Finally read the Deathly Hallows

In the early 90s a friend of my sister's identified a model for fools and heroes fests that he dubbed "The Amulet of Zlarg". In an Amulet of Zlarg fest something horrible happens on Friday night. By Saturday morning it has become clear that the problem can be solved by acquiring the four components of the Amulet of Zlarg which have been hidden in the surrounding forest - groups go out and collect these. They then have a banquet and get very drunk. The following day the Amulet has to be used in some complex fashion while the villains attack and so, allowing sufficient time for everyone to recover from their hangovers, there is a big battle.

( I guess I better put my actual thoughts about the Deathly Hallows under a cut because they're unlikely to be spoiler free )

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parrot_knight's recent post has got me thinking.

For five weeks I've been reading comments in reviews which boil down to "Martha had promise in the first novella (except for those that link through into, presumably, Big Finish's next Benny audio offering). The centre of this novel is a twist/revelation about one of the easiest papers I've ever written. Michael is keen on the use of child soldiers. On an "anti-war" level, however, at the end (e.g. neadods - neadod's post is here but you'll need to look in the comments). I imagine the Master's demand that the Doctor merely acts as a focal point for the rest of the trilogy but if Christopher Paolini ever publishes a stand-alone novel (especially once his writing has had a few years to mature) I may well buy it now) and two excellent short stories by Paul Di Filippo and Peter F. Hamilton ("Personal Jesus" and "If at First..."). Other highlights were the moving "Last Contact" by Stephen Baxter and "The Farewell Party" by Eric Brown. I also particularly liked "Zora and the Land Ethic Nomads" by Mary A. Turzillo (this was set on Mars and the Author bio suggests that she's written several novels in this setting so I'm tempted to check one out) and "The Accord" by Keith Brooke although both of these read stylistically more like short novellas than short stories (which usually have a more distinct sense of self-containment).

Out of fifteen stories I reckon I've got one "Eeew!", four "Eh?"s of varying degrees, one too funny/post-modern for its own good, 3 "good but nothing special"s and 6 I really like (some of the "Eh?"s were pretty good too up until the "Eh?" moment - actually I think I had some idea of making Christmas Puddings in them but they are all way too small and Christmas pudding still gets made in pyrex bowls.

* two of my former flatmates were horrified to discover my mother had a whole room full of carefully washed and stacked margarine tubs and yoghurt cartons. At that point it became their mission in life to prevent me placing small pots of left-overs in the fridge. Yesterday I cooked up a mushroom and aubergine "veggie gloop" from the Sainsburys Vegetarian Cookbook on the grounds that the rest of the hotel should keep it cool....

I've been alohaed many times already, but no one has raised the subjectivity/objectivity debate* - sometime tomorrow I predict) while others are more interested in the history of mining.



Erasing Sherlock by lordshiva is the fifth and final Faction Paradox novel. For those of you don't watch CBeebies.