Subject: (urth) _The Sorcerer's House_ reviews

From: Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 21 Mar 2010 14:55:26 +0000

A list of online reviews I've seen thus far:

- http://www.popmatters.com/pm/review/121553-the-sorcerers-house-by-gene-wolfe/
- http://www.tor.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=blog&id=58638
- http://www.lawrenceperson.com/?p=941
- http://www.fantasyliterature.com/wolfegene.html#house
(This one, incidentally, agrees with us that Bax kills George at the
end. I'm coming to think that Bax's talk of cheating is supposed to
hint that he boobytrapped or disabled one of the 2 dueling pistols,
and that's how he won.)

A few things I notice in the middle of my second reading:

* Winker is bothering me ever more. I could understand the geisha
stuff, but did she really have to speak so stereotypically? 'Ah so! Ah
so!'
* Is Bax really that honest? His reply to Millie vaunts her as his
only friend, though he has to know that she's a bubble-brained blonde,
and that he has at least 3 friends besides Millie (Winker, Doris, and
his mother; his mother's friendliness and focus on food makes much
more sense this time around - she's trying to get in mothering that
she missed)
* I don't think Old Nick/Black killed a hobo or his dog; the
newspapers were at least a year old, Bax says. That hobo, if it wasn't
Old Nick to begin with, was long gone.
* The book does seem in general less of a puzzle-box than AEG, leading
me to think that maybe there isn't any esoteric story besides that
explained by the end. In tougher Wolfe books like _New Sun_, Wolfe
wouldn't've bothered to explain what 'Skotos' means in Greek, or
'Zwart' in German.

-- 
gwern

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From: Jonathan Goodwin <joncgoodwin at gmail.com>
Date: Wed, 24 Mar 2010 04:41:32 +0000

Another review (that I wrote): http://www.jgoodwin.net/?pu5

On Sun, Mar 21, 2010 at 9:55 AM, Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com> wrote:
> - http://www.tor.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=blog&idX638
> - http://www.lawrenceperson.com/?p”1
> _______________________________________________
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From: Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2010 23:08:22 +0000

> hint that he boobytrapped or disabled one of the 2 dueling pistols,

http://fantasybookcritic.blogspot.com/2010/03/sorcerers-house-by-gene-wolfe-reviewed.html
http://goldenpigsy.blogspot.com/2010/03/sorcerers-house-by-gene-wolfe.html

(Both agree about the twist ending.)

-- 
gwern