avery_switch's review
dark
funny
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
basbleu_dans_labiblioteque's review
dark
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
itabar's review
2.0
Ugh. Depressing. I love Brust's voice, which is the only reason this gets 2 stars. If the next book is like this, I'm done.
gmvader's review
2.0
Teckla starts out by introducing marital issues between Vlad and his wife Cawti. She’s joined a group of revolutionaries and he’s following her around being overprotective and she gets mad and they spend the rest of the book fighting about it. The tension of the relationship troubles was real and at least added some conflict to the story. It still just doesn’t seem to amount to much.
My first encounter with Brust was a free Firefly novel that he wrote that I though captured the character’s voices well and was a fun story. I find his Vlad Taltos books confusing and boring. Vlad tries to make jokes but just isn’t funny. Terrible things happen that elicit no emotional response — torture, murder, assassination attempts, who cares. Even social upheaval is pretty irrelevant and doesn’t mean much.
I understand that Brust has a number of fans and Vlad Taltos — his main character — has just as many. What I don’t understand is why.
Teckla was the most interesting of the three books I’ve read but it was still emotionless, boring and confusing. Vlad will fight about Cawti joining a revolution because he’s worried about her and he will stalk her through the streets and spy on her but when questions of his motives come up he starts talking about revenge against somebody who is encroaching on his territory. The ‘bad guy’ captures him and tortures him at one point and Vlad spends the rest of the book wandering around and getting nothing much done while telling himself he’s getting revenge by keeping his wife safe, or something.
Then he has a revelation about his grandfather who shows up and fixes everything simply by saying hello to a few people.
This is definitely slow burn fantasy. In fact it’s also small stakes fantasy which makes it a little harder to get into. Slow burn is great when that burn builds into a raging fury. When it builds into what amounts to an Independence Day sparkler then I wonder why I waited so long.
What Brust is trying to do here is hard. I understand that. He’s trying to tell an emotional domestic story in a fantasy backdrop that involves assassinations and mental trauma while using a humorous cynical voice and a fair amount of social commentary on not only modern times but much of the early twentieth century mob mentality. That’s a hefty weight to shoulder in one work and if it worked it would be amazing. If he were able to pull off half of those things, or even one of them the book would at least be worthy of either deeper discussion or a mild chuckle.
Everything falls flat. Vlad is a humorless narrator and a boring person to be stuck with. The characters around him are even less interesting than he is. Character motivations are straddling the line between ‘wouldn’t this be funny’ and straight out stereotypes and ends up somewhere closer to ‘I need this for the plot.’ The plot is incomprehensible and convoluted so much that it’s not clear what’s going on (Vlad breaks into a house to spy on his wife and ends up having a chapter long conversation with a ghost who doesn’t know why he’s there — the ghost is never seen again). The social commentary isn’t doing anything other than having some events similar to real-world things happening around the time the book was written.
Then there is the writing. I’m not expecting Shakespeare or Tolkien. I just want to read a book without having to flinch at unfortunate word choices or reread passages because they make no sense. Brust seems to write with a clunky style that feels choppy and confused, like Brust doesn’t quite know what he’s trying to say so by using short sentences he can avoid the need to actually make sense.
As you can probably guess, I would not recommend this book to anybody.
My first encounter with Brust was a free Firefly novel that he wrote that I though captured the character’s voices well and was a fun story. I find his Vlad Taltos books confusing and boring. Vlad tries to make jokes but just isn’t funny. Terrible things happen that elicit no emotional response — torture, murder, assassination attempts, who cares. Even social upheaval is pretty irrelevant and doesn’t mean much.
I understand that Brust has a number of fans and Vlad Taltos — his main character — has just as many. What I don’t understand is why.
Teckla was the most interesting of the three books I’ve read but it was still emotionless, boring and confusing. Vlad will fight about Cawti joining a revolution because he’s worried about her and he will stalk her through the streets and spy on her but when questions of his motives come up he starts talking about revenge against somebody who is encroaching on his territory. The ‘bad guy’ captures him and tortures him at one point and Vlad spends the rest of the book wandering around and getting nothing much done while telling himself he’s getting revenge by keeping his wife safe, or something.
Then he has a revelation about his grandfather who shows up and fixes everything simply by saying hello to a few people.
This is definitely slow burn fantasy. In fact it’s also small stakes fantasy which makes it a little harder to get into. Slow burn is great when that burn builds into a raging fury. When it builds into what amounts to an Independence Day sparkler then I wonder why I waited so long.
What Brust is trying to do here is hard. I understand that. He’s trying to tell an emotional domestic story in a fantasy backdrop that involves assassinations and mental trauma while using a humorous cynical voice and a fair amount of social commentary on not only modern times but much of the early twentieth century mob mentality. That’s a hefty weight to shoulder in one work and if it worked it would be amazing. If he were able to pull off half of those things, or even one of them the book would at least be worthy of either deeper discussion or a mild chuckle.
Everything falls flat. Vlad is a humorless narrator and a boring person to be stuck with. The characters around him are even less interesting than he is. Character motivations are straddling the line between ‘wouldn’t this be funny’ and straight out stereotypes and ends up somewhere closer to ‘I need this for the plot.’ The plot is incomprehensible and convoluted so much that it’s not clear what’s going on (Vlad breaks into a house to spy on his wife and ends up having a chapter long conversation with a ghost who doesn’t know why he’s there — the ghost is never seen again). The social commentary isn’t doing anything other than having some events similar to real-world things happening around the time the book was written.
Then there is the writing. I’m not expecting Shakespeare or Tolkien. I just want to read a book without having to flinch at unfortunate word choices or reread passages because they make no sense. Brust seems to write with a clunky style that feels choppy and confused, like Brust doesn’t quite know what he’s trying to say so by using short sentences he can avoid the need to actually make sense.
As you can probably guess, I would not recommend this book to anybody.
cheezvshcrvst's review
5.0
We've arrived at the turning point in my reading/writing life: Vlad Taltos # 3, Teckla! This reread has proven a maxim correct, in that a good book does not read the same twice. Nor on the third or fourth go. I've reread Teckla several times in the last 15+ years, and what's most remarkable to me is that the reasons I recommend these books to folks are first revealed in these pages. Teckla is a masterclass on how to implement dialogue to drive a plot without resorting to exposition. If Yendi (VT #2) suffered from anything, it was an overabundance of plotting was neatly tidied up in conversations characters had with one another. Now, VT #3, the proper sequel to #1, boldly goes somewhere you wouldn't imagine a male author writing from a male perspective to go: how would you like to see the hero humiliated and at his weakest, and at an ideological crossroads with himself and everyone around him? Well, here you have it: Vlad is rich, accruing power and territory, and is at the top of the killing-elves-for-money game (well, Mario is but of course Mario isn't playing the game on anyone's level), but when his wife Cawti suddenly chucks their relationship at the proverbial Greater Sea of Chaos to join a band of revolutionist Easterners and Teckla in their less-than-merry struggle against the aristocratic Houses of the Empire our hero Vlad finds himself unable to kill or do violence for control in the ways he's spent his entire life learning to do to protect himself and the things he cares about. Vlad must figure out a way to save Cawti from the Elf Mafia while staying alive long enough to maybe still lose her to a band of idealists he can neither side with nor disagree with except in principle! What we're offered here is a book that doesn't rely on violence or conflict but the effort to seek resolution and understanding to drive the plot. And Brust does this wonderfully and with grace and no flair but plenty of style! VT #3 (found in the 3-book omnibus Book of Jhereg) completed my first go at reading a Steven Brust book teenaged-me purchased with money, and I closed this book and ran as fast as I could to the B&N in Forest Hills, Queens to find, much to my disappointment, nothing further for Vlad. Well, skip over how this led me to To Reign In Hell and then Agyar, and then check up on me at 17 or 18 and I'd discovered Athyra and Phoenix shoved in a stack in a much unloved science fiction/fantasy section at Seaburns Books on Broadway in Astoria, Queens and... well, none of this is the point except to say that Teckla is a quietly and powerfully brilliant novel that always renders me introspective and hopeful for the dude I am and will be. It's not easy to say a book holds different lessons and insights at different times in a person's life (because, quite often, that's only ever said about books that don't but want to) but Teckla does, and I'm incredibly grateful that it exists.
csdaley's review
3.0
Probably my least favorite of the books I have read. A lot of what made the first two wonderful was missing. Still enjoyed it.
ashleylm's review
1.0
Disappointing, meandering, dull, and not the kind of thing I want to read, and especially not the kind of thing I want to read when I've reached for a "fun" fantasy series. Stopped at 35%.
(Note: 5 stars = amazing, wonderful, 4 = very good book, 3 = decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful. I'm fairly good at picking for myself so end up with a lot of 4s). I feel a lot of readers automatically render any book they enjoy 5, but I grade on a curve!
(Note: 5 stars = amazing, wonderful, 4 = very good book, 3 = decent read, 2 = disappointing, 1 = awful, just awful. I'm fairly good at picking for myself so end up with a lot of 4s). I feel a lot of readers automatically render any book they enjoy 5, but I grade on a curve!
kjboldon's review
3.0
I found this entry in the Vlad Taltos rather a slog. Lots of ideology plus a collapsing relationship. And no Aliera, Morollan, Kiera or Sethra. Just not as much fun as some of the others in this series.