Julian May

[abaddon]

Julian may refers to Aiken Drum as a Medici in one of the books Mercy Rosmar thinks that he looks startalingly like one of them.

 

[GOLLUM]

A blast from the past this one....

I remember reading Saga Of The Exiles maybe 20 years ago? I still have Many Coloured Land in the bookshelf somewhere...

I remember enjoying the series because it seemed quite a bit different from what I was reading at the time. Too long ago to remember specific details though.

How anyone could think Julian May was a man I'll never know....

 

[abaddon]

I agree with GOLLUM On that count.

 

[Brys]

I haven't read any of them yet, but I found the Many Coloured Land for £2.99 in my local newsagents, so I picked it up.

 

[Remillard]

I read the Saga years ago after a recommendation.. LOVED 'em. After that I pretty much ate up anything she wrote.

The Galactic Mileu stuff is pretty decent, but not as enjoyable. The Perseus Spur series she wrote was worth a read too.

 

[Rosemary]

Yet, I prefered the Gallactic Milleu...for a fan of Fantasy books, I thought it was very good.

 

[Foxbat]

[QUOTEThere is an song I use in my classroom called Aiken Drum. It's about a man who lives on the moon. His hair is made of spaghetti, eyes of meatballs etc. and he plays upon a ladle. Is there any connection to May's Aiken Drum?][/QUOTE]

I'd have to hunt out my copy and confirm this but I seem to recall some notes at the end of The Many Coloured Land where May writes about some of the influences in writing this story. One was Celtic legends and music (in particular Londonderry Air...which I think is the tune to Danny Boy). Aiken Drum (quite possibly) is a name that came from the same source.

 

[abaddon]

This forum moves slowly. I feel like Marc

 

[murphy]

Thanks Foxbat.. I had forgotten these books.. well on my upper level of what passes for consciousness anyway.. they were still there deeper awaiting a reminder! Massive imagination involved and very clever books I agree.. a real mouthful to read but well worth the effort..

Who knew she was a woman? Blimey you learn something every day here! As Mark said.. "What is it with these women anyway? First they want equal rights, but they want men to still be courteous and gentlemanly towards them... now they're stealing our names!" Bit of a cheek! I do like to know these things..

Perhaps she didn't choose her name. Her parents gave it to her, just like they gave me mine.

 

[Brys]

I've started reading the Many Coloured Land now. It's quite good, and some parts show potential to be very good, but overall it's not spectacular. It gives me the impression of being competent and enjoyable, but not outstanding. The idea of how the torcs work is interesting. The characters aren't generally that great though - Aiken Drum is a very interesting character and Richard Voorhees and Felice have the potential to be interesting, but pretty much all of the others are undeveloped archetypes - well to be fair, they are all slightly more developed than that, but not hugely. It's a good mix between science fiction and fantasy, though I think the first part of the book was drawn out too much.

 

[j d worthington]

Have not read these in far too long; got distracted shortly after getting through the third one, and never got back to them.

However, I do remember quite liking them, so I picked up her other books when I'd come across them. I suppose I really ought to haul these all out and give 'em a go sometime soon.... I would recommend them to anyone who likes a big, sprawling story with some rather tragic elements.

 

[Snowdog]

I loved The Saga Of The Exiles, I thought there wasn't anything else like them at the time (almost certainly wrong lol). I also thought Intervention and the first two books of the Galactic Milieu trilogy were great. But I found Magnificat something of a disappointment. It felt rushed and I got the impression that May had just scribbled anything to get it out of the way because she'd got bored and wanted to move onto the next project.

Maybe it was just because the mystery of who the killer was, was revealed only a few pages in, rather than at the end that spoiled it for me...

 

[Brys]

I've just finished the Many Coloured Land and I have mixed thoughts about it. On the one hand it's an imaginative, well written story with some interesting characters and ideas and a solid plot. On the other hand, it's not really special - while Aiken Drum and Felice are interesting, they are almost ignored (particularly Aiken - and Felice became less and less interesting as the book went on, as it became evident there wasn't any character development). The plot is pretty straightforward and predictable and the pacing wasn't quite right - it started off too slowly, ended up much too fast. The idea of the torcs and the firvulag (sp?) was interesting, but those were really the only imaginative ideas in it. The writing was generally competent, but it almost collpsed towards the end - the last 50-100 pages were filled with inconsistencies, badly written dialogue and other problems. It's also obvious that May doesn't know the difference between the words "chivalry" and "cavalry", which is disappointing in an otherwise good author.

It was certainly a good start to a series, but I feel it could have been a lot better. There aren't a lot of books to which it easily compares, but as a science fantasy it doesn't have anything on Gene Wolfe's Book of the New Sun, as traditional epic fantasy I think Patricia McKillip's Riddlemaster series is far superior and in science fiction it rates as one of the weakest books I've read - that isn't a slight on Julian May, but merely a reflection that my science fiction reading so far (excluding Star Wars books) has been almost entirely of brilliant books (PKD, Alfred Bester, Daniel Keyes, Frank Herbert, Roger Zelazny, Ursula Le Guin, Joe Haldeman - you get the idea), but the comparison isn't a great one anyway - it's closer to fantasy than science fiction.

 

[Rosemary]

Has anyone read The Boreal Moon Series? As I enjoyed Galactic Milleu, I thought I might try some more of her books.

1.Conqueror's Moon (2003)
2.Ironcrown Moon (2004)
3. Sorcerer's Moon (August 2006)

 

[edott]

I really liked Galactic Milleu series. in fact i really enjoyed all of her books.

 

[Spectrum]

The Pliocene Exile books are good.

The ending is annoying, however. At the end, there are still all sorts of story threads dangling: What happens to the Tanu and Firvulag in the end? What is the deal with Nodonn's child with that woman (don't remember her name)? And what really happens to Felice?

Does the Galactic Milieu series touch these problems?

 

[troels_vastrup]

The Pliocene Exile books are good.

The ending is annoying, however. At the end, there are still all sorts of story threads dangling: What happens to the Tanu and Firvulag in the end? What is the deal with Nodonn's child with that woman (don't remember her name)? And what really happens to Felice?

Does the Galactic Milieu series touch these problems?

No, no, maybe and somewhat... ;-)

There is maybe a reference to Felice and her Tanu "friend" in the Galactic Milieu books. I don't remember the exact content, but I think it involves "Fury" and the reference is to a "Sinister object deep under spain". Can anyone remember?

The Galactic Milieu books is about the rebellion, so we meet some of the ones that was escaped in the Exile books. The Galactic Milieu books does not really close the storyline, theres plenty of room for more books [crosses fingers].

 

[williamjm]

There is maybe a reference to Felice and her Tanu "friend" in the Galactic Milieu books. I don't remember the exact content, but I think it involves "Fury" and the reference is to a "Sinister object deep under spain". Can anyone remember?

If I remember correctly it was talking about "The Great Carbuncle", the red key-fob with myterious properties that Atoning Unifex gives Rogi. There's a brief remark about it being reminiscent of a sinister object deep under Spain, but that's about it. It doesn't seem to have anything to do with Fury directly, as far as I can tell, in fact it is a fairly pointless mention.

 

[Parmenion]

thisd is one of the first and very few scifi series i have read, i have always been more of a fantsy and history reader, but this series is truly great.

The concept appealed to my love of history, the alien bit did tweak that geek that we all have in us, but it was the characters that i loved, they really were brought to life in the series.

the latest series theo boreal moon etc..are agin good books but not on a level with the saga of the exiles.