The Zoo over Ambuscade Street

Dear Public Works Asshats:

The next time you feel compelled to turn the power to a 24x7 lab facility filled with sensitive electronic equipment on and off repeatedly, please let us know before you do it. An hour or two, at least, would be nice, so we can bring all the equipment happily down.

But no, you couldn't do that. And now I have a possibly trashed core router (do you want the bill for that? I think it cost us somewhere around a quarter million...), an alert server that managed to crash the base email server, and a freaking air conditioner making all the problems even worse. One of your air conditioners, in fact.

And what the hell are we supposed to tell our users? "The air conditioner is trashing the network." Right - like they're going to believe that. I barely believe it.

In conclusion: *STAB*

Oh yea - got the old "no funding" email today. Just the icing on the freaking cake...

I'm almost finished with Avaryan Rising, the first three books in the series by Judith Tarr. In fact, I'm about fifteen pages from finishing it, a state that is almost terminally abnormal for me.

I liked the first book, and I adored the second. I was even enjoying the third until it got to The Plot Twist, which I didn't really see coming (although in hindsight I really should have - I was thinking along those paths earlier in the book, I just didn't take it to the logical conclusion). Post-Twist, however, it just really isn't working for me. Most of it because of certain character developments and how they're being handled (or not), but not all.

Part of it is that the worldbuilding that Tarr does is incomplete. Or feels incomplete - I get the impression that she's crafted elaborate backgrounds and histories, but she hasn't seen fit to insert that information into her novels until it suddenly becomes critical. That works sometimes, but it seems to be happening so frequently that it's like she's making it up on the fly. It's harder to "believe" in her world, because the necessary underpinnings aren't there until they're essential to the plot. It's like walking across a bridge in progress - you step into nothingness, with the hope that the next plank will be in place before you fall.

Three more books - I like the dynasty storytelling, and her prose is almost as stark and elegant as CJ Cherryh at her best. One half-novel worth of weakness isn't going to ruin the series for me, I think.

If anyone's interested in picking up the Saiyuki singles, TRSI has all ten in the DVD Bargain Bin for $7.99 each. Along with lots of other stuff, but that's the only new title I spotted.