Review: The unusual stylistic choices make much more sense to me now...
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 06 21, 2014
I dinged the first part of this trilogy for being disjointed and at times tangential - not to mention the lack of quote marks in the dialog which still gave me pause here in book 2.However, I retract my objections to the tangential nature of some of the subplots now that I understand how cleverly Gurley has assembled a pastiche of chronologically ordered short stories where the overarching events of the universe unfolds around those shorts. Regular visits to the main characters further weave the subplots together, and relieved of the assumption that every character has to be central to the main arc and somehow move the plot forward, I went back and reread the first book with new eyes and enjoyed it much more than on the first reading.Most of the side stories that I thought were jarring in their abrupt conclusion upon returning to the main characters (in both books) are easily strong enough to stand alone unaided by the surrounding backstory we get by reading the whole book from cover to cover, and in a few cases quite moving in their own right. And yet, in context, they also smartly add to the richness of the author's world.I'm still not over the lack of quotes, but something definitely clicked about a third of the way into this book that pushed it way up in my estimation. I love it when an author is smart enough to challenge a reader this much, because when it does click the payoff we readers get is huge.Bravo Mr. Gurley! Please don't keep me waiting too long for the conclusion of this trilogy.