Product Description
From the New York Times bestselling author comes a never-before published collection of seven stories about relationships, loving and passionate, thought-provoking and inspiring. Some verge into the familiar Anthony territory of fantasy and science fiction, where others focus on the eroticism of contemporary life, proving that love has many facets. The second in a series of three volumes! ... Read more

Product Description
Piers Anthony is the acclaimed author of more than 100 novels and short story collections. His works include the Xanth series, the Mode series, Chthon and Total Recall. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Barely any original content
I have read dozens of Piers Anthony books and liked all of them except this one.It's too much of a re-hash of the previous five books in the Space Tyrant series.It's told from the perspective of a different character, but that doesn't make it any less of a re-hash because it's mostly just a condensed retelling of the events in the first six books.If you have read the first six books, skip this one.If you haven't read the first six books, read them--then skip this one.

If you want a quick overview of the Bio of a Space tyrant get this book
This was another stay up and read book that had excellent continuity throughout the entire Bio of a Space Tyrant series. If you want to see a different side to the entire series, and either own or do not want to buy the series, the Iron Maiden is the best book in the lot to get. While it condenses the other five books in the series, it is probably the best one in the series to get an overview of what Bio of a Space Tyrant is all about.

We start off with Refugee, and quickly move through the rest of the series from the view point of Hope Hubris's sister, Spirit. This is her view point of how her brother coped, overcame, and developed his career, as well as the rise to power in a quick to read, but endlessly fascinating book. We delve on her life as the power behind the throne. Her loves, her life, and how she approached the process and built the relationships that helped her brother rise to the top of the political food chain.

We also learn a lot about her, and her dreams and in many ways shattered life as she sacrificed everything to bring about a "dream" for mankind. Overall excellent book, one I am going to hold on to and read frequently.

Save your money
I was so disappointed with this final book in the series. It's nothing more than a complete rehash of what happened in the first 5 books. Granted it comes from the point of view of Hope's sister, Spirit, the vast majority of content was just cut-and-pasted from the original books. I kept reading through the book in the hopes that there'd be a continuation of the story after Hope's death, but very little was added.

While Piers Anthony's books are almost always guaranteed to be a good read, the lack of original content in this one was a complete let-down.

I guess some work is for art, and some is to pay the rent. This was definitely the latter.

A nice wrap-up to a fantastic series
Iron Maiden is a very pleasant read. It manages to cover the time span of the entire series to this point, but with a fresh perspective. While the writing is not as strong as the other Space Tyrant books, it did a nice job of filling in the holes where Spirit's life was concerned. Finally, we get inside her head... though to a limited degree. Hope was the author of his own biography, whereas Spirit provided Hopie with materials and let her expand upon them as appropriate. Once you accept that the approach fits with Spirit as we know her from the other books, the different tone works. Overall, a pleasant finish to a series that is one of Piers Anthony's best. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Good Story, but Hyper-Aggravating Style
Piers Anthony's ambitious novel tells the story of a man who moves between worlds of science fiction and fantasy, assuming different powers in each.The worlds coalesce toward the end of the novel.One fascinating element of the story is a competition called The Game, played among serfs in the science fiction world.In it, a player can be randomly called upon to compete in any realm of human endeavor, from ballet to math problems to sword fighting.

Unfortunately, the book is written throughout in a maddeningly over-explantory style, along the lines of "He stopped for a drink of water.Water is used to quench thirst, and drinking is performed by swallowing liquid." (not an actual quote).I find it mind-boggling to think that any editor could have accepted this.I could probably myself reduce the book from 790 to 500 pages without leaving out a single detail.Too bad. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Not Free SF Reader
Yet another male-female alien pairing of agent and other. Or, in other words, this book isn't very good at all compared to the others.Throw in some philosophy of the whole thing, sword fighting, an Ancient site, and not a lot of point to this one. For example:"Rondl floated before a class of twenty young Bands. All were attentive to his beam as it flashed across the enclosure and reflected from the curving wall. Could he get his message across? "This is the story of the ugly Solarian and the three innocent species," he said. He had the nagging feeling he had adapted the story from some other narration, but he could not think what that might be. There was nothing similar he knew of in Band lore. "The Solarian is a gross physical creature with bone-filled extremities, flesh-filled torso, and liquid-filled eyeballs sliding within moist socketsââ,¬â"

A new point of view
The best part of this book (I read it a very long time ago) is that after I looked up from reading I looked at everything around me differently.I had just read a chapter from an alien's point of view and I had troublereconciling the world I was reading about and what was real.A very oddfeeling.If you liked early Xanth books and the books Piers Anthony wrotebefore them you will love this book. ... Read more

Product Description
The carcass shook and the upper wall depressed against him heavily. The bird was on top of it, crushing him! A giant thorn, a hooked spear poked through the wall inches from his face. It was a talon of horrifying size. Six inches long, an inch thick at the base..and what he saw was only the tip of it. The monstrous beat of wind began again, a hurricane of air smashing the ground. Dust swirled into his breathing-hole. The roc was taking off!

A fantastic Arabian Nights adventure by the author of the Xanth Series, illustrated with a glorious wraparound cover and five full-page drawings by George Barr. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (4)

Enjoyably light, no-thinking reading.
While I admit the story and characters are simplistic, I rarely look for depth when reading Piers Anthony novels.Most of his earlier works are written to appeal to a younger crowd. This book is told straight out in simple language a tale of adventure with an appropriate mix of heroism, sex, stupidity, love, and conflict.Hasan is admittedly one-dimensional, but that is to be expected of a poor young man who has been exposed to nothing but goldsmithing in his life...until he meets up with a crafty magician who cons Hasan into trapping himself on a mountaintop.This turns a blessing in disguise when his only means of escape leads to the gilded, isolated abode of a dozen beautiful and wealthy princesses who adopt him as their brother.He learns much from them but still never quite loses his naivety through the story.But this same naivety ultimately keeps him on his pursuit to rescue the marvelously pretty, artificially-winged woman he meets, marries, and then loses to a wrathful queen of the Isle of Wak (also, incidentally, inhabited entirely by beautiful women).Several help him in his quest, including a hardened but compassionate military general witch and an arrogant but humorous djinn. The book reads quickly...great to breeze through and then give to a friend, and a nice paperback to keep on your shelf afterward.

Piers Anthony does it again!
This book is very interesting. A little different than his other novels, but definately worth reading.

Pleasant Imitation of the Arabian Nights
Anthony admits in "Bio of an Ogre" that a lot of his fantasy inspiration is from the Arabian Nights. Here he tries a similar story in his style.You are better off buying The Arabian Nights in an unexpurgated edition -- yes, that means that when the hero sneaks into the harem, he really does it with the ladies.Its easy to see that Anthony's bold sexual themes derive from the inspiration of his source.However, the book lacks a certain dimensionality to the characters, as if this is an early work when he was an uncertain writer.I don't remember much of the story or plot, and that says it all -- its a throwaway imitation.Get the original source!

Don't pass it by...
This is quite the good story.Apart from Anthony's usual fixation on large breasts and illicit sex and his predilection for justifying the most villianous of characters, this story makes for outstanding light reading.I enjoyed it: don't let the above rating fool you. ... Read more

Product Description
They live.

They die.

They return.

Zombies.

38 authors.

38 gut-wrenching tales.

Flash fiction at its finest, all illustrated by underground favorite SeanSimmans and edited by Keith Gouveia.

Stories by:

Customer Reviews (6)

A new type of Zombie material
I was very surprised to find out how enjoyable it was to read 2 page stories. Each seemed to have been taken from a really great scene of a Romero movie that I must have missed.
An entirely new type of read, not novel, novella or short story, but a very short story. Really entertaining.
Goes right for the juggler.
[...]

A fun read
The stories are so quick it can almost be frustrating but then its nice to move on to yet another story. you want to keep turning the page because the next story is only a minute away. Some of the stories are average but there a few that are really good, it takes skill to write a 2 page story and have the reader remember it.
a fun read and worth the time. If you love zombies then this needs to be a part of your collection.

Tidbits and pieces of bloody goodness
Lots of little stories here.If you were looking for anything that goes beyond the 5 minute reading span look elsewhere.This is the undead for those with ADD and can be read in its entirety in about an hour or two at most.
Some of these stories are not exceptional but there are a few that are quite memorable.Just a little twist, usually subtle that make you blink in surprise but not much else because before it sinks in it is time to move on to the next juicy morsel.
Entertaining and quick, this is a great little zombie snack for those who want something easy and quick to digest.

Bits of the Dead is a package of zombie bonbons
Bits of the Dead edited by Keith Gouveia
Coscom Entertainment, 2008
ISBN:9781897217818
Available New

Bits of the Dead is a package of zombie bonbons, with little bite size pieces of zombie goodness that you can devour quickly... and you can't eat just one.The stories in this collection range from one to three pages in length. While I was initially leery of a collection of super short zombie stories, I was pleasantly surprised. I was impressed with the quality stories the authors wrote with such a limited word count.A wide variety of horror authors, both well known and new, contributed to the collection. The stories range all over the spectrum of zombie fiction, and there is enough variety that even the most well read zombie fiend will find something new.In short, Bits of the Dead is more than simply a novel idea for a zombie anthology... it's the best kind of mind candy.I recommendBits of the Dead to fans of the zombie genre in particular and horror readers in general.

Contains: gore

38 Truly terrifying tales of the dead!
'Bits of the Dead' is one of the finest collections of truly great zombie short fiction. This tome features the literary lashings of notable authors:

Piers Anthony, Robert Appleton, Joel Arnold, Drew Brown, Adam-Troy Castro, Nick Cato, C.M. Clifton, Christopher Allan Death, Ed Dempster, J.G. Faherty, Paul A. Freeman, Charles A. Gramlich, J.H. Hobson, M.M. Johnson, Michael Josef, Kiernan Kelly, Nancy Kilpatrick, Michael Laimo, Catherine MacLeod, James Newman, Kurt Newton, Jeff Parish, Matthew John Peters, Jeffrey C. Pettengill, Daniel Pyle, Gina Ranalli, Steven Savile, Julia Sevin, R.J. Sevin, Nate Southard, Jeff Strand, Simon Strantzas, Marcie Lynn Tentchoff, Lee Thomas, William T. Vandemark, Steve Vernon, Tim Waggoner, and John Weagly.

All of these great stories are highlighted by the unique artwork of Sean Simmans who is one of the most versatile artists I have ever seen. His style changes from story to story and each short is perfectly accompanied by his work.

I'd put 'Bits of the Dead' right up there with the likes of Skipp and Spector's 'Book of the Dead' or David J Schow's 'Zombie Jam' - each eerie tale featuring it's own new take on the dead.

If you're a fan of zombies and zombie fiction...load your gun, stock your basement and make a run to grab this book!

... Read more

Product Description
Chthon was Piers Anthony’s first published novel in 1967, written over the course of seven years.He started it when he was in the US Army, so it has a long prison sequence that is reminiscent of that experience, being dark and grim.It features Aton Five, a space man who commits the crime of falling in love with the dangerous alluring Minionette and is therefore condemned to death in the subterranean prison of Chthon.It uses flashbacks to show how he came to know the Minionette, and flashforwards to show how he dealt with her after his escape from prison.The author regards this as perhaps the most intricately structured novel the science fantasy genre has seen.It was a contender for awards, but not a winner. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (9)

Loved it
The protagonist of this story is Aton Five, is from the planet Hvee. At age 7 Aton meets an extremely beautiful woman in the forest named Malice. She appears to him 2 more times and he is warned by his father that she is a dangerous siren called a minionette. He goes in search of her but when he finds her she pushes him away. He is then sent to a retreat planet and is cared for by a slave girl named Coquina. His second love.

Because of his love for Malice he ends up on a prison planet called Chthon. Here the lesser criminals are kept on the upper level and the more dangerous ones on the lower levels. Here they mine garnets for food.

Half way through this book I ordered the sequel Phthor, I cant wait to read it! This is a book I think ill have to read again in the future to fully understand but its the first of many Piers Anthony books ill be reading.

Shiva is his heart, Minionette is her love
Aton five finds himself in a prison. Not just any prison, but sentenced to a planet, in hot dark tunnels. He must work as a underground gem slave to earn his daily bread. He must escape. Badly. And he doesn't care how many slaves he must lure to take part of his plan; to become his sacrifice. He is Chaos. This is a story of Aton 5, son of a wealthy world where Hvee flowers -- who flourish only in virtue -- are grown. At age of 7 he had heard siren's melody in the woods. An fairy sitting in a hillock. So beautiful, that her hair is firing black and red. She kissed him telling: he would not find anyone as beautiful as her. At age of 14, after agonizing 7 year waiting, Aton found him again. Now matured, starting to understanding his emotions, the fairy returned with his melody. And she kissed him once again. And now she's gone. And Aton is lost. But the melody won't stop. He had to find her. And for his love he was sentenced to Chthon, the prison.

This is a dark novel. About dangerous love whose subject is alluring Minionette. About forbidden love that is not allowed to spread in galaxy. The planet of the Minionette race is a buried secret. Swept out of the galactic navigation archives so that nobody would ever get lured. The emotions of Aton, the search for his Minionette turns the skies upside down when he understands the truth. Not just about the Minionette but himself too. He is incurable; the madness of Chthon, the prison, was already living in him. The rest of the series are Phthor (1975), Plasm (1987; by Charles Platt) and Soma (1988; by Charles Platt).


Five (5) stars. Written in 1967, the is no other novel like it even today. The destruction, inverse emotion telepathy, pain and pleasure is is quite well realized. The sheer capacity needed to ascertain every little metaphorical and ever single sub-based plot in the novel is mind digging. The dark abyss of the Minionette can't be understood in one reading. No wonder the book took 7 years to write. After reading, you want to start all over again to see if you captured it all.

Great book
If you're looking for just another book by Anthony, that's the wrong address! Anthony`s books usually are light read, without any comlexities of caracters or plot. This one is nothing like this! It's really a mature book (altough first one?). Just great read! I highly reccomend it...

Love is Hate, but the Flower Knows
Anthony arrived on the science fiction scene with quite a bang with this novel. So much of a bang that it was nominated for the 1968 Hugo award, losing out on the award itself only to another truly brilliant work, Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light.

Anthony introduces a multitude of ideas in this work: a flower that shows whether or not your significant other truly loves you, a galaxy-spanning `message' that kills humans in its path by hypothermia, a naturally formed inorganic based consciousness, a type of grub that quite literally eats absolutely everything. But the most significant idea is a genetically modified type of human, the minionettes, all physically identical and the very picture of absolute female perfection, who have their emotional circuits inverted, where the kindest thing you can do to them is hate, abuse, deride, and punish them.

Anton Five, knowing nothing of her true nature, has the misfortune to fall in love with one of these minionettes, a love that is an obsession, a mixture of real love and conflicted hate, as the object of his emotions, after only three brief encounters, goes to space.It becomes his mission in life to track her down, even at the expense of his farm and a rejection of freely offered true love by a daughter of the family of Four. And due to this obsession, he eventually is sent to the prison planet Chthon, where the prison is the naturally formed caves and tubes formed by ancient volcanic action and that no one has ever escaped from. Within this prison are real monsters, truly horrifying and very unique, many of which are seen only from offstage or half-seen, and the very indistinctness this lends to these creatures adds to their effect. Some of the images of this section gave me nightmares for years after the first time I read this book.

Anton is a fully delineated character, not very likeable - in fact he's amoral, selfish, a loner, single-minded, and at least something of a psychotic. But there are occasional glimpses of a different man hiding inside, one capable of giving and receiving love, who knows pity and can empathize with other's misfortunes. The story, outside of all the fantastic ideas so casually tossed around, is really about his development into a fully rational human who can allow his emotions full sway when appropriate.

The story construction is rather unique, using both flash-backs and flash-forwards from his time in prison. This is deliberately done, as there are a set of parallels/contrasts between the actions in the prison and the actions at other times in Anton's life, which help illustrate the man and his changes. This construction has the disadvantage of lessening the suspense, but the added meaning given by this structure more than compensates for this.At least part of this book can be viewed as an allegory for the travels of a man through the stages of life, and Anthony buries quite a bit of symbolism inside his creations.

The power of this book resides in the changes Anton goes through and its tremendous imagery coupled with some truly different and unique ideas.Be prepared to put as much effort into reading and comprehending this book as it would take for a classic 'literary' novel - this book is a far cry from the grade-B space-operas of yesteryear.

--- Reviewed by Patrick Shepherd (hyperpat)

Chthon-Another great Book!!
Piers Anthony was one of my first fantasy reads.I read his Robot Adept and had to have all the books on the series, plus a lot of others from other series!It stole me away from romance and mystery, being far more interesting!From his novels, I crossed the threshold into fantasy and sci-fi, reading many good writers' works.Chthon is a cut above the rest, despite it being a first work and I applaud an already celebrated author for yet another great work of fiction! ... Read more

Customer Reviews (12)

Trite, creepy, rape-fetishizing, and moral cowardice
I read the first one, which boiled down to "Women and children on a ship are helpless and get raped and murdered.A lot."It got old pretty quick.I put up with it because I thought it was meant to give Hope (main character, the putative "Space Tyrant") some interesting character development.Then, by the next book there would be a fascinating anti-hero who was the understandable psychological result of all the traumas of his youth.You wouldn't quite agree with all his actions, but you could understand why he did them.

Boy, was I wrong.The second book was worse.All the rape in the first book?Served no actual purpose for anything other than Author's skeevy fetish.You can see it by how he bends himself into pretzels trying to find new and interesting ways to work women getting raped into the plot at every opportunity.There's no point to it, just gratuitous violence against women.

Hope himself is the biggest literary disappointment I've seen in a while.He's really the only character in the book, everyone else just hovers around him enabling his every whim.No other character has anything interesting about them, although there are hints that there could be, if the author would stop adoring his Marty Stu long enough to bother about any of the other characters.But no, they exist purely to take the moral blame from Hope at any given situation.

Need to fight some pirates?Here's a character to explain that it's so sad that poor little Hope has to take human life (and boy does Hope feel bad about it - without doing anything to stop it) but that it's not Hope's fault, he has to do it.Nothing about Hope being angry or messed up about the brutal murder of most of his family, wanting revenge, being desensitized to violence after seeing so much of it in book 1.No, he's still a sweet boy who wants everyone to be happy.

Need to use some trickery to win a battle?Here's another character to do it for him, so darling Hope can be the most morally spotless commander ever.Need to get your character laid?Here's half a dozen entirely implausible reasons why women have to have sex with him without ever giving their free consent (consenting sex is so dull, after all - and it's immoral unless the woman's forced into it somehow)Need to rape someone?Here's another character to explain that we understand dear Hope doesn't want to do it, but he has to rape that 18-year-old for a pointlessly implausible reason, and we'll explain all about how it's really not his fault and he's still perfect.Oh, and no real talk about how seeing his sisters and mother raped in the first book might make him less eager to do it.(why use the horrible events of the earlier books for character development and plot points when they could just be excuses for the Author to indulge his rape fetish?)

The whole thing is the Author trying to let Hope do all the bad things while apologizing for him at every turn and saying "but it was okay in this situation, and Hope's a perfect guy - really!"I wouldn't have minded so much if it was just a dark book with an anti-hero, but the author wants Dudley Do Right with an excuse to do every dirty thing the Author's ever fantasized about.And the prologues (ostensibly by Hope's daughter) are the most pointless spoilers I've seen in a while.

Lame and tedious
When I was in junior high, I really enjoyed P. Anthony's Xanth series, most of all for the creativity. I also remember enjoying Battle Circle, the Adept series, and some of the Incarnations of Immortality. Never anything too special, but enjoyable. This series however, gets worse and worse as it goes on. The first 2 are nominally entertaining, but Anthony seems to become bored with the story later on. He doesn't seem to have the energy to develop the story anymore, so he glosses over major events with a quick summary abstract, so that major episodes became "just so" stories. Anthony constantly refers to events of the past, assuming the reader has not read previous installments. Therefore, the educated reader has to suffer through multiple summaries of Hope Hubris' history. Eventually, the book degrades into what appears to be Anthony's own attitudes or dreams about sex and politics, which are all the more boring because of their one-sided nature. The sex in the book is especially boring in its predictable, stereotypically male approach. She's hot, she can't resist him, he nails her, she's happy just to have been the subject of his rutting. Lame. The political world is somewhat creative. Perhaps during the cold war era it may have seemed more appropriate. Reading it today it appears trite and tedious The scientific aspect has its moments, but even when the technology is exciting the explanation of it is grade school. Anthony seems desperate for the reader to know he's done some research. Overall, the books are highly predictable. Each chapter is nearly guaranteed to have an attempt on Hope's life, a sexual encounter, and a miraculous turn of events in which Hope trumps the odds.
My good memories of Piers Anthony will have to remain in my junior high and early high school life. Perhaps my maturity level at the time explains my enjoyment. But reading this series today (25+ years later), I wonder if those books (Xanth etc.) were even that good. This series is better left on the used book store's shelf.

not really out of print
The books are not really out of print. All five volumes of Bio of a Space Tyrant can be found at www.Xlibris.com (search under piers), however these new copies are expensive and are not too hard to find used.

The books parallel the history of the last 50 tears transposed to the twenty-seventh century. The first volume is quite downbeat; the other four are more like Piers's usual upbeat style. The originals of a lot the places and people can be identified. For example Megan (of volume 3) is Helen Mary Gahagan Douglas who lost a race for the Senate to Nixon in 1950. One final comment. There is a nice definition of honor on page 72 of Mercenary (vol.2). Those familiar with Piers's books know this is a recurring theme for him.

BIO OF A SPACE TYRANT
I happen to own all five books of the Bio of a Space Tyrant series, in paperback format. I've read each one at least twice. I was looking to replace rather a worn-out copy of Politician - but now it appears I willhave to scour the Out-of-Prints. This pentology tells the epic tale of oneboy's rise from humble beginnings as a refugee to becoming a powerfulleader, visionary, and elder statesman in a setting where the politicalclimate holds close parallels with our own global situation of the early1980s.

In REFUGEE, we follow Hope Hubris as a teenager with his family,forced to escape from Callisto (counterpart to Cuba or Haiti) into spaceand brave the depradations of pirates in the hopes of finding a better lifeelsewhere. Raped, plundered, and set adrift by pirates, the survivorsresort to cannibalism to survive - eating their own friends andfamily.

In MERCENARY, we find Hope and his sister Spirit as the onlyknown survivors of their family. Now in the military of the United Statesof Jupiter (counterpart to our United States), they proceed to ascend theranks, gather allies, and mount an expedition to wipe out piracy throughoutthe solar system.

Returning from their successful mission, Hope turns tocivilian life and embarks upon a career as a POLITICIAN, with the eventualgoal of becoming President of the United States of Jupiter. With the helpof his wife, Meghan, his sister, Spirit, and others, he succeeds - with atwist. Massive opposition from the incumbent president, Tocsin, leads aConstitutional assembly to suspend their Constitution and government anddeclare Hope Hubris to be the sole source of lawful government.

Backed bythe military of which he was once a part of, he takes power as Tyrant inEXECUTIVE. Under his rule, he enforces sweeping social changes ingovernment - addressing recurring societal problems within health care,education, crime, and the economy by executive fiat. While this approachsolves some problems, his harsh rule lends strength to oppositional forcesthat eventually force him from power.

In the last book of the series,STATESMAN, a middle-aged Hope Hubris travels the solar system, promotingpeace and sharing his vision of developing light-speed travel as a means ofsettling mankind into the stars before political and populational pressurescause the solar system to erupt into an unsurvivable System War III(counterpart to what would be our World War III).

The Bio of a SpaceTyrant series really is an excellent read, but it can definitely boreothers. If you want, you can read Mercenary first. The military tactics,intrigue, and human manipulation angles can be very interesting. It mightthen lead you to want to read the others, including Refugee, the book thatbegan it all, or Executive, which is also somewhat fun.

I hope you findthis review useful in determining whether these books are worthy of yourpurchase.

Stay Away..FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, *PLEASE* STAY AWAY
"~MY...*GOD*...what a BAD book this was. I'm telling you, I've read a LOT of smellers in my time, and this gives the worst a run for it's money."~ barrage of his insipid personality and caustically annoyingexplaining in general, you're assaulted by tragedy throughout the entirebook...getting beat up by the bullies, general abuse from being a peasant,having family members raped and murdered...over, and over, and over...whichis DOUBLY bad, because you'll find you're loathing yourself for feeling badfor the main character, who's so annoying he deserved it in the firstplace."~ Immortality series was, deciding I'd finally try out his workand grabbing the only Anthony book available to me at the time, I foundmyself doing something I'd never done before as someone who'll tough it outthrough almost any book I start because of curiosity alone (hey, if I starta book, I have to know how it ends); I found myself skipping a page or twoof the book. I just couldn't take the main character's patheticexplanations of technology anymore. turned me off from all of Anthony'sother works...I'll probably never experience the Incarnations OfImmortality because of this SUPREMELY bad dog of a stinker. Don't let ithappen to you. Negative 5 stars. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (15)

A historical flashback break from the storyline
Question Quest is a book that has very little original content, but instead focuses on putting the previous volumes of the Xanth series in perspective while filling in background details on the life of Magician Humfrey. This book was annoying to read because it was clear that Piers Anthony has not lost any of his facilities with puns and making fun of figures of speech. As an example, something must be done before the statue of limitation runs out - is literally a statue that tries to run out of an enclosed space, however he runs real slow so it gives the heroine of the moment time to accomplish her task, etc.

The storyline starts like a typical Xanth novel. This time the heroine is Lacona - one of the Zombie Master's twins. Her problem is that she is in her mid-30's and her life is completely dull. So, she goes to Grey Murphy for an Answer and is sent to find Humfrey. All of this takes place in the first two chapters and after that the bulk of the rest of the book is a retread of the previous 13 books as Humfrey tells Lacuna his history and story and puts all the other adventures in a timeline. This part of the book also fills in some other details like family relationships that were not previously obvious (did you realize that Crombie was Humfrey's son?) and how of the people got to be the way they did (e.g. Crombie as a woman hater and how Humfrey got to be the Magician of Information).

My problem with this book was that I read all the previous books. So it was fustrating to read about the same adventures and storylines in summary form with a few extra nuggets of infomation. The few extra nuggets were simply not enough for me. This is why I downgraded the rating of this book to three stars. It was interesting to read some of the adventurs from a different viewpoint, and also to see how some of the relationships developed over time that lead to various scenes in the books, but overall this book was a disappointment to a long time fan. I will keep the book in my library for the sake of completeness, but would not necessarily recommend it to all.

Xanth 14: Question Quest
Xanth #14: Question Quest, by Piers Anthony

The Good Magician makes an appearance in every Xanth book. That's how most books start - a character has a problem in their lives that they need to see him about. So they make a journey to his castle, battle through the three Challenges, get their Answer from the Book of Answers, and end up on a journey through Xanth to figure out their cryptic Answer.

But *how* did the Good Magician get his Book of Answers? How does he know what every person ultimately wants? And just how does he have five and a half wives?

While "Question Quest" starts out with Lacuna, a woman who has passed into middle age and thus has a very boring life, it is actually the story of Good Magician Humfrey. Because his son-in-law is manning the Book of Answers and doesn't quite understand everything written the book, Lacuna goes to Hell in a handbasket to get a more complete Answer. There she finds Humfrey, who has been sitting in the Demon X (A/N)th's waiting room for 10 years, trying to rescue one of his wives from Hell.

I found "Question Quest" to be an excellent history book of Xanth. This is the first time Humfrey's story is told in full detail, from his youth with MareAnn, to marrying a demoness, to attending Demon University to get a degree in magic, to finding Castle Roogna, and quite a few other adventures. Humfrey's over 100 years old, and he's sure packed a lot of living into his century plus of life. This Xanth installment really fleshes out the old gnome, and adds a lot of information to any reader's knowledge of Xanth.

This is probably one of my favorite Xanth books, as I tend to like histories, especially histories of created worlds. "Question Quest" gives life to one of the more interesting characters in Xanth, a character included in every novel but one previously hadn't much back story. Read it if you want to learn about Humfrey, or if you're curious about the history of Xanth.

4/5.

Question Quest
I got this book in an extremely timely manner (possibly the quickest i've ever gotten anything ordered online) and it was in a condition exactly as described (if not better.)

Great Introductory book
Never read a Xanth book before?This might be a good place to start.This book give a good history for all the major characters leading up to this book.Although it does give away the ends of previous books, it doesn't reveal the plots (and puns) in the other books.And, let's be honest, the puns themselves are the great reason for reading about Xanth.

A good overview
I love the Xanth Series, though to begin with I read several of them out of order.While each one is a fine stand alone novel, the more you know the better, and this book helped until I got all caught up.Again, lots of puns and fun stuff, but the best part of this book for regular Xanth readers is the Answer of who the Good Magician is and where he came from.Appearing in every book (i think) he is the director of quests, the all-knowing Oz to whom everyone turns for Answers, and this book give you the when, who and how of his life.Why does he charge a years' service, what's with the challenges, where did the Big Book come from - these are all answered in this fun book,as Humfrey recounts where he's been in order to get where he is going.A great Xanth novel! ... Read more

Product Description
Key to Survival is the fifth and concluding quarter-million word sexy ChroMagic fantasy novel. It features King Havoc, Queen Gale, and their four Glamor children as they tackle the invasion of the machines. The machines have destroyed one third of the galaxy and are working on the rest. They have overwhelming power and ruthless competence. But one thing makes them pause: they want to recruit Havoc's daughter Voila to their cause, as she is the strongest of all glamors with a talent they need. If she joins them, they will spare the rest of the human culture--and destroy the rest of the galaxy much faster. This is an offer Voila has to think about: whether to betray all the other living cultures, to save her own. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

if you have nothing else to do
I bought the downloaded copy of this book direct from the publisher Mundania Press.It only cost six dollars and it's a good thing that was all,because it really wasn't worth that much more. The problem with this book is that there is only one real problem and the rest of it is any quest designed to help the persons find whatever it was they were supposed to find in order to achieve the main quest.It gets a little boring, if you've already read other Piers Anthony titles to have characters emulating other characters emulating other characters pretending to be one another for sexual purposes.Sex is a major plot point in this book.It's not just incidental.The relationships among humans, not humans, aliens and machines can get a little confusing and in many cases seem just pointless.The major conflict is designed around the fact that the machine culture is attacking a humid and other living cultures.For some reason that the characters have to find out and to deal with special characters called Glamors who have powers which enable them to do more investigation of the mystery than other characters.Also Glamours are especially sexual and their sex lives are described in great detail.

It's a fantasy and science fiction novel, which is almost pornographic in tone.Key to Survival is not one of Piers Anthony's better works, but if you're out of the country, you could download and read it to pass the time.If you have access to a good library in English, almost any other book you would select would be better. ... Read more

Product Description
The Prophecy:A Roundear there Shall Surely be; Born to be Strong, Raised to be Free; Fighting Dragons in his Youth; Leading Armies, Nothing Loth; Ridding his Country of a Sore; Joining Two, then uniting Four; Until from Seven there be One; Only then will his Task be Done. When Kelvin was a child, his mother read to him from the Book of Prophecy and he asked what the poem meant. Now he was about to learn. The Kingdom of Rud languishes under the heel of a usurper; an evil sorcerer has taken the throne in the name of his wicked daughter. Even deep in the forest, away from all power, the people tremble and await the day of prophecy's fulfillment. It cannot come too soon: Charlain and her children are soon to lose their home to the tax collector. But Kelvin and Jon have other plans. they have found a dragon's territory, where scales of purest gold, shed by the dragon, lie free on the ground for anyone with courage, or innocence, to take. And the words of Mouvar the prophet echo across Rud. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

A Potential Hero
Dragon's Gold is the first novel in the Kelvin of Rud series.John Knight was a Terran and a fugitive from the Queen's dungeon when he meet Charlain while trying to steal her horse.Charlain was a fortune-teller and knew that John was coming and that they would be married, so they were wed the next day and had two children, Kelvin and Jon.

In this novel, Kelvin and his sister Jon are dragon hunting with Mockery, the mule they have just bought.Jon finds a scale and then another and then more, following the dropped dragon scales up and over the nearby hill.On the other side is a dragon, which she first thinks is dead, but then only injured.To resolve the problem, she bounces a stone off the dragon's snout with her sling and gets his attention.Now she decides that she is in trouble and yells for Kelvin.Coming down the hill, she falls in a hole and can't get out.Kelvin goes to her rescue and falls into the same hole.

The dragon doesn't see Jon when he comes over the hill, but he does see Mockery.As he goes after Mockery, Jon pops up, yells that he can't eat their mule, and bounces another stone off him.Now the dragon is after Jon again.When the dragon grabs Jon with his tongue, Kelvin and Jon drop a boulder on it.The dragon reflexively lets go of Jon and tries to pull his tongue out with no success.Kelvin sends Jon after the tent pole to use as a weapon.Of course, she has to ask why he wants the pole and then checks out the injury on Mockery where the dragon has pulled out the mule's tail, but finally she brings back the tent pole.Kelvin sharpens the pole and stabs the dragon in the eye, which causes the dragon to jerk up his head, with pole and Kelvin attached thereto.The resulting fall knocks Kelvin unconscious.

When Kelvin comes to, he finds himself up a tree, the dragon dead, and Jon busy prying off scales.They remove as many scales as they can reach without moving the dragon and start home.However, a bandit acosts them, steals the scales, and heads off to sell Jon to the Boy Mart (he hasn't yet noticed that Jon is a girl).Kelvin tries to stop him, but is totally ineffective.The only thing left for him to do is to follow Jon and the bandit, but instead he goes home and reports the kidnapping.The guardsmen identify the bandit -- a former guardsman -- but kick Kelvin out for wasting their time.The youngest guardsman, however, refers Kelvin to his father, Mor Crumb.

This novel is about a prophecy of the Roundear that will unite the kingdoms of Rud.Kelvin has round ears from his Terran father and so is supposed to fulfill the prophecy.He has fought a dragon, but he has a long way to go before he is ready to lead armies.His sword play needs a lot of work.So does his aggressiveness;Jon has more than he does.

This story is a magical quest tale, searching for the magical artifactsof Mouvar the Magnificent.On the way, Kelvin learns to fight and to be an effective leader.He has plenty of help, starting with Jon and Mor Crumb.

Recommended for Anthony fans and anyone who enjoys light adventure tales with a touch of humor.

Dragon's Gold
I absolutely loved it!It was a truely imaginitive piece of work.I'd like to see more work of this caliber.A sci-fi / fantasy ride from start to finish.

This book is wonderfly entrancing!
I first read this book six years ago when I was twelve. Recently I was going through some old boxes and I found this old dusty book. I read it and just like that I fell in love with reading all over again.I definetlyrecomend reading all of the books in this series.(Dragon's Gold, Serpent'sSilver, Chimaera's Copper, Orc's Opal, and finally Mouvar's Magic.)

A book about a prophecy and technology
This is an interesting book about what happens when a rift which connectsmany worlds brings both technology and magic into a single world.This isnot one of the best of Piers Anthony's novels, and yet it would beenjoyable to anyone who likes the concept of gloves of stregnth, swords,ray guns, and jet packs all in one.Makes for one interesting book, butdefinately not on par with some of the series that Piers Anthony hascreated.

This is one of Piers Anthony's best books.
It is a very good boook, about an alternate world where all people have pointed ears, but some exist from the reality of Earth with round ears, and are hated. In the BOok of Prophecies, it says that a round ear will unite the kingdoms, and make the world better. A boy name Kelvin, a round ear, beins to unknowingly fulfill that prophecy.. ... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (1)

the first few chapters are completely focused on rape....
ok so we all know that he's a dirty old man, but seriously? the first chapter is completely about rape as are the next ones. for the love of jesus christ monkeyballs....
i don't even need to say more ... Read more

Product Description
book ... Read more

Product Description
Piers Anthony tells his own remarkable life story in this candid autobiography, a volume that is sure to intrigue and entertain his many fans-and infuriate his critics. The book begins with a review of the author's early years, revealing new and telling details about his upbringing at the hands of two brilliant but often careless parents, including a riveting section about their harrowing experiences as expatriates in Spain just before the Second World War.

But most of the book focuses on the past fifteen years since Bio of an Ogre (the first volume of his autobiography) was published, a time both of personal progress and professional frustration for Anthony, as his works became increasingly ambitious while his sales began to slow. He offers cautionary tales on the pitfalls of the "bottom line" publishing mentality, as well as scathing portraits of several well-known publishing figures.

Candid, opinionated and endlessly fascinating, How Precious Was That While is an intimate self-portrait by one of the most intriguing writers of our time.
... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Best critique of the SF book business I've ever read
Piers Anthony's nonfiction writing is first rate. He dissects the idiocy in printing too few copies of a book (a topic often discussed in PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY, but he makes it understandable to the layman), and shows the pitfalls and rewards of the writer's life. I wish I had the benefit of this advice when I married a writer--I could have been saved a lot of anguish and anxiety. His skewering of the sacred cows within the Science Fiction field--some of the editors, agents, fanzine editors, and writers--is first rate and meticulously backed up.

There are parts of this book involving letters written to him from abused children that I found very hard going. I read those sections once, but found it hard to re-read. There are writers who insist the problem of sexual abuse of children is overblown but I suspect they don't seem to be as a sympathetic ear as Anthony is.

If you find biographies of writers interesting, you'll probably enjoy this book. I found it utterly fascinating. I had never been a big fan of his before, now I eagerly anticipate going back and reading his work now that I have some background on it. ... Read more

Product Description
This is the fourth in the series BIO OF A SPACE TYRANT,featuring the stages in the life of Hope Hubris, the Tyrant ofJupiter, and his beloved sister Spirit. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (8)

Hope Hubris becomes a Socialist
Book four in the series falls flat. (This review is of the 1985 Avon mass market paperback edition)

After 3 good books (I've only read #2, but other reviewers seem to think the others are just as good), the final book in the Bio of A Space Tyrant series goes completely off the deep end.

Hope, now in his 50's, developes an even stranger appetite for kinky sex which degenerates into an unhealthy affair with a minor.

And he becomes a dictator to boot (all in the best interest of Jupiter, of course). Just like every other tin-horn dictator that starts out to clean things up, he becomes a tyrant. And he has the same attitude: the peeepuuul just don't have enough sense to make their own decisions, while "those of us" in power are blessed with all the insight necessary.

Unlike every other dictatorship of its kind in "real life", the fictional version, although plagued by many problems that can't be dispelled with a wave of Hope's magic wand, eventually improves the lives of his subjects.

I'll give Anthony this, he realized that in the end, the people won't stand for it.

One I missed
I had read all the other books in this series, but never this one. Now, thanks to Amazon, I was able to get a copy in new condition. It's every bit as good as the other books in the Space Tyrant series. Just a good story well told, and a delight to read.

Not Free SF Reader
Rewriting the rules of power.


Hope succeeds in this endeavour as well, and is elected President of the area.With this office, he then sets about changing the legal framework of the society, through political means.As a consequence of this, he is appointed head honcho of the whole shebang, which is where the Space Tyrant moniker comes into play.

The Tyrant Rules
Now with supreme authority over Saturn, for the sole purpose of balancing the deficit, Hope Hubris begins a reign that in years following will be looked back upon and the cure a tragically deficient planet needed. Of course, going throug it is pure hell.

One of the things I particularly liked was the way he dealt with overpopulation. You see, for years the Navy has instituted weekly sex for their members, mandatory! To prevent unwanted pregnacies, they have an additive they put in the water supply which is prevents women from getting pregnant. To halt the rising overpopulation, he puts that drug in Jupitor's water supply. A civil war almost erupted over that one thing.

Many other less than appreciated programs were put into effect but they were all done for the greater good. Sometimes you have to pull a tooth to save unwanted unpleasntries later.

Excellent continuatin of the life of Hope Hubris.

Is Tyranny the best policy?
With the rest of the reviewers I have to highly recommend that reading the first three books in this series is essential to fully grasp their nature and purpose.In this one (Vol.4) Hope Hubris has assumed total command of Jupiter and is attempting to institute many overdue changes in the governmental and societal structure of Jupiter. Through a heavy dose of satire and allegory Piers Anthony is able to demonstrate and spotlight many of the problems in our own political and social structure.Although this book is not as fast paced as the previous ones in this series it is still a highly entertaing and thought-provoking look at how the best intentions and ideas can become buried in bureaucratic quagmire, and the lengths (and sacrifices), Hope must go through to accomplish his goals. In the end the book does make you wonder if perhaps a tyranny is the best form of government. ... Read more

Product Description
Piers Anthony, one of the best selling writers of science fiction and fantasy, displays all of his literary virtues in "Reality Check," a magnum opus of why Anthony is more than an entertaining writer. He is an important writer.

This novel builds bridges between generations as it builds them between worlds. There is a quality here of classic Heinlein. The main characters face the unknown with courage instead of fear. Encountering the fantastic makes them think better instead of not thinking at all. "Reality Check" is a celebration of life, and a love story between grandparents and a granddaughter, between cousins, and between friends. Most of all, "Reality Check" is the first novel to fully explore the impact of the internet on the American family, albeit in science-fiction terms. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (10)

Great premise, but some missed opportunities
Realty Check was not a book I expected to read; I intended to just skim through the first pages and see if it was worth keeping. Before I knew it, I was 30 pages in and fully engrossed.

The story opens with Penn and Chandelle, an elderly couple, looking to rent a house for a few months during the summer. They end up at a strange house that appears to anticipate their needs and wants. The house is furnished the way they like, the closets are filled with clothes and shoes that fit them perfectly and even the refrigerator is filled with food they like. They also discover a computer and a television setup with seemingly limitless access to the internet and an infinite number of channels. Most intriguing about the house are the front and back doors, which can be programmed to open to a variety of different locations and times.

They soon invite their teenage grandchildren, Llynn and Lloyd, to join them at the house to help them figure it all out. They discover hidden chambers, languages and devices that can do everything from enhancing a person's physical abilities to healing wounds. They are eventually joined by a brother and sister they aid in a dangerous situation. All occupants of the house feel an intense desire to explore it's many secrets and find out the purpose of the house.

Piers Anthony has created an interesting concept that snags the reader's attention almost immediately. However, the book is flawed. The dialogue in many cases isn't realistic. While it's interesting to follow along with the logic of the characters as they think out loud, it's also simplistic. There also seems to be an unusual amount of sexual tension in the book, much of it incestuous.

Despite its flaws, Realty Check is a fun book. I enjoyed reading about the different uses the characters found for the devices they discovered in the house and the final explanation for the purpose of the house was intriguing, if somewhat unsatisfying. I thought the theory conjectured by the characters right before they discovered the truth to be more satisfying and sinister: that the purpose of the house was to lure in humans of various ages so that aliens could run a captive breeding experiment with them (and it would have explained all the sexual tension throughout the book). The actual explanation, where the house was recruiting humans willing to be host bodies and tour guides for alien minds was neat and cute and ultimately... meh.

[Disclosure: This review also appears on [...], a site for review and discussion of creative works.]

Great Book
I read this book in about 7 hours.It was a very fast paced, well written book.One word of caution: if you are of a conservative nature, this book may not be a good idea for you.For the rest of us, this is an excellent read.

A Good Story
This book starts with Penn and Chandelle, an elderly couple renting a house for a season to be closer to their granddaughter Lynn.But the main character is really the house.When they first inspect it, they find it is already stocked with food and clothes; even more improbably the clothes are in their sizes.But that's the least of the surprises from this house, which also has a back door that opens on a vast array of different landscapes, and a front door that can be set to relocate the house in different cities.

Exploring the house and its secrets becomes the main activity of Penn, Chandelle, Lynn, and her cousin Lloyd.Along the way they pick up new companions and ultimately discover the house's real purpose.

The story is unusual, enjoyable and not easily predictable.The characters are engaging but quite flat, and the author's hand in putting them through their paces, and particularly providing lessons and growth experiences for the two adolescents, is a little too visible.

I appreciate that in an era when SF/fantasy shelves are groaning under the weight of vast multi-volume epics that seem to start at about 1,000 pages and can run up to 10,000, Anthony has written a pleasant little book that tells its story without padding and gets to an ending in under 250 pages.This book is a perfectly good way to spend an afternoon, as long as you don't expect too much from it.

Not a quality book, but entertaining
I think this author has great potential, but he certainly needs to develop his writing skills a little.The idea for the book is wonderful and original.The strange and mystical house that the family moves intohas all sorts of interesting surprises that are loads of fun to read about and it is set up for some very nice speculative/escapist fantasy.

Unfortunately, the book could easily be mistaken for a children's book were it not for some adult themes, by the simple and undeveloped writing style.The characters are very one-dimensional and quite stereotypical.The dialogue is stiff and the storyline in general is quite contrived.Some things just don't seem right, such as how easily conflicts are always resolved and how nonchalantly everybody takes it when one of the characters is repeatedly raped.It also gets extremely irritating that the author has to go on and on about how sexually attractive every female character is, even though it usually has nothing to do with the storyline.When you're following a character going through an adventure, it's rather trying to constantly hear about her "tantalizing legs" or that her skin is "like roses and silk."

Still, it is entertaining, fun and original.Worth a read if you're an avid fantasy and science fiction fan, but definitely not something worth hunting down.

Good Read
It could be accurately stated that this work leaves some things to be desired. More character development to start. But where the book offers us readers a few minuses, it is truly a hypnotic tale notwithstanding. Imagine yourself finding a house which is fully furnished - everything you would normally want is inside. What is more: it's FREE for a full month. Then factor in the house windows that look out onto foreign landscapes --- a front door that leads to every city or place imaginable in the world. From this conceptual framework alone, you can see how the author could have become so excited by the plot that he forgot about the characters.

I enjoyed this one most because I didn't have any idea as to what I might find on the next page. I love that thrill. Heck, it's why we read all these books, isn't it? The adventure and thrill of the unknown. Piers is the kind of author you can trust for a fun ride through an imaginative world. A+ for storyline / B- for character development. Enjoy! ... Read more