As it turns out, I was suckered into reading Allen Steele’s Coyote, which I thought was a novel (what with it saying novel on the cover) but is actually one of those series-of-short-stories things. Oh, and I’d already read one of them. Serves me right, really, for being pretty darned ignorant about the whole specfic scene.
Anyway, after the initial shock of discovering that it was going to be a series of shorts, I settled down to more or less enjoy it. Unlike Roma Eterna, the short stories all take place in a period of a few years (subjective), so we can get to know the characters a bit over time. Also, unlike that book, this book has clearly been edited to smooth some stuff over, and it seems like Mr. Steele did a good job of it. There’s still the problem of the differing styles and viewpoints, and the episodic nature which, in an actual novel, seems arbitrary and distracting. On the other hand, there are lots of actual novels written like that, too.
chazak, chazak, v’nitchazek,
-Vardibidian.