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The Sorcerer's Appendix
The Sorcerer's Appendix [Mass Market Paperback] Harman, Andrew
304 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published May 1, 1993
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
January 7, 2025
In my quest to seek out goofy fantasy as a relief from the hardcore history books I'm presently reading to prepare myself for a deadly new age of American despotism, I stumbled upon Andrew Harman, only to discover that this guy is a terrible Terry Pratchett knockoff -- down to the footnotes and the sequential description, but without the wit, the humanism, or the vivid characters. Harman has no real inventive prowess. He is obviously a writer who wanted to pick up on the wave of Terry Pratchett's popularity in the early 1990s. But his prose style is leaden and uninspiring. A small sample:
"In the deepest, darkest part of Fort Knumm's cold heart, a slab of air lurked. It was warm, clammy and it pulsed. Low, almost subterranean, bass frequencies throbbed through it with a regular heavy rhythm."
There are writers who know how to stack shitloads of modifiers into a sentence very well. But, as you can see, Andrew Harman is not one of them. A not very literate reader might be seduced into thinking this garbage style is somehow "literary" when it is clearly on overdrive to say nothing at all. Or how about:
"Snydewinder shook the remains of a large, and once triple-locked, oak door out of his hair. He shook the last few feathers off his black feather robes. And then...he shook."
Har har. This is as witless as the worst comic imaginable on open mic night. It truly delineates the feeble manner in which Harman "invents," which is to say throwing random ideas from his mind onto the page without considering the underlying logic behind it -- the way that Pratchett was so good at and Harman is so terrible at.
There is another moment in which the characters elude battle and try to fake their way through it by being in close proximity to warriors who have some experience. That's a decent enough setup for a comedic premise, but Harman blows this by not really delving into his characters. And then we get a "tawny owl perched nonchalantly on his C minor 7-trimmed shoulder." What?
I really loathe writers like Harman (or a ridiculously overrated asshat like Jeff VanderMeer, whom everyone knows deep down is a talentless hack) who vomit onto the page without rhyme or reason, without an instinctive understanding of what it is to be alive. The science fiction and fantasy genres often give bad writing like this a fair pass and the people in publishing then weaponize their fans against anyone with literary standards who calls out this horseshit.
I am here to tell you that Andrew Harman is awful and not worth reading. You're better sticking with Terry Pratchett, I assure you.
"In the deepest, darkest part of Fort Knumm's cold heart, a slab of air lurked. It was warm, clammy and it pulsed. Low, almost subterranean, bass frequencies throbbed through it with a regular heavy rhythm."
There are writers who know how to stack shitloads of modifiers into a sentence very well. But, as you can see, Andrew Harman is not one of them. A not very literate reader might be seduced into thinking this garbage style is somehow "literary" when it is clearly on overdrive to say nothing at all. Or how about:
"Snydewinder shook the remains of a large, and once triple-locked, oak door out of his hair. He shook the last few feathers off his black feather robes. And then...he shook."
Har har. This is as witless as the worst comic imaginable on open mic night. It truly delineates the feeble manner in which Harman "invents," which is to say throwing random ideas from his mind onto the page without considering the underlying logic behind it -- the way that Pratchett was so good at and Harman is so terrible at.
There is another moment in which the characters elude battle and try to fake their way through it by being in close proximity to warriors who have some experience. That's a decent enough setup for a comedic premise, but Harman blows this by not really delving into his characters. And then we get a "tawny owl perched nonchalantly on his C minor 7-trimmed shoulder." What?
I really loathe writers like Harman (or a ridiculously overrated asshat like Jeff VanderMeer, whom everyone knows deep down is a talentless hack) who vomit onto the page without rhyme or reason, without an instinctive understanding of what it is to be alive. The science fiction and fantasy genres often give bad writing like this a fair pass and the people in publishing then weaponize their fans against anyone with literary standards who calls out this horseshit.
I am here to tell you that Andrew Harman is awful and not worth reading. You're better sticking with Terry Pratchett, I assure you.
February 5, 2021
Great to re-read this a few years on
Great start from an excellent comedic fantasy writer, read his first few novels on pb release. Returning to them is not disappointing
Great start from an excellent comedic fantasy writer, read his first few novels on pb release. Returning to them is not disappointing
February 1, 2013
Humourous and witty, but not top of the class funny. That said, it's worth reading if you like fantasy comedy.
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September 1, 2013Book 1
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews