[.ca] Alvin Journeyman (ISBN 1433205920)

The Tales of Alvin Maker continues its downhill slide:
It has been said that any plot which depends on a dramatic courtroom trial is doomed to mediocrity. ALVIN JOURNEYMAN, unfortunately, is one of those plots. In this fourth installment of Orson Scott Card's alternate-history and Mormon allegory "The Tales of Alvin Maker", Alvin is put on trial for his life. We, the readers, spend half the book being dragged through courtroom melodrama with a protagonist the reader is having a hard time caring about anymore. At the end of PRENTICE ALVIN, Alvin finished his prentice stint with Makepeace Smith and had returned to his hometown of Vigor Church to teach Making. ALVIN JOURNEYMAN sees him return almost immediately to Hatrack River due to the slander of a young lady in love with him. Upon his arrival, however, he is arrested and put on trial for theft of the golden plow, and his young ward Arthur Stuart faces being taken back to slavery in Appalachee. Verily Cooper, a young English lawyer with a knack for binding things together, is brought to the United States by rumors of a Maker and defends Alvin. And while Alvin endures his hardships in Hatrack River, his malevolent brother Calvin heads for Europe to learn from Napoleon himself how to rule over others. Orson Scott Card wrote ALVIN JOURNEYMAN five years after the previous installment, and it is pretty evident that he has grown somewhat tired of the series and no longer sure of what direction it will take. Alvin teaches Making in Vigor Church, but how can you teach that, what exactly would you be teaching? Card can't come up with an answer either and thus he abandons the topic as soon as this installment begins. There are several blatant errors with geography (a judge refers to "the state of Kennituck" when Card had already said that Kennituck was a county of Appalachee). After fleeing from Vigor Church and wandering for a bit, Alvin and Arthur Stuart's return to Hatrack River seems forced. Why would Alvin return to a place where his enemies await him? A bit of the novel is dedicated to the comeback of White Murderer Harrison, but after he is elected, Card quickly dispatches him almost beneath the reader's notice. The ending resolves nothing and is little more than a Taleswapper cameo. The novel is also frustrating because it accomplishes little for the series. We see no progress towards the building of the Crystal City, and the only indication of where the series is headed are the occasional foreboding references to how Alvin should not visit Carthage City lest he die, just as the founder of Mormonism, Joseph Smith, met a violent end in Carthage, Illinois. However, in ALVIN JOURNEYMAN Orson Scott Card does start to go off track with the formerly solid Mormon allegory. The trial of Alvin is obviously symbolic of the trials of Joseph Smith, but while Alvin is acquitted, the young Joseph Smith was found guilty of moneydigging. ALVIN JOURNEYMAN leaves the reader drifting, totally ignorant of what is going to happen next or, indeed, what the point of the series is anymore. The first two volumes of The Tales of Alvin Maker were quite entertaining and the third volume, while it had its moments, was a disappointment. It is becoming increasingly difficult to recommend the series.

definitely the best so far:
this is in my opinion the best book so far in the alvin maker series. although i wish card would just get to the crystal city, this book still had suspense and excitement. the only thing i have to complain about is the way card can draw out scenes to last pages when the only need about 1/2 a page to explain. but still one of the best books card has written.

Thief!:
Alvin is accused of theft by Makepeace Smith, his former Master. The book explores what happens as Alvin tries to clear his name. Much happens in this book, which is a continuation of Card's "Alvin Maker" series. There are some real surprises and some characters I didn't expect to come back, which come back in unexpected ways. Worth Reading? You Bet!

Maintaining the decline:
The positive: Affable characters, fast moving, easy to read. The negative: Uninteresting plot. Although slightly better than the previous book in this series, Card still doesn't manage to recreate the magic of the first two. In this book, the bulk of the tale is involved in Alvin facing trial for being wrongly accused of theft. Many characters are introduced based on characters created in an AOL chatroom by Card's fans and this book gives the impression much of it was written to coddle those fans and feature their characters. Not an entire waste of time but don't go into this series thinking each of the books will be as entertaining as the others.

Another great story within a story:
I originally read this several years ago, and re-read it recently after getting the new book in the series. As I read this series as a whole, I am staring to notice that the individual stories form each book (The war in Red Prophet, the story of Arthur Stuart in Prentice Alvin, and the trial in this book) and the new characters that keep coming along, are starting to overshadow the overall story of Alvin's quest to build the Crystal City. This book started a little slowly, so I thought it might not have been as interesting as the previous books in the series, as often happens once you get this deep into a series. But with the introduction of Verily Cooper and Alvin's trial, the book really picks up the pace. I look forward to re-reading the next book (Heartfire) followed by the The Crystal City, which will hopefully conclude the series. If you've enjoyed the other books in this series, you probably won't be disappointed by this one.