Chaos and Amber

If you enjoyed the original Amber series by Zelazny, you should like this one.

I am sorry to see that john has gotten such bad reveiws for the Amber books. I have read all of the Amber series up to this one(including Zelanzy's) and I can honestly say it is the best series I have ever read. I like Amber because it is a series different than any other Fantasies and its a place that I feel very comfortable in. I think that John has done a remarkable job at keeping these books along the same lines that roger Zelanzy drew in his Amber books. I hope that more people will give his books a chance because honestley I would like to read a thousand more books of amber.

After a slow introductory book, there's a little more action in this one. That makes sense, given that Oberon has to transition into a truly powerful leader to make it consistent with what we see in the Zelazny Amber series. I think Betancourt did a great job of dealing with the need to describe Chaos and the significance of the Pattern. He's a worthy heir to the Zelazny mantle.

The title of this review says it all. John pulled off another masterpiece that is a tribute to Roger Zelanzy -- Amber Series.His description of Chaos is just short of amazing. I enjoyed the continued unfolding of the plots and how Oberon, the Jewel of Judgement and so much more fits in all this. I can't say more without giving anything away.Enjoy.MoonDragon of SoA

I enjoyed this book. Betancourt's first Amber novel, "The Dawn of Amber" *was* different from Zelazny's works, and many of Oberon's family that Betancourt described were one dimensional creations who lacked depth. In his second Amber novel, "Chaos and Amber", the characters introduced have greater depth, and he develops those which were treated poorly in the first novel. The plot develops, but is also 'revealed' by some rather direct actions by Oberon (and an enemy who very nicely spills the beans and tells him what is going on). Betancourt's descriptions of Oberon's experiences in Chaos are great fun, and he is rather novel about Oberon's mishaps. In many ways, this book is very much a tale of Oberon's blunders and coming to terms with what is really going on with some inspired direct action (which I won't spoil). You can start to see some of Freda's foretelling that Oberon will challenge Dworkin in this book.My major criticism of this work is that unlike Zelazny's novels, Betancourt feels the need to tell us what happened in the previous novel for about the first 50-100 pages. And to make it worse, nowhere on the cover does it say that this is the Second Novel of Three. So the publishers probably feel that the recapping is justified, but I don't. It's a waste of sapce. Secondly, I am beginning to feel that the story is being rushed - it could be drawn out a lot more. The last 150 pages of the book shine, with Oberon driving the plot rather than being a passive player. I also liked the character development, as Betancourt fleshes out of a number of his brothers and sisters. We are given more description, and more information about their pasts. Suddenly Taine, Locke, Isadora etc become three dimensional characters which is great plus. (They were just names before) I like the transformation in Aber too - he goes from being the 'useful sidekick' to (well, I won't tell you, you'll have to read and see). Betancourt is definitely setting up Oberon to face off against his brothers and sisters, and against Chaos itself. I just hope Betancourt doesn't rush things in his third novel. For such a story arc, it's a real pity that he couldn't write it over five novels.