Paul Grenyer

Inhibitor Phase by Alastair Reynolds    ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0316462761 * * * Warning Spoilers * * * To say I was excited at the prospect of another core Revelation Space novel, more than a decade since Absolutely Gap, wouldn’t come close. In preparation I reread Absolution Gap and loved it on the second reading. I wasn’t inspired by the description of the Miguel character hiding from the Wolves on an unknown planet, but it turns out this was just a minor distraction at the beginning and that The Inhibitor phase plays a major part in advancing the story. The scope and breadth, as you would expect from Alistair Reynolds is vast and intricate. I was a little disappointed that the characters were ping ponging between some of the same old worlds, Ararat and Yellowstone, and the evolution of some of the survivors from Redemption Ark into Merpeople, but this didn’t detract in any way. It either wasn’t clear or I missed what happened to Ana Khouri - maybe she’s still on Hela. It was sad...

A Clash of Kings: Book 2 (A Song of Ice and Fire) George R.R. Martin ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0007447831 I loved the Game of Thrones TV series Even the way the final series ends. Although I’m not sure I would have chosen the eventual king. I was looking forward to reading the books and understanding the stories in more depth and, to an extent, that was the case. More so with the first book than the second. A Clash of Kings just has too much irrelevant detail and quickly becomes laborious to read. A part which stands out is after one of the battles where there are many pages given over to a list of knights who were awarded honours. The vast majority were in no way relevant to the story and just prolonged getting to the end. Fortunately the last 3% (I was reading on kindle) was given over to an appendix so I was able to skim that. There were a number of key events from the TV series, not least of which Bron lighting the wildfire with an arrow, which I was looking out for and were disappointingl...