books Archives - Page 45 of 64

Yzabel / August 13, 2014

Review: Fiefdom

Fiefdom: A Kingdom Novel by Dan Abnett

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

The last of humanity has taken refuge in hibernation at the poles, hiding from the giant invading insects that have conquered the Earth. Defending these outposts against bug attacks are genetically engineered dog soldiers, loyal and unquestioning to the Masters’ voices in their heads. At least they were, but things have changed on the Earth. The Masters voices have gone and a new peace has arrived in the northern hemisphere. The legend of a masterless rogue soldier from the distant South has spread, and in the new Fiefdoms of old Germany something very dangerous is about to happen.

In a not-too-distant future, amongst ruins in the the ancient city of Berlin the Aux’s live in clans, fighting amongst themselves. Their ancient enemey, Them – giant marauding insects, are a folk memory. Young Evelyn War however will be the first to realise that this quiet is not what it seems, that the Auxs themselves, having been bred for hand-hand combat in a war long-thought to be over, and now idling violently in peace in the subways and collapsing buildings in Europe, must set aside their petty hostilities if they are to face the battle to come. Evelyn is the only one to see the oncoming storm, but the clan leaders and her elders do not believe her warnings, and time is running short.

Review:

(I got an ARC through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

My review comes a little late, I should’ve read this novel in June or July, and posted back then. Ah, well…

Mixed opinions on this one. It’s set in the world of the comics Kingdom, but decades after their events. I never read the comics, so I probably missed a few interesting things, or didn’t “get” everything right; I honestly can’t tell. On the other hand, since I approached the novel with an unknowing eye, at least I can tell what would work for new readers, and what wouldn’t. Or so I hope.

The setting is definitely a post-apocalyptic one. At some point, “Them” (giant insects of sorts—possibly alien?) came to Earth; to hunt them down, the humans engineered dog-human hybrids, the Aux, powerful fighters meant to obey the voice of their “Masters”. One of them in particular, Gene the Hackman, became quite the legend, to the point that every tale told by the Aux today, gathered in packs in the old Berlin underground stations and tunnels, start with a recap of what he did. The weather changed (or was changed), leading to a “Time of Ice” that made Earth too cold for the insects, and drove survivors underground. I think this is the gist of the background story behind this world, and if it indeed is, then the book is clearly understandable from a new reader’s point of view.

I wrote “mixed opinions” earlier on, though, because Kingdom also has a deterrent potential, depending on what you’re looking for in it. So I’m going to proceed in a “what I liked/disliked” fashion, and let readers decide if this would be their cup of tea or not.

What I liked:

* The Aux live according to a pack mentality loosely based on dogs’. Not wolves, for a change, but dogs. Their mythology, their beliefs, have evolved along such lines. They display attitudes and personalities of fierce warriors, with both male and female being sent to “scrap” (kill the insects), but deep inside, there’s still talk of “Masters”, of “keeping Them off the lawn” (in a way, that was almost cute). It’s indeed as if they were dogs given a human voice to speak of what their owner expected of them, and they don’t take kindly to those who go “feral”, start forgetting their duties.

* The names: every Aux has a name reminiscent of a famous writer/poet, sometimes being exactly the same, sometimes not, but always with a hint of what they stand for: Ezra Pound, Evelyn War, Makewar Thackeray, and so on. This brought a smile to my face more than once, although I’d have liked to know why they had such names.

* The Berlin setting. I like underground stations in general, but I don’t know Berlin, so I was both in familiar territory and in one a little different from the usual Anglo-Saxon cities I read about in novels. The third person narrators are Aux, and they see everything through their own eyes, obviously. I liked that little game of reading a description and piecing things up to determine what was its original function. The station plans, for instance. Or the “voice of the Master” that is actually an old recording of which tunnel each train had to run in.

* The Aux mythology, their tales of Gene the Hackman who walked the earth to kill “Them”:

Gene the Hackman, top dog, him done the great Walk Around. Not for him the darkness, not for him the cold, not for him the Time of Ice. Gene the Hackman, him got whet. Gene the Hackman, him got whet and walked the Earth and him killed Them.

He’s a role model for them all, but the tale-teller, Edward Leer, had a way to use his Gene stories to weave new tales, and adapt them to the pack’s current predicament.

* The Aux speech patterns. They talk in mangled, broken English that fits well with their origins: simple words (just like the ones you’d use to order dogs around), a lot of playing on words (get wet/get whet—although that one doesn’t work with the “hw-” feature in my own accent), yet that also gave every dialogue a strange musical lilt. It enhanced the oral quality of their culture, as well as their existence as warriors bred for one thing only, and now living as if the threat was still here, while slowly losing their ways. (Once-revered Hearers, those who received orders from the Masters, aren now despised, just like those who believe in their words.)

What I disliked:

* I never got a clear idea of what the Aux looked like. At first I imagined them 100% human-looking, only with a pack mentality, but this seemed a little too… clean? to my liking. They have hands and legs (they wear gloves, trousers, can use crowssbows…) so they don’t have paws, but are their faces hybrid of dog and human, or not? I could never tell.

* Things got repetitive after a while, with the pack moving around looking for alliances and getting into various fights. The story ran in circles, much like them, which in terms of matching patterns did fit, but wasn’t so interesting in terms of plot.

* This included the broken English, a make-it-or-break-it deal in my opinion. It was pleasant to my “mental ears” in the beginning, but in the end, I wished the characters sometimes used different expressions for a change, not always “time to get whet” or “there’s strength in numbers”.

* I still don’t know if it’s a standalone stories, or the beginning of a series. The story took its sweet time to get to the ending. Then, once said ending was here, I thought it was too abrupt, and both too open and too closed at the same time: we can easily imagine what will come next, and it seems like there aren’t that many possibilities left for the Aux.

* I would’ve enjoyed more details about the world. The Aux never talk about packs outside Berlin, in other cities. We don’t know if the Masters are still here, nor how the Hearers managed to listen to them (was it some different chemistry in their brains?). What is this “Auxtralia” mentioned once? (It sounds like Australia, but that would be way too far considering the Berlin setting.) Why did they have writers’ names, was it some tradition initiated by the Masters? I guess someone who’s read the comic books will have some of those answers, but I didn’t, and I was a little frustrated.

Overall, though I kind of enjoyed this book, I wasn’t awed. I liked its atmosphere, but not so much its plot.

Yzabel / August 8, 2014

Review: Blood Crown

Blood Crown by Ali Cross

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

Androids have claimed power over what remains of the human race. They rule without remorse. They are the Mind and humans exist only to serve them.

But it wasn’t always so.

Before the android uprising, select droids, called Servants, were pivotal in engineering a new human race with nanotechnology enhanced DNA. The Blood Crown theorum was to be humanity’s crowning glory and the key to their survival in deep space.

But Serantha, Daughter of the West, was the last female to receive Gifts from her Servant and when the Mind mutinied, she was hidden away, and presumed dead.

Without Serantha there is no hope of the Blood Crown being realized so Nicolai, Son of the East, abandons his crown to join the rebel forces. He might not provide the future for his people he had once dreamed of, but he will not go down without a fight.

When Nicolai discovers Sera among a small compliment of kitchen staff, everything changes–but Sera’s Gifts were never completed and she is ill-equipped to face a legion of androids determined to wipe her, and every other human, out of existence.

Their only hope is the Blood Crown–but even if Serantha and Nicolai can realize their potential it may be too late to save mankind.

Review:

(I got a digital copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

This book throws you directly into the action, with little info dumping in the beginning: we learn information as the plot goes, and this is a method I tend to like. I found it easy enough to understand the premise of the story (the hope of enhanced humanity through nano-technology, the androids rebelling against their creators and taking control…). And the mastermind behind the android faction was devious enough to my liking. A little on the boasting side, yet with a tendency to keep a contingency plan on the side, and screw with the heroes’ minds a little more every time. I like that.

However, there were a lot of things I didn’t quite know what to make of, and those contributed to make me consider Blood Crown as a little sub-average, when I would’ve wanted to enjoy it more (from the blurb, I really hoped I would).

First, there were three points of view, but I felt that only Sera’s was really useful. Nicolai’s tended to rehash things the reader has already learnt, only with his opinion about it. Not completely uninteresting, but clearly unneeded. Archibald’s… Well, the way he saw Sera was sweet, and highlighted the possibility of feelings within machines, the “can an artificial intelligence be like a human or only copy it”; unfortunately, his scenes were often pretty short, made of waiting for events to happen, and not really useful either. Too bad; his presence could’ve been made better.

Sometimes, the characters’ actions were also hard to understand. Both Nic and Sera tended to jump into situations without thinking them through, not always because they lacked time, but because… I don’t know? And then I didn’t see any point to Nic’s lies, pretending he didn’t know who Sera was, when just explaining everything would’ve been so much easier and faster. For what reason? A very insignificant one, considering the big picture and what was at stake. It led to mistrust on Sera’s part, and to misunderstandings of a kind I don’t like: those that are here only to create artificial tension, not because they’re logical. In a way, the Mind’s apparent lack of logics (making humans cook food nobody would eat) seemed more believabe, in a “we’re superior to humans but in fact we imitate them because we want to be like them, only better, oh the irony” way.

I remain divided about the West/East thing: those terms don’t make much sense to me in space, and seemed a remnant of some USA & Eastern block thing, minus the Cold War. The ships’ names (New Oregon, New California…) and the Eastern peopel’s names (Nicolai, Natalya, Karenina…) definitely gave a very open feeling about that. Part of me is saying “sure, why not?”, while another still can’t really fathom it. Some thousand years later, in space, would we still care much about that? And what about the rest of the world? Where were people from Asian, African, or any other descent?

The pace was good enough until around 60-65% of the story… then it fell into too much romance. I didn’t mind the romance itself in hereas I do in other novels: both Nic and Sera had been kind of “programmed” for that from the beginning, with their symbiants acting to put them together, so, OK, not cool in terms of personal freedom, but not out of the blue either. Only what should’ve been a part mounting towards climax wasn’t, because both heroes were busy being romancy. At that point, I got bored.

In conclusion: interesting premise and good ideas that weren’t developed enough, and didn’t do it for me in the end. More like 1.5 stars.

Yzabel / August 6, 2014

Review: Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer

Pinocchio, Vampire Slayer Complete Edition by Van Jensen

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

This puppet may not be a real boy… but he just might be a real hero! When bloodthirsty monsters invade Pinocchio’s hometown and kill his father, Geppetto, Pinocchio discovers a new benefit to his magical nose: telling lies produces a never-ending supply of wooden stakes to combat the vampire hordes! Will Pinocchio be able to defeat these horrors, avenge his father, and save his friends? Now, for the first time, the complete trilogy is collected together in a single deluxe softcover edition. Jensen (Green Lantern Corps) and Higgins (Knights of the Living Dead) present a captivating blend of comedy, horror, romance, and adventure, rooted in the original Italian novel, but brought – as if by magic – to new life.

Review:

(I got a copy through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

As honest a review as possible, since it was a preview that contained about half the graphic novel, and I have no idea how it’s supposed to end.

I quite liked it. Its premise felt somewhat weird, but all things considered, it was actually fairly logical: killing vampires with wooden stakes… Well, here’s a puppet with an endless supply, for as long as he can tell lies, and lies are easy to come by. So why not?

The drawing style isn’t a favourite of mine, but it was dark, sharp and raw, and in my opinion, this fit with the mood of the comics. The plot’s rooted in the original tale, with characters out of it and somewhat changed (the cricket’s a ghost, the fairy’s kind of dying, Master Cherry creates weird weapons…) and events that clearly aren’t the nice ones a lot of us got used to when reading more childish retellings (or watching the Disney version). Pinocchio became a vampire hunter after Geppetto was killed by such a monster, and while this places the story’s theme in the traditional revenge-type category, it worked for me. It also deals with related themes such as the matters of letting go, of trying to find a balance, a new life, and how those things aren’t so easy to achieve. Also, being human might not be such a boon after all.

The story had several twists and turns, and possibly some more in the part I didn’t get to read. I won’t place buying the complete volume on my priority list, but I’ll possibly do that at some point or other, if only to see where the characters will go from there (the excerpt ends on quite a cliffhanger).

Yzabel / August 3, 2014

Review: Blackout

Blackout by Tim Curran

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

In the midst of a beautiful summer, in a perfectly American suburban middle-class neighborhood, a faraway evil is lurking, waiting to strike the unsuspecting residents.

First come the flashing lights, then the heavy rains, high winds, and finally a total blackout. But that’s only the beginning…

When the whipping black tentacles fall from the sky and begin snatching people at random, the denizens of Piccamore Way must discover the terrifying truth of what these beings have planned for the human race.

Review:

(I got an ARC of this book through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

3.5 stars, not sure yet if I’ll round it up to 4, but nonetheless a story that I enjoyed reading. I’m not familiar with this author, but I’d definitely check more from him later on.

Blackout focuses on a series of strange disappearances and occurrences in the suburgs at night. After people went about their day and evening the normal way (BBQ with the neighbours, one too many drinks), the night turns out to be a long, nightmarish one. Darkness fills the sky. Lights remain turned out. No phone, no internet. Nobody knows what’s going, except that one by one, the inhabitants vanish, as if out of thin air. Or maybe not? Maybe it has something to do with the eerie lights in the sky, or with the creepy black cables dangling from above, coiling in seemingly harmless masses, until someone touches them, that is.

The characters in this story are of the Everyday Joe type: the sexy wife who feels her beauty capital running out; the sturdy, protective husband; the political activist prone to ranting about the people in charge’s lack of response; the narrator, a normal guy in so many ways; an old lady going on dementia, but with surprising bolts of insight at time; a mother and her children. Cliché in a way, sure, yet also easy to place, a set of characters in which, somehow, a lot of people could find a bit of themselves.

The setting, the way things happened, were quite stifling, and in spite of the place itself being a town, it felt as if everyting was going on behind closed doors. The people couldn’t escape, even by car, and every attempt was sure to be met with something, whether gruesome outcome or within-an-inch escape. This kept on enhancing the fact that they were on their own, and made it seem less and less likely that help would come. Feelings of pressure and horror were in for me here, and I was glad for my nerves I mostly read it during the day, not at 2 am. Also, nobody gets a free pass here, with death looming above everybody.

I would’ve liked to see a few more happenings, I think. A few more confrontations between the characters, which in my opinion would really have cranked up the stifling factor up a notch—I sometimes felt that tension arosen leading up to more cracks in the facade, but then one of the involved characters would be removed, and the tension fell down. Probably a matter of personal preference here. Probably also due to the story’s length (it’s a novella, after all).

Overall, a fairly decent story that falls both in the horror and science fiction genres. It’s not the most original one, it didn’t blow my mind, but I liked reading it.

Yzabel / July 31, 2014

Review: Deadly Little Sins

Deadly Little Sins: A Prep School Confidential Novel by Kara Taylor

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

It’s August and Anne is back in New York City for the summer, but she can’t escape the memories of the terrible things that happened at the Wheatley School last spring— and the possibility of being expelled looming over her. When an unexpected— and suspicious— turn of events gets Anne sent back to Wheatley, she’s determined to figure out what happened to her favorite teacher and only adult ally at the school: Ms. Cross.

After a shocking, gruesome murder with connections to the Wheatley School occurs, Anne is convinced there’s more to Ms. Cross’s sudden disappearance, and that her favorite teacher is in danger. But after an ugly breakup with Brent and a new, inexplicable distance between her and Anthony, Anne isn’t sure who she can trust. And even worse, Anne discovers evidence that someone at Wheatley is covering up what really happened to Ms. Cross— someone who will stop at nothing to keep Anne from learning the truth in this engrossing, unputdownable read.

Review:

(I got an ARC from NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

Still a page-turner for me: there was something quite compelling to it no matter what. Unfortunately, I didn’t like it as much as I did the previous two books.

I felt Anne had lost some of her intensity, and that her needing to juggle with her school work, friends and investigation looked less like a conundrum, and more like her detaching herself from everything, not caring anymore. The daily scenes with friends, frenemies and people who didn’t like her at school were mostly gone. Her “love life” made me wonder what the point to the whole (slight) triangle was, after all. Of course her character couldn’t get unscathed from the previous series of events, but this wasn’t the Anne I knew and had grown to love.

The mystery this time also seemed less satisfying, perhaps because it was less tied to Wheatley’s daily life and occurrences than those in the other books? It answered some questions, which isn’t bad, yet it also left a few other strings hanging. For instance, what about Alexis’s part in here, what happened to her afterwards? She’s one of those unpleasant characters with a past that explains some of their reactions and attitude problems, and it would’ve been interesting to see her part of the story given an ending as well. However, it’s like her arc was just dropped and never picked up again. Same with Anthony’s[Anthony’s (hide spoiler)], who barely appears anyway. And some characters were clearly introduced for the sake of being plot devices, like the rio of boys and their freshman girl target. This could have developed into more, yet never did.

Speaking of the ending, the big reveal and how it unfolded was sort of rushed; and what happened after, the offer made to Ann, was rather unrealistic. It hints at a potential new series, one that would happen on a whole other level, but I’m not sure if I’d appreciate that or not. Part of my interest for the series was the boarding school setting, so with this potentially removed, I don’t know…

I’m torn, really. I liked this series a lot, and I sort of liked this third installment as well, but it left me terribly unsatisfied, compared to the others, and way too flat. 2 to 2.5 stars here.

Yzabel / July 30, 2014

Review: Erased

Erased by Margaret Chatwin

My rating: [rating=4]

Summary:

There’s that moment – you know the moment – when you emerge from sub-consciousness and enter full awareness. Now imagine reaching that moment with a pounding head, throbbing body, hospital ID band around your wrist, and no memory. No idea why you hurt the way you do, or how you got where you are. No clue what your own name is, or who the people next to you are.
I’m seventeen-year-old Ryan Farnsworth, and that’s what happened to me. Now I have to walk a mile in my own, unfamiliar shoes; view myself through the eyes of a perfect stranger; live the life a former me chose. I also need to figure out why that former me tried to kill me.

Review:

(Book read and reviewed for {Read It & Reap 315} in the Shut Up And Read group.)

This is the second book I read by this author, and like the previous one, I found it very easy to get into the story, always wanting to read “just one more chapter” before having to put it down. There was something pretty compelling to the writing, to the way the main character went about his life (though I’d have a hard time explaining how exactly such an effect was achieved).

In any case, I found “Erased” to be an interesting take on the themes of amnesia and, most of all, second chances. Ryan, the main character, is just coming back from a three-month stay in the hospital after a horrible car crash, with barely any memory of his family, his friends, and what his old life used to be. All he knows in the beginning is that his accident was very likely a suicide attempt… but of course, he doesn’t know why he wanted to kill himself, and trying to reclaim his life, in between coping with his body that’s far from done healing, is already hard enough a job as it is.

And this is where things are interesting, because the cracks start quickly showing under an apparently pristine surface, cracks Ryan may or may not have noticed before. Now that he’s more of a watcher, someone who observes the lives of those strangers called “parents” and “brother” and “girlfriend”, he’s also able to see them for what they really are, or at least, for what they might have made him feel before. The teenager he used to be—popular, football star, with plenty of friends and a gorgeous girlfriend—may not have been such a stellar person. Ryan’s brother is clearly hostile, in a justified way that Ryan just can’t understand because, well, he doesn’t remember, all that simply. And then, there’s Paige, the first person Ryan actually makes friends with post-accident, the one he remembers making friends with, which makes a huge difference.

Ryan was given a second chance, one to make things right, or at the very least to realise what was wrong before and not go through the same mistakes again. However, the other thing I really liked in this story was how things seemed very black and white at first, yet always had another edge, depending on whose point of view you relied. For instance, Ryan’s father behaves in a very encouraging way, motivating his son to go through physical therapy, to try and do things by himself (climbing stairs…) and not get caught into remaining physically weakened; Ryan used to be an excellent football player, one who could’ve easily gone to college on a scholarship thanks to that, and his father keeps reminding him of that in order to make him claim back his old life. Only Ryan isn’t so sure anymore he liked football that much, and feels under constant pressure… but he also doesn’t dare tell his father this, caving under this very pressure, when communication could’ve been key here. The same way, both his parents try to help him by throwing a party for him to meet all his family and old friends again, so that he can get reacquainted with them. The result? Ryan feels at unease, overwhelmed, starts to resent their decision—but he doesn’t tell them that meeting those people one by one, gradually, would’ve felt better for him. And Lucas, well, Lucas appears like an asshole to Ryan, for sure. However, his attitude made me wonder: how would I react if someone who had treated me badly for all my life suddenly waltzed back in without any memory, any regret of what s/he did to me? Lucas’s position was one of terrible pent-up frustration with no real outlet, in fact.

Nobody’s perfect here, people keep making mistakes, trying to clutch at memories, at a former life that won’t come back, or not the way it used to be. I thought it was an interesting take on this theme of how to live with amnesia, how to find oneself, and also how good intentions can quickly become hurdles, because nobody’s really equipped to react “the right way” to such trials. There isn’t even a “right way” at all in my opinion.

On the downside, the copy I got could’ve done with another round of edits. I found several typos, mistakes and formatting errors that became annoying after a while. I don’t know if it was my file only, though, or if other editions have the same problem. (It wouldn’t be the first time a file reads oddly on my phone, but not on another tablet. I’ve had it happen regularly with galleys, among other things.)

Then I was torn regarding my feelings about Ryan’s relationships with Paige. What I found more important here was the way things changed between Ryan and Lucas, whether such loathe between brothers could be mended or not, and this was a very moving and beautiful story to read. On the other hand, I felt Paige to be somewhat… just there. As a friend, she was all right; as a love interest, I was never sure if this was a good choice, if it was really that useful. I also wondered about a few other characters in the book, a few other relationships that could’ve been explored deeper (Ryan and his mother, or some of his former friends, mostly): I expected Ryan to pay more attention to those, whether it was to try and get his memories back or to understand better what kind of person he was before and what kind of things he did.

Overall, I’m giving this story 3.5 stars. I’m rounding it to 4 here because, in spite of its shortcomings, I really liked seeing how Ryan discovered the boy he was before, struggled with the idea, yet still tried to get past it and become a better person by learning from his former self. Basically, he had to function differently (if only because he couldn’t rely on even simple physical actions like keeping his balance), and I think he went through this in believable ways, including bouts of depression, of denial, but also of acceptance and will to become a new person, a self he could look in the face without being ashamed.

Yzabel / July 29, 2014

Review: Horrorstör

Horrorstör by Grady Hendrix

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

Something strange is happening at the Orsk furniture superstore in Columbus, Ohio. Every morning, employees arrive to find broken Kjerring wardrobes, shattered Brooka glassware, and vandalized Liripip sofa beds clearly, someone or something is up to no good.

To unravel the mystery, five young employees volunteer for a long dusk-till-dawn shift—and they encounter horrors that defy imagination. Along the way, author Grady Hendrix infuses sly social commentary on the nature of work in the new twenty-firstcentury economy.

A traditional haunted house story in a contemporary setting (and full of current fears), Horrorstör comes conveniently packaged in the form of a retail catalog, complete with illustrations of ready-to-assemble furniture and other, more sinister accessories. We promise you’ve never seen anything quite like it!

Review:

(I got an ARC through Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.)

3.5 stars. An interesting enough blend, in my opinion, of an IKEA/retail parody coupled with horror/ghost stories elements, though after a while, I wished said blend had been more balanced (hence my rating: I would have liked this book more if it had been the case, I think).

It plays on several tropes typical of the genre (people isolated in a haunted place, with dangerous things happening as soon as they’re separated, etc.), while also offering tongue-in-cheek criticism of large retail stores practices. One thing I really liked, both as a reader and as a graphic-designer, was that the book itself reads like an IKEA catalogue, complete with square format, furniture illustrations, pseudo-Swedish names. Those schemas also gradually shift from innocent-looking retail items to contraptions and devices that appear in the real horror part, and the change was subtle enough to make me at unease without realising, for a few seconds, what was actually wrong.

The characters weren’t too likeable in the beginning, in a cardboard-cut way, but some of them I started to appreciate after a while, and they displayed growth as well: nobody could get out unchanged from such an experience, after all, and the changes seemed to me both traumatising as well as positive.

Oddly enough, or maybe not, the serious horror part didn’t really cut it for me. It was definitely creepy, with vivid descriptions, and definitely fit what I’d expected from a horror story. In fact, I’m of a mind to dub it “Silent Hill meets IKEA”, in that the places the characters are trapped in aren’t merely frightening: they also toy with their psyches. However, I realised I missed the funnier tone from earlier chapters. The book cover made me expect more satire, and so, in the end, I felt a little disappointed in that regard.

Nevertheless, I’d recommend this story. It was entertaining, had its really scary parts, and its ending provides a conclusion to the night’s events while still leaving room for enough speculation—not a cliffhanger, but reader’s imagination, which is something I always appreciate.

Yzabel / July 28, 2014

Review: The Very Best of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Volume 2

The Very Best of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Volume 2 by Gordon Van Gelder

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

Fantasy & Science Fiction continues to showcase some of the most famous authors writing in any genre. The magazine jumpstarted the careers of bestselling authors such as Roger Zelazny, Bruce Sterling, and Jane Yolen and continues to champion bold new crossover talents including Paolo Bacigalupi and Ken Liu.

Now drawing upon F&SF’s impressive history of classic and contemporary tales, this extraordinary companion anthology revisits and expands upon sixty-five years’ worth of top-notch fiction. These broad-ranging, award-winning tales appeal to readers of genre fiction and beyond, exploring alternate history, time travel, urban fantasy, virtual reality, modern myth, horror, interstellar travel, epic fantasy, mystery, and space opera.

Review:

(I got a copy of this book from NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.)

3.5 stars for this collection of 27 stories, some of which are funny and grotesque, some others dark and disturbing.

Strangely, I didn’t feel that much of a connection with a lot of those. Maybe I’ve become picky after a few disappointing experiences with anthologies recently, or maybe I tend to expect more definite endings; I regularly got the feeling that this or that story was interesting (because of its theme and/or the questions it raised), but without going as far as I thought it should go, considering that I expected “the best”, yet felt I got “good only”. It’s definitely strange, indeed, since I wouldn’t say those texts are bad. Objectively, there’s a lot of creativity in here, lots of different concepts, lots of exploring, which all represent a variety of stages in the history of speculative fiction. Subjectively, they just didn’t touch me the way I thought they would.

My favourites:

* Maneki Neko: I really like the idea of a network linking people, everybody being a link in the large picture chain without knowing what it’s going to end in, but performing acts (of kindness, but also totally random sometimes) for strangers. It would almost seem of the conspiratorial kind… but it could also be seen as another way of living, with the awareness that whatever you do for others, someday a stranger will do something good for you as well.

* The People of Sand and Slag: An exploration in what being human entails, once technology/biotech have gone so far that human beings can regrow limbs, live on basically dirt if they need to, and have lost part of what make us who we currently are.

* The Paper Menagerie: Bittersweet and touching, a tale of magic and love gone misunderstood until it’s much too late for the protagonist to do anything about it.

* The Anything Box: An interesting reflection of people’s (especially children’s) ability to dream, and how this ability can be so easy to crush by other people who think they know so much better than you. After I read it, I was all the more determined to never let anything destroy my soul.

* The Prize of Peril: Probably not as original today as it was when it was first published, but as far as reality TV goes, it definitely felt “right”. The Good Samaritans, the people helping the protagonist, aren’t so good as willing to see danger pop up here and there for as long as possible. Very ambiguous.

Not so favourites, though still intriguing:

* The Bone Woman, as a tale of second chances and dreams given to those who’ve lost everything.

* The New York Times at Special Bargain Rates, for its blend of haunting longing and trying to fit into a new life.

* Winemaster: An exploration of microcosms on different scales, how they may be perceived, and where people would draw the line at, well, “people” and “not-people anymore.”

* The Aliens Who Knew, I Mean, Everything: Pretty amusing. I somehow expected the ending, yet it still made me chuckle no matter what.

* The Third Level: Here, too, I could somewhat sense the twist coming. However, it was one of those stories where it just doesn’t matter: you see it coming, you want it to come, and it’s really satisfying.

Overall, it is a pretty satisfying collection, and makes for an appropriate introduction to lots of different types of SF/F stories, especially for readers who’re not very familiar with what those genres at large have to offer. My “problem” with it is mostly personal, a matter of feeling, rather than of actual literary worth. Sometimes, it just happens…

Yzabel / July 24, 2014

Review: William Shakespeare’s Star Wars : Verily, A New Hope

William Shakespeare’s Star Wars by Ian Doescher

My rating: [rating=4]

Summary:

Inspired by one of the greatest creative minds in the English language—and William Shakespeare—here is an officially licensed retelling of George Lucas’s epic Star Wars in the style of the immortal Bard of Avon. The saga of a wise (Jedi) knight and an evil (Sith) lord, of a beautiful princess held captive and a young hero coming of age, Star Wars abounds with all the valor and villainy of Shakespeare’s greatest plays. ’Tis a tale told by fretful droids, full of faithful Wookiees and fearsome Stormtroopers, signifying…pretty much everything.

Reimagined in glorious iambic pentameter—and complete with twenty gorgeous Elizabethan illustrations—William Shakespeare’s Star Wars will astound and edify Rebels and Imperials alike. Zounds! This is the book you’re looking for.

Review:

(I’ve had my sights on this book for quite a while. When I saw it up on Edelweiss, I promptly requested a digital copy, and was pretty glad I was approved quickly. All this in exchange for an honest review, of course.)

I must confess I’m a long-time Shakespeare addict. I sure don’t find all his works wonderful, I have my favourites and my not-so-favourites, and sometimes I take it more in jest than in earnest, but we’re nevertheless speaking here of someone who recognises her iambic pentameters when she sees them, and who can still quote most of Edmund’s speeches even five years after studying King Lear. I am, simply put, totally biased, and not ashamed of it the least bit.

I’m also an old Star Wars nerd. Seriously. I stopped counting a long time ago (in a galaxy far, far away) how many times I watched the original triolgy—both the first version and the remastered one. Also, know that I drive to the tune of Darth Vader’s voice giving me directions whenever I turn my GPS on.

Simply put, as I was reading this play, I kept thinking: “My, actually staging it would be great, and I’d probably be ready to do it, even though I have no experience whatsoever in theatrics”.

I also couldn’t help but find traces of Joseph Campbell in there, which the afterword confirmed, and which isn’t surprising at all. Shakespeare’s plays rest on a lot of classical archetypes, and George Lucas’s do as well, considering his own contacts with Campbell’s works. (Have I ever said I deeply admire the latter?)

This book contains a lot of things I loved:
* Hints at scenes from Shakespeare’s plays, including Luke delivering a “poor Yorick” soliloquy while contemplating the helmet of the Stormtrooper whose armour he stole.
* Proper use of “wherefore” (honestly, you have no idea how good it is to find an author who doesn’t mistake it for “where”).
* Hilarious asides from R2D2, whose bleeping and various other noises are only a cover for real thoughts. Pretty much like the typical Fool, in fact.
* Tongue-in-cheek quips at the movies:

HAN: Aye, true, I’ll warrant thou hast wish’d this day.
[They shoot, Greedo dies.
[To innkeeper:] Pray, goodly Sir, forgive me for the mess.
[Aside:] And whether I shot first, I’ll ne’er confess!

* Leaning on, or even breaking the fourth wall, and addressing the audience, much like in the original plays.
* Strong attempts at respecting the movie’s lines:

VADER I find thy lack of faith disturbing

LEIA Thou truly art in jest. Art thou not small
Of stature, if thou art a stormtrooper?

* Actual stage directions—probably one of the reasons why I felt this could very well be staged.
* Iambic pentameters. I checked. I counted. They’re not so easy to pull.
* Illustrations in the shape of etchings featuring Star Wars characters with their normal looks combined to some late Elizabethan fashion elements.

I was less at ease with the fifth act, though, and I think it was mainly because the Star Wars scene is a space battle, yet trying to conform to stage directions led to a lot of talking and describing actions. The attempt didn’t work so well as it did in other parts of the book. I also questioned how the book may be perceived if read by someone who doesn’t appreciate both SW and Shakespeare: I’m not convinced it would make a good introduction to either of those. One definitely needs to be acquainted with both to start appreciating it.

Overall: a few things I didn’t like, but that never hampered my enjoyment of the book. I found it cleverly executed, as well as both a fun read and one that made me try and match scenes/quotes from the movies with their potential parallels in Shakespeare’s plays. 4.5 stars.

Yzabel / July 23, 2014

Review: Tabula Rasa

Tabula Rasa by Kristen Lippert-Martin

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

The Bourne Identity meets Divergent in this action-packed debut thriller with a Katniss-esque heroine fighting to regain her memories and stay alive, set against a dystopian hospital background.

Sarah starts a crazy battle for her life within the walls of her hospital-turned-prison when a procedure to eliminate her memory goes awry and she starts to remember snatches of her past. Was she an urban terrorist or vigilante? Has the procedure been her salvation or her destruction?

The answers lie trapped within her mind. To access them, she’ll need the help of the teen computer hacker who’s trying to bring the hospital down for his own reasons, and a pill that’s blocked by an army of mercenary soldiers poised to eliminate her for good. If only she knew why . . .

Review:

(I got a copy through Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.)

Good idea and interesting beginning, but the second third kind of dragged in my opinion, and the ending was, well, wrapped up in a trope that made me really roll my eyes.

I liked the premise of PTSD victims being given a second chance (whether “true” victims or perpetrators) by having their memory removed—or at least, all the memories pertaining the trauma and/or crime. And in the beginning, nothing is certain as far as Sarah, the narrator, is concerned: was she so psychologically damaged and abused that she couldn’t function even with normal treatments? Or was she some hardboiled criminal, considering how despised she was by some of the hospital’s personnel? I thought the ambiguity was well-played here, because both reactions were present: nice doctors and nurses making small talk with her, while others would scowl and prevent her from having contact with other patients. Her skills, too, were ambiguous: they could be those of a burglar just as well as those of an acrobat, after all.

However, I found the pacing after that rather problematic, being a blend of action scenes interspersed with slow moments in which info was dumped and nothing really interesting happened. The mandatory YA romance subplot felt boring, too, and as is too often the case didn’t bring anything to the story. On the one hand, I get that it was part of Sarah’s development and return to her true self, something to make her feel like fighting and not give upt, but… on the other hand, does a person in such a situation really need some love interest to do that? Why did it have to be romance? One that sprang in a couple of days or so, no more. I don’t dislike romance plots; however, most of the time, they’re not really useful, and are of the marketing ploy kind, “because romance sells”, instead of being fully part of the story. Here, that was exactly my impression. Budding love? Sure. Full-blown romance with “I love you” and feelings that the person is/was The One, in less than 72 hours? Doesn’t work for me. In this type of setting, survival is key, and professing love just like that was kind of cheesy anyway.

Some of the plot points were fairly predictable, along with conveniently placed flashbacks and special snowflake syndrome (after a while). Add to this a few mind-boggling moments, such as soldiers not even taking someone’s pulse to see if that person’s indeed dead (huh?). Also, I didn’t like the ending—more specifically, the part where the Big Bad nicely explains what the plan was all about. I want explanations, of course, only I prefer them to be shown to me, not unveiled in a gloating villain speech. It’s been done too often for it to work, not to mention that the villain’s motives were… too basic.

On the bright side, somehow I still managed to like Sarah and Thomas. They had a “no bullshit” streak, in that they planned to get things done and acted on those plans, and didn’t mope around while being useless. I’m tired of heroines who don’t get anything done themselves, and Sarah was all but that. Which is why I’m leaning towards 1.5/2 stars here.