I felt annoyed at how many twists there were, and just wanted the mystery to be done, kind of like how I felt with the Community Episode "Conspiracy Theories and Interior Design". As soon as you think you've figured it out, Zahn keeps twisting the story. Zahn spends roughly 140 pages making the story more and more confusing, adding layer upon layer to the mystery. I'll simply state that if you liked how ridiculous "The Icarus Hunt"'s ending was, then you will love this ending. The last third of the book falls into the ridiculous category. This portion of the book will have you seriously on the edge of your seat. Several familiar faces pop up along the way. Zahn was able to create atmosphere of sci-fi worlds while also telling an action-thriller. They spend the first portion of the book planethopping looking for her. Gregory Roarke and his work-partner Selene are tasked with hunting down Tera C, an old member of the missing "Icarus" project. The first two thirds of this book is a relatively simple concept of a cat-and-mouse storyline. I enjoy mysteries, but I think Zahn missteped in how far he went with the puzzle box in this book. The Icarus Hunt itself was kind of a puzzle box book, and this one definitely follows suit, but to a more extreme. The Conquerors Trilogy, Angelmass, and Mantas Gift are all relatively easy to read and understand Sci-Fi books. While most of his books have mysteries, they usually are straightforward mysteries. Timothy Zahn has described this book as a "Puzzle Box" book.
On the back-flap of the dust-jacket, there is a vague reference to his Star Wars novels, but absolutely no reference to "The Icarus Hunt", a monumental marketing blunder. They didn't even include his Star Wars books, certainly his most famous and best selling by far. Baen made the decision (which I would characterize as selfish) to only include a list of Timothy Zahn's books that he had published at Baen. For some reason, nowhere in the book does it indicate that this is a sequel or set in the same universe.
"The Icarus Hunt" was published by Bantam Books, while "The Icarus Plot" was published by Baen books. Part of the issue with this book is that it is published by a different publisher. Yet, as this book fills in most of the gaps and does a good job of being its own standalone story, although several characters do pop up from the original. I read Icarus Hunt 4 years ago and don't remember too much from it.
The first thing that should be noted is that while this is "technically" a sequel to The Icarus Hunt, you don't actually need to have read Icarus Hunt in order to read and enjoy this book. Fans have been clamoring him to write a sequel for decades and finally, the sequel has arrived. In 1999, Timothy Zahn released "The Icarus Hunt", a standalone novel that caught his audience by suprise and would be one of if not his best known standalone novel outside of Star Wars.
0 kommentar(er)
