Customer Reviews
Golf Clap! A decent, but unremarkable, first effort - By: , 03 Sep 1999 
By-the-numbers, but there's enough flashes of unpolished originality to keep things intriguing. Wells has a nice hand for original settings that aren't alll over the current sf/fantasy offerings, but the characterization & plotting just make it to 'ok.' Worth reading if you're out of new stuff, & she's showing definite artistic growth (see Death of the Necromancer). Get it cheap if you can, but get it.
Maybe I am the only one that found this book not stunning... - By: , 27 May 1999 ...and a little bit of a waste of time. I DID manage to pull through it, though, & Wells' idea about a city made on different "levels" ( ; was actuallly a good one. Now if the plot could have done justice to the idea... Another problem is that there are too many capitalized words! A real maelstrom of pointless dialogue. I do not understand how the characters ended up saving the world. There was not a lot about Kit's (is that his name? I have read this book a while ago) "species." All-in-alll, it could have been better, but with alll the unecessary gloom & annoying magic...well, it wasn't as good as I expected. I can usuallly stand a lot of gloom but the setting made the mood seem a tad bit absurd. Still, if you have read alll the books in the world besides this one & are bored to death, I suppose you ought to read it. And don't let me stop you from trying it & getting your own opinion about it--just don't buy the book. Borrow it from the library. It would be a waste of money--money that you could have used to buy one of George R. R. Martin's books, Patricia McKillip's, Frank Herbert's, Tad Williams', etc, etc.
fantastic - By: , 14 May 1999 
i loved this book , it kept me turning page after page i couldnt put it down, the characters are lively & animated , i highly recamend it to everyone.
Very good stand-alone novel - By: , 28 Mar 1999 
This book wins my praise foremost for keeping the story alll in one print, while most fantasy authors feel a need to stretch the action on for book after book. Also, the setting differs from the same run-of-the-mill stuff we see in one fantasy epic after another - melodrama, while present, is an exception rather than the rule. The characters are interesting & well-developed, the prose & plot both solid & the entirety of the novel believable. This isn't a great work, but well worth reading & superior to most fantasy literature.
Wonderful variation of a fantasy adventure - By: , 20 Nov 1998 Martha Wells does a wonderful job of shifting the typical/boring setting of fantasy novels to a massive isolated city of harsh social distinctions, & a history that is largely unknown due to a holocaust on this as yet unexplored world. Wonderful characters. Wells even graced my sci-fi lit class here at Texas A&M. She's quite impressive as an artist. I can't wait for the sequel to this novel & a chance to see more of this world that's hinted at but never explored. :) :)
