Book Two - Bearing an Hourglass - Incarnations of Immortality

The book I've chosen to review is entitled: "Bearing An Hourglass," by Piers Anthony. One major conflict in the story was between the evil lord Satan and Norton, who is the main character of the novel. The way it was settled, was with a battle between good and evil. The conflict started when Norton had angered Satan by using a time spell to make him spin and bob in mid-air. This had angered him greatly, literally causing smoke to bellow from his nostrils. After this event, Satan shot a fireball in an attempt to kill Norton which utterly failed. Next, Norton was able to use a spell in order to finally defeat Satan to call off his minion.

The character I have chosen is the main character of the plotline--Norton, who is in basic terms a hiker who camps out in parks who has nowhere else to be. Also there is the grim reaper named Zane, who like Norton was down on his luck, when he had gone into debt and had become poor which forced him to live in the slums of a city called Kilvarough. They got along quite nicely because after a chain of events Norton met Zane on Gawain's property and was asked by Zane to be the new Chronos so they had to get along as fellow incarnations. They help each other in the story when Satan had sent a minion forward in time to stop Luna from defeating Satan politically. The way Thanatos(Zane) had helped Norton, was by helping to spoil Satan's plot in the previous book in order for Norton to become the new Chronos.

Norton was just a normal hiker in a park until he was visited by a ghost who asked him a favor. The ghost asked him to impregnate his wife when something bad happenned. The baby died and Norton spoke with the grim reaper when he had come to collect its soul. The reaper told him that Satan would win politically, ensuring hell on Earth unless he helped stop him. After that he takes over the newly vacated slot of Chronos the incarnation of time in order to defeat Satan. This novel portrays the events on Nortons journey to stop the lord of lies from achieving Hell on Earth.

The reasons I am recommending this book is: the story has a lot of action, a great plotline, and that it is written by a great author. Piers Anthony has written quite a lot in his career as an author. He has written over forty books and many of which pertain to incarnations. Another thing is that you should ask this question: "Is it possible?" . The people I would reccomend this book to are people who enjoy fantasy and sci-fi books. I have read the book and I believe that it is very good; and that I am going to continue reading Piers Anthony's books, because each has a sense of individuality, by giving it twists that almost every reader would enjoy.

This book was a little weird. The part which brought it down to a "3 star" rating was where Time was trying to converse with someone going (directionally in time) opposite from him. You have to read whole sentences backward, and it gets really tedious!

There were some interesting ideas in this book and in the first one, but Piers Anthony is, quite simply, a painfully bad writer. He writes like an early teenager in almost every way - redundant, self-indulgent, and shallow. The sad thing for these books is that, unlike the Xanth series, there is actually a decent story at their core. Even a mildly competent editor could have turned this series into a decent work of fantasy. Instead it's just a monument to a missed opportunity.

I'd been dreading this book since after I finished "On A Pale Horse," because it was sure to be a confusing story. Not only does it deal with Chronos (the Incarnation of Time), his attaining the role and his adventures that ensue, but everything occurs backwards! Talk about confusing! However, Piers Anthony pulls it all off seamlessly! Incredible concept, outrageous plots, and unforgettable characters make this book a must have for Anthony fans and/or intelligent minds.

The incarnation of time is still my favorite throughout the entire series, mostly because of the concept.
Here you have a man who lives backwords and can change future (or was it past?) events, making the concept of the office hard to grasp for the reader and makes the reader think. For a man who can write about paradoxes, time, and connections between small events in time, I must say bravo, Piers

Written with KEEN insight - Anthony MUST know something we don't. This series presents the reader with the most believable accounting of the incarnations. Hated to finish. All his series are my favorites, however this is the one that stands out the most. Once you have read the first book, the rest are a necessity.

Take the time to read this series, better than Harry Potter by far !
This is the third time I have read this series and I still can't put them down ! Why on earth these books have not been made into movies is beyond me, it would blow Harry out of the water ! Pick one up and enjoy!!

I just recently started reading the Incarnations series, and 'Hourglass' is my favorite so far. (Of course, I've only read 'Hourglass' and 'Pale Horse'.) The only thing that disappointed/surprised me was the quality of the humor parts as compared to the quality of the serious parts. As with 'Pale Horse', IMHO, the serious parts were genius, but most Xanth fans would probably find the humor lacking something (And I'm not talking about puns here, although there aren't any I've noticed in 'Incarnations'.) The only other negative thing I could say about this is that some of Anthony's character names seem a little...well, dull to me. (Bink? Norton? Orb? They just don't seem to fit a main character--or even a lesser one--that well.) The other concepts are _very_ well thought-out and/or imaginative, though, such as Chronos's abilities and talisman.

Surrogate ghost parent stint fails, becomes Lord of Time instead.

This Incarnation gets to do the Merlin thing, and live backwards in time. Being in charge of that he can go forward if he wants to, though.

He hooks up with one of the Fates, and also has Satan try and trick him, one of these stunts includes trying to convince him to stop the event that makes the guy in the first book Thanatos.

This book is a classic example of bad writing that has been well targeted to earn good money. The characters are completely one-dimensional, boring, and unrealistic. The women in the book (and the series) are not-too-subtle male fantasies. Also, the plot is pretty weak although there are some interesting notions about time and its incarnate portrayal.
If you want some good reading, please avoid this horrendous book aimed at juvenile boys and go to the quality fantasy/sci-fi like George R.R. Martin, Tolkien, Asimov, etc.

I struggled throught this second book at first, mostly because i missed reading about Zane. After a while, though, i got over it and actually really enjoyed this one too. The only thing i didn't like was that they spent too much time in the "alternate reality" setting that satan sent Norton to. Other than that, i loved the beginning prior to him taking office with the ghost. I also liked the idea of chronos living backward. Drawkcab was the funniest chapter in a book i have ever read. If you have already read Death then read this for sure. if not, why the hell haven't you read death yet?

This book was really good. A different style of writing for piers. It must have been really hard for him to write backward for one full chapter for one individual, and forward for yet another. If he had as much fun trying to write it as I had reading it he should be commended