The Furies of Calderon - Jim Butcher

nesf

I saw this getting a lot of good reviews and gave the first book a go. I found the writing dreadful, some of the ideas interesting and some of the plotting on a level with children's books. It was like the earlier Raymond E. Feist stuff when he still has some new ideas but written more cack handedly. I mean, seriously, a fantasy character uttering "but they have bigger fish to fry" is bottom of the barrel writing.

It's a pity really since the setting and concepts in the book were pretty interesting but are let down so much by the dialogue and turn of phrase. Or so it seems to me at least. Am I an outlier here and did I miss something major about these books?

Morag

I gave up 1/3 of the way in, was very disappointed very much for the reasons you've pointed out.

Thargor

I read them all fairly quickly, cringed a few times especially when the main protagonist was a kid (another fcuking orphan hanging around a castle ffs) but was never tempted to quit, some okay ideas later on with the larger furies living in mountains etc, definitely worse series out there.

Manach

Going against consensus here, but I rather enjoyed the series. Patchy and a times rather derivative, there was enough character dev and battle scenes to keep me going till the final book in the series.

Thargor

Nah I liked it aswell, fairly devoured all the books and there were a lot of them.

nesf

Manach wrote: »

Patchy and a times rather derivative, there was enough character dev and battle scenes to keep me going till the final book in the series.

The Serpentwar Saga by Feist was this for me. Maybe if I'd read this book when I was younger or something. I've grown cantankerous about writing in recent years. :P (I think it's because I've less time to read and less of a need to fill the void of free time with books!)

Wedgie

I read the first two, and they were okay, but I doubt that I'll be continuing with the series.

I discovered them after having a look at what else he had written, as I enjoy the Dresden Files series.

Thargor

The later books were definitely better than the earlier ones.