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Title: Interesting ideas, mediocre writing
Review: Ultimately, there's nothing original or effective enough in "Archform: Beauty" to set it apart from the SF herd. Modesitt creates a fairly convincing world and sets up an interesting web of relationships among his narrators, but the whole effort is undermined by poor writing. Descriptions are flat. Dialogue is artificial and stilted. Future-slang is unnatural -- in some cases, practically unpronounceable. Language naturally evolves in directions that are easier to speak aloud, not harder. "Counterfeit" would never evolve into "feit" (sounds too much like "fit," and many more colorful synonyms already exist), nor "Denver" into "Denv," nor the already well-established "condo" into "conapt." Maybe I've been spoiled by Neal Stephenson, but I like my science fiction to be good writing, not just good speculation.
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