7 down, 45 to go

I have just finish what was the perfect finale of such an amazing series.

With The Ashes of Worlds, all the tension and conflicts building thru-out six books come crashing down, being honest, and not quite sure in how being one of the shortest books in the series, 512 pages, Mr. Anderson handles all the lose ends beautifully, without feeling the conclusion is rush or for sake of closing out the story.

My favorite parts of the series are the ones involving the idea of the keepers of the memory or history of the various civilizations, the name of the series comes from the grand epic of the Ildiran Empire named Saga of the Seven Suns, were the Rememberers, the equivalent of the human historian, pour all the great deeds of their vast history for all the population to learn, this is kind very similar to the Poetic Edda of the Norse Mythology, full of figures that time have transform into long lost memories.

It’s only fitting that the series finish with the creation of a new record of an ancient civilization’s story, I will not spoil anything further that that, you should really give read this amazing story.

The thing that I think reverberates the most is that inside the keeping and telling of this stories there’s the ever present phantom of the “fabricated reality”, all thru-out the books, and from all the civilizations involved, there’s some time of manipulation of information to create animosity against what is perceive as foreign or different, something that affects our world so deeply, and even in the face of imminent destruction, they can’t put their differences behind and fight the common threat.

That is what makes this type of stories feel so real and hopefully more of us can learn that there are more things that binds us as sentient creatures, and that being a green priest from Theroc, or a Roamer from Kanaka is merely circumstantial.

I highly recommend any work from Kevin J. Anderson, but this saga in particular will hold a special place in my heart, those types of books that eventually you come back to them or share with your grandchildren.

Now I am off to read my next book, Exhalación by the master of Science Fiction Ted Chiang.

azr.