Orphans of Chaos (Hardcover)

~ (Author)
Key Phrases: headless man, Miss Daw, Miss Windrose, Headmaster Boggin (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

At first glance, Wright's myth-infused fantasy looks like something older Harry Potter fans might enjoy with its creaky British boarding school setting and its five ageless orphans—Colin, Quentin, Victor, Vanity and Amelia—each with a supernatural gift. But the underlying theme of dominance and submission plus a fair amount of physics and theology make this definitely a book for adults. A spanking scene involving the precocious Amelia Armstrong Windrose, who can travel into the fourth dimension, may offend some readers, but others will find it playful. Wright (Mists of Everness) doesn't fully develop the intriguing premise of these unusual students trapped in a school run by Greek gods as hostages in a bizarre war, but presumably he'll do so in later installments. Those who like sophisticated fantasy with a mild erotic charge will be most rewarded.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

In the first installment of the Chronicles of Chaos series, common associations of high school with prison prove spectacularly well founded. The five teen protagonists are hostages in a British boarding school run by pagan gods. Sustaining themes of lost identity from Wright's respected Golden Age trilogy and heavily borrowing from the work of Roger Zelazny, the narrative charts the teens' discovery of their true identities--they're shape-shifters who hail from Chaos--then pits their budding powers against school authorities who have proceeded from acting in loco parentis to being ominous and occasionally lascivious oppressors. Phaethusa, who goes by Amelia after her aviatrix role model, narrates the rich and frequently comic intrigue, which takes full advantage of the alluring juxtapositions that arise when the soul of a "montrosity from beyond the edge of space and time" is trapped in a nubile teen's heaving breast. Mythological references and discursions on the nature of reality may prove substantial barriers for some; Wright's growing fandom will revel in his overlapping frames of reference. Jennifer Mattson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Tor Books; First Edition edition (October 20, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0765311313
• ISBN-13: 978-0765311313
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #849,092 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent writing with a minor annoyance, February 11, 2007

By	Mike Reeves-McMillan (Auckland, New Zealand) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Orphans of Chaos (Mass Market Paperback)

I agree with other reviewers that this is excellently written. John Wright gives a (to me) very convincing impression of a teenage girl who is also an ancient four-dimensional Greek goddess (or demigoddess, or something). However, I must mention how annoying I find it that the dialogue of these teenagers, raised in Britain, given a very old-fashioned classical education and almost completely isolated from popular culture, is colloquial American (up to and including the phrase "go figure"). This is also interfering with my otherwise great enjoyment of the sequel, which I'm reading at the moment.

As a disclaimer, I'm a New Zealander with a master's degree in English language and literature who reads a lot of British and American fiction, and is married to an American, so I am much more aware of this than most readers will be. Your mileage, as they say in the US, may vary.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Oddly Entertaining, November 15, 2006

By	N. Burt "nikkles" (Wisconsin) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Orphans of Chaos (Mass Market Paperback)

I found this book to be intriguing. I did not necessarily love the characters, if fact I dislike most of their personalities, but I still feeled concerred for them. I still wanted to know what was going to happen to them. The very uniqueness of the story makes it slightly difficult to read, but more enjoyable to get through. What do I mean by that? Well if you don't have at least a cursory knowledge of greek myths and their pantheon of gods and godesses your going to have problems and get lost. You'll probably still enjoy the story, but you can start figuring out where things are going if you know a little background. Also, all of the characters have quite a few names that you must keep straight to figure out who is doing what to whom. I feel the complexity is a plus to the story, but if you don't want to have to think about character relationships you probably wont like this book. There is also a great deal of physics involved in this book . . . I assume accurate physics, but I really wouldn't know. I found it fun to try to work theses section out, but if you didn't want to you could easily skim over them. If you actually know a lot about physics they would probably be really fun sections to read. So, you see this is a complicated book, I liked that and I think it leads to a lot of interest and fun. However, if you don't want to think while you read I wouldn't try this book. Take a chance on something different and read this book.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars wonderfully entertaining, December 28, 2005

By	Donna Royston (VA) - See all my reviews

The preceding customer review and the Booklist review summarize the plot very well, so I won't repeat what they've said. I'll just comment on what excellent adventure and mystery the novel offers. Who are these children? Why are they being held prisoner in a boarding school? WHAT are they?

Highly imaginative and suspenseful, this novel is what a fantasy should be (and very few are): an intriguing situation, a dangerous threat, and wonders of the impossible that are made real. I enjoyed every minute of it and am waiting for the conclusion with great anticipation.