The Anubis Gates
by Tim Powers
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Book Summary Information
Author: Tim PowersEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1997-01-01
ISBN: 0441004016
Number of pages: 400
Publisher: Ace Trade
Book Reviews of The Anubis Gates
Book Review: The book is good but only good
Summary: 3 Stars
It is, perhaps, a bit unfair to judge the merits of a time-travel novel published in 1983 so many years later when time travel elements are so commonly featured in so many different works in speculative fiction. Still, for all the charm and skill in this book-and they are considerable-the work is still not strictly memorable in the sense of a story getting under the reader's skin and affecting the way he sees his life around him. The book has not changed the way time travel is considered in speculative fiction-in fact, one could argue that this theme is actively ignored. Gates is, in the end, an action novel with the trappings of a time-travel setting. In all honesty, time-travel isn't even a requirement of this plot: the book could just have easily been set in the contemporary era, entered the genre of horror, invoked the same dark magic with the same popularized villains We say this because Powers doesn't make us think any differently about London, about the Romantic era of English literature, or even Egyptian magicians. For as much as we liked the book-looking at it from the perspective of a critic we can't say it has changed anything about the genre.
WHO SHOULD READ THIS:
There are many occasions where people simply want a skillfully told and engaging tale to read: a vacation book. If this is what you're looking for and you have a bent for Romantic poetry, Egyptian mythology, or a spot of time travel, then it would be hard to do better than pack up this book in your carry-on suitcase for relief from the squalling urchins that infest the backs of passenger airplanes. While not as good, people who enjoyed Ilium by Dan Simmons, The Lecturer's Tale by James Hynes, and even portions of City of Saints and Madmen by Jeff VanderMeer, may find some of their interests in seeing academicians portrayed in heroic situations satisfied. There will be a substantial number of people who will disagree with our review based upon their love of his prose, his characters, and the ease with which the book speaks to them-and in fact, we agree!-but we also maintain that it will not be one of the more ultimately fulfilling books of their lives.
WHO SHOULD PASS:
One of the closes parallels to this book is Ilium. If the notion of reading the ancient past revisted upon a modern (or future) situation is compelling to you, then go to Simmons first who commits entirely to the genre, his theme, and the importance of literature. To find your intellectualism explored to the utmost, then Gene Wolfe's Latro in the Mist and The Book of the Short Sun are far, far superior. This is a good book, not a great book. To enjoy it, you must have a strong commitment to speculative fiction and not expect to find a great work of literature that can go toe-to-toe with the works of any author in any genre.
READ THE ENTIRE REVIEW AT INCHOATUS.COM
Summary of The Anubis Gates
Ace Books is proud to present this classic novel of time travel in a beautiful new trade edition. It took the fantasy world by storm a decade ago, and now fans can savor this Philip K. Dick Award-winner for the first time all over again. Only the dazzling imagination of Tim Powers could have assembled such an insane cast of characters: an ancient Egyptian sorcerer, a modern millionaire, a body-switching werewolf, a hideously deformed clown, a young woman disguised as a boy, a brainwashed Lord Byron, and finally, our hero, Professor Brendan Doyle.
Author Tim Powers evokes 17th-century England with a combination of meticulously researched historic detail and imaginative flights in this sci-fi tale of time travel. Winner of the 1984 Philip K. Dick Award for best original science fiction paperback, this 1989 edition of the book that took the fantasy world by storm is the first hardcover version to be published in the United States. In his brief introduction, Ramsey Campbell sets The Anubis Gates in an adventure context, citing Powers's achievement of "extraordinary scenes of underground horror, of comedy both high and grotesque, of bizarre menace, of poetic fantasy."
The colonization of Egypt by western European powers is the launch point for power plays and machinations. Steeping together in this time-warp stew are such characters as an unassuming Coleridge scholar, ancient gods, wizards, the Knights Templar, werewolves, and other quasi-mortals, all wrapped in the organizing fabric of Egyptian mythology. In the best of fantasy traditions, the reluctant heroes fight for survival against an evil that lurks beneath the surface of their everyday lives.
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