Cowl (original 2004; edition 2004)

Interesting story based around time-travel and long exhausting war that spreads millions of years starting from the future backwards - yup you read it well, backwards :)[return][return]Characters are great - maybe not too fleshed out but nevertheless very well portrayed. Main characters seem to be of the Asher's favorite type - good person forced to live at the edge of society and do things that others find awful and distasteful and the brutish merciless one, perfect killing machine bred for war, assassinations and combat who finally discovers himself to be a person - not a robot. Now mix this with the most unexpected sort of time travelers and you are in for a treat.[return][return]Great read. Recommended. ( )

The is a bizarre but engaging book, despite its unnecessarily grim dystopian opening, worth a look for its unusual take on time travel. Although the main plot essentially boils down to "hunt the monster", the characters are genuinely interesting, the ideas big and bold, and the subplot twists and turns plentiful. It all makes for an enjoyable read, even if the first 20 pages are more than a little off-putting. ( )

Meh. I've often wondered about the utility of that word, but now I've found what it's for: it's the perfect description of my reaction to Cowl. It expresses the concept of 'been there; done that ... what's next'.

So, the two main characters are set up in an adversarial role, and then thrown into a battle between two tribes of future humanity who are struggling for supremacy in a war to preserve/destroy the human race as they know it. The war involves time travel, with the climactic confrontation scheduled to take place in the distant past where the 'creature' Cowl exists. The episodes as each of the characters skip back in time are quite interesting, and the chapter introductions provide a framing device to paint the big picture. Are the main characters pawns or kings? Which of the tribes are the goodies and which the baddies? These are the questions ... that you end up not really caring about in spite of the pretty decent story-telling.

I've only read one Neal Asher collection before embarking on this stand-alone work. (Most of his other stories are set within the framework of the 'Polity', which I've only got the vaguest outline of so far.) That collection was pretty inventive and thrilling, so I was looking forward to something of the same calibre here. You'll have gathered I was let down: I don't think it was by the writing, or the story outline, so perhaps it was just the lack of clarity of what was going on or the convoluted descriptions of what was needed to get time-travel to work effectively. Or perhaps the poor editing with a bunch of typographical errors which hit someone like me between the eyes.

On the basis of that other book, and the general high regard in which Asher is held, I'll carry on with acquiring and reading his work. But, sorry to say, it's a 'don't start here' warning from me. In fact, you won't be missing much if you don't start this book at all. ( )

Interesting story based around time-travel and long exhausting war that spreads millions of years starting from the future backwards - yup you read it well, backwards :)

Characters are great - maybe not too fleshed out but nevertheless very well portrayed. Main characters seem to be of the Asher's favorite type - good person forced to live at the edge of society and do things that others find awful and distasteful and the brutish merciless one, perfect killing machine bred for war, assassinations and combat who finally discovers himself to be a person - not a robot. Now mix this with the most unexpected sort of time travelers and you are in for a treat.

Great read. Recommended. ( )

A young street kid, surviving on sex and drugs gets dragged into a time war.

So does a soldier in pursuit of her because of some of her dodgy acquaintances.

Opposing forces include warriors from the future, and an end of evolution entity that the book draws its title from.

The battle is for time, or at least the most likely timeline. Tactics includes trying to force others 'down the probability well' into unlikely places so they cannot be an influence.

So, world wars, earlier, the Silurian and others become battleground for these timebeast travelling antagonists.

http://notfreesf.blogspot.com/2009/09/cowl-neal-asher.html ( )