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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Engaging and intriguing read that left me wanting more., October 15, 1999
Shadow of Ararat impressed me as a first novel in a genre - alternate history - that is one of my current favorites. It had many of the elements I most like in a work of epic fiction such as: Disparate plot lines of which most, but NOT all, converge in time and space Protagonists whose motivations can differ greatly from those individuals driving events and who come across as people, not icons, even when the details of their life story remain sketchy. A sense of verisimilitude that convinced this reader that the events were taking place in a different place and time, not the world of today with different costumes and names. There were elements that were not to my taste. The work is wordy in some sections, at times reading like a set description with more detail than is required about the nature of clothing worn or the texture of mud. It paints a very clear picture, but one my mind's eye could have filled in the details of from a more sparse description, and at times I found myself muttering "get on with it" when I wanted to find out where the constantly intriguing plot was going. Some descriptions gave this reader no information that aided understanding of characters or events, but only served only to this reader to establish a point of difference previously established, such as the frequent descriptions of who wore makeup and who did not. My biggest complaint is one of personal preference only. I wanted much more of the back story of how Mr. Harlan's world diverged from our own. I expect much of this will be found in the later works of the series, but I always want to know more about the point of divergence in an alternate history novel. All in all I recommend this work to lovers of epic fiction, military fiction, historical fiction, and just plain good yarns.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A noble attempt--, August 31, 1999
as one of Harlan's characters might say, as they seem incapable of realistic speech. Seriously, a good try for a first novel--nothing to be ashamed of--but I hope Mr. Harlan works on his characters and forbears from pushing the plot around just to get from point A to point B in his next book. We have a character introduced in a manner that suggests he's a fairly young boy, no older than 11 or 12, then we suddenly find out in the middle of the book that he's 16. 16, dammit! We have a character wondering time and again why the men under her command accept her as a leader, but golly, they just do. We have a character who gives no hint of his ability to stand up to the major supreme meanie on the block, but he almost does, not once, but twice. His attempts seem to cause more harm than good by the way--and just how does his body end up back within city walls when he falls outside them in single combat, surrounded by the enemy? A few other things that happened off-stage took me quite by surprise. Oh, I also hope he eases up on the fashion show. I was getting to the point where one more description of a plain tunic with stitching at the collar and cuffs would have had me hurling the book across the room. And it's a library book. That wouldn't have been nice.
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8 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A sweeping epic, rich in detail, but a bit too complex, December 6, 1999
Shadow of Ararat is book 1 (of 4) in what is shaping up to be an epic in today's fantasy/sci-fi genre's. The author does an extremely fine job of detailing all surroundings, no matter how trivial, so as you can paint the best possible picture in your mind. The varying landscapes of this novel are a joy to read. The characters, for the most part, are interesting, and you soon take on a few favorites. However, some (not all) are very cliche, the same type you see over and over again in these types of novels. And a few of the names are hard to pronounce (because of thier heritage). Lastly there are soooo many characters to keep track of, it may get confusing at times who is on who's side, and who is related or connected to someone else. The novel itself is good, but what makes this very interesting is that there are multiple stories going on concurrently, and one overall 'big picture'. I found that the introduction of the book was fun and showed a lot of promise, but soon the story takes on a more lethargic tone, and it seems to take forever. Only until the last 100 pages, where once again the book picks up in action and resolves some plot lines. This is where the book is made, and now I MUST buy the second to see how things pan out. I personally would have liked to see much more involvement of the Egyptians, both in characters and in landscape. Though this is a book about the Roman Empire, a large portion of the book does not take place anywhere near Rome or Egypt, but Persia. Overall this 510 page book, probably could have been just as good, or better, by cutting out some non-essential occurences (maybe they were meant to flesh out chracters) and bringing it down to 350-375 pages.
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