An Autumn War
Written by Daniel Abraham
Narrated by Neil Shah
4.5/5
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About this audiobook
As the Galtic army advances, the Poets who control the andat wage their own battle to save their loved ones and their nation. Failure seems inevitable, but success would end the Galtic threat.
Daniel Abraham
Daniel Abraham has had stories published in the Vanishing Acts, Bones of the World, and The Dark anthologies, and has also been included in Gardner Dozois's Year's Best Science Fiction anthology. He won the International Horror Writers Association award for best short fiction for his story “Flat Diane.” His books include The Long Price Quartet, starting with A Shadow in Summer. He lives in New Mexico with his wife and daughter.
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Titles in the series (4)
A Shadow in Summer Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Betrayal in Winter Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5An Autumn War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Price of Spring Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
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Reviews for An Autumn War
11 ratings6 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5As I was reading this book, I thought about all the military SF I have read in the past. So much of it is mere body count or more cool ways to destroy people and their property. Although this book is about a deadly war, it is much more about the effects of any war on the people who fight it and the people who suffer from the fighting. In the previous two novels, Otah, a disowned son of a Khai (an hereditary leader of a large city/state) trains to be a poet (a master of a elemental spirit), becomes a common laborer, courier, and eventually Khai of his father's city/state in the far north mining areas. His empire is protected by andats, elemental spirits that can change the nature of reality itself. The rival empire of Galt is desperate to end the threat of andats forever. One lone Galtic general travels to the far east to recover manuscripts from the First Empire that ended in almost complete destruction when andats fought andats. He finds a way to release all andats from their binding allowing him to quickly destroy all the andat protected cities and their poets in a short period of time. Only Machi in the far north is left. Their two remaining poets try desperately to recreate an andat, any andat. And so they do, but it is just as treacherous and dangerous as all previous andats. Both Galt and the Khaiate cities are changed forever.Daniel Abraham makes you care about all of his characters, both weak and strong. There is no one right way, but a true conflict of different powers and how they lift up or crush the people around them.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As with the previous two books in the series, this was a very enjoyable and fresh take on fantasy. As the series develops the depth of it becomes even greater and the twist at the end of the tale in this third of four parts made the entirety elevated beyond much of what else exists in the world of fantasy.Daniel Abraham is a skilled craftsman. His use of the action of 'Posing' to add to verbal communication gives us another worldly feel, as well as sometimes the language that cuts out an essential verb, forcing the reader to use our minds to fill in the missing word.We find additional details that make us think that some human emotions are lacking in the people that populate the tale, but they are all living within their motivations. There is evil but you see it more as a world that has generations of mistrust and animosity such as plagues the Middle East where it is something so ingrained that rising above will take extraordinary people. People that may never exist.It is my understanding that it is hard now to find the fourth book alone, or expensive, but after such good storytelling for the first three books, I must pursue this fourth book.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5There is something about these books that causes me to get stuck about halfway through, leave it be for a few days, and then pick it up and drive straight on to the end. I’m not sure if it’s a lull in the action or what, but this is the third time it’s happened. I am so glad I did pick it back up, though, because this book is easily the best in the series so far.And a warning: we have reached the point where it is inevitable, there will be SPOILERS for the earlier books in the rest of this review.Some fifteen years have passed since the events of A Betrayal in Winter. Otah is now Khai Machi, responsible for an entire city. He has, scandalously, only one wife, and his only son Danat is sickly. His daughter Eiah, being a teenager, is starting to act out, despite the careful guidance of her beloved Uncle Maati. Into this relatively blissful domestic scene comes Liat, the former lover of both Maati and Otah, with her grown son, who had been raised by Maati when he was small but who is now so visibly Otah’s son that his presence is likely to cause even more scandal. Not as much, though, as the news Liat brings with her: the Galts are going to attempt an invasion.For centuries the andat, the incredibly powerful beings held by the poets of the great cities, have protected them from the technologically advanced, militaristic Galts, but Galtic General Balatar Gice has dedicated his whole life to destroying the andat. No one, he thinks, should be allowed to have that much power – control over a being who could pull down whole cities with a thought, or destroy the crops of an entire country, or cause ravaging floods and devastation. He has gone into the desert that used to be the old Empire, he has found a poet of his own, and he is going to first destroy the andat and then any possibility that they will ever return, even if that means destroying every one of the great cities on his way.All of the cover blurbs on this book talk about the amazing ending, which usually puts me off because most of the time, knowing the twist is going to come, I can predict it well in advance. Not so much in this case. The climax of this story hits that perfect combination of exquisite foreshadowing and total surprise – Once you get there you realize there is no way it could have gone any differently, but it was so completely not what you were expecting that it feels like a punch in the gut. In a good way, of course.Abraham’s characters are exquisite, and as the world becomes more familiar the deeper you get into the series, the characters take their places as the highlight of the book. Otah, Maati, and Liat have all changed so much since A Shadow in Summer, grown both in wisdom and in their flaws, but they’re still deeply recognizable as themselves. It’s the characters who make that ending what it is, because it’s the characters, their drives and disappointments, the whole history of their lives, that make it so inevitable. It’s a wonderful study in how good people can do horrible things in pursuit of good causes, and there is no one, from the Galtic general to the treacherous mercenary, who you can really blame. Everyone is doing the best they can with the options they have, they’re just terrible options. It is, in fact, very like a Greek tragedy; if they were different people it would have gone differently, but they aren’t, so how could it?In any other series, this would be the end. This book ends with an earthshattering change, but there are possibilities for growth and rebirth still visible. Most writers would have left it there, but there is another book in this series, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The relentless marching of the Galts and the intrigues of poets and andat continue in the third volume of the Long Price Quartet. Otah Machi, now ruler of a northern city, is one of the few to recognize the threat of the Galts and to prepare for their brutal invasion. However, neither he nor the opposing Galtic army expect the final twist in this epic, which felt me hoping to read the next installment in this series soon.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The third in Abraham's Long Price Quartet features a major Galt invasion of the Khaiate, with the goal of permanently removing the threat of the andat. One can sympathize greatly with both sides of the war. Once again, Otah Machi's world is turned upside down.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I really enjoyed this book, the third volume in Abraham's The Long Price Quartet. On one hand, I'm happy that the series is defined as a quartology; the current trend of dragging fantasy series on interminably is not enjoyable. On the other hand, I really like his writing and each volume is better than the last.This one is does not suffer from the common "middle book" problem of being merely connective tissue between an interesting beginning and an exciting ending. The plot gets twisty and readers are forced to think about who are really the bad guys and who the good. The characterizations continue to be well done and there's plenty of action and excitement with an ending that leaves you anxious for the fourth volume (have no fear...it's already published). Definitely recommended.