Steven breast

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Steven Breast, 2006.

Steven Karl Zoltán Brust (born November 23, 1955 in St. Paul ( Minnesota ), USA ) is an American fantasy author of Hungarian descent. His novels about the hit man Vlad Taltos are published in Germany by Klett-Cotta Verlag . In addition to his writing activities, Brust has released a solo album entitled A Rose For Iconoclastes and written various pieces of music.

Taltos series

The Taltos series takes place in a fantasy world that is predominantly populated by the somewhat eleven-like Dragaerans. As an easterner (human), Vlad Taltos belongs to the underprivileged minority. Despite his origin and race he occupies a high position in the Dragaeran society. His father used money to buy a title of nobility in the Jhereg house - these large houses structure the population in Brust's fantasy world in a manner similar to a complex caste system. House Jhereg, the only one to carry out such transactions, is also the organization that is home to bandits and criminals. A fact that decisively influenced Vlad's life and career. He makes his living as a hit man. The setting of the books is decisively shaped by the races that determine the protagonist's career. As a member of an oppressed minority still under the lowest caste in the empire , he falls victim to racism and develops his own at the same time. Unable to use real magic from the East , he must overcome this type of handicap by painstakingly learning the East German art of witchcraft . He has to fight off his hostile environment very early on. He meets the Dragaerans, who are superior in strength, with speed and wherever possible with the advantage of the element of surprise. Due to the loss of his mother and father, he has few caregivers in the world. This is accompanied by a far-reaching loss of trust that shapes his relationships with other people. The only really confidants are his grandfather and a small flight reptile that Vlad Taltos has telepathic contact with.

The mixture of fantasy, mafia and development novels is one of the main unique selling points of the Taltos series.

Brust has written eleven books in this series so far, and nineteen novels have been announced - each named after one of the Great Houses, one named after Vlad, and one previously titled "The Last Contract" as the conclusion of the series . The Taltos series is published in Germany neither in chronological order nor in the order of the date of publication of the original editions. Even if each novel is self-contained, it is advisable to read the books in the order in which they were originally published, as Steven Brust uses anecdotes and allusions to refer to the other books in this series. In February 2005, the novel Athyra was probably the last German publication by Steven Brust. According to Klett-Cotta, no further volumes in the series are currently planned for the publisher's program.

Khaavren novels

The Khaavren novels deal with events in the Empire well before the time of the Taltos series. The series pays homage to the novels by Alexandre Dumas ( The Three Musketeers ). It consists of three books ( The Phoenix Guards , Five Hundred Years After , The Viscount of Adrilankha ). The first novel describes how three young gentlemen, Pel, Aerich and the eponymous hero Khaavren, as well as the Dzur warrior Tazendra try their luck in the emperor's bodyguard. Breast designs a world interwoven with empty politeness, a sense of honor carried to the extreme and complex intrigues. One adventure follows the next, and hardly a day goes by without an invitation to a duel or devious attempts at murder, until the heroes have torn the web of intrigue and solved a large part of the imperial problems. In Five Hundred Years after , the heroes, who lost sight of each other after the adventures of the first part, come together again, only to find the empire on the verge of disaster. Old enemies are just as much your opponent as old friends. Various parties try to use the desolate situation of the empire for a coup - with too much success: The novel ends in "Adron's Disaster", the destruction of the capital Dragaera City. The "orb", the source of magical powers in the empire, is lost. Without an emperor, the time of the interregnum begins. The Viscount of Adrilankha consists of three volumes. Even more than in the first Khaavren novels, the story of people who are important characters in the Taltos novels is illuminated here. The four heroes of the Phoenix Guards are again important players, but even more so are the generation of their children. The title hero, the Viscount of Adrilankha, is Khaavren's son Piro. The big task this time is to bring the last Phoenix heiress safely to the realm of the dead. There she is supposed to get the gods to surrender the orb and then restore the empire with the help of her friends. In addition to the pure adventure story, Brust uses the opportunity to shed light on the change in the world through the interregnum. Love relationships between the different houses are discussed, as is the relationship between the Dragaerans and the Easterners, and the role of the gods in the course of things is explained to the reader in more detail.

attitude

Steven Brust criticizes the establishment as a socialist and also accuses the Democrats of "wars of aggression, the militarization of the police, domestic espionage, the prosecution of whistleblowers, torture and war crimes". His choice are the candidates of the Socialist Equality Party and the Republican presidential candidate Trump he called "fascistoid".

Works

Dragaera (Dragaeran Empire)

Steven Brust in 2004 in Minneapolis

Vlad Taltos

Inner chronology:

  • Taltos , Dragon , Yendi , Jhereg , Teckla , Phoenix , Jhegaala , Athyra , Orca , Issola , Dzur

Khaavren Romances

The Viscount of Adrilankha

The incrementalists

Other works

Web links

Commons : Steven Brust  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ If you think of Hitler when you think of Trump, you should think of Hindenburg when you think of Clinton - Letter from an American writer to his colleagues , World Socialist Web Site, June 9, 2016
personal data
SURNAME Chest, steven
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Breast, Steven Karl Zoltán (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American fantasy writer
DATE OF BIRTH November 23, 1955
PLACE OF BIRTH St. Paul