The Gates of Creation

Again, mildly enjoyable. There are some deeper themes here - what the Lords have become, alienation from parents and siblings - but mostly it's a fascinating journey through some seriously weird settings (the World of Tiers is positively normal beside some of the stuff Urizen came up with). Aside from a little with the inhabitants of the air-island, there's basically no interaction with people outside the Lords themselves - in many places there aren't any other people, but even back on the waterworld the inhabitants of the first island and the Mother Island are generic, not fleshed out at all. A lot of nasty tricks and a lot of nasty people - the Lords are shown to be childish, selfish, greedy, capable of casual and not-so-casual show more betrayal, and overall people there's no reason to like. Heck, Theotormon ends up being a better man than most of his siblings. Luvah is presented as better, but his actual actions don't particularly support it - he doesn't betray Wolff when Wolff needs support, but that's about it. By the end of the book, only the good people get to get away, though. And this book is another chase to rescue Chryseis - she needs better defenses if she's going to hang around Wolff. show less

It turns out that this is a sequel - and a copy of the predecessor is in a warehouse along with the vast majority of my other books. So that is mildly irritating but not the book's fault...

Reading this book I was quickly and persistently reminded of [b:The Great Book of Amber|5367|The Great Book of Amber (Chronicles of Amber, #1-10)|Roger Zelazny|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348965047s/5367.jpg|8810]. I haven't checked which series started first but the correspondences are manifold: murderous family plots and feuding; protagonist who spent much time on Earth; ability to create whole universes; gates/trumps between places.

The Amber stories are better than this, however. Better world building, better characterisation. Better prose. This show more is my first encounter with [a:Philip José Farmer|10089|Philip José Farmer|http://d.gr-assets.com/authors/1234714074p2/10089.jpg] and I can't say I'm positively impressed. show less

En ‘Los pórticos de la creación’ (The Gates of Creation, 1966), segundo libro del Mundo de los Niveles, nos volvemos a encontrar con Robert Wolff, que se ha establecido en su propio planeta junto a Chryseis. Pero la paz no durará mucho, ya que su padre Urizen, gran creador de universos, acaba de secuestrar a Chryseis. Wolff se verá en la obligación de buscarle, y para ellos contará con la ayuda de sus hermanos y primos.

Este es el planteamiento de la novela de Philip Jose Farmer, que no es otra cosa que aventuras en mundos extraños, al estilo de Jack Vance, pero sin llegar a su nivel de imaginación. En mi opinión, la historia no daba para tanto, ya que se vuelve excesivamente repetitiva.

5.5/10
A rather dated science fiction/fantasy/speculative fiction book (1966), this second book in the World of Tiers series is a pretty straightforward quest to save a damsel in distress and wreak vengeance on her kidnapper by a band of family members who basically hate each other. The author is credited with originating many of the tropes we take for granted in speculative fiction. It was a quick read but I found I didn’t much care what happened to any of the main characters, much less the secondary characters who inhabit the various worlds. However, I will likely continue with the series since I have the books on my shelf & some people consider them classics in the genre.

Not very entertaining. Farmer, in my estimation hit his peak with the "Riverworld", and so this mild take on "Orpheus goes after his wife, but his father doesn't want that to happen", is not very good.

This book also has Wolf as the primary character. I've read it a couple of times over the years & am re-reading now as part of the full series. It also weathered the decades well. Again there are some holes in it, but it was a great read. We learn more about the 'Lords' & how they are just regular people who have high technology that they don't understand. They're not very good people, either.