halforc Survivor
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Joined: Oct 2010 Gender: Male  Posts: 21 Karma: 0 |  | Dies the fire SM Stirling « Thread Started on Feb 5, 2011, 10:09pm » | |
Dies the fire is a PA style book that starts when the island of Nantucket is affected by a weird dome and after a searing flash that causes massive headaches.
After this, all electrical, electronic petrol driven atomic etc (al ltechnological items) and gunpowder! stop working.
its not explained (so far) what causes this to happen, but the first book esp is a great just after the event survival novel.
another (free fan fiction) work based on this premise is available to read on the sm stirling site. Its called Fire and for a free peice of fan fiction, if it was to be published I would buy it, well polished and written it is worth reading.
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MEGATØN The Ayatollah of Rock and Rolla
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![[homepage] [homepage]](http://images.proboards.com/buttons/www_sm.gif) Joined: Apr 2010 Gender: Male  Posts: 1,995 Karma: 43 |  | Re: Dies the fire SM Stirling « Reply #1 on Feb 5, 2011, 10:50pm » | |
I got about 2/3s through the first book and gave up on it. I think it was mostly all the Wicca stuff that turned me off. But I do know that a lot of people like it.
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Joined: May 2010 Gender: Male  Posts: 33 Karma: 0 |  | Re: Dies the fire SM Stirling « Reply #2 on Feb 6, 2011, 7:44am » | |
I absolutely loved the first three books. Stirling crafted an engaging story about how people with our worldview adapt to the world of the Change. I would recommend it to PA fans in a heartbeat, the first three books that is. The latter series? The ones after Meeting at Corvallis? Don't bother. Stirling goes all George Lucas and kills his creation. Rather than rip a new one about an author far more accomplished than I am, I'll just say, enjoy the first three books and pretend you never heard of the others. But I have to say, if he did throw in a Jar Jar Binks character in the latter series, I wouldn't even notice, because I was asleep by the time I was a third way through High King of Montival. Damn! I shouldn't have said that.
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Joined: Nov 2010 Gender: Male  Posts: 555 Location: Australia Karma: 24 |  | Re: Dies the fire SM Stirling « Reply #3 on Feb 6, 2011, 6:14pm » | |
I must respectfully disagree, I read Dies the Fire and was left with an overwhelming desire to scream "Get On With It!". Stirling takes so damned long to get to the point and then when he gets to the climax of the approaching battle, the one that the whole book has been leading up to, he doesn't describe it, he bypasses it completely. It's like getting a cappuccino and finding that it's all froth and there is no coffee to be had.
I get that his story is basically a fantasy tale but some of the occurences where too damned convenient, like finding a former British SAS soldier who just happens to make medieval weapons as a hobby. If Stirling could cut down his wirting from 500+ pages to 300 or so, he'd have the makings of a good writer. To each their own, some like it but I found it completely overwritten to the point that I don't want to read anything at all by S. M. Stirling.
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halforc Survivor
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Joined: Oct 2010 Gender: Male  Posts: 21 Karma: 0 |  | Re: Dies the fire SM Stirling « Reply #4 on Feb 8, 2011, 9:30am » | |
agree he is somewhat overwritten and the fiirst 3 books are the best, the fan fiction deals with just after and doesnt go into wicca.
try Island ina sea of time, it came out before the dies the fire series and deals with what actually happened to Nantucket, thrown back to around 2000bc. although one battle later in the trilogy, which tbh needs a 4th book one battle sounds alot like rourkes drift.
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Fors Survivor
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Joined: Mar 2012 Gender: Male  Posts: 7 Karma: 1 |  | Re: Dies the fire SM Stirling « Reply #5 on Mar 12, 2012, 3:52pm » | |
I definitely agree with the idea that the first three are the best. After that, they're not so bad if and only if you take them as a who new set of books. The entire premise changes from one of practically dealing with a loss of technology, to that of a society developing magic and living in a less modern world. And yeah, I have to agree that Stirling did have a LOT of convenient meetings... like all the bowyers... how many bowyers do you know who are actually any good?
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![[homepage] [homepage]](http://images.proboards.com/buttons/www_sm.gif) Joined: Aug 2011 Gender: Male  Posts: 16 Karma: 0 |  | Re: Dies the fire SM Stirling « Reply #6 on Apr 5, 2012, 9:06am » | |
I did enjoy the first one because of all the cannibalism and mass-exodus stuff but after starting the second one I realized that it was all just a setup to another one of Stirling's medieval alternative history stories. I read about 50 pages of the second book and gave up.
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raftpeople Survivor
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Joined: Sept 2012 Gender: Female  Posts: 2 Karma: 0 |  | Re: Dies the fire SM Stirling « Reply #7 on Sept 9, 2012, 9:06pm » | |
I was really hooked on the series, but the he got side tracked and starting writing some sort of kinky vampire novels or something - must want to catch the wave. He hasn't finished the series yet. Its kind of annoying but I guess he needs to make a buck too.
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