Epinions Recent Reviews for slarter

Artistic Inspiration: Horowitz and the Humanization of Virtuosity

Wed, 5 Jan 2005 01:39:21 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - There is a world of beauty beyond our experience, beyond the mundane and the everyday, that most of us are seldom aware of. Every now and then, however, we attain a glimpse of the transcendent—a shaft of sunlight on a curl of ocean foam, the...

Predictably "Eddings", Surprisingly Disappointing

Mon, 27 Dec 2004 20:58:49 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - David Eddings is one of those authors whose name looms large over the modern fantasy landscape. His Belgariad and Malloreon quintets are almost perfect examples of light, but well-crafted fantasy tales. The problem with these...

Middle-of-the-road Bryson, but still entertaining...

Mon, 20 Dec 2004 00:34:36 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Bill Bryson is part travel-writer and part social commentator. In N
otes
from a Small Island, he turned his eye toward his adopted home of Britain, his place of residence for almost two decades. The results...

... standing on the shoulders of giants...

Thu, 16 Dec 2004 02:11:56 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - There is something in the fantasy epic that lends itself to a peculiar form of excellence. The trilogy in particular, well-nigh sacrosanct to the genre, embodies this, but the more finely crafted of the longer series partake of the same fact. The...

...prepare for the dance-rock onslaught...

Sun, 12 Dec 2004 21:47:50 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - You've never heard of the Kandy Whales. I can be fairly confident in saying this, since they're primarily a niche, local band in Philadelphia, playing mainly small, second-stage venues. Recently they scored a gig opening at the TLA on...

The fantasy novel as literature?

Tue, 7 Dec 2004 23:19:49 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - The insipid offerings that comprise much of fantasy literature rarely have much to say concerning the human condition. Indeed, one can count oneself lucky if one even finds humans in some genre novels. In the main, fantasy stories are just that,...

Sub-zero cyclist? These gloves are for you.

Tue, 7 Dec 2004 15:27:13 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - For bicycle commuters everywhere, the sinking temperatures over the past month or so will have precipitated much digging in the backs of closets and in boxes stowed in attics or basements, all in search of those cold-weather clothes that were packed away...

The quintessential "adult" fantasy novel.

Tue, 23 Nov 2004 22:57:19 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - There are very few fantasy novels that can claim a more "adult" audience than is normal for the genre. This is most certainly true of the 1970s, when the aftereffects of The Lord of the Rings could still be felt (despite its current...

And the moral of the story is...

Wed, 10 Nov 2004 22:39:06 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Blatant moralizing is never a very pretty affair. In literature, it takes a deft hand indeed to convey a moral or religious message without devolving into cheap sentimentality or unpalatable preachiness. A few Christian writers over the past century or...

Second surpasses first, surprisingly.

Wed, 3 Nov 2004 00:27:30 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Published in the early 1990s, Stephen Lawhead’s Song of Albion trilogy was everything my teenaged heart desired. The Celtic theme appealed to my inherent patriotism (in which, at that point in my life, all things even remotely...

Celtic escapism for the fantasy addict.

Mon, 1 Nov 2004 20:39:21 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Much of the success of the fantasy genre, it may be argued, is attributable to its readers’ yearning for escape, for something other than their everyday lives. Science fiction, to an extent, offers the same type of draw, but the appeal of...

"Three swords must come again..."

Thu, 28 Oct 2004 22:05:27 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - I am quite sure that Tad Williams regretted more than once electing to structure this series of novels as a trilogy. Of course, given the books’ focus on the three swords, Memory, Sorrow and Thorn, a three-book cycle was almost a...

A worthy successor to its brilliant forebear.

Fri, 22 Oct 2004 22:06:43 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - In the world of fantasy literature, the trilogy is almost sacrosanct. Tolkien, of course, wrote the mother of all fantasy trilogies, and since his time, it has become almost de rigeur for fantasy authors to churn out books in sets of three...

Pedestrian prose, but intriguing premise.

Thu, 21 Oct 2004 01:06:39 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Dan Brown has been embraced most enthusiastically by the book-buying masses. He has also, however, engendered a correspondingly negative reaction from certain of the literati. In a certain sense, I can empathize with both points of view. Brown...

Bw Nyack On Hudson: A place to sleep.

Tue, 19 Oct 2004 23:37:07 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Hotel reviews are usually fairly generic. A listing of the room’s amenities, the hotel’s service, and the like are often enough information to go on. The problem is, most mid-range hotels are pretty much alike. They’re generally decent...

Epic fantasy, epic prose.

Sun, 10 Oct 2004 22:02:55 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - The temptation to prolixity is one many writers struggle with, myself being no exception. Some, however, take wordiness to a whole new level, elevating it almost to an art form. This was a far more common phenomenon in the 19th century, in the...

Brilliance in obscurity.

Sat, 9 Oct 2004 14:59:19 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - <=== The Composer ===> Who was Ferruccio Busoni? Certainly he is not a musician who enjoys a great deal of notoriety in our present day. He seems to have been overshadowed as a composer by his contemporaries, despite being a...

Jane Eyre: Feminism ahead of its time.

Fri, 24 Sep 2004 18:13:43 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Jane Eyre is a remarkable work of literature. The first, and possibly the greatest reason for its success lies in the singular nature of its authoress. Charlotte Brontë, daughter of a dour minister, resided for most of her life in the...

Quite possibly the epitome of men's fiction.

Wed, 22 Sep 2004 16:14:39 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - One hears the phrase “rollicking good tale” bandied about from time to time in reference to a particularly entertaining bit of (generally male-oriented) fiction. I have come to somewhat dislike that kind of reference, as it is usually applied to...

Evanescent, it's not. It's actually closer to excellent.

Sun, 19 Sep 2004 00:29:55 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - A face I saw now haunts my ev’ry dream. Perhaps it was the face on the album – haunting, slightly surreal, and visually arresting. Perhaps it was the fact that I had heard a single on the radio that sent shivers down my spine and an...

The Sea Lodges of Cayman Kai: Original beach front living, Grand Cayman style.

Thu, 9 Sep 2004 17:26:52 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Shh. Be quiet. Just listen for a moment. Do you hear that? Cocking your head to one side, you adopt a listening posture. For a moment you don’t hear anything out of the ordinary, but then you realize what you are missing: the quiet, unobtrusive...

Christianity not divorced from the intellect. (E&E W-O)

Wed, 18 Aug 2004 00:26:31 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - C.S. Lewis was undoubtedly one of the premier Christian apologists of the twentieth century. One would be hard-pressed to find a more lucid thinker in the recent Christian tradition, and indeed, his remarkably accessible style has endeared him to at...

Technology Review Magazine: For real-world technology news, look no further.

Thu, 5 Aug 2004 21:03:37 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - Like many other people, we get so many magazines in our household, it honestly becomes difficult to keep up with even paging through them all. Most of them were free, one-year trial subscriptions—something to do with unused airline miles—so we...

If the theology doesn't leave you behind, the sorry writing certainly will (E&E W-O).

Sun, 1 Aug 2004 21:11:15 GMT

rating: 1/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - In analyzing a work of Christian fiction, there exists the great temptation to simultaneously deconstruct both message and prose. Theology being what it is—one of the most prickly and hotly-debated intellectual disciplines around—a novel built...

Fluffy fantasy falls flat.

Sat, 24 Jul 2004 17:35:47 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author slarter - I often describe fantasy novels as “junk food for the brain.” Another way of framing this thought would be to say that fantasy novels are the literary equivalent of television’s ubiquitous “situation comedy.” In sitcoms, a group of...