Out of This World

What does an Evil Overlord/Necromancer/Dark Lord do when he has conquered his world? He begins searching for new worlds to conquer. Shadow has swallowed his entire world, and found an alternate reality, where a space-going Galactic Empire holds sway. The Galactic Empire is looking for allies and finds another reality, our Earth. And so, Pellinore Brown and some others from Earth, Captain Joshua Cahn and the crew of the ISS Ruthless of the Galactic Empire, and Raven of Stormcrack Keep and some other resisters of Shadow begin their trek across three realities. But, their journey will take them where they never expected to go. For many years now, I have been a great fan of Lawrence Watt-Evans' wonderful Ethshar and Lords of Dus series. Having finished all of the Ethshar and Dus books currently available, I have moved on to his Three Worlds series. This book is another great read; one that shows off the author's writing ability. I loved the author's three, mutually exclusive worlds, finding each one fascinating. If it's so great, then why did I only give it four stars? Frankly, towards the end of the book, the storyline turns to images of rape, brutality and murder, and became just a little too intense for me. This is definitely not a book for younger or more sensitive readers. But, that said, I did enjoy this book, and look forward to reading the next book in the series. Lawrence Watt-Evans is a great author, and this book is another shining example of his abilities. I highly recommend this book!

I picked up this book and the third one in the series awhile ago at a used book store and I just got around to reading it. This is the second book by Lawrence Watt Evans that I have read, and I picked it up because I really enjoyed his collection of short stories, Crosstime Traffic. This book starts out as a fun and innocent fantasy novel, and there are several amusing passages towards the beginning. However, the book takes a drastic turn towards the dark side near the end. Two likable characters are killed off in a rather sudden manner. However I still enjoyed the novel, and I'm looking for a copy of the second book.

Dear 'A Reader'.The violence towards women being 'unnesacary'? Man, are you ever out of touch. This series is brutal. It's nasty. Scary, evil horrible, awful stuff happens because that's the kind of place The Empire IS. Anywho, it's a book. I enjoyed it in my own way but it is NOT reality.

The main reason i gave this book five stars is because it isn't the normal clap trap where no one gets hurt because they are good guys. The author is to be applauded because he brings a certain amount of realism to the fantasy genre. People are injured and killed not because they are inherently bad but because generally this sort of thing happens to people who don't have the power to defend themselves. If you are the kind of person who believes the tooth fairy should beat the Incredible Hulk just because she has a nice smile and a dimple then this is not the book for you.

The story starts out as a light novel, then, in a surprising and shocking turn of events, turns very dark with the brutal ending of some very sympathetic characters. I suspect that even Mr. Watt-Evans musthavebeen surprised to find his characters developing tragic depths. I doubt if he intentionally started out for this to happen. It was like falling off a cliff while on a pleasure hike...I had to reread some parts a few times until it sunk in that this was somehow developing into a major saga (such as The Hobbitt developed into the Lord of the Rings). I have not yet read the sequels, but will soon. What a rare event in (usually) predictable fantasy!