 Trade In this Item for up to £1.75
Trade in Faction Paradox: This Town Will Never Let Us Go for an Amazon.co.uk gift card of up to £1.75, which you can then spend on millions of items across the site. Plus, get an extra £5 when you trade in books worth £10 or more until June 30, 2012. Trade-in values may vary (terms apply). Find more products eligible for trade-in.
|
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Tag this product(What's this?)Think of a tag as a keyword or label you consider is strongly related to this product.
Tags will help all customers organise and find favourite items. |
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is the first of Lawrence Miles' projected series of Faction Paradox novels, which is an off-shoot of a concept that he originally introduced in his Doctor Who novels. As Miles was always an experimental author, ready to take risks with narrative and format, it is only to be expected that this book does not read like your average pulpy science fiction tale. Instead we get an omniscient, cynical narrator telling us the tales of several individuals and the effects that our modern society has on them, using the science fiction tropes to tie their stories together, rather than as the focus for the plot. It is a very dense novel and is demanding of your attention while you read it, but you also have a sense that you are reading something that the author is going out of his way to make relevant. And that is perhaps the major failing. There is a definite sense of cockiness or even smugness to the narration of the tale, an acceptance that this is a worthy novel and that it is imparting major truths to the reader about the nature of reality, and sometimes this can be a barrier to one's enjoyment of the book. However, it is definitely a book to persevere with as it will make you think, and after all isn't that what a good book is all about?
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
The first stand alone Faction Paradox novel works well as an introduction to the series, with the concepts of a temporal 'War in Heaven' being introduced through the eyes of 3 'normal' people in a contemporary setting, who happen to be affected by the War, and an object that seems to be buried under their town... Cleverly the existence or non-exitence of Faction Paradox et al can be determined by the objective reader, with America's current 'War on Terror' making for some frighteningly fitting resonance's with Miles temporal war. The actual plot of This Town is quite basic, with the story taking place over 6 hours, but the ideas behind the basic plot on ritual, media and war are heady stuff. The only downside is that sometimes Miles style slips into preaching mode, with the book often reading more like an etended interview than a novel, and Miles is so determined to buck the accepted norms of adventure storytelling that the book is wilfully contrary, complete with a decidedly anti-climactic ending. Not the most satisfying thing Miles has ever written, but still a challenging and thought-provoking piece of science fiction, and a great start to the Faction Paradox novel series.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
2 reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
The best mainstream science fiction you've never heard of
2 May 2010
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Few authors and critics know real time-travel, science & historical fiction like Lawrence Miles. More people should be aware of his works and his influence on contemporary continent spanning television and sci-fi. I wish he would write much more Faction Paradox, and similar derivative works.
If you yearn for more background depth and character development in Doctor Who episodes without actually concentrating on, or even mentioning Doctor Who, you want to read the Faction Paradox series (someone please convince his publishers to create Kindle releases..)
If you yearn for more background depth and character development in Doctor Who episodes without actually concentrating on, or even mentioning Doctor Who, you want to read the Faction Paradox series (someone please convince his publishers to create Kindle releases..)
Sometimes a great notion
16 July 2008
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Lawrence Miles has written some amazingly good science fiction, including his invention of the Faction Paradox (see some of the other books). This book though never seemed, to me, to completely come together. There are lots of ideas, characters, and plot advancement, but the sum of the parts didn't quite come up to a brilliant whole.
That said, it's a great book, and if you're reading the other Faction Paradox books, you'll read this regardless of the reviews. And, it's better than the vast majority of the science fiction novels available, so go ahead.
That said, it's a great book, and if you're reading the other Faction Paradox books, you'll read this regardless of the reviews. And, it's better than the vast majority of the science fiction novels available, so go ahead.
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
