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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5683126" data-attributes="member: 54877">Issola is also my favorite. One of the reasons though, wouldn't hold up as well if viewed in isolation. A great deal of what makes Issola great is all the character development that has occurred before the book starts. This lets Brust be economical with his characters' actions and statements, while still saying a great deal, well. Even Teckla contributes to this. It simply happens to be one of the pivotal "down" chapters where things go to hell in a hand basket for Vlad, not least because of his own failings If the whole thing was a completed work in one giant volume of 17 chapters, then I'd bet people would find Athyra and Orca the least compelling. Yet Orca is fairly decent as a single work. It is also an unusual series in that Brust is both hampered and helped by writing the books on the cycle. The titles aren't just arbitrary names. The story is supposed to be about something highly pertinent to that house. Perhaps this conceit made Orca and Teckla hard books to write. Yet, that same conceit drives Phoenix, Jhereg, and probably several others. Jhereg might be good even without it, but I don't think Phoenix would be.  Dragon is a bit hurt the same way that Phoenix is helped.  Dragon works well enough, but it seems a bit contrived to get Vlad involved in an appropriately Dragon-ish story.</blockquote>