eBook, 448 pages
English language
Published Aug. 15, 2016 by Orbit.
The season of endings grows darker as civilization fades into the long cold night. Alabaster Tenring – madman, world-crusher, savior – has returned with a mission: to train his successor, Essun, and thus seal the fate of the Stillness forever.
It continues with a lost daughter, found by the enemy.
It continues with the obelisks, and an ancient mystery converging on answers at last.
The Stillness is the wall which stands against the flow of tradition, the spark of hope long buried under the thickening ashfall. And it will not be broken.
I will have to come back to this one. I need time to think. I might wait until I read the third one...
Not really about this book, but: man, one thing people forget to mention about ebooks is that when the alternative is a TPB, an ebook really saves your wrists.
This is the second book in the trilogy, and as such has to do a lot of heavy lifting. World-building is further developed, and we begin to get some glimpses of where this series is going.
Fortunately I found this volume to be less depressing than the first, although it is absolutely a post-apocalyptic story. So keep in mind that that "less depressing" is indeed relative.
Overall this is a fantastic book. Jemisin is in great form, and it is a pleasure to read anything she is writing these days. I'm looking forward to volume 3.
Couldn't put it down. This series was exceptional and I'm anxious for the conclusion.
This book was just as good as the first one, which was excellent. We continue the story where we left off and learn a lot more about the world, orogeny, the Seasons, and some of the characters. While the characters are still great, it feels much smaller in scope as we spend practically all the book with either Essun or Nassun. The setting is fantastic and the plot is still pretty good, though it feels a bit slower or more confined than its predecessor. Regardless, The Obelisk Gate is a top notch book and a must-read.
For my full review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2017/01/book-review-obelisk-gate-by-nk-jemisin.html
This series is so wonderful.
I read the first book, "The Fifth Season", when it came out, but I re-read it before reading this sequel. Both books are excellent. The world-building is amazing. I felt like I understood the setting without any painful info-dumps, and it's rich and strange. The characters are complex and compelling. The plot pulled me along urgently.
I liked Obelisk Gate a lot, even if it wasn't quite as strong as Fifth Season.
Part of the difficulty for me was the amount of exposition, however I more or less see this as unavoidable. Fifth Season was able to maintain its velocity in part by shunting off all explanation for another book, and that narrative debt comes due midway through OG. It's not, bad - I feel like Alabaster explains quickly to Syen/Essun, and her reactions are completely believable, it's just a lot of volume.
I think a second difficulty is the scope of the plot, which has become more complicated and with more stakeholders. The strength of FS was the very personal story against the backdrop of the global catastrophe. In the pull back to reveal more of the history of the stoneeaters and the guardians there feels like a change of scale of the story and …
I liked Obelisk Gate a lot, even if it wasn't quite as strong as Fifth Season.
Part of the difficulty for me was the amount of exposition, however I more or less see this as unavoidable. Fifth Season was able to maintain its velocity in part by shunting off all explanation for another book, and that narrative debt comes due midway through OG. It's not, bad - I feel like Alabaster explains quickly to Syen/Essun, and her reactions are completely believable, it's just a lot of volume.
I think a second difficulty is the scope of the plot, which has become more complicated and with more stakeholders. The strength of FS was the very personal story against the backdrop of the global catastrophe. In the pull back to reveal more of the history of the stoneeaters and the guardians there feels like a change of scale of the story and something is lost.
The shift from just orogeny to actual magic was a bit of a jolt, but I came around to really liking how they talked about magic.
I have mixed feelings about Nassun - it breaks my immersion a little that she's so talented so quickly. It makes sense (and is emphasized) that orogeny is inherited and that Essun is also extraordinary, but I never really connected to Nassun in the same way. It felt too easy for her.
Anyway, the book is great even if I had some quibbles. Very excited to conclude the trilogy.
