Nine Princes in Amber

by Roger Zelazny

Reading Among Others made me want to read more sci-fi and fantasy. In that book, the narrator mentioned loving the Amber series by Roger Zelazny, so I picked up the first two books from the library (in a single volume, called The Chronicles of Amber, Volume 1).

People apparently love this book, but I did not. Since I think the whole book reads like the outline for an epic novel, I’ll just write the outline of my thoughts about it here. This CONTAINS SPOILERS.

The style reminds me of the Hunter books by Richard Stark - choppy, too busy to explain everything to the reader. This can be compelling (I kind of like the Hunter book I read), but it feels sloppy and incomplete too.

Some interesting devices - the trumps, underwater mirror kingdom, etc.

SO MANY Deus Ex situations. E.g.,

1. Near the end, Corwin is in prison. The author needs him to have a spoon to try his escape. A good author might flip back to a previous scene and contrive some way for him to get a spoon. RZ just says, “I had a spoon that I had taken the last time I was at supper.” Like, he won’t take the time to set up a necessary plot element. You get the idea that he wrote the whole thing start-to-finish without editing and then said, “ship it.”

2. Dworkin appears in the cell at just the right time, happens to be able to draw a lighthouse on the wall that Corwin can use to magically escape. He draws it with the sharpened spoon. How did he get there, violating the rule that you can’t walk through Shadows in Amber? “I cheated.” Why (as an author) set up a rule like that if that’s all it takes to break it? It feels very convenient for the author but breaks the rules of the world.

Several times he mentions something and says, “maybe I’ll tell you about that later, no time now,” or something similar. It just feels like RZ can’t be bothered to actually write down some of his ideas, but he wants you to know he has them! The whole thing reminds me of listening to a young kid tell a story he’s making up as he goes along.

I was planning to read the second book (The Guns of Avalon), too. But I read the (glowing) reviews on GoodReads and Amazon, and I get the impression it’s not any different, so I won’t bother.

Quotes:

I usually do my best thinking when I'm thinking about something else.

We drove over to Kenni Roi's and got a bucket full of Kentucki Fried Lizzard Partes and another bucket of weak, salty-tasting beer.

(Kentucki Fried Lizzard Partes is a great example of having a good idea but not developing it. The idea that all roads lead to Amber, that the Shadows are infinite variations but related to the original, is cool. Reminds me of The Dark Tower books. But that idea is much better developed in The Dark Tower. “All roads lead to Amber” == “All things serve the Beam.”)