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A review by sergeus
Alamut by Vladimir Bartol
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
3.5
This book was first brought to my attention as a potential inspiration for the Assassin's Creed video game series. Before starting it, I did wonder how clear that inspiration would be. So I had to laugh when at the top of the very first page after the title, before even the first chapter header, "Nothing is true, everything is permitted" is written large at the top of the page.
But the actual narrative didn't turn out to bear much resemblance to the games. I could definitely see it as a kind of "motif inspiration". Though in the games, the assassins are clearly "the good guys" and Hasan and the Ismailis are much more ambiguous. There's no Altair here, though Masyaf does make a very quick cameo.
However, I'm also not here just to review a 1938 Slovenian adventure novel through the lens of Assassin's Creed.
This book was also relatively hard to find a copy of! The English translation is from 2004, but all of the copies I could find in Europe were in French. In the end, the copy I got was from the US (thanks, Mom!).
The pacing of this book took me by surprise. It's like there are two completely separate styles of narrative progress. For the first 75% of the book, it was slow. I'm someone who reads books that have a lot of detail, but even I was surprised by how minute-by-minute, blow-by-blow the writing went through what was happening as the main characters were trained and plots were hatched.
I was looking at how much was left in the book and wondering how it could possibly wrap up. The book isn't part of a series, so are we really going to get to the end without seeing any <i>hashashin</i>? And then the final stretch happens. Suddenly the narrative is jumping to only cover important strokes, and all of the plots from earlier in the book whirl together.
In that rush, some characters are surprisingly endearing with their limited screen time. Overall, everybody makes a lot of mistakes, though several of them don't recognize it. There are definitely no "good guys".
I can see where Hasan's coming from, but he's also a monster. I'm a bit disappointed in ibn Tahir. I'm surprised by Abu Ali (by what he didn't do). And I feel sorry for Miriam and Halima.
All in all, Alamut feels well grounded in its time. It is slow going to get started, but pays off. You'll enjoy it if you like a good Machiavellian scheme.
But the actual narrative didn't turn out to bear much resemblance to the games. I could definitely see it as a kind of "motif inspiration". Though in the games, the assassins are clearly "the good guys" and Hasan and the Ismailis are much more ambiguous. There's no Altair here, though Masyaf does make a very quick cameo.
However, I'm also not here just to review a 1938 Slovenian adventure novel through the lens of Assassin's Creed.
This book was also relatively hard to find a copy of! The English translation is from 2004, but all of the copies I could find in Europe were in French. In the end, the copy I got was from the US (thanks, Mom!).
The pacing of this book took me by surprise. It's like there are two completely separate styles of narrative progress. For the first 75% of the book, it was slow. I'm someone who reads books that have a lot of detail, but even I was surprised by how minute-by-minute, blow-by-blow the writing went through what was happening as the main characters were trained and plots were hatched.
I was looking at how much was left in the book and wondering how it could possibly wrap up. The book isn't part of a series, so are we really going to get to the end without seeing any <i>hashashin</i>? And then the final stretch happens. Suddenly the narrative is jumping to only cover important strokes, and all of the plots from earlier in the book whirl together.
In that rush, some characters are surprisingly endearing with their limited screen time. Overall, everybody makes a lot of mistakes, though several of them don't recognize it. There are definitely no "good guys".
I can see where Hasan's coming from, but he's also a monster. I'm a bit disappointed in ibn Tahir. I'm surprised by Abu Ali (by what he didn't do). And I feel sorry for Miriam and Halima.
All in all, Alamut feels well grounded in its time. It is slow going to get started, but pays off. You'll enjoy it if you like a good Machiavellian scheme.