My opinion of Stirling's ISOT and Emberverse Series

[Calgacus]

For me it was the "Huh, so they're doomed forever because MAGIC. Gosh, I sure hope none of the protaganists are this world's hewers of wood and bearers of water."

I was OK with the Bearkillers side of the story up till when they settled down. After that it got a bit dull.

And the Pagan bunch - they were really irritating. All that pseudo-Celtic BS. Having said that, I went to a "Celtic Festival" last month and there were tons of people there like that. Very, very strange experience.

 

[Bill Cameron]

I finished the Draka series simply due to inertia, wanted to see the ending despite predicting it early on. I read the first books in the Nantucket series before giving up. I haven't touched the Emberverse books and from what I've read of them here strongly suggests I haven't missed much either. Peshawar wasn't too bad for airliner mind candy, just not good enough for me to track down the other story. I won't bother with the pulp Venus/Mars novels unless there's nothing else around to read.

I can't quite put my finger on it, but the more I read Stirling's work - and I read relatively little of it - the more I got the feeling he was really picked on in school. I mean really picked on. The obsessions with sex and martial arts just screamed "dork" or "dweeb" to me. When I saw a photo of him on that back of one paperback, overweight, thin beard, cokebottle bottom glasses, hair balding on top with long sides, the feeling got much stronger.

Stirling has issues, that's for certain, and writing allows him to vent somehow. Sadly, that means we're reading what are essentially therapy sessions slathered over AH novels.


Bill

P.S. After a bit of googling, the photo I'm remembering can be found at http://www.clanstirling.org/uploads/smstirling.jpg

 

[Brian Boru]

Though the bio says that he is married with two daughters, which might be a blessing because no boy in his right mind would ever admit to having him for a dad.

 

[Jackshadow]

Though the bio says that he is married with two daughters, which might be a blessing because no boy in his right mind would ever admit to having him for a dad.

That might be a big harsh, eh? Thought this was on his universe and books, not the guy himself.

Whether or not I agree wholeheartedly with the two series' characters, plot, etc., his work (along with other authors) *did* get me interested in alternate histories, so I can't ditch the whole body of work AND the writer. *shrugs*

 

[farwalker]

I've read the emberverse series as well as the excerpts on his site, and I have to admit, I do like his writing but there is something faintly "squicky" about the moral dilenmas it poses. I don't believe Stirling himself is racist or any such thing its just that his style, with the endless references to a characters ethnic/cultural background leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth.

That being said I've heard and read him in interviews and he seems a perfectly sane and normal human being, so maybe it is like he said about the people who confuse a character's opinions with an author's...

I also don't think its relevant or particularily gracious to pontificate and psycho-analyse some author based on a jacket photo.

 

[eschaton]

I've read the emberverse series as well as the excerpts on his site, and I have to admit, I do like his writing but there is something faintly "squicky" about the moral dilemmas it poses. I don't believe Stirling himself is racist or any such thing its just that his style, with the endless references to a characters ethnic/cultural background leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth.

I think Stirling's problem is he's heavily influenced by the romantic literary tradition, which was a reactionary answer to the enlightenment. So he's not racist and sexist himself, but he draws from a body of work which implicitly has racist, sexist, and authoritarian overtones, so it oozes into his work.

Regardless, almost all of his protagonists are the same. An alpha male (or female) jock with brains. Someone who is ultimately good, but hardly noble - instead rather rough and tumble, and unafraid to beat the shit out of someone, or kill someone, if needed. The protagonist never has any real bouts of self doubt either. It's an archetype which is rather rare in science fiction, although it might be more common in fantasy I suppose.

So I don't see his being nerdy having anything to do with his writing - unless he's a self-hating nerd. Come on - all sci-fi writers are nerds to some degree. They don't write protagonists based upon some absurd alpha male stereotype - they generally write about ordinary people, or dorky scientists.

As an aside, before he was banned on the forum he told me he was a a Democrat (in both senses of the term) which absolutely shocked me. That would make him on the *left* side of the Baen books stable of writers.

*shudder*

 

[Bill Cameron]

That being said I've heard and read him in interviews and he seems a perfectly sane and normal human being, so maybe it is like he said about the people who confuse a character's opinions with an author's...

Farwalker,

You write about what you know, so Stirling's "defense" about not confusing his opinion's with his character's can only be taken so far. Truly exceptional authors can transcend the "write what you know" paradigm, but Stirling is no where near being a truly exceptional author.

As others have pointed out, Stirling is writing in the Romantic tradition which itself was a reaction to the Enlightenment. As a Romanticist, there will be certain concepts underlying Stirling's writing, concepts like elitism and authoritarianism among others.


Bill

 

[Brian Boru]

Steering back to the original point of the thread, I never said I didn't really like his works, they are pretty good, but if you read a fair number of them there will be several points that come up to the point of ridiculousness. I read the Internet excerpt of the Scourge of God, and for Pete's sake, WHAT'S WITH EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING GOING NEO-PAGAN?!! Now even SIGNE IS A PAGAN! WHO'S NEXT?!!

I appologize for the above rant, but I was a cradle Roman Catholic and so many leaving the Catholic Faith to what they preached against just bothers me.

Or remember the pastor from Suttersdown who opposed Juniper and her group, struck dead with a heart attack, the man who's family all wanted to go pagan and he didn't, dead as a doorknob after said battle with Arminger's goons. Make me think of the TVTrope - "ROCK FALLS EVERYONE DIES" (didn't understand that look it up but don't whine when you can't leave the site for hours on end)

 

[Atom]

I won't bother with the pulp Venus/Mars novels unless there's nothing else around to read.

Actually, I found those to be quite good. In the Courts of Crimson Kings is notable for the amount of worldbuilding and alternate technology present.

 

[Malta]

Bah. The Emberverse then the Nantucket series are my two favorite series EVAH. For with the Emberverse series it provided me with hours o entertainment in plotting how things would go down as well as a host of scenarios and what-ifs. I also like how they are interconnected where you have relatives of people mentioned in both books and both sides wondering what happened to the other etc, Walker was the sort of guy I loved to hate for screwing around with the ancient socities for his own game and the end he got was just for him. Babylon With Guns, whats not to love?

On and off I like Peshwar Lancers though the Peacock worshipping Russkies was abit over the top for me.

Despite some early misgiving I actually really liked The Sun People and COurt of the Crimson King, more scifi then what I usually like in my AH but still pretty good.
I also ind alot of his characters to be 'real' so to speak.

Steering back to the original point of the thread, I never said I didn't really like his works, they are pretty good, but if you read a fair number of them there will be several points that come up to the point of ridiculousness. I read the Internet excerpt of the Scourge of God, and for Pete's sake, WHAT'S WITH EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING GOING NEO-PAGAN?!! Now even SIGNE IS A PAGAN! WHO'S NEXT?!!

Ah that reminds me the part where Will Hutton's son is the Praetorian of the Pope was another mind tickling tidbit.

Though again I have to give Mr. Stirling a hand because without reading Emberverse I would not have become a NEOPAGAN. Its what got me interested and even knowledgeable that there were such folks as neopagans. Though I'm not a flowery wicca/celtic sort it was also somewhat satisfying to see what a Post-Apocolyptic rebuild up of society in the Wicca/Celtic brand would look like and I was not disappointed.

As for Signe I am not sure, I sitll think she is going to kill Juniper for sleeping with her husband and is secretly plotting something...

 

[Jackshadow]

Steering back to the original point of the thread, I never said I didn't really like his works, they are pretty good, but if you read a fair number of them there will be several points that come up to the point of ridiculousness. I read the Internet excerpt of the Scourge of God, and for Pete's sake, WHAT'S WITH EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING GOING NEO-PAGAN?!! Now even SIGNE IS A PAGAN! WHO'S NEXT?!!

I appologize for the above rant, but I was a cradle Roman Catholic and so many leaving the Catholic Faith to what they preached against just bothers me.

Or remember the pastor from Suttersdown who opposed Juniper and her group, struck dead with a heart attack, the man who's family all wanted to go pagan and he didn't, dead as a doorknob after said battle with Arminger's goons. Make me think of the TVTrope - "ROCK FALLS EVERYONE DIES" (didn't understand that look it up but don't whine when you can't leave the site for hours on end)

There *is* a small light in the Catholic tunnel in the Emberverse series. A number of the Protectorate characters are Catholic, and one, Father Ignatius (member of a militant order, a la Hospitallars, Templars) has a vision of Mary when he prays for guidance.

Didn't say it was a big light, but something....

 

[MerryPrankster]

Signe going neo-pagan--albeit a different sort than her rival Juniper's--was a bit of a WTH moment for me.

Especially participating with Juniper in rites!

 

[Malta]

Signe going neo-pagan--albeit a different sort than her rival Juniper's--was a bit of a WTH moment for me.

Especially participating with Juniper in rites!

Well it has been some odd years, maybe they made up in the way only widows can?

 

[eschaton]

Steering back to the original point of the thread, I never said I didn't really like his works, they are pretty good, but if you read a fair number of them there will be several points that come up to the point of ridiculousness. I read the Internet excerpt of the Scourge of God, and for Pete's sake, WHAT'S WITH EVERYONE AND EVERYTHING GOING NEO-PAGAN?!! Now even SIGNE IS A PAGAN! WHO'S NEXT?!!

I apologize for the above rant, but I was a cradle Roman Catholic and so many leaving the Catholic Faith to what they preached against just bothers me.

Or remember the pastor from Suttersdown who opposed Juniper and her group, struck dead with a heart attack, the man who's family all wanted to go pagan and he didn't, dead as a doorknob after said battle with Arminger's goons. Make me think of the TVTrope - "ROCK FALLS EVERYONE DIES" (didn't understand that look it up but don't whine when you can't leave the site for hours on end)

It's all fitting together...your basic issue with Stirling is that he doesn't support your moral and religious views 100%

Come on dude - you're going to disagree with writers on occasion. I've read libertarian science-fiction without a problem.

That said, I agree that the mass conversion to neopaganism is kind of weird. Stirling argues in the book it's due to the founder effect - the Wiccans form a stable core of society, and people become pagan mostly in an effort to conform. However, I think he mostly does it because he thinks it's cool to have neopagans running about. And I think it's fair to say he doesn't have the most positive view of Christianity overall.

 

[MerryPrankster]

Well it has been some odd years, maybe they made up in the way only widows can?

That is possible, but Signe is still hostile towards Rudi at points during the second trilogy.

Given how darn cold-blooded Signe can be, it would make sense for her to promote Christianity (and a particularly harsh kind at that) among the Bearkillers to make it impossible for the pagan Rudi to become Lord Bear.

 

[MerryPrankster]

And I think it's fair to say he doesn't have the most positive view of Christianity overall.

It depends on the denomination. Catholicism is depicted well in the Domination novels and in the Emberverse.

Evangelical Protestantism, not so much, although the obnoxious preacher for Sutterdown does get an awesome moment before he dies.

(He has a heart attack while rallying fleeing Sutterdown troops in battle with the Protectorate)

At least that's the depiction in the Emberverse--I don't recall evangelicals appearing elsewhere.

 

[Malta]

That is possible, but Signe is still hostile towards Rudi at points during the second trilogy.

Given how darn cold-blooded Signe can be, it would make sense for her to promote Christianity (and a particularly harsh kind at that) among the Bearkillers to make it impossible for the pagan Rudi to become Lord Bear.

Well as I mentioned maybe she is just getting close to Juni to get her to let down her guard....

Will Hutton is the Regent atm and he has nothing personal against Juni

Other then that despite personal differences and problems that fact is that the Bearkillers and MacKenzies are allies and have a MUCH bigger enemy The Protectorate and Signe wants her son to take over and become Bear Lord o Bearkiller territory eventually. Not only that the Bearkillers and Mackenzies fought together during the Protectors War and it would be hard to get the Bearkillers to start hating the Mackenzies when there so darn frustratingly friendly

It depends on the denomination. Catholicism is depicted well in the Domination novels and in the Emberverse.

Evangelical Protestantism, not so much, although the obnoxious preacher for Sutterdown does get an awesome moment before he dies.

(He has a heart attack while rallying fleeing Sutterdown troops in battle with the Protectorate)

At least that's the depiction in the Emberverse--I don't recall evangelicals appearing elsewhere.

Don't forget the awesomeness that are The Knights of Mt. Angel !!!

He does seem favorable to Catholicis. Besides the knights he does have England Re-Tie the knot with the Pope!

 

[farwalker]

Farwalker,

You write about what you know, so Stirling's "defense" about not confusing his opinion's with his character's can only be taken so far. Truly exceptional authors can transcend the "write what you know" paradigm, but Stirling is no where near being a truly exceptional author.

As others have pointed out, Stirling is writing in the Romantic tradition which itself was a reaction to the Enlightenment. As a Romanticist, there will be certain concepts underlying Stirling's writing, concepts like elitism and authoritarianism among others.

Bill

Oh you're probably right about writing in the romantic tradition. It's just that having been weaned on egalitarian, vaguely socialist, utopian sci-fi, it gets my nerdy-sense tingling. While I truly like the premise and have been GMing a GURPS game based on Dies the Fire, the more I read from him the more squicky feeling I tend to get, but the books are a good fun diversion.

 

[Tom Kalbfus]

You haven't talked to many gays about why they serve, have you?

There are too many "booby traps" in this subject for me, so I feel I rather not talk about it at the risk of getting banned. I prefer to give my honest opinion and avoid political correctness, but as I don't want to get banned - hence the edit.

 

[MerryPrankster]

Even if Signe has little formal power in the Bearkillers organization, she can still cause trouble due to her position as intelligence mastermind and the fact she was Lord Bear's wife.

Or at least try.

And you can still be friendly and have religious issues--if Rudi were to convert to Catholicism to marry Mathilda, he might well lose his position as heir to the MacKenzies (it's in the book somewhere they would not tolerate a Christian ruler, even though there are Christians in the clan).

All Signe has to do is make it politically difficult for Rudi to succeed Mike, not set off a full-blown war between Clan Mackenzie and the Bearkillers.