Vraks

[Mr Farson]

G'day

 

Has anyone whom picked up the new vraks novel finding it a bit of a slog? 

 

It feels very dream like with not a lot of detail present and changes scene rapidly.

[grailkeeper]

I really like his first Krieg book, wasn't mad about the second. Haven't read this one. The one l review I saw was negative but it was also negative about the book I liked so who knows.

[The Scorpion]

On 6/26/2024 at 4:03 PM, grailkeeper said:

I really like his first Krieg book, wasn't mad about the second. Haven't read this one. The one l review I saw was negative but it was also negative about the book I liked so who knows.

I haven't finished it yet, but I think the first Krieg book is better.

 

This one has some good moments, such as a Vraksian militia POV at one point, but I believe the lore of Vraks is ironically what holds it back.

 

Lyons takes time to tell a story for most major events of the war, told trough Tyborc, Fodor, etc... but perhaps not all the pivotal events of the war are always thematic.

 

Still, not a bad book. So far I don't feel that it has felt like a slog, even if it sorta could've gotten away with it, being a book about a slog of a siege where it looks that no progress is being made.

[cheywood]

A fifth of the way through and I’m enjoying it quite a bit. It’s written in a very fast paced, matter of fact style. It seems Lyons is covering the major beats of the siege in a rather understated way and threading character development through them. I think people will have very different opinions on this book depending on how attached they are to the Imperial Armour books. I’m getting a lot of mileage out of that personally. 

Edited June 28 by cheywood

[The Scorpion]

Ok, finished Vraks. Turns out it I had to let the book come into its own

 

Could it have used less telling and more showing why things are the way they are? Absolutely. But I don't think the book was bad.

 

Still think the "Krieg" book is superior, especially for the whole theme of sacrifice and whatnot

 

I feel like Siege of Vraks would've worked better as an anthology, "Siege of Cthonia" style. Lyons put a lot of attention to detail. Many got stories worth telling: from the Colonel that died in the Green Hell to the dude on Lord Zhufor's trophy rack.

 

These stories would've worked better self-encapsulated against the larger backdrop of the siege, I believe.

 

A story for Tyborc.

A story for Fyodor

A story for Keled

A story for the Hero of Hangman's hill

Another story for Tyborc, later in the siege

A story for Comissar Maugh

And so on...

 

Thenaxus, Hector Rex, and Thor Malkin could be the secondary characters that belong to the "wider" siege, and tie the short stories together by appearing in multiple tales.

Edited June 29 by The Scorpion

[LemartestheLost]

On 6/28/2024 at 11:14 PM, The Scorpion said:

Ok, finished Vraks. Turns out it I had to let the book come into its own

 

Could it have used less telling and more showing why things are the way they are? Absolutely. But I don't think the book was bad.

 

Still think the "Krieg" book is superior, especially for the whole theme of sacrifice and whatnot

 

I feel like Siege of Vraks would've worked better as an anthology, "Siege of Cthonia" style. Lyons put a lot of attention to detail. Many got stories worth telling: from the Colonel that died in the Green Hell to the dude on Lord Zhufor's trophy rack.

 

These stories would've worked better self-encapsulated against the larger backdrop of the siege, I believe.

 

A story for Tyborc.

A story for Fyodor

A story for Keled

A story for the Hero of Hangman's hill

Another story for Tyborc, later in the siege

A story for Comissar Maugh

And so on...

 

Thenaxus, Hector Rex, and Thor Malkin could be the secondary characters that belong to the "wider" siege, and tie the short stories together by appearing in multiple tales.

 

I had the exact same thoughts as I finished this one today. Nothing would have been lost in an anthology and the choppiness would have been reduced substantially.

[theSpirea]

So far, this is the weakest of Lyons's novels for me. He tried to do too much with a very short word count. Some sections read like a dry battle report, with too much telling, and not enough showing. Sadly, the interesting snippets (like The Hero of the Hangman's Hill and similar) are fairly quickly abandoned to return to the dry battle-report style.

I'd still give it 5/10 which to me is a decent score. I don't regret reading it but it's not a book I'd recommend to others.

[aa.logan]

I’ve still not gotten round to reading the Imperial Armour books, so maybe I was on a hiding to nothing with this book- I had no idea what was going on for the first 100 pages or so- the lack of exposition was a bold choice, but once I got my teeth into the book, it improved vastly. 

It’s very well written, and undoubtedly a good book, just one that I didn’t enjoy. Really should have gone for the audiobook instead.

[Roomsky]

I'm sorry Mr. Lyons, but I can't do it.

 

There's just nothing here I can grab on to. The Death Korps are not interesting as individuals; their nature means that even a captain's growing sense of independence is a frustratingly basic journey. Lyons' prose is completely neutral, so that doesn't make up for the lack of character. There's no great effort put into the atmosphere of the Siege, nothing about the mundane drudgery between battles that is just as much a part of wartime, and none of the engagements are compelling because it's all just running at emplacements whose significance is barely explained. Hell, I bet a traitor's POV of the entire conflict would've been more satisfying.

 

I see no reason why I shouldn't just read the Imperial Armour blurbs about Vraks instead. Quite the letdown after a re-read of Krieg.

[The Scorpion]

On 7/24/2024 at 9:47 PM, LemartestheLost said:

 

I had the exact same thoughts as I finished this one today. Nothing would have been lost in an anthology and the choppiness would have been reduced substantially.

Plus, it would've really solved the issue of cramming more than a decade into one novel.