191. The Second Chronicles of Amber (#6-10) by Roger Zelazny
Review
“The Second Chronicles of Amber (#6-10)” by Roger Zelazny is the final half of the series and is made up of another 5 books. The storyline somewhat continues, however with a new main character as the focus of the story. Apart from this change the universe remains the same. Saying it remains the same, is somewhat an overstatement. What Roger Zelazny does exceedingly well is to allow the universe he’s built to develop through technological advances and ideas, that allow the world to feel ever-changing and vibrant.
Due to the change of main character, an obvious comparison occurs between the two parts of the series and thus also provokes the reader to develop a preference. Personally, I’m very much in favour of the main character in the first part, simply because he is less predictable than his successor. The second part of the series feels more solid in the writing and the amount of inventions and the way in which Zelazny continuously bends the universe he’s created is wonderful.
The comparisons remain the same as for the previous books and is thus repeated here: In order to compare this book to anything, I’d make the comparison to the books by Neil Gaiman. The genre and themes are very much in line and if the cover had had Neil Gaiman on it instead of Roger Zelazny, I’m not certain I would’ve been able to tell the difference. Otherwise, the best comparisons to be made are in the fantasy genres and I’d say that the book reads as a simpler version of some of Brandon Sanderson’s books and also somewhat like “The Wheel of Time”-series by Robert Jordan, but a lot less grim than what Robert Jordan presented in his epic series.
Score: 8/10
It is no secret that I’m a fan of Roger Zelazny, I find him to be an extremely vibrant author, who loves to write. When this is evident for me as a reader, it’s all the more pleasure to see where he will take you. I have then decided on a score of 8 out of 10, which is lower than the first half of the series and the cause for this mostly due to my preference for the main character in the first five books.