Group Reads of the Raksura - October - Stories of the Raksura Volume One

This volume contains two long stories, a sequel taking place shortly after The Siren Depths and a distant prequel detailing the founding of the Indigo Cloud Court, and a couple of short stories with background on Moon and Chime.

"The Falling World"
Jade, sister queen of the Indigo Cloud Court, has traveled with Chime and Balm to another Raksuran court. When she fails to return, her consort Moon, along with Stone and a party of warriors and hunters, must track them down. Finding them turns out to be the easy part; freeing them from an ancient trap hidden in the depths of the Reaches is much more difficult.

"The Tale of Indigo and Cloud"
This novella explores the history of the Indigo Cloud Court, long before Moon was born. In the distant past, Indigo stole Cloud from Emerald Twilight. But in doing so, the reigning Queen Cerise and Indigo are now poised for a conflict that could spark war throughout all the courts of the Reaches.

Also includes the short stories "The Forest Boy" and "Adaptation," both set before The Cloud Roads.

This one is available in paper, ebook, and audiobook. Despite several stories in this collection being prequels, the best place to start is probably still at the first book, The Cloud Roads, for more context- feel free to bump the other Group Reads of the Raksura threads in this forum at any time to discuss.

I'm really looking forward to this one, especially as we'll get to see the Three Worlds through perspectives other than Moon in a couple of the stories!

Ah, so it's out! I had lost track of this one. I will definitely buy it soon and join in the conversation...

I'm going to try and buy a copy while I'm in the US this month.

I've just read the first story, and I'm a little disappointed. Bottom line, I don't see the point of the story. The story is flimsy, and it doesn't show much more of Raksuran society. I've got the feeling the point is mostly to describe another weird thing found in the Reaches. Because that's what it's about: Jade doesn't return from a trip, Moon goes after her with a group, they find she's involved in a weird adventure, and they get her out. I got maybe two new things about known characters: Moon realizes he approves of Chime's search for mentors changing into warriors and River has lost status and tries to prove himself. Hardly enough to get me interested. And the weird things? I'm a bit tired of it. In my opinion, when you're describing a world it's ok to talk about things that are normal to that world. A land we haven't visited yet, a people we haven't met yet, especially if you get to know them and they play a crucial role to the story. But there's only so much description of weird and singular things I can take. We already had the people living on a turtle in book 2 (which I wasn't that fond of). Now I have to wade through all the description of a new species that is inconsequential to the story and of a strange city. I found it boring. And the story didn't make up for it in other ways. No extra Raksuran tidbits, hardly any new information on the characters, no cool storyline or good solution. It was basically just a search to find Jade, Stone going of for help in the middle, some mentor business and that was about it.

>4 zjakkelien: I've started this one finally, but I'm not very far in. I'm a little disappointed that Jade is out of the picture again, after the scenarios in The Serpent Sea and The Siren Depths- I would like more screen time with her and Moon together like their journey together in The Cloud Roads.

I agree about the things that nobody has ever seen, though, this world is rich enough that entire volumes could be dedicated to just exploring the implications of what we've seen, a la Cherryh's Foreigner series.

>5 sandstone78: If it would have been centered around interaction between Jade and Moon, I would have liked it a lot more. I was worried about the second story, because that one doesn't have any of the currently existing characters in it (well, one). I started it today, however, and I like it a lot better than the first. Maybe it has new characters, but it does show Raksuran society again, which I like a lot.

I finished this a little while ago, but didn't have time to come and put in my comments. I thought that the first story was okay- it was nice to spend time with these characters again, and I think it was a good length- too much longer and it would have felt dragged out I think. I wasn't really as bothered as I expected by the fact that it was another previously unknown hazard- I think it was interesting, actually, and possibly setting up a future story with there are many artifacts of the ancients around, including this fallen- literally!- city and the leviathan city in The Serpent Sea.

Something felt off, though, and I think it's that the action was centered around Chime's experiences, but we really didn't get to see very much of that- I would have liked maybe some of his POV as well, or maybe a little more of his reflections on what had happened from their side at the end of the story. I thought it interesting that the predator creature ended up being some kind of sorcerer too, maybe.

The Tale of Indigo and Cloud worked better for me overall. I really liked having the POV of a Raksuran queen and all of the court life detail, and Indigo's clever solution to the problem at the end, but I think what made it for me was the tail end when the story switches to the present day in Indigo Cloud and we see how the story is received. I don't think I picked up before on the fact that Stone was old enough that he was a fledgling during what happened with Indigo and Cloud, but I thought the quiet scenes with him at the end were very well done.

The Forest Boy didn't do a whole lot for me, since it was a foregone conclusion what would happen by the end and I don't remember any of this of Moon's failed attempts to find a home specifically coming back up in the later books (though I could be wrong) to make me curious about it; Adaptation was a nice little extra about Chime, which I had read before on Wells' website and liked well enough for what it was- I listened to it in the audiobook, and didn't really care for the unusually deep voice that the reader gave Chime.