Book Review: ARIEL by Steven R. Boyett
Jan. 12th, 2013 08:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jpskewedthroneAriel originally came out in 1983, but was re-released in 2009 because Steven R. Boyett wrote a sequel to it called Elegy Beach. I wasn't aware of it until the re-release, which is a surprise because I like post-apocalyptic novels, and one that has fantasy overtones would have caught my attention. I can only assume that it just didn't cross my path in all of those years. In any case, I bought this immediately after seeing it.
The basic premise is that something caused a Change in the world, altering the laws of nature (physics) and suddenly electricity and guns don't work and the creatures of fantasy and myth begin roaming the lands. Pete is a survivor of the initial Change, and five years after that fateful day, he runs across a wounded unicorn he names Ariel. The two become Familiars, bonded to each other, and learn to survive in the post-apocalyptic world together. But a necromancer wielding power in New York has discovered the unicorn and wants the power of its horn for himself, and so the hunt is on.
I thought the book was good, but not stunning. Part of the problem was that there have been other books out since its initial release that have similar ideas and plots. If I'd read this when it was originally released, it likely would have come across as incredibly original and I'd have loved it. As is, it probably suffers a little from the time displacement. That doesn't mean it wasn't fun. I enjoyed the main character, and once the plot got going, I enjoyed the action. It was certainly an entertaining read, and I haven't read anything that has dealt with a post-apocalyptic fantasy in quite this way. But some of the post-apocalyptic tropes are here, such as the run-in with cannibals, etc. Once the main plot dealing with the necromancer in New York begins, though, it settles down into its own story and isn't about the world as it is after the Change and is more about the characters. And that's where it gets good (and is worth reading).
My main problems with it are with the slow start and with a little bit of the world itself. The book doesn't really begin until Pete and Ariel travel to Atlanta, but there's a long section of the book dealing with them wandering from Florida up to Atlanta. Some of this is how Pete meets Ariel and is establishing how they come to terms with each other, but all of that could have been worked in as backstory once the main plot started. The worldbuilding issues could also have been fixed easily. My main question is what happened to all of the people? The Change itself didn't kill anyone. Things just . . . stopped working, leaving everyone alive, and magical creatures started to appear. So . . . why are there so few people left now? There's no real explanation for how everyone ended up dying. I assume starvation, rioting, the usual, but there's no real mention of this. And if that were the case, there still seems to be plenty of undamaged property and resources left lying around. Now, some questions being left unanswered are fine (such as what exactly caused the Change in the first place), but some things needed to be fleshed out a little more, in my opinion. I didn't quite believe the world set-up as it was presented, but it could have been solved relatively easily with a few simple explanations. (For example, it could have been established that the Change made some people simply vanish, as if they'd flickered out of existence, or whatever.)
The ending also felt rushed. I thought it could have been developed more, which would have made what happens in the end more emotionally dramatic (and traumatic). I pretty much figured out how the book was going to end long before I got there, so it wasn't a surprise, but it still could have had more power than it did.
Now, the author does bring up the issue with the slow start and the rushed ending in his afterword to the novel, admitting that he agrees with those critiques. But this was how it was originally written, with only minor changes (and a few additions of originally cut scenes). He could have changed it, but I agree with him that if he had, it would have been a completely different book, and that wasn't the intent. He's grown as a writer since this was first published, and I certainly feel that I've grown as a writer since my first book hit the shelf. I know there are issues with that first novel (and all those that come afterwards), things that I would never do if I wrote the novel now, but as the author says in the afterword, that's who he was then and I agree that readers just have to accept that and take it for what it is.
So, overall, a good book. I'll definitely be reading the sequel (which is set 30 years after the Change), but it's not something I feel the need to pick up and read immediately. It doesn't involve the same characters, only the same world, so the urgency to "find out what's happened" isn't there. But I'll definitely check back on this world eventually.
The basic premise is that something caused a Change in the world, altering the laws of nature (physics) and suddenly electricity and guns don't work and the creatures of fantasy and myth begin roaming the lands. Pete is a survivor of the initial Change, and five years after that fateful day, he runs across a wounded unicorn he names Ariel. The two become Familiars, bonded to each other, and learn to survive in the post-apocalyptic world together. But a necromancer wielding power in New York has discovered the unicorn and wants the power of its horn for himself, and so the hunt is on.
I thought the book was good, but not stunning. Part of the problem was that there have been other books out since its initial release that have similar ideas and plots. If I'd read this when it was originally released, it likely would have come across as incredibly original and I'd have loved it. As is, it probably suffers a little from the time displacement. That doesn't mean it wasn't fun. I enjoyed the main character, and once the plot got going, I enjoyed the action. It was certainly an entertaining read, and I haven't read anything that has dealt with a post-apocalyptic fantasy in quite this way. But some of the post-apocalyptic tropes are here, such as the run-in with cannibals, etc. Once the main plot dealing with the necromancer in New York begins, though, it settles down into its own story and isn't about the world as it is after the Change and is more about the characters. And that's where it gets good (and is worth reading).
My main problems with it are with the slow start and with a little bit of the world itself. The book doesn't really begin until Pete and Ariel travel to Atlanta, but there's a long section of the book dealing with them wandering from Florida up to Atlanta. Some of this is how Pete meets Ariel and is establishing how they come to terms with each other, but all of that could have been worked in as backstory once the main plot started. The worldbuilding issues could also have been fixed easily. My main question is what happened to all of the people? The Change itself didn't kill anyone. Things just . . . stopped working, leaving everyone alive, and magical creatures started to appear. So . . . why are there so few people left now? There's no real explanation for how everyone ended up dying. I assume starvation, rioting, the usual, but there's no real mention of this. And if that were the case, there still seems to be plenty of undamaged property and resources left lying around. Now, some questions being left unanswered are fine (such as what exactly caused the Change in the first place), but some things needed to be fleshed out a little more, in my opinion. I didn't quite believe the world set-up as it was presented, but it could have been solved relatively easily with a few simple explanations. (For example, it could have been established that the Change made some people simply vanish, as if they'd flickered out of existence, or whatever.)
The ending also felt rushed. I thought it could have been developed more, which would have made what happens in the end more emotionally dramatic (and traumatic). I pretty much figured out how the book was going to end long before I got there, so it wasn't a surprise, but it still could have had more power than it did.
Now, the author does bring up the issue with the slow start and the rushed ending in his afterword to the novel, admitting that he agrees with those critiques. But this was how it was originally written, with only minor changes (and a few additions of originally cut scenes). He could have changed it, but I agree with him that if he had, it would have been a completely different book, and that wasn't the intent. He's grown as a writer since this was first published, and I certainly feel that I've grown as a writer since my first book hit the shelf. I know there are issues with that first novel (and all those that come afterwards), things that I would never do if I wrote the novel now, but as the author says in the afterword, that's who he was then and I agree that readers just have to accept that and take it for what it is.
So, overall, a good book. I'll definitely be reading the sequel (which is set 30 years after the Change), but it's not something I feel the need to pick up and read immediately. It doesn't involve the same characters, only the same world, so the urgency to "find out what's happened" isn't there. But I'll definitely check back on this world eventually.
no subject
Date: 2013-01-13 05:20 am (UTC)The point you raise above is also covered--after the Change, 90% of the population just vanished.
no subject
Date: 2013-01-13 08:22 am (UTC)I read it when it first came out, and a lot of the tropes are ones that were new, which makes a big difference in your read of it.
A few years after Ariel, he wrote "The Architect of Sleep", which is about a man who gets hit by lightning and wakes up in a world where the racoons of North America were the ones who developed opposable thumbs and not the great apes. They talk in sign language, and a very, very few of them are able to prophetically dream. The book ends on a cliff hanger. And then until Elegy Beach, Steven R. Boyett pretty much dropped off the face of the earth. He's said he knows how the story ends, but won't tell us, even though he plans on never writing the sequel. I have very mixed feelings about that.
no subject
Date: 2013-01-13 03:01 pm (UTC)And I don't understand why he didn't just say in a sentence or paragraph or something in Ariel that 90% of the population vanished. My guess is that he hadn't really thought of that at the time of Ariel, that no one asked the question, "What happened to all of the people?" until after it was released. But I do intend to read Elegy Beach, so I'll see how he explains it all away then.
Talking about The Architect of Sleep, which I haven't read, I'd say he might have gotten caught up in the publishing world and how it works. He probably does know how the story ends, and fully intended to write it, but no publisher stepped forward to buy the novel. At the time, that was the only way to get published. In this day and age, he could potentially write it (a significant investment of time) and then release it as an ebook if no one was interested in publishing it, but the payback for doing that (in terms of money) is probably not high enough to make the investment and trouble worth it. That's not to say he may not write it on his own just for fun or to have that sense of completion for himself at some point, but us writers do kind of need to feed ourselves, too. *grin*
no subject
Date: 2013-01-13 02:53 pm (UTC)And it's good to know that my concern over what happened to all of the people is also covered. I kept looking for that one line or paragraph that just said a good chunk of the population just vanished that would have solved the problem in Ariel but never ran across it. It's funny that my solution (they just vanished) is what he uses in the end.