Jhereg, by Steven Brust

[sophia_sol]

Idk, I've read this book before and decided to reread it to remind myself of what happens before maybe attempting to continue in this series and...this book is not nearly as good as I had remembered it being.

It's just very much a dude book, in a way it's hard for me to put a finger on because it's not actively terrible about female characters which is one of my usual main dude-book indicators. But the whole thing exuded DUDE at me very strongly. And I mostly just found it kinda boring. It got a bit exciting right at the very end once things actually start HAPPENING instead of just people talking about things that are happening/need to be happening. But that still doesn't really make up for the rest of the book being boring. Does the series improve from here? I've heard good things about the series in general!

Comments

[genarti]

Unhelpfully, it's been on my To Try Out list for a while, because I know several people who really love it... but they're all people whose taste overlaps unpredictably with mine, IIRC, so for all the recommendations I have no real idea whether I'll like them or not.

[sophia_sol]

I've had a few people on tumblr talk with me about it, and apparently I'm not alone in getting a very Dude vibe from it. So probably it will depend on how much you're willing to put up with that kind of tone.

[genarti]

We'll see whenever I get around to trying, I guess! It does often help to go in forewarned, though.

[sophia_sol]

Yeah, for sure. Expectation management is often important in having a good experience with things.

[sophia_sol]

also what a great icon!

[genarti]

Hee, thank you! It's skygiants' fault -- she made a big batch or three of FMA icons back when we were both much more involved in the fandom. I don't get to use it very often, but man, is it satisfyingly appropriate when I do.

[ellen_fremedon]

I've found that the books, while all fairly dudely, vary wildly in style and tone. (Intentionally; Brust also tries out a new structure trick in each one.) So there are some that are so dudely and boring I can barely get through them (Dragon is a huge yawn), and some that I really love. Teckla, Orca, and Issola were my favorites; I also really liked Athyra, Phoenix, and Jhegaala. Didn't care for Yendi or Taltos much, and found the others enjoyable but not memorable.

(Oh, and there's Dzur, if that's the one I'm thinking of, in which I found the frame story highly compelling and the rest of the book entirely forgettable. The frame story is a menu and restaurant review. Holy cow can Brust write good food porn. There was plot going on during and around the meal; I don't remember a thing about it. I do remember the mushroom soup and the meat dish with the hot stone.)

Though there is an overarching plot arc, the books are very self-contained; you can skip around and find the ones you like. In general I dislike the ones that take place chronologically before Teckla-- I really only start liking Vlad later in his life, once he has learned certain lessons and undergone certain spoilery changes to his circumstances.

[sophia_sol]

Huh, interesting. I think overall that I am fed up enough with dudely books that I probably won't bother seeking out the others, even the ones you like. But thanks! (and I gotta say you very nearly make me want to read Dzur because that sounds like such a neat structure trick.)

[ellen_fremedon]

The structural tricks are honestly my favorite part of the series. There's one book that is literally built around a laundry list.

[sophia_sol]

...GOSH. I am really into structural tricks. Dangit, I am conflicted. I love structural funtimes but I am just so over dude books. I will...put them on the metaphorical shelf and decide later whether to try to keep reading.

[soupytwist]

OH my goodness, yes. I've been leery of just describing the Vlad books as dudely because they really are a lot better on ladies (and indeed most other things) than most books I'd describe that way... but there is definitely something ineffably dudely about them in a way that means they won't ever be at the top of my list. I think they DO get better, at least those I've read (which is... five or six of them?), and the way things are shown differently in the different books is cool, but yeah.

[sophia_sol]

It has been so affirming to have people tell me that I am not alone in getting a dude vibe from these books because yeah, whatever's dude about them is ineffable and hard to describe but it IS there.

[soupytwist]

I get the impression Brust himself is a bit like that - apparently he/a lot of his friends really were in the mob in the way that Vlad is, up until a friend of his got killed doing it. I heard that's why the later books take a darker/more critical perspective on the whole setup. (Not that it was ever like, yay the mob, but.) Until this post, the closest I'd got to describing it was that there was still the Goodfellas-y feeling going on.

[sophia_sol]

whoa, interesting, I had no idea