Linda Evans (2) (1958–)

Unbelievably stupid and not remotely believable. Sometime in the future, time travel is possible, both “uptime” and downtime.” To do this, time scouts are needed to scout unknown areas and guides are needed to show tourists scouted areas such as historical Rome, Victorian England, shogun Japan, etc. The most famous time scout of all time is the stupidly named Kit Carson, who is retired.

One day, some total massive hottie, the like of whom has never been seen in the universe shows up on show more the space station in a massive rush looking for Kit. She is secretly 16, but “looks 18,” so it’s okay that every male who sees her, regardless of age or marital status stares and drools. All men think with their penises in this book. Even Kit, who’s old, when he sees her, is struck dumb with amazement. Then she announces she’s his granddaughter and wants him to train her to be a time scout! No more incestuous thoughts, I guess. Still, everyone else wants to pork her.

Kit tries to talk her out of it and enlists the aid of every time scout around and the top weapons specialists and researchers around. She thinks it sounds romantic and knows nothing about it. Well – get this – first of all, you have to be a scholar. You pretty much have to have a PhD. Many have PhDs in History or Anthropology or other Humanities discipline. Margo, the girl, doesn’t study. Hates school. Then, since you’re visiting who knows how many foreign countries, you have to be fluent in many, many languages. Kit is fluent in 20. Margo barely knows one. Then, you pretty much have to be a special forces veteran. A PhD. Yep. You have to know how to fight anyone anywhere and how to beat the hell out of anyone and kill them if need be. You also need to know your weapons. You need to know how to use, fire, and clean hundreds of guns. Margo has never picked one up. You need to know blades. Margo has never picked one up. You need to know at least three to five martial arts, black belt level, probably more. Margo took a few classes of one in high school. And one of the time scouts who’s helping to train her who seems to be about 40 develops some type of romantic relationship with her even though they have absolutely nothing in common and even though it’s statutory rape. Apparently, the author, Robert Asprin (Linda Evans is a collaborator, but I’m not convinced she did that much, because I have some respect for her), really wants to fuck a 16-year-old girl. Really badly.

And yet, I’m willing to bet, Margo triumphs over all and becomes a successful time scout, the first female one, no less, and everyone is happy. I say I’m willing to bet because I didn’t finish this joke of a disaster. It’s too stupid to waste my time on. There are too many other good books to read. This was honestly one of the dumber books I’ve picked up in a long time and rest assured I will never read another book by this author, who must be a total dumb ass. One star. Definitely not recommended. show less

Oh drat. When I first read this book, I loved it. I gave it four stars for creativity, characters and plot. I liked the way the authors interwove the facts of the Jack the Ripper case with the events happening to the characters in the book. I loved the steampunk aspects of the entire series. I even understood why the authors found it necessary to invent a whole new character to pin the murders on.

What I do NOT understand is why the authors made a huge historical error (by neglecting one tiny show more piece of research) for no reason that advances anything in the book. One of the prostitutes who is soon to be murdered goes to Aleister Crowley for help when she feels endangered, and he has sex with her, but can't help her avoid her coming fate. There is nothing in the scene with them which advances the plot or the reader's understanding of any of the characters. It's as if Crowley is dragged into the novel just so the authors can mention his self-awarded reputation as "The Great Beast."

One big problem--Crowley was thirteen years old when the Ripper murders took place. He wasn't in London, wasn't even living on his own. One teensy little websearch by either Asprin or Evans would have turned up this little fact.

You blew it, guys. show less

Second in the Multiverse series created by David Weber and Linda Evans, Hell Hath No Fury is quite excellent. If one can stomach quite a bit of violence. For violent it is. Two separate worlds in two separate universes, each exploring new alternate universes through portals they’ve discovered, encounter each other in the first book. And Arcana, the magical, militaristic culture run entirely by spells attacks a civilian survey crew from Sharona, which is a technology-based world, of a WW I show more era of technology, including rifles, revolvers, artillery, etc. Both sides suffer casualties, but while Arcana takes two prisoners, both of whom are presumed dead by Sharona, and one of them is the most popular woman in their universe, Sharona exacts their revenge on Arcana. So Arcana sends out some “diplomats,” asking to negotiate, not shoot. Things seem odd, but the Sharonans decide to negotiate in good faith, as they don’t want an interstellar war. Meanwhile, the devious Arcanans are moving up thousands of troops and dozens of battle and transport dragons to attack the Sharonans and invade their portals and take as many as possible into Sharonan territory. In doing so, they’ve lied to their troops, telling them their most popular citizen was killed by Sharanon troops when in fact it was an Arcanan who killed him. And they know that. They’re itching to start an interstellar war, but they have no orders to do so. One rogue mid-level officer has ordered this and now tens of thousands of lives are at stake.

Meanwhile, we meet Crown Prince Janaki, heir to the Sharonan throne, detailed to take some prisoners home and accompany Voice Darcel Kinlafia, the man who “saw” the original slaughter and alerted all of Sharona to what had happened. Janaki is a good man and talks Kinlafia into going ahead of him to run for Parliament, where he might be able to do some good. He, like his whole royal family, has Glimpses and knows his destiny lies in dying in defense of a major portal fort several universes away. His father, Zindel, and his sister, Andrin, not yet 18, both have strong Glimpses and are deeply worried. A Conclave is called and a world government is called for to unify the world’s countries and their armies into one, all presumably to be led by Zindel. Unfortunately, one Chava Busar, Emperor of Uromathia, is holding everything up, refusing to give his approval to this arrangement unless Zindel’s son marries one of his daughters, thus putting his grandchild on the empire’s throne at some point in the future. Many people are ticked, but Zindel agrees and the time is set for putting this all together.

So, the time has come for the Arcanans to attack. And they do, with 14,000 men against 800 Sharonans. And they lose a battle dragon or two, which shocks them, even though they annihilate all Sharonans. There are three types of battle dragons. One breathes fire, one throws lightning bolts, the third breathes poison gas, killing the most people. They are their secret weapon, since the uncivilized, barbaric Sharonans don’t have and have never seen magic.

And they attack a fort. And decimate it. And take prisoners. And torture and slaughter the prisoners. And this becomes a pattern. When Weber, for this is undoubtedly his work, writes bad guys, they are REALLY bad! The Arcanans are evil bastards. They kill all the Voices, since the have learned about the Sharonan VoiceNet and how they use it, and they destroy fort after fort, taking prisoners and torturing and slaughtering them as they go. It seems the only honorable Arcanans are the long distant Jasak Olderhan and Gadrial Kelbryan.

Finally, they reach the big fort, the major fort where Janaki is. Through his Glimpses, he has been able to warn the commander of the impending attack, how it will happen, where it will come from, how to defend, etc. And they’re ready. The battle scene is a typical David Weber battle scene: most excellent. And of course, Janaki dies. The serious problem with that is it leaves Andrin heir to the throne and now Busar is insisting she immediately marry one of his sons and he is gloating his way to the throne. However, as we will hopefully find out in the next book, Kinlafi will have something to say about that and will play a major role in the survival of Sharona. The book ends in a typical Weber cliffhanger stalemate and I’m damned eager to see some Sharonan revenge. The problem for many people is that this book was published in 2007 and there’s been no Book Three. People have been left hanging and they’re not happy about it. Apparently, Linda Evans became quite ill, so the series was discontinued. People ask why Weber didn’t just continue it himself, since it was so quite obviously HIS book. But he didn’t. The good news is, I just learned that Book Three is scheduled for publication in March 2016! With a different co-author. Don’t know what happened to Evans, but I’m damned glad Weber got together with someone to continue an excellent series. The first book was quite good, but this one was better. Lots of action, lots of intrigue. Definitely recommended. show less

The first book in the Multiverse series doesn't spend much time in setting the scene as we are dropped straight into the middle of the action as a Sharonian exploration team member makes an unfortunate first contact with a member of an Arcanian expedition. With both parties dead, working out who's fault it was would be impossible and neither side expected to meet another civilisation in the first place so both sides were afraid of what the other would do. It's not quite a 'cast of thousands' show more novel, but the book (and series) swaps points of view between those at the sharp end of the action, to those in political control (particularly on the Sharonian side), though this isn't as jarring here.

Although the two authors have their distinctive voices, they mesh quite well in this book though I suspect David rather preferred the Sharonian side to the Arcanians - both sides have different levels of technology and mental skills - the Sharonians have Talents that resemble 'traditional' psionic skills, and a level of technology around the late Victorian era, whilst the Arcanians employ magic and have developed creature out of legends such as dragons and unicorns, and a level of technology about the late medieval period and the inability of either side to come to terms with their opponents' skills is one of the drivers of the conflict that drives the series show less