[EWY]⇒ PDF Free Gate of Ivrel Morgaine Cycle C J Cherryh 9780886772574 Books

Gate of Ivrel Morgaine Cycle C J Cherryh 9780886772574 Books

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Gate of Ivrel Morgaine Cycle C J Cherryh 9780886772574 Books

Gate of Ivrel by C. J. Cherryh was recommended to me by a friend who knows I actively seek out stories with strong heroines who wield a sword. This novel definitely qualifies!

First, the good. The story drew me in right away. I was intrigued by the sci-fi aspect of the gates, and the idea of a dedicated team of people who sacrifice their lives to see the portals destroyed. I liked the idea of a medieval style world embroiled in the chaos and war that these gates caused. I enjoyed how, just like in Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, and many other similar epics, we have a variety of cultures each with their own motivations and intersests. We have the few-structures-nature-living group. We have the high-honor-castle-living group. We have other groups with unique personalities. That's always enjoyable in a story.

The heroine, Morgaine, is certainly strong and wise. She's able to protect herself. She also has flaws, which is good to keep a story real. I admit I wish she wasn't the romance-novel-cliche of being so drop dead beautiful that every man who sees her has to have her. The hero, Vanye, also is a bit cliche with his perfect fighting and perfect muscles.

The book does well with plot, catching you up in all the layers of what is going on and wondering what is going to happen next. I stayed up all night in order to finish it and see how it ended.

Now, that all being said, there were some issues.

First, the book sets itself up to be a long, multi-book epic. It's clear in how it's worded and how it ends. This is fine in theory, but instead of rolling out the characters and history in a way readers can absorb, it's dumped in a massive pile that one would need to map out a family tree and relationship map to be able to keep track of in the prologue. That leaves the reader with the task of spending a while memorizing all the names in case some are important soon, or just ignoring the whole lot as "non-important filler" and moving on with the story. I hate to read-and-ignore content. To me, if an author presents something, it's because it's important. So working those details smoothly and gradually into the story is key for me.

Next, there are some fascinating cultures in here, but we get only bare descriptions of them. We get a skim of what they're like, without the beautiful underlying foundations that we see for example in Lord of the Rings. The same with characters. We get the "mad king". And then there's the "malicious king". For all that we have a great heroine, she's it for women. Somehow the rest of the world only has females who are prostitutes. Or obnoxious little girls.

Lots of little mistakes were made that editors should have caught. The use of "thee" and related language is wrong which is continually jarring. From Shakespeare, it should be: "Seest thou this letter? Take it up, I pray thee." An example from the Bible: "Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast fashioned me as clay; And wilt thou bring me into dust again?"

The progression also makes it hard to visualize what is going on at times. We're barely told that the hero, Vanye, has had a manhood ceremony in the past - but that's about it. Does that mean he's 13? 15? The only real clue we ever seem to get is the cover, and that is so outrageously off on the heroine's outfit (putting her only in a bikini as a trained warrior) that it's hard to imagine it's very accurate.

Finally, for a book all about a sword-fighting woman and her sword-fighting man, there's very little detail about the sword-fighting in here! It seems more a convenient skill to get them out of scrapes than a real aspect of their characters that's covered in the book. We hear more about how he cuts his hair.

Still, I did like the interweaving of their codes of honor, and their challenges of loyalty. I love stories that cover those things. I enjoy strong female characters, and we certainly have one here. However, usually there is a male character worthy to be at her side. Here, he seems more like a fifteen year old boy. Yes, he was raised in a certain culture, and I wholeheartedly understand that. But even there, the way he acts seem to lack a level of wisdom / maturity in some scenes. Men in medieval times had to grow up quickly - and especially men in the position Vanye was in. He seems a bit too naive to be believable.

Still, clearly the story did suck me in, and I cared about the characters. I wish an editor had done a more thorough pass at the book to clean up some of its issue and encourage the author to provide more layers in some areas. It's as if they didn't trust the readers to be able to handle the larger level of detail, but absolutely we can. One only has to look at the great success of other similar novels to see that.


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Gate of Ivrel Morgaine Cycle C J Cherryh 9780886772574 Books Reviews

When I was in ninth grade I joined the Science Fiction Book Club and got 4 books for a dollar with the commitment of buying 4 more books in the next year. As I recall my mother had to sign off on it because of my age and she wasn’t happy about it, but she did it for me. (Thanks, Mom!) I stayed in the SFBC for the next ten or twelve years and bought hundreds of books from them, but those first four stand out in my memory A Heinlein Trio, The Chronicles of Amber, Riddle of Stars, and The Book of Morgaine. Each was at least a trilogy because I wanted to get my money’s worth, and oh did I get it. That was the single best dollar I have ever spent in my life!

Over the last 38 years I’ve read each of those books several times. Recently it was C. J. Cherryh’s turn again with the amazing novel, Gate of Ivrel. This is the story of the enigmatic, Morgaine, a cursed woman out of legend, and Vanye, who becomes bonded to her and her mission to save humanity by closing down a series of gates that can transport people through space and time. These gates offer the potential of great power, but they have also the potential to destroy civilizations if someone uses them to tinker with the past. A human civilization sent a company of soldiers through the gates to close them one after the other until there are no more. (So it’s a suicide mission because they will only discover that there are no more when they don’t come out the other side of the last gate.) Morgaine is the last (and possibly not the first generation) of those soldiers and her tale is amazing in no small part because the Gates offer power and the possibility of immortality and many fight her in her efforts to close them down.

Cherryh tells Morgain’s story through the eyes of Vanye, the bravest man in literature who was ever condemned for cowardice. He is the epitome of honor and we watch him be tricked into serving Morgaine whom he loathes and fears as a witch who got ten thousand men killed a century earlier. Over the course of the book he grows to understand just how selfless and heroic his lady truly is. In doing so we watch him navigate a world in which none of his peers (save one) lives up to the ideals that he embodies. Cherryh’s greatest strength as an author has always been her ability to portray new and distinctive cultures in great detail but without exhausting the reader through long and tedious descriptions. Vanye is one of her tools for accomplishing this. We learn about his people by contrasting his actions and motivations with those of everyone he encounters. I love this novel and I bet you will too.
The Gates of Ivrel started strange. It is written from the perspective of the Hindu Culture. It is confusing with references to Hindu gods and goddesses that are bewildering to someone who is not of that culture. If you stay with the book until the 3 or 4th chapter, the story and the characters become interesting. By the end of the book you are hooked. I ended up having a deep desire to continue with the main characters in the next of the Morgaine Cycle. While the book is no epic along the line of Tolkien, it is a great read.
This an early Cherryh book that I had read long time ago so it is not on kindle. Decided to read series again when I head about the movie proposal.
I have read this series at least ten times. Morgaine's mysterious character, as well as her dangerous goal beckons the reader to follow this saga. The ending of the last book is open-ended and I dearly hope C.J. Cherryh continues Morgaine's deadly quest.
Really fun series with Morgaine and her arrior.
a good read
An excellent book. It must be read in the proper sequence with the other 2 of the trilogy.
Gate of Ivrel by C. J. Cherryh was recommended to me by a friend who knows I actively seek out stories with strong heroines who wield a sword. This novel definitely qualifies!

First, the good. The story drew me in right away. I was intrigued by the sci-fi aspect of the gates, and the idea of a dedicated team of people who sacrifice their lives to see the portals destroyed. I liked the idea of a medieval style world embroiled in the chaos and war that these gates caused. I enjoyed how, just like in Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, and many other similar epics, we have a variety of cultures each with their own motivations and intersests. We have the few-structures-nature-living group. We have the high-honor-castle-living group. We have other groups with unique personalities. That's always enjoyable in a story.

The heroine, Morgaine, is certainly strong and wise. She's able to protect herself. She also has flaws, which is good to keep a story real. I admit I wish she wasn't the romance-novel-cliche of being so drop dead beautiful that every man who sees her has to have her. The hero, Vanye, also is a bit cliche with his perfect fighting and perfect muscles.

The book does well with plot, catching you up in all the layers of what is going on and wondering what is going to happen next. I stayed up all night in order to finish it and see how it ended.

Now, that all being said, there were some issues.

First, the book sets itself up to be a long, multi-book epic. It's clear in how it's worded and how it ends. This is fine in theory, but instead of rolling out the characters and history in a way readers can absorb, it's dumped in a massive pile that one would need to map out a family tree and relationship map to be able to keep track of in the prologue. That leaves the reader with the task of spending a while memorizing all the names in case some are important soon, or just ignoring the whole lot as "non-important filler" and moving on with the story. I hate to read-and-ignore content. To me, if an author presents something, it's because it's important. So working those details smoothly and gradually into the story is key for me.

Next, there are some fascinating cultures in here, but we get only bare descriptions of them. We get a skim of what they're like, without the beautiful underlying foundations that we see for example in Lord of the Rings. The same with characters. We get the "mad king". And then there's the "malicious king". For all that we have a great heroine, she's it for women. Somehow the rest of the world only has females who are prostitutes. Or obnoxious little girls.

Lots of little mistakes were made that editors should have caught. The use of "thee" and related language is wrong which is continually jarring. From Shakespeare, it should be "Seest thou this letter? Take it up, I pray thee." An example from the Bible "Remember, I beseech thee, that thou hast fashioned me as clay; And wilt thou bring me into dust again?"

The progression also makes it hard to visualize what is going on at times. We're barely told that the hero, Vanye, has had a manhood ceremony in the past - but that's about it. Does that mean he's 13? 15? The only real clue we ever seem to get is the cover, and that is so outrageously off on the heroine's outfit (putting her only in a bikini as a trained warrior) that it's hard to imagine it's very accurate.

Finally, for a book all about a sword-fighting woman and her sword-fighting man, there's very little detail about the sword-fighting in here! It seems more a convenient skill to get them out of scrapes than a real aspect of their characters that's covered in the book. We hear more about how he cuts his hair.

Still, I did like the interweaving of their codes of honor, and their challenges of loyalty. I love stories that cover those things. I enjoy strong female characters, and we certainly have one here. However, usually there is a male character worthy to be at her side. Here, he seems more like a fifteen year old boy. Yes, he was raised in a certain culture, and I wholeheartedly understand that. But even there, the way he acts seem to lack a level of wisdom / maturity in some scenes. Men in medieval times had to grow up quickly - and especially men in the position Vanye was in. He seems a bit too naive to be believable.

Still, clearly the story did suck me in, and I cared about the characters. I wish an editor had done a more thorough pass at the book to clean up some of its issue and encourage the author to provide more layers in some areas. It's as if they didn't trust the readers to be able to handle the larger level of detail, but absolutely we can. One only has to look at the great success of other similar novels to see that.