Larry Niven's Man-Kzin characters are brought to renewed life

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	• Man-Kzin Wars XI (Man-Kzin Wars) Larry Niven Baen, 2007 - 496 pages average customer review:based on 10 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Moving, exciting, and a bit sexy

I enjoyed all these stories enormously. Hal Colebatch, who wrote the first three stories which take up most of the book, is a fine writer. His plots are becomoing more complex and surprising. He handles the sexual tension between Dimity and Vaemar in "Catspaw" beautifully (I think I am falling in love with Dimity, especially since he appearances in "One War for Wunderland@" and "Music box" in Man-Kzin X. She is a great character, but so are Colebatch's other characters, human and Kzin. One really warms to the old Kzin Raargh, and feels for the young "Strtaight Arrow" Vaemar, with a fight between his conflicting heritages going on inside him. Plenty of action, jokes, and some splendid descriptive writing to convey xonvincingly the feel of another world - some of "Grossgeister Swamp" is like as dream. Matthew Harrington's stories are also extremely well done, mind-stretching and full of surprises. The science in them seems good, too. Larry Niven's own story is punchy and effective and leaves uyou feeling proud of the human race. Six great stories!

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Satisfying return to Niven's universe, but uneven writing

I have read pretty much everything Niven himself has written, and I think I have pretty much hoovered up all the Man-Kzin Wars series too. It's a way of franchising that part of Niven's universe to other writers, which seems on the whole to be good for everyone - writers, publishers, and readers. Obviously, it's in Niven's interest (and his publishers) to avoid any dilution of the brand.

This latest fix includes three stories by Hal Colebatch, two by Matthew Joseph Harrington, and a short contribution ("The Hunting Park") by Niven himself. I think Harrington's are clearly the best: well plotted, scientifically convincing, and pacily written, they accomplish the challenging feat of extending Niven's vision rather than just wallowing in it. Colebatch is good, but his style is sometimes a bit sentimental for me; to take one example purely at random, "He stroked her, whispered 'Mother', and died. Leonie moved to close his eyes". As other reviewers have said how much they like his writing, this is clearly a matter of taste. To be honest, I didn't feel that "The Hunting Park" stands out above the other stories; indeed I would go so far as to say that Harrington's stories are crisper, more interesting, and generally more like early Niven.

One thing has been puzzling me: the striking cover illustration appears to depict Vaemar and Dimity in action. He is armed with a wtsai, she with a huge gun of some sort. But how come Vaemar is shown as resembling a huge lion, instead of a tiger? Niven has stated over and over that kzinti are basically orange and look like big fat tigers. Also, the powerful impact of the picture merely serves to underline how extremely unlikely any emotional bond between these two creatures would be.

Bottom line: strongly recommended for Niven fans, and SF lovers in general. The standard of writing is really very good, and Harrington's two stories "Teacher's Pet" and "War and Peace" are fit to stand beside Niven's own books such as "World of Ptavvs" and "Protector". As far as I know, there can be no higher praise.

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Larry Niven's Man-Kzin characters are brought to renewed life

Larry Niven's Man-Kzin characters are brought to renewed life in Hal Colebatch, Matthew Harrington and Larry Niven's MAN-KZIN WARS XI, a collection of stories which includes a new story by Niven and others expanding the Man-Kzin Wars series. Here a secret agenda affects a safari even as a woman lands on a plague world only to find something even more dangerous than plague. Familiarity with Niven's Man-Kzin series lends a special appreciation to this book.

Skip the Hal Colebatch stories

Niven, of course, is great. How did Hal Colebatch get included. He knows nothing of soldiers or professional warriors, and his depictions of such are just stupid. The first story almost made me chuck out the whole book. I'm glad I didn't but honestly, Colebatch must be Niven's nephew or something. He can garner zero credibility for action/adventure-type sci-fi. His characters and their relationships (huh?) are really shallow. But if you like to read about people doing one stupid thing after another to cause their own demise and then pulling through due to even more stupidity on their part, you'll love Colebatch's stories. Better yet, skip Colebatch's stuff and read the good ones.

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War in Known Space?

Three new short stories from Hal Colebatch, two from a new M-K-Wars author, and a rare new story from Larry Niven himself. This is an excellent addition to the M-K-Wars series. With five engaging stories, and well developed characters, it's easy for a dedicated fan to get lost in this book.

reviews: page 1, 2

The Kzin were the mightiest warriors in the galaxy, which they were wasting no time in conquering, one star system at a time. Then those feline lords of creation ran into those ridiculous weed-eating pacifistic apes who called themselves humans. And the catlike Kzin found they had their collective tail caught in a meat grinder. When the mighty Kzin moved in to take over the monkey-infested worlds, they got clobbered. The humans, with their underhanded monkey cunning, turned communications equipment and space drives into weapons that cut the dauntless Kzin heroes into ribbons. And then those underhanded humans gained a faster-than-light drive, and no amount of screaming and leaping could keep the Kzin from losing their first war in centuries of successful conquest. But you can't keep a good warcat down, and the Kzin have by no means given up. New weapons, new strategies, and new leaders: Here they come again and those monkey-boys from Earth had better watch their backs. Once again, it's howling time in Known Space!

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