
match up well.
-- The decay of buildings and the globe-trotting Brits all
seem to happen a bit fast, more in line with a 20 years-later than just a half-dozen.
-- Meanwhile, that they are just now figuring out what happened
to the machines or that they are ramping up to a war seems more
like 1 year later rather than a half-dozen.