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Caine Black Knife (Acts of Caine) | 
 enlarge | Author: Matthew Stover
Publisher: Del Rey
Category: Book
List Price: $14.00
Buy New: $8.34
You Save: $5.66 (40%)
New (31) Used (8) from $7.96
Avg. Customer Rating:  14 reviews
Sales Rank: 38713
Media: Paperback
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 368
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.9
ISBN: 0345455878
Dewey Decimal Number: 813.54
EAN: 9780345455871
ASIN: 0345455878
Publication Date: October 14, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: BRAND NEW
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Product Description
In Heroes Die and Blade of Tyshalle, Matthew Stover created a new kind of fantasy novel, and a new kind of hero to go with it: Caine, a street thug turned superstar, battling in a future where reality shows take place in another dimension, on a world where magic exists and gods are up close and personal. In that beautiful, savage land, Caine is an assassin without peer, a living legend born from one of the highest-rated reality shows ever made. That season, Caine almost single-handedly defeated–and all but exterminated–the fiercest of all tribes: the Black Knives. But the shocking truth of what really took place during that blood-drenched adventure has never been revealed . . . until now.
Thirty years later, Caine returns to the scene of his greatest triumph–some would say greatest crime–at the request of his adopted brother Orbek, the last of the true Black Knives. But where Caine goes, danger follows, and he soon finds himself back in familiar territory: fighting for his life against impossible odds, with the fate of two worlds hanging in the balance.
Just the way Caine likes it.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...
 Caine's Back! November 23, 2008
In Caine Black Knife, Caine's thrown back into the festering mess that is the conflict between his homeworld, Earth, and the mythic-like Overworld. At the same time, we are given snips of the adventure that made him a super-star "Retreat from the Boedeken." The contrast between the young and old versions of Caine are remarkably noticable, and at the same time, they are obviously the same man. It really provides a nice effect.
I'm a longtime fan of Mr. Stover's work, and in all honesty, have absurdly high expectations for the quality of his books. Caine Black Knife meets my expectations 100%. My only question, now is, when's the next one coming out?
CBK baby, CBK November 10, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is the best fantasy series being produced now. The Caine stories have not deteriorated into utter nonsense (see Robert Jordan / Terry Goodkind) but advanced with philosophical nuances and bone splitting action scenes. It does get a little graphic at times, so it isn't for my 9 year old nephew. I just finished the 3rd book tonight and I think I might have to reread the series yet again because I'm already missing it.
This is a huge addition to fantasy genre. I can't wait for the next book.
 CBK was just...OK November 3, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
Back in 1998 my wife and I read a novel called - Heroes Die - and found it to be one of the most rare synthesis of sci-fi/fantasy to come around on the literary scene. It had everything and more that my husband and I love - raw action and grand adventure on an epic scale.
Heroes Die screamed for a sequel. But we then read somewhere that he hated writing sequels. (And maybe for good reason?) But alas, 3 years later, Blades of Tyshalle came out. And though it was not as good as Heroes Die, it was still a new Caine novel, and was pretty good.
Then it seemed like Stover went all Star Warsey on us, and wrote a trilogy of those, seemingly leaving Overworld on the backburner forever.
Then, to our amazement, there was talk of another Otherworld/Caine novel! Then there was a title and a cover shown here and it sounded great. We could not wait to get our greedy mitts on this too-long-in-the-waiting-sequel. Could it be that Stover patiently groomed this latest Caine novel for 7 long years for it to blow-up the literary world once again?
Unfortunately, the answer for us hardcore fans is - no, not really. It wasn't a bad novel, just felt limited in scope and execution. As always, Matthew Stover gave us a no-hold-barred action/adventure sci-fantasy novel, but it dragged in alot of places. New Otherworld places were limited to only a couple of fairly dull places. Are there not vast tracts of this fantasy world to explore?!
The overall concept to this novel was unique, jumping back and forth 25 years in Hari Caine Michaelson's life. Sometimes it was interesting, but most times it dragged between long exposition to action sequences that were definately NOT Stover's best. Sometimes it read like a feverish dream. Hard to follow and comprehend. (Perhaps it had just been too long inbetween novels?)
Having written only 8 novels in his long career, Matthew Stover does know how to write viscerally and dark. We remember Caine being a rogue, with him being the ultimate anti-hero, with dark humor and dirty mouth. But in this novel, his abusive language seemed amped-up to its maximum. I'm not a prude by any means, but after awhile, it was way overdone.
I'm sure Matthew Stover knows you can't make everyone happy. Maybe that's why he seemed reluctant to write sequels. But I'm sure he got so many demands for another Caine sequel, and aside from his Star Wars novels, his only money-maker and self-created masterpiece that fans will gobble up, Stover felt compelled to create a duology to beat fans back for awhile.
Please Mr. Stover, in the final novel upcoming, don't make us wait so long, and expand the storyline into new realms to explore in Otherworld. Expand also on the new characters you introduced us to here in CBK.
Thus far, this trilogy from best to least best is running in its right order. Even though we weren't blown off our feet with this latest, we still look forward to a hopefully dramatic and much more explosive ending to this series.
 Maybe it's just me... October 29, 2008
4 out of 7 found this review helpful
Perhaps I'm just getting old. I've read the first two books of this series and I'm currently reading the third installment. I probably shouldn't write a review before I'm finished reading it, but I don't think I will be able to.
There's no questioning the vivid, even lurid writing style of Stover. The violence is visceral and the reader may even tend to flinch or cringe at some of the more graphic passages. While I accept this as part of Caine's character and as part of the world in which he lives, I feel there is not enough sense to balance it all...it's as if there is merely a colorless and bland world that turns idly on it's bored and yawning axis between Caine's horrific explosions of wolverine-like carnage.
I feel that Stover concentrates more on Caine's bitter, cynical and almost self-hating monologue (book is written in first person) than on the connective details and the development of other characters that might make the story more comprehensible. It's almost as if we were stuck in Caine's head, with his crass irreverence and his gruff, clipped thoughts and descriptions...and that we can't get the taste of what the outside world is really like.
Again, maybe it's me. I won't say that Stover is not a great writer, but I didn't feel like a part of this world. I feel that Scott R Bakker and the Prince of Nothing series has more to offer in this respect.
Read it if you love the sound of cracking bones and tortured screams...
Violent and Profound October 27, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Matthew Stover's third book in the "Acts of Caine" series is a good one. Stover does an impressive job of aging Caine and demonstrating the difference in perspective between the character at 25 and the character now in his middle fifties.
Hari/Caine is in Overworld to aid his Ogrillo blood brother (sort of a cross between a gorilla and an Ogre)Orbek. Orbek has been imprisoned and is sentenced to death for defying his "betters" and Caine feels it is his duty to save the life of the young Ogrillo as a younger Caine was responsible for the downfall of the Ogrilloi and the Black Knife clan in particular. There are really two stories going on here: one in "real" time and the other in the form of a recording of "Escape from the Boedecken" (mentioned in "Heroes Die" but never fully explained); this is the adventure that made a young Hari Michaelson (Caine) a star and also the Genesis of the current problems that a mature Hari must now try to fix.
The Caine novels are heavy with extreme violence and gore and liberally peppered with (ahem) very "adult" language. But the novels are also heavy with insightful social commentary on the nature of government, freedom and caste. This is thinking persons Fantasy/science fiction and there is no way to read these books without asking questions about the state of our own freedoms and the world around us. Stover's fiction is eye opening, but it's also great entertainment. The end of "Caine Black Knife" leaves us with a promise of more Caine to come. I hope that it's true.
Buy this one and read it.
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