The Ruby Dice (original 2008; edition 2008)

Skolia,SF

Quis is back, the amazing dice/strategy/mathmatic/political game that Kelric first played in The Last Hawk (one of my favorite books in the series) which has become one of my favorite things in the whole series, actually.

The book centers around (Imperator) Kelric and (Emperor) Jabriol, two leaders of empires at war, who are linked through some rather interesting means and history. This book is definitely not a stand alone and should not be read without some background in the series, so I definitely cannot recommend it if you haven't read previous Skolian Saga books. But if you have - Awesome, this book rocks.

All in all, very tightly plotted, well paced, and very interesting. This book doesn't have anything in the way of romance (other than people reuniting) like the other books tend to, but the political intrigue and personal stories of the people in both the Eubian and Skolian systems more than makes up for it. ( )

Quis is back, the amazing dice/strategy/mathmatic/political game that Kelric first played in The Last Hawk (one of my favorite books in the series) which has become one of my favorite things in the whole series, actually.

The book centers around (Imperator) Kelric and (Emperor) Jabriol, two leaders of empires at war, who are linked through some rather interesting means and history. This book is definitely not a stand alone and should not be read without some background in the series, so I definitely cannot recommend it if you haven't read previous Skolian Saga books. But if you have - Awesome, this book rocks.

All in all, very tightly plotted, well paced, and very interesting. This book doesn't have anything in the way of romance (other than people reuniting) like the other books tend to, but the political intrigue and personal stories of the people in both the Eubian and Skolian systems more than makes up for it. ( )

The Ruby Dice - Catherine Asaro
Skolian Empire, Book 12; SF; 10/10
I love Catherine Asaro's books and I love this series. I've had it since it was published in January but I kept putting it off and putting it off and I couldn't figure out why. I finally decided it was a combination of factors: I was afraid it wouldn't live up to my expectations (it did), I wanted to read it when my brain was at its best so I could take in all the details (in the end, I read it anyway as the brain hasn't cooperated on that front), I didn't want to read about bad things happening to the characters, especially Jaibriol who is in an unenviable position (none of it was totally awful, but not roses and rainbows either) and I wanted the chance to savour it without being interrupted (I managed that my taking longer to read it and reading when I was alone in the house). So while it wasn't necessarily an easy read, I loved this addition to the Skolian series. A major milestone was reached in Skolian/Trader relations and Jaibriol finally got to share some of his secrets, even if it did leave him understanding exactly how alone he is (poor, poor Jai). We got to see many favourite characters again and it was a wonderful visit to a wonderful world. It leaves me with many, many more questions than answers, and I hope Asaro will continue to tell tales of this point in her timeline (although the next book goes back ten years to tell the story of another character and I'm looking forward to that just as much). So I loved, loved this book and probably would have done if I'd read in in January too, but I had to wait until I felt ready to take it on. I guess it means I won't have to wait as long as some people for the next one, which doesn't come out until May 2009. This is totally not the place to start this series, but I do recommend giving it a try as it's a wonderful canvas Asaro has created and great stories. I'm planning on rereading the entire series, including short stories, in chronological order now I'm up-to-date. If you do want to try the books I suggest Primary Inversion (first published) or Skyfall (first chronologically) as a place to begin. ( )

sigh. This was a disappointing read. I get the feeling she wrote an outline for a short story and her publishers wanted a novel, so she fleshed it out, repeated herself a few dozen times and sent it off. The story took forever to reach it's conclusion and then ended abruptly. The meotional impact was negligent and poorly expressed. There were perhaps 3 memorable scenes, well written and fully engaging, but that's it.

As usual, the scientific explanations were wooden and far too frequent. And the book was terribly edited! Far too many times I had to stop reading a dialog and trace out who said what because the words were coming out of the wrong person's mouth.

I suspect it is past time the Skolian Empire was allowed a little privacy. I'm not at all sure I'll read the next installment. ( )