ParanetOnline
The Dresden Files => DF Books => Topic started by: heidi_storage on September 30, 2020, 04:33:30 PM
-
Long-time lurker, first-time poster. I will not be receiving Battle Ground until Christmas (I got Peace Talks for my birthday). Please tell me, without spoilers, how is this book? How does it compare to PT, and to other books in the series? Did it answer questions raised in PT? Thanks!
-
Welcome. BG was way better than PT. I would put it in the top 5 through 10 of the series.
-
You know how the books normally have to go into detail and build up to get to the chaos? Yeah, Peace Talks was the build up, outside the first 7 or 8 chapters, the rest of the book is the battle. Picture the Chichen Itza battle from Changes an entire book. Pretty much what he does here.
-
Thanks, you two! Looking forward to it.
-
Peace Talks was very uneven, painfully so. Battle Ground is also painfully uneven for about 100-150 pages. Its like it somehow took 500 pages to get to something like a proper Dresden Files book. I'm only up to chapter 23 and its written like a normal Dresden Files book thus far. I don't know if it falls back to shit after this.
The way this book is written is just freaking painful, since it doesn't have the proper set up that a normal Dresden Files book has. Jim wrote what was published as 2 books as 1 book so that's how I'm looking at it. I think the change to the new publisher is the problem since they refused to publish the book as he had written it. IIRC Jim mentioned something about the editing process for this taking quite a while, which is weird since he had mentioned in the past that his books normally don't take much editing.
What I've finally gotten to from chapter 14 to 23 could have been bigger and better than Changes, but the way you can see the holes where stuff was hacked out makes the whole story suffer to the point its worse than Storm Front.
-
I second what sayyadina says. The editing is appalling, and I'd accept a small bet that the editors for the two books were different - there are multiple continuity errors between the two books. Shame, as there are many cool moments that deserve to be in a more carefully polished book. (Book, singular. There's also a lot of waffle that could easily be cut, turning this into a single tight, exciting book).
On the story itself? I'm unimpressed with a lot of the 'development' of various characters. I frankly didn't care whether they won or lost by the end of Battle Ground, I had no attachment to most of the surviving characters.
-
After 2 weeks of "slogging" I made it to Chapter 27. It reads unevenly, there is an obvious "bromance" involving the author and one character who developed into something akin to a superhero largely off screen over the last 3 books. It's impossible to keep any timeline in mind and forget remembering where some characters are during battle scenes. For me, it feels as if the author spent 3 years jotting down epic pieces of battles then sat down at the kitchen table to try and string them together. The editing is sub par. Not sure if it's worth the effort to try and read the book all the way through.
-
I second what sayyadina says. The editing is appalling, and I'd accept a small bet that the editors for the two books were different - there are multiple continuity errors between the two books. Shame, as there are many cool moments that deserve to be in a more carefully polished book. (Book, singular. There's also a lot of waffle that could easily be cut, turning this into a single tight, exciting book).
On the story itself? I'm unimpressed with a lot of the 'development' of various characters. I frankly didn't care whether they won or lost by the end of Battle Ground, I had no attachment to most of the surviving characters.
In the spoiler section I created a thread that explains the continuity errors, I think. I don't believe it's bad editing at all. I think it is (mostly) deliberate decisions made by Jim for a specific purpose. The title of that thread is "Dresden Files Continuity Errors – There aren’t any." Here's link to it. https://www.paranetonline.com/index.php/topic,53735.0.html (https://www.paranetonline.com/index.php/topic,53735.0.html) For the person who won't get BG until Christmas, don't go there now. That thread is in the spoiler section for a reason, though now that I think about, almost nothing from BG is in it.
My feelings about BG are mixed. My favorite parts of BG aren't the battle scenes. I really enjoyed watching Harry interact with some of the heavy hitters of the supernatural world that mostly happen before the battle. I also liked how future developments were set up in the final chapter. I thought that was a much more interesting chapter than most denouement chapters, of any series.
I'm not saying the battle scenes were bad, far from it. However, if I compare BG to another book with tons of action; Changes, it doesn't come off as well. Changes has far more changes of pace and interesting bits of dialog and character development. In BG, once you get into the battle, or I should say battles, it never seems to stop. That's a slight exaggeration because there are times when the action slows down and some confrontations are small scale rather than large scale, but it is relentless at times.
That said, I really like where the series is when the book ends. I feel like the ship that is the Dresden Files was thrown into a complete stop at the end of Changes, that it was wallowing and slightly adrift in Ghost Story, then slowly starting to move in a new direction in Cold Days and then it picked up speed in Skin Game, but with some old issues still holding it from reaching full speed. Even with things Harry goes through in BG, I feel like the series is back up to full speed. This is in spite of the fact that in the next book Harry will have to deal with the fallout that BG created.
So could BG have been better? Yes, I felt it was somewhat uneven but it still managed to accomplish important goals from the greater story arc perspective.
-
When I make a series of polls on The Dresden Files Facebook Group - (pick least favourite each round and eliminate method) - Peace Talks/Battle Ground treated as one entry won 4th place (1. Skin Game 2. Changes 3. Dead Beat).
That's about as much as I can objectively tell about it.
Listening it was fun but personally I'd put it beyond top 10 - I had issues.
It's definitely both one book with Peace Talks, but also in a way completely different - but that was Jim's plan - Ethniu was meant to be sudden twist of WHAT THIS BOOK IS REALLY ABOUT.
-
I have issues too but I think BG is superior to PT specially because of editing. Also, beyond the merits of the book itself, it had me excited for the future. I am very interested in the new book.
-
On one hand it is possible that some of the things that seemed off have plausible in universe explanations. Except it really didn’t feel like a proper Dresden Files book. Jim has had a very distinctive style and Harry’s voice is likewise very unique through Skin Game. That all went out the window totally except for a handful of pages where it actually sounded like Harry.
Maybe it’s editing. Maybe the betas failed. Maybe it was all the time off and Jim forgot how to write Harry. Maybe Jim’s ex wife Shannon was more of a positive influence than we knew. Regardless there really was way too much about this book that IMHO broke the series. Which makes me sad since I loved this series. I guess all good things come to an end, some before their time.
-
Long-time lurker, first-time poster. I will not be receiving Battle Ground until Christmas (I got Peace Talks for my birthday). Please tell me, without spoilers, how is this book? How does it compare to PT, and to other books in the series? Did it answer questions raised in PT? Thanks!
The biggest question out of Peace Talks is answered in Battle Ground. So if you don't read Battle Ground you'll kick yourself. But understand there is really only one good book between the two. So these two books will make you work hard as a reader.