[Self]

Mmmm, after reading so many reviews that describe this series as a masterpiece, literary brilliance etc etc I am sorry to say I found this to be mind numbingly boring dribble. Every page was a torturous, painful experience, & every time something caught my interest & I began to get excited that I was finally about to understand the universal acclaim for this work, it was short lived. I found Wolfe's writing style tedious, the narratives wandered into unnecesary & irrelevant directions, & in short, I am at a loss to comprehend how this book got anyones interest.

Now, I may be flying solo on this one, & if so, I expect to have to run from howls of protest from loyal devotees, but surely there must be others that share this view???

(If not, I am having plastic surgery, changing my name & going into witness protection...)

[Jeroen]

Well. I think its one of the best books ever. But if you dont like, that is ok. Watch out! Here comes a conversation-killer: Everyone is different, and thats good.
If I were to explain to you what makes this book so brilliant, I would just be copying the reviews, and you've already read those. I guess that if you don't see it, it will be hard to make you understand :P That is always the case with any form of art.
I think it helped that I thought his writing was very powerfull and compelling and everything that happened interesting and worthy of my investigation.

In the end, I don't think there are any unnecessary or irrelevant directions in the narrative. In fact, this must be the book with the least unnecessary or irrelevant directions I have ever read. Everything gives clues. Multiple explanations in every paragraph. Ah, look at me, I'm rambling again.

Anyway, I would like to know what books you consider your favorites then

[Sfinx]

Don't worry about the 'howls of protest' m8 :)

Although i am a big fan of Wolfe's work (see Nov BOTM thread), i can understand your sentiment. I guess it all depends on how you read his books or in other words, what do you expect from them? One of the key elements in Wolfe's writing is the fragmented, even unreliable storytelling. It takes quite some effort on the reader's part to make sense of things. If you're looking for a 'straightforward', clear and fast-paced adventure, Wolfe will probably disappoint you. His story can seem obscure, or as you say contain unnecessary or even irrelevant bits. But, and this for me this is a big but, on rereading and rethinking the parts that seem irrelevant or obscure, they slowly turn into something meaningful, and parts start to fit together. I think this experience of 'exploration' and finding meaning is why so many people love Wolfe's work.

Can't resist throwing in a quote of Wolfe himself, last line in both Shadow of the Torturer and The Claw of the Conciliator:

"Here I pause. If you wish to walk no farther with me, reader, I cannot blame you. It is no easy road." ;)

[Bear]

I very much like Gene Wolfe. He's got style, and lots of it, and his books nearly always make me think, even if they're not always briskly paced. I could understand why someone might not be into his work, but I'm certainly a fan.

[Larry]

Perhaps a good analogy would be someone who is just learning a second language who hears a really funny joke in that language, but due to not having all the background stuff down, the joke falls flat or sails completely over that person's head. There is a ton of stuff in this series that has been worked into the background. The more one knows about gnosticism, Catholic hagiography, how to approach reading unreliable narrative accounts, etc., the more of the "joke" one gets.

For myself, it's one of my favorite works of fiction, but it's one where you have to work at it to glean more and more from it. There are so many layers to this tale that typically it takes at least a few re-reads over the years in conjunction with reading some philosophical/religious histories to get the maximum effect. Some readers are willing to put in that time and effort; others are not. It may be that such stories aren't for you.

[FitzChivalry]

I read it once, it was ok, i'm not the rereading type, rarely reading more than once anything, so i didn't do much rethinking here.
Can someone give some example of some hidden layer or just some really cool detail that usually escapes casual readers?
Seems like i missed quite a lot.

[Larry]

Do a Wiki search for Abaia, Abraxas, St. Catharine, Yesod, and...well, I hate to cheat/promote, but I wrote a whole series of reflections/reviews on this work recently that I posted under this tag (http://ofblog.blogspot.com/search/label/Gene%20Wolfe). That should save more time than just spelling out every single thing I've observed in spoiler tags.

[FitzChivalry]

Well, many authors use terms from real mythologies or history when creating their fictional ones. I got most of those.
I thought there is something deeper as Gene Wolfe is usually singled out as brilliant in that regard.

[Larry]

He's usually signaled out for the ease in which they are integrated into stories that can be read in many different styles. His short stories are interesting and with his latter novels, he's begun a sort of "deconstruction" of recent mythologizing of knights and pirates, among others. It is that combination, along with the borrowing of some techniques from Jorge Luis Borges that makes his writing stand out today.

[Yobmod]

I read it once, it was ok, i'm not the rereading type, rarely reading more than once anything, so i didn't do much rethinking here.
Can someone give some example of some hidden layer or just some really cool detail that usually escapes casual readers?
Seems like i missed quite a lot.

I'm no expert, and it's a few years since i re-read it, but on the second read i noticed details like:

Dorcas is a resurected dead woman (this is quite obvious from the first reading), but is also Severian's grandmother, which therefore means that the waiter in the hotal in a tree (in shadow) must be his father. Also, it is implied that he is a twin (the child severian had a twin sister called Severia?), hence his sister is the young witch he meets (in Claw).