My two favourite Technic History stories are "How To Be Ethnic In One Easy Lesson" and "Lodestar." They bookend the Polesotechnic League instalments in
The Earth Book Of Stormgate. Both feature
Adzel. I like the younger one-off characters, Jimmy Ching and Betty Riefenstahl, and also Coya Conyon who reappears just once, older, in
Mirkheim. Their later counterparts are Tabitha Falkayn and Diana Crowfeather. "How To Be Ethnic..." and "Lodestar" both show us something of the Solar Commonwealth but in very different periods. In the first story, Jimmy and Adzel have yet to enter the League whereas, in the second, David Falkayn, Adzel and Chee Lan know it all too well from the inside. In fact, they are nearly killed on the first page: action that makes a point.
In "Lodestar," the generation gap between Nicholas van Rijn and his granddaughter, Coya, is particularly good, like a reversal of such gaps that some of us have experienced.
5 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
But those two favorite Technic stories both belong to the first half of the series. Do you have any favorites among the stories set in Dominic Flandry's lifetime?
Probably my single most favorite Polesotechnic era story is THE MAN WHO COUNTS. I really like Old Nick! Others would be "The Three-Cornered Wheel" and "The Season of Forgiveness."
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
In Flandry's time, maybe THE GAME OF EMPIRE.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
That's all? So late in the series??? I esp. enjoy ENSIGN FLANDRY, A CIRCUS OF HELLS, and the stories in FLANDRY OF TERRA, to name just a few!
I can't agree with this apparent minimizing of the Imperial era of Technic history.
Testing.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
The first part of the history is much more intricate.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Intricate? Granted! But I thought the Imperial era was plenty intricate--esp. stories like THE PLAGUE OF MASTERS, set on Unan Besar.
Testing, anxiously.
Ad astra! Sean
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