Gods and Pawns

Baker's Company series has dragged a bit lately, so it was a pleasure to read this collection of short stories. Each is an excellent tale on its own, filled with action, mystery and a lot of characterization. I love the cyborg's wry asides and their anachronistic mindsets. This was also the first book in a while that made me truly like Mendoza, Lewis and Joseph again--for too many books they've been running around doing desperate things without any humor to them, and I really appreciated seeing Mendoza's focused courage, Lewis's kind and slightly hapless attempts at love, and Joseph's optimistic sarcasm. These stories also introduce a few new characters, most memorably the mortal, middle-aged and perpetually over-worked Maria. I loved show more her, and I loved her smart, independent and very believable reactions to slowly learning about the Company. show less

Some excellent short stories about the immortal cyborgs seeded through time by the time-travelling company as part of an immense scheme to make immense amounts of money in the future when discoveries and antiquities carefully hidden for hundreds or thousands of years and which can now be sold for a mint. Life ain't easy for an immortal cyborg and there are always difficulties and problems to overcome, to say nothing of the machinations of both the Company masters and of certain powerful immortals who think they'd be better off in charge. Baker writes engagingly, it's easy to become addicted.

I am not a fan of short stories, but Kage Baker writes excellent short stories and since these are set in the same world and with some of the same characters as her Company series, it was more like reading episodes that didn’t quite make it into any of the novels. Great vignettes of Joseph, Lewis, and Mendoza.

Baker really thrives in shorter pieces: she's vastly less likely to get cutesy with her material. At its best this series is very, very good. Exemplary work. At its worst its still pretty good.

...Gods and Pawns by Kage Baker.

This was another collection of short stories in Baker's Company universe.

I remain impressed by the way Baker has mastered both the short and long fiction forms and can tell a full and satisfying story either way.

I enjoyed all the stories in this volume, although naturally some more than others. I especially enjoyed more Lewis tales as he has very much grown on me as a character. I'm not sure that I can pick a favourite, as each story had things I liked and they were all deftly written.

My least favourite was probably "The Land Beyond the Sunset" in which Lewis and Mendoza go on a field trip and find an apparently lost civilisation. Again, it was well written and engaging, but didn't work for me as well as show more some of the others.

I liked the 1930's-set "Welcome to Olympus, Mr Hearst", although the future ramifications of the Company's machinations in this case are rather scary. But the story of the house party was delightful, as was the early cameo by Rudolph Valentino.

Another favourite was "Angel in the Darkness" that showed the complications of Porfirio's continued observation of his mortal family from the point of view of one of those family members rather than one of the cyborgs.

Perhaps not a book to come in and read cold, but a lovely addition to the series.

Gods and Pawns
Kage Baker
9/10 show less

[Amy] Rather than putting the Company short story collections into publication order when reading the overall series, I decided to tack them on to the end. I'm not entirely sure that was a good idea - I lost some of my enthusiasm for this series upon completion of the main storyline, which caused me to put off reading the collection for quite some time.

I did enjoy the stories, though, despite not caring nearly so much about prospecting for hints about the nature of the Company and so on as I once would have. The characters are still interesting, and the setting still has much to offer. I wouldn't, however, necessarly recommend that people read it unless they are (as I so often am) obsessive completists. "Enjoyable but not necessary", I show more think, would be my summation.
(http://weblog.siliconcerebrate.com/zenos-library/2009/01/gods_and_pawns_kage_baker.html) show less

I really enjoy this book in the series. I like the novella within a novel writing style of Kage Baker. I enjoyed the mystery quality to Mendoza and Lewis adventure in Bolivia. I was happy to read more about Lewis, since he is my favorite character.