Catastrophe's Spell

Dance of the Gods #1

by Mayer Alan Brenner

Welcome to the Dance of Gods!

In a world of magic, where computers and nanotechnology are long gone, where thoughtless gods struggle for power with little regard for those below, one unlucky man must make some tough decisions ...

Maximillian the Vaguely Disreputable isnâ t sure whatâ s going on in the village of Roosing Oolvaya. Someone--probably a god--has trapped Maxâ s friend The Great Karlini in a castle that keeps trying to move at the most inconvenient times, and naturally itâ s up to Max to figure out how to spring him. But the gods throwing their weight around in Roosing Oolvaya are more than Max bargained for, and soon heâ s caught between necromancers, working with a detective named The Creeping Sword, and even dancing with Death itself in a desperate attempt to save the city from catastrophe.

â Three separate lines of action engage disparate characters in a race to converge at last in a huge blast of action ... leaving the reader breathless but satisfied.â --Kliatt

Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Novels, Ebooks, Science Fiction

320 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published July 1, 1989

Reviews

[DJNana · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was responsible for killing my reading enjoyment for 2 months.

Entirely because the characters were so poorly written, and dead. There was absolutely zero character development.

I get the feeling that I might actually get into this series, if I continued to read, because the world building and magic system is fascinating, and it feels like there's a big reveal coming in like 2 books. The kind of stuff I love.

If only I had patience to push through. Who knows, maybe one day.

[Gaiainc · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book. I did. However I didn’t. Max sounds like Karlini sounds like others. Shaa has a slightly more distinct voice but not by much. I do not understand the magic. I do not understand the first person POV of the detective/sorcerer. The style is a lot of sense paragraphs and not much else. I just did not understand the appeal nor felt engaged with the book. Just no.

[Ted Goldstein · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first book in the Dance of The Gods tetrology, this is a fun adventurous romp in magic, sorcery, Gods, Deaths and insurance. I like how the magic users approach their art with true scientific methodology.

[Cat Noe · Rating 4 out of 5]

It does get into some tedious technical detail, but I loved the humor in this, and the style is exactly the sort that got me into reading as a kid. Overall, it was a very fun fantasy romp, once you get past the character introduction. I can't wait to read the next two.

[Jsnows · Rating 4 out of 5]

I stumbled upon this book by accident and I had never heard of it or the author so I had no expectations at all besides hoping it was a good read.
Mayer Alan Brenner did a great job with the characters which I found to be well developed and have a fair bit of depth to them. Plus , you've got to love a "hero" whose nickname is "the Vaguely Disreputable". The story is frequently humorous in a real life sort of way, mostly due to twisted circumstances rather than deliberately attempting to be funny, and it always seems to avoid falling into the standard good guys vs bad guys mould.

This is all good stuff, right? So why did I give it a 4/5? Well, I get that the author aims for a magic that's closer to engineering than mysticism, and in my opinion that turned out quite nicely, but he tends to be over descriptive of each spell and counter-spell, how these are set up, what they require, what they look like, etc. and at times I found myself lost in unending paragraphs of overlapping helices and matrices of different colours and textures producing all sort of effects. I think that, in this case, the idea that "less is more" would have helped make it a better read.

Despite that, I enjoyed the book quite a bit and will be moving on to Spell of Intrigue next.

[Ann aka Iftcan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ok, not exactly sure what to call this book. It has some dystopian features, some post-apcolyptic features, plus is definitely fantasy.

First of all, I will admit, I picked it up after reading the blurb on the back and falling in love with the hero's name. Maximillian the Vaguely Disreputable. . . I mean, who wouldn't love a book with a hero with that name, right?

Anyway, poor old Maximillian has his hands full, trying to save friends, allies and even an entire city. And what is he trying to save them all FROM? A god who seems to have gone a tiny bit insane.

I loved the mythology that Brenner came up with for this series, and I especially loved the main characters, who all have definitely interesting names. Not perhaps, on a par with Maximillian's name, but still some very interesting names.

[Linda · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had the 3rd book in this series for many years on my shelf, and I'm trying to declutter a bit. Rather than give that one away, I finally went to the library and asked them to bring the others in the series up from archival storage, because that's the kind of book nerd I am.

This is a decent fantasy book. His characters are intelligent, and there's some humor and enough action that I will go on and read the next book in the four-part series. This first one stands on its own; there is no cliff-hanger.

I saw another review that complained about the technical aspect of magic being too much. Brenner does go into a lot of detail, but he is establishing the laws of the universe that the book is set in, and I think it overall adds to the book rather than detracting from it.

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brenner is an old-school fantasy author with an ornery streak. Catastrophe's Spell is Errol-Flynn-style adventuring (or is that "Phlinn Arol"?) with references to quantum physics, higher maths, existential and epistemological puzzles, and gritty gumshoe brawling.

Don't look for any character growth (or even real depth), or answers to life's deeper mysteries. Just good clean science/magic fiction fun, with plenty of pretentious, sarcastic banter.

A light read, but highly enjoyable.

EDIT: Forgot to mention that the books are freely downloadable from http://www.mayerbrenner.com/

[Teejaybee · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good read. A slow burner that took a long time to get going and seemed disjointed as a result. The finale was worth waiting for and, by means of a simple construct, I've been left looking forward to the next in series to see what happens to the characters.

Good characterisation and good , complex magic that was described well through the dialogue. I hadn't come across this fictional approach to magic in a book before so it was interesting and seemed very believable.

There is an interesting twist to what happened to the "Olde World" too.

[Hugo Scaramuzza · Rating 3 out of 5]

Got this book for free online in pdf format, read most of it on my phone while on the train. Fun, light-hearted fantasy adventure. Got a little too verbose in his descriptions of magical effects, describing in minute detail all the colors and interactions of magical power flying around when spellcasters fight, but otherwise an enjoyable read. Story jumps back and forth between a handful of main characters, so it's a little hard to follow at first, but I liked it.

[Tabitha Ormiston-Smith · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book somehow just failed to grab me. Faults I didn't like were: long technical discussions about magic (boring enough when it's technical discussions about something that exists let alone...) and I felt the characters were not well delineated. At times I picked up the book in the middle of a conversation and had to page back to see who was speaking. I think it was this failure of the characters to come to life that prevented the story from catching fire for me.

[David · Rating 3 out of 5]

Four-book fantasy series with a few sci-fi touches. Comes across as being set in someone's RPG gameworld, but it's distinctive enough and it has some clever touches, though you'd have to read all four books to appreciate most of them. Slow starter. I believe Brenner has the full text of book 1 available free on his website.

[Tamara · Rating 2 out of 5]

I had a VERY hard time following which character was currently speaking ... lots of backing up and re-listening and still had a tough time

so, in essence, I got the Cliff Notes version of the book even tho I listened to the whole thing, unabridged.

with that, I'm not sure I can really tell you what the story was about other than what is already available in the synopsis

[Dan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantasy; swashbuckling. The characters were detailed and engaging. The trick with the detective's viewpoint was very cute.

[Kathy]

a real interesting and unique read.

[Betsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Where did this author come from? What a surprise. I loved the characters and how they inter-twined in this plot. Very entertaining, not dull at all. Reading the second book now.

[Michael McDougall · Rating 4 out of 5]

Solid, slightly tongue in cheek fantasy adventure.