I have long been a die hard fan of intense science fiction. The one star I'll give Hand for this book is for her excellent use of deep imagery in the work to invoke almost physical responses from the reader.

However, the rest of what makes a story into a novel is missing. The characters are lackluster (at best), having no real passion or direction, and gaining none as the story progresses. For a while I was truly enthralled by the read, one page pulling me into the next until I had burned through the first three hundred pages in as many minutes.

And then it died...not in a blast, or a convoluted plot twist, or even in any way that could be defined as heroic, romantic, philosophical, or otherwise. It faded as if it had never been. The story just seems to stop (like a car stalling silently on a fast highway) the story coasts in neutral for about 150 pages, flares like the engine sputtering to life for a heartbeat, (but not really) and then sliding onto the shoulder, making you wonder why you got in the car at all!

Even if you like the occasional anticlimactic plot twist, this takes the concept a step further, where the only characters who receive any sort of finality die in ignoble, boring ways. I am also a male reader, but unlike one of my fellow reviewers, I don't need a huge hollywood style ending.

I would, however, like an ACTUAL ending.

This work actually hovers around 7.5 on the 10 scale. The are many strengths to E. Hand's style but at times these turn out to be her weaknesses as well. One of the things I enjoyed most about this work were the frequent allusions to Eliot's Wasteland (the hyacinth girl, death by water etc). However I believe her greatest strength in the Glimmering is how she intertwines the mystical/sureal/ethereal scenes in such a way to leave the reading guessing if it is a hallucionation or real. This is the saving grace of the book because Hand is a master at this. The overuse of the sex scenes and sexual references is what diminished the book's rating for me. At first they are beautiful and relevent, but they get tedious after while. Then you begin to wonder if E. Hand as some fixation with oral sex.....Despite this, it is good read for those who like the genre, and its enviromental tone is very Germane as we approach the new millenium. A word of warning though, if you are a christian this book may not be for you. Most of the christians here are depicted as fundamentalist terrorists (which may delight some readers) and there is a frequent use of homoerotic images throughout her work.

As a librarian, I have thousands of books at my fingertips everyday, but I chose to read Hand's novel. First of all, the millenium will be a hot topic for some time to come and hopefully even after that! I felt like I was in the room with her characters, peeping in on the taping of a movie or something. Her words are so vivid with color and reality. I liked how she hopped from reality to fantasy or was it the other way around? What is reality anyway? I would say it's how you see things. Hand has done a great job showing us how she sees things! Can't wait to read her next book.

I would also like to comment on the cover. As a librarian, I've seen people drawn to the book by it's cover only. As for Hand's cover, I give 5 stars to Hasselberger for the design and either Eguchi or Mydlowski for the actual photograph. I would love to know where this gargoyle exists if at all.

it's not as bad as one of these reviews might lead you to believe. . .

Some truely interesting concepts are presented, but as a sequel, and I guess as a book in general, it really does fall short. Too many loose ends and meandering sub-plots. A STRONG dissapointment, but if you've enjoyed Hand's other books, this probably IS worth a look (if you have nothing better to do.)

If there was a zero rating option, I would have picked it.I LOVED the two predecessors to this novel, Winterlong and Aestival Tide. Elizabeth Hand had drawn us into a dark future frightening and enthralling. Icarus Descending, on the other hand seems to have been written by someone who couldn't care less about the first two books... Everything in the first two books lead to NOTHING. I was so disappointed by this book that I shall never read another by the author again. In fact, I threw away my copy of Icarus Descending and just pretend that it never existed.

Icarus Descending is a very interesting tale, mostly looking at one particular question: if your total lifespan is only three years how do you view God or Salvation? What is important when you are literally born to work as a slave for 1000 days and then be discarded?

This book has a wildly black look at a possible future, brain eating in various guises and a really peculiar look at deepspace geneslave paganism. Lovely.