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Gan Moondark #1
Warrior
The story of Gan Moondark of the Dog People and the nation he forged in the post-apocalyptic Northwest.
For centuries the proud Dog People had roamed with their horses across the grassy plains and fir-clad hills of the Northwest. Then, when their strength was as its greatest, the Dogs turned their bows on one another in a struggle over who would become War Chief after Col Moondark.....
For centuries the proud Dog People had roamed with their horses across the grassy plains and fir-clad hills of the Northwest. Then, when their strength was as its greatest, the Dogs turned their bows on one another in a struggle over who would become War Chief after Col Moondark.....
663 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published September 13, 1990
4 people are currently reading
222 people want to read
About the author
Donald E. McQuinn
20 books4 followersDonald E. McQuinn is an American author, and former U.S. Marine.
McQuinn grew up in Texas, and attended the University of Washington on a Navy scholarship. He served twenty years in the Marines (retiring as a Major) before becoming an author. He lives in the Pacific Northwest with his wife and three grown sons.
McQuinn grew up in Texas, and attended the University of Washington on a Navy scholarship. He served twenty years in the Marines (retiring as a Major) before becoming an author. He lives in the Pacific Northwest with his wife and three grown sons.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 11, 2012
I am using this space to offer a recommendation of Don McQuinn's wonderful WARRIOR trilogy, which was published by Del Rey back in the 1990s. It was out there in paper for a long time, but then Del Rey let it go out of print. Don got the rights back and he is putting each book out there in 99 cent sections. These are big books, so breaking them up won't slow you down reading-wise. He is releasing the pieces every 30 to 60 days. I highly recommend them to readers of epic fantasy, especially of Dune and similar works.
March 17, 2019
Quite a few folks seem to love this book and, honestly, there is quite a bit to love. But I'm afraid I didn't enjoy it as much as it, perhaps, deserves. And I'll try to lay out my reasons here. First, the writing here is actually quite good and probably worth a solid 4 stars. There's some excellent description and a bit of poetry in the prose. The world building of a post apocalyptic America is also excellent. This is a fully realized and detailed world created by the author and deserves five stars at least. The characters are also quite interesting and have complex backstories and motivations. They seem like real humans, although I found myself irritated at times about a little too much human weakness in the main character, Gan. Still, characterization deserves a good 3 to 4 stars.
So, why am I giving it two stars? The problem is, for me, that the forward momentum of the plot is bogged down to a glacial pace by asides and by far too much detail. The world building strengths of the work actually cause problems for the plot. The author clearly did a lot of research on primitive societies and the accuracy seems quite good, but it seems like he included everything he researched in the story. As an example, at the top of page 245, Gan kills a deer, and then the rest of the page is dedicated to how he prepared the deer for cleaning, then cleaned the deer, then packed the deer. I've cleaned deer myself so I can tell you the accuracy is good, but cleaning a deer is boring as hell to do, much less read about. That scene could have been completed in a few sentences and then we move on.
On page 259 we are treated to a detailed account of the making of snowshoes. Elsewhere we get lengthy detail on the cleaning of weapons, the construction of shoes, the training of dogs and horses. Every cultural ritual is described down to the details of clothing and musical instruments. Some of this was interesting but much of it just didn't seem important to me when I wanted to know what was happening to the characters and wanted to get a big picture of the world rather than seeing it only a detail at a time. And if I wanted to know such detail about things I would try to access nonfiction works on the subject. Fiction needs enough detail to give it verisimilitude, that sense of being real, but I think too much extraneous detail works against the story.
The book is 634 pages long and--to me--about 300 pages or more too long. I'm afraid I was only scanning it by the end to get the gist of the story and was just skipping over all the extra detail. You can see that I started the book on January 13 and finished it March 17 so it wasn't making me turn the pages very fast. I hated that because there was really a decent core story about interesting characters at the heart of the book.
This is part of a trilogy. 1: Warrior, 2: Wanderer, 3: Witch. I'm not going to read anymore but if you've read through my review here then I'd say to give that first book a chance. You might find that this amount of detail is right for you and that it doesn't detract from your ability to enjoy the plot.
So, why am I giving it two stars? The problem is, for me, that the forward momentum of the plot is bogged down to a glacial pace by asides and by far too much detail. The world building strengths of the work actually cause problems for the plot. The author clearly did a lot of research on primitive societies and the accuracy seems quite good, but it seems like he included everything he researched in the story. As an example, at the top of page 245, Gan kills a deer, and then the rest of the page is dedicated to how he prepared the deer for cleaning, then cleaned the deer, then packed the deer. I've cleaned deer myself so I can tell you the accuracy is good, but cleaning a deer is boring as hell to do, much less read about. That scene could have been completed in a few sentences and then we move on.
On page 259 we are treated to a detailed account of the making of snowshoes. Elsewhere we get lengthy detail on the cleaning of weapons, the construction of shoes, the training of dogs and horses. Every cultural ritual is described down to the details of clothing and musical instruments. Some of this was interesting but much of it just didn't seem important to me when I wanted to know what was happening to the characters and wanted to get a big picture of the world rather than seeing it only a detail at a time. And if I wanted to know such detail about things I would try to access nonfiction works on the subject. Fiction needs enough detail to give it verisimilitude, that sense of being real, but I think too much extraneous detail works against the story.
The book is 634 pages long and--to me--about 300 pages or more too long. I'm afraid I was only scanning it by the end to get the gist of the story and was just skipping over all the extra detail. You can see that I started the book on January 13 and finished it March 17 so it wasn't making me turn the pages very fast. I hated that because there was really a decent core story about interesting characters at the heart of the book.
This is part of a trilogy. 1: Warrior, 2: Wanderer, 3: Witch. I'm not going to read anymore but if you've read through my review here then I'd say to give that first book a chance. You might find that this amount of detail is right for you and that it doesn't detract from your ability to enjoy the plot.
May 16, 2019
There are certain books that are long for effect: Bonfire of the Vanities is one. There are other books that are long because the story requires it: the Lord of the Rings and Moby Bick spring to mind. Then there are other books where the other WILL show off his extensive knowledge of his subject, damn your eyes. Such a book is Warrior. Mr. McQuinn set out to construct a very deep world, and, on a sense, he succeeded. The world of people he builds is very deep - so deep, in fact, that the author falls in up to his waist, and gets stuck. You can see this in the way that he goes into extensive detail about battle formations, travel, political machinations, and character's backstories, with nothing cut out. Mr. McQuinn realized this, too: he himself found out necessary to punctuate the descriptions with sex and warfare once every fifty or so pages to keep his action moving.
Mr. McQuinn combined this with an apparent ignorance of his location. I don't doubt that Mr. McQuinn, being a careful researcher, knew a lot about the state of Washington. But I'll be darned if I found out about it in this book's 663 pages. It seemed at several points that Mr. McQuinn needed a convenient place to set his savages and Marines scooting about, and the Cascade mountains seemed appropriately wild.
I have no doubt that the author of Warrior enjoyed writing his story. But, for the reading of it, I am filled with regret and a vague sense of loss.
Mr. McQuinn combined this with an apparent ignorance of his location. I don't doubt that Mr. McQuinn, being a careful researcher, knew a lot about the state of Washington. But I'll be darned if I found out about it in this book's 663 pages. It seemed at several points that Mr. McQuinn needed a convenient place to set his savages and Marines scooting about, and the Cascade mountains seemed appropriately wild.
I have no doubt that the author of Warrior enjoyed writing his story. But, for the reading of it, I am filled with regret and a vague sense of loss.
November 14, 2012
Best sci-fi series I have ever read. Great character and plot development. Hope that people find this series again now that post-apocalyptic books are popular. And the author responded personally to my email.
September 13, 2008
Not a great deal. It is a mighty fine yarn though. A common enough topic for my infantile personality. Post apocalyptic Merka. The Pacific NW to be exact. Great fun and one of those ubiquitous trilogies.
April 15, 2015
My version had 877 pages. it was a good read, although bloated in places with excessive internal dialogue. That said, the plot held together nicely, the action was good and the characters journeys' came to good resolutions. Recommended.
September 13, 2007
Post-apocalyptic northwest - survival of the fittest.
Story of Gan Moondark of the Dog People and the nation he forged.
Good read
Story of Gan Moondark of the Dog People and the nation he forged.
Good read
December 6, 2012
Excellent dystopian adventure. A little long winded at times.
May 26, 2022
It’s strange reading a book where civilisation has fallen so far after the events of an apocalyptic war.
Gan Moondark and Clas na Bale are both part of a prophecy to reunite the tribes of the known world and prevent the rule of the Altanar, king of Olan.
Conway and Tate find themselves woken from centuries of stasis sleep after the events that caused the collapse of civilisation. They were tasked with helping to educate any survivors and rebuild the world they knew.
How will these two worlds collide? How will their paths cross?
Gan Moondark and Clas na Bale are both part of a prophecy to reunite the tribes of the known world and prevent the rule of the Altanar, king of Olan.
Conway and Tate find themselves woken from centuries of stasis sleep after the events that caused the collapse of civilisation. They were tasked with helping to educate any survivors and rebuild the world they knew.
How will these two worlds collide? How will their paths cross?
October 5, 2019
First the good part: McQuinn's writing is solid. The plot is a good one. The characters are well developed. The conflict is well developed.
Now the bad: It's too blasted long! The story could have been told in half the length of this monster. The author spent too much time on character reactions and internal struggles. Not that such things should be overlooked, but he beat it to death.
Sometimes brevity is best.
Now the bad: It's too blasted long! The story could have been told in half the length of this monster. The author spent too much time on character reactions and internal struggles. Not that such things should be overlooked, but he beat it to death.
Sometimes brevity is best.
October 29, 2013
I highly recommend this book. I remember reading it when it was released. If you're a fan a long fantasy novels with good character development you may enjoy this series. I notice it has been re-released into 9 e-books. The book was hard to find in print. I had to resort to used book sellers to find the other 2 books in the trilogy. Fans of Horseclans novels by Robert Adams or readers who like fantasy books set in a Post Apocalypse setting may enjoy this book.
June 14, 2012
This series is what got me to love sci-fi/fantasy genre back in my teens. And I haven't looked back yet. I highly recommend this series.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews