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1634: The Bavarian Crisis | Rating | |
| D | |||
| Eric Flint and Virgina DeMarce | |||
| Series | Related Books | ||
| Ring of Fire | 1632, 1633, 1634: The Baltic War, 1634: The Galileo Affair, 1634: The Ram Rebellion, 1634: The Bavarian Crisis, 1635: The Cannon Law, Ring of Fire, Grantville Gazette | ||
This is the fourth 1634 book — as opposed to 1632 and 1633, years that had only one book each, if you don't count the story collections. Like all the other such, except for 1634: The Baltic War, it is a side issue. It concentrates on the political ramifications of several of the USE's most prestigious ladies traveling through a war zone on a fundraising jaunt, and the marriage of a Bavarian Duke and a fiancee who has rather more brains and curiosity than then men of the time know what to do with. The events influence — and are influenced by, of course — the main story of the series, that of the new twists imposed on the Thirty Year's War by the introduction of modern technology and philosophies, but they are not crucial to it.
It also seems to arise virtually from nowhere. Many of these down-time personalities are appearing in the setting for the first time with this book — or were, at best, minor characters elsewhere. I don't recall the other books being especially concerned with the politics of this marriage, or the rammifications of what Maria Anna proposes. Not even the other books set in that year, though most of those have their own rather narrow foci. But neither does even the sole book (so far) set in 1645 really feel the need to mention it. Certainly, if it did, somewhere, I never wondered what the full story was and thought it deserved its own book to explain it to me! Any references made in the other books to what happens here were sufficient enough that they never really registered except as a bit more exposition.
It doesn't help at all that nothing happens. Not for most of the book. The pages are filled with narration and musings and names — lots of names! — but very little actually is going on. Not politically, and certainly not militarily. This in the middle of a war consuming Europe. Heck, there's barely even any dialogue. The first third is terribly difficult to wade through, and despite my effforts I doubt I retained a third of what the authors were trying to get across. It was just dull, thick reading.
The problem isn't just that nothing happens, either, or next to nothing. It is that when something does, it is difficult to pick out what it is out of the morass of names and places and dates being bandied about. Events do pass, the story does progress. But it's hard, very hard, to tell what's important and what is background detail. And for well over two hundred pages, I still wasn't sure what the story even was. What, exactly, is the crisis, here? Most of the issues I saw were of a small, even personal scale. The few exceptions had wider influence for obscure reasons, the explanations of which were were tedious to read.
Thankfully, a plot does develop. Eventually. And perhaps halfway through the book, events even reach a stage that might be considered a crisis. It helps a great deal. The story suddenly becomes comprehensible. There is a goal and challenges to overcome in order to reach it. There's not much militarily, but politically the book comes alive. So, for that matter, do the characters.
But two or three hundred pages go by before readers ever reach that point. And they are very dull and difficult pages, at htat. The information and setup are important, but it goes on for so long, and is so hard to read, that at times I truly wondered if it was worth my while to make the effort. Especially since there was no good hint of what the authors were setting up for. As it turns out, it was indeed worth it, sort of. The book redeemed itself somewhat in that second half. Bit I simply cannot forget the sheer tedium of the first. Any book where I can skip a page or two at a time with no impact on my understanding of the story is not going to make a favorable impression on my mind. Especially when I can do that multiple times. Especially when I have the unrestrainable urge to roll by eyes and mutter, "Blah, blah, blah!" And I assure you, I did.
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