ROME: We have maybe 20 names we use in various orders.

CARTHAGE: Hold my beer.

Everyone is named Hanno, Hamilcar, or Hannibal. I have no idea who's doing anything. Maybe it's the same three guys and they're immortal.

(It might also have something to do with how I put the book down months ago and just picked it back up last week.)

#history

This is the world.

It's not the one we're supposed to have, but it's the one we made.

We did this. We did it with open eyes and willing hands.

We broke it, and there is no putting it back together.

In an alternate world of super-science and magic, the Apocalypse is upon humanity, but Death has turned his back on the other Horsemen and rides for his own reasons...

(Since my last weird Western ended up a bit of a letdown, I'm going back to one I know is excellent 😁)

#comics #western #scifi #fantasy #reread

The pieces are there, but never quite come together into a cohesive whole. The fantastical elements feel superfluous—not much would have had to change to make it a mundane Western. The first-person narrator has a distinctive (and appealing!) voice, but he's entirely reliable, a wasted opportunity in a story whose character beats rely heavily on self-perception. Not a bad read, but not one to seek out, either. #western #firstpersonnarrator

It's a decent piece of plot-driven sci-fi with strong worldbuilding, but the book and I have irreconcilable differences concerning one of two POV characters, which meant every time I was enjoying the plot, the narrative would start acting as if I were enjoying Holden too, which I most definitely was not. It's such a major flaw it eclipses the good parts, and I would have bailed if I hadn't promised someone I'd finish the book. #scifi

“But I recall the springtime of the world as though it were yesterday, those days when we rode together to battle, and those nights when we shook the stars loose from the fresh-painted skies! The world was so new and different then, with a menace lurking within every flower and a bomb behind every sunrise. Together we beat a world, you and I, for nothing really wanted us here and everything disputed our coming.“

Lord of Light blew my teenage mind. In the mid-90s, I was a high schooler cashiering in a supermarket that shared a plaza with a used bookstore, which proved devastating to my paychecks. The bookstore and the supermarket are both long gone, but some things remain. (“This year's Hugo Award“ was 1968, by the way.) #scifi #hugoaward #nostalgia