The Given Sacrifice by SM Stirling

Like with Turtledove's new stuff, it seems like it's easier to read Stirling's books by proxy and then discuss them. Thanks to all who take on the burden of reading their tomes in a non-proxy way.
 
Does the future have science back yet?

As of CY 46 (2044 AD)...nope.

Also, Stirling seriously cannot do "climactic victory/closing speech" scenes without sounding like everyone in the scene is reading from a script*. Outside of epic poems, people don't stand up from their father's/mother's/buddy's corpses and begin declaiming the Gettysburg Address. Stirling's characters regularly deliver extemporaneous, off the cuff speeches that sound like they had written it weeks ago, had professional speechwriters go over it, rehearsed it....and then delivered it in a wildly overly dramatic way.

It's especially bad when Havel does it at the end of DtF ("...so witness Earth! So witness Sky!"). It's basically like he got possessed by Aragorn for a few minutes, and really doesn't relate to the rest of the character's portrayal.

I would get up in front of the AUSA (Association of the United States Army) convention and begin speaking like I'd just walked off the set of Henry V. Unless I was way drunk.



*-remember the "Spartans! They have KILLED THE KING!!!" scene from Prince of Sparta?
 
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I wonder if their is a point to that, in that he does that on purpose. As he has pointed out that Havel and Rudi are the basis for the legendary, founding myth for what is a new world and civilization.
 
I wonder if their is a point to that, in that he does that on purpose. As he has pointed out that Havel and Rudi are the basis for the legendary, founding myth for what is a new world and civilization.

They could talk like gangbangers and wear cowboy hats, then, and it wouldn't matter to the people 3000 years later.

It's certainly no rationale for the overly-formal dialogue/monologue and the utter lack of tension between the main characters.
 
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