Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Books read in 2015: No. 43 -- The Night of the Long Knives

by Fritz Leiber

Started: Dec. 27
Finished: Dec. 30

Notes: I'd never heard of this novel from this famous sci-fi/fantasy author, so I grabbed it for free at Amazon when I discovered it. Apparently it is a post-apocalyptic novel and has nothing to do with the infamous events in German history that bear the same name as the title.

Mini review: Holy shit, that was a good book, the best I've read in a long while. And the weird thing is, when I stop and think about the story, none of it should work, but it does. It's kind of a Mad Max meets 1950s science fiction tale, but honestly, there's not that much action. There is a little action, but most of it is the main character's viewpoint thoughts or his talking with others. I realize that doesn't sound all that exciting, but I promise, here it works. And deep down, or maybe not so deep, this is a philosophical book with a moral, talking about murder and war and violence. I'm sorry I hadn't read this one years earlier. This might now be my all-time favorite work from Leiber.

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