Thoroughly liked it. ( )

Inspired to read it by a comment on LT - now I don't remember who or what. But I'm very glad I did read it. I've tried before and never got past the first couple chapters - the hero is such a whiny, weasely _brat_ at the beginning that I always dumped it (and had a rather bad impression of the author). However, this time I slogged on through all his attempts at wriggling out, got to Ethshar of the Spices and he actually told the wizard the truth. I expected him to try to make something up, but he just told his story straightforward and tried to deal with reality. Suddenly he became a much more interesting person. Now, admittedly, the rest of his adventures were also triggered by trying to weasel out - but it's a much more _reasonable_ weaseling out to try to get out of being arrested. And though he constantly thought about slipping away, he didn't - just went ahead and got through. Sort of. Anyway, the rest of the story was fun, I very much liked him by the end of it. (And I just saw the description of the book that it's 'another exploration of Ethshar' - so I need to find the other Ethshar book(s) now!) ( )

another sampling of the Ethshar world: this one also deals with the "personal rather than cosmic" (Ethshar, Wikipedia.org). the hero here being a young wizard and challenged to learn and grow as opposed to a veteran soldier challenged to live. a likable book! ( )