science fiction Archives - Page 13 of 16

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 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 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.

Yzabel / July 7, 2014

Review: Tales of the Hidden World

Tales of the Hidden World by Simon R. Green

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

Seventeen delightfully unexpected stories from Simon R. Green–including a brand-new adventure of the Droods–take us deep into the Darkside, embroil us in the Secret Histories, and lead us into the shadowy places where monsters and demons roamWelcome to the worlds of Simon R. Green. In this wide-ranging collection, the “New York Times”-bestselling urban fantasist opens doors into hidden places: strange realms bordering our own mundane existence and prowled by creatures of fancy and nightmare. Here are the strange, frequently deadly–and sometimes even dead–things that lurk in garbage-strewn city alleyways and grimy subway stations after midnight, visible only to the most perceptive human or inhuman eye.In these tales, Green revisits the ingenious worlds within worlds that he created for his wildly popular novels. Take a stroll on the Darkside with a jaded street wizard, an underpaid government functionary responsible for keeping demons, vamps, and aliens in line. Enter the hidden recesses of Drood Hall, where the aging family member who creates powerful weapons that protect humankind recalls his long and bloody career. Join a squad of no-longer-human soldiers dispatched to combat the all-consuming jungle on a distant planet. Visit a house at the intesection of two realities that serves as a sanctuary from the evil of “all” worlds. Confront the unstoppable zombie army of General Kurtz in a brilliant homage to “Apocalypse Now.” And whatever you do, never forget that there “are” monsters out there. Really.Each story includes a new afterword by the author.

Review:

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

I’m not quite sure what to make of this anthology. I only know Simon R. Green through his Hawk & Fisher series, of which I only read the first volume, so I applied for this one thinking it’d make a good introduction to his writing in general, but… I’m not so sure anymore. For instance, the first story, for instance, deals with the Armourer of the Drood family, and while I mostly got what it was about, it feels like not knowing the corresponding series is a slight problem. Or maybe it’s just me.

Also, I admit I skipped the second story (“Street Wizard”), because I had already read it a few weeks ago in another anthology.

Most of those stories were rather dark, which was all right with me, since I was in a mood to read about characters put in such situations. I guess mostly my problems with this anthology stemmed from the choice of stories, whose plots in general didn’t seem so thrilling, and whose twists were fairly predictable (“Dorothy Dreams”), or kind of flat (“Down and Out in Deadtown”). The last third of the book is made of older shorts dating back to the 70-80s, and they feel different, incomplete, somehow… unfinished? The last two in particular puzzled me: the prequel was printed after the “main” story, and it removed all suspense as to whether the characters would survive their adventure. I don’t really understand that choice.

I read Hawk & Fisher in French, not in English, so I can’t compare the author’s style here with that in his novels. When it comes to this specific collection, I thought it was heavy on the adverbs.

All in all, lots of good ideas, but not so well executed.

Yzabel / May 15, 2014

Review: The Martian

The Martian by Andy Weir

My rating: [rating=5]

Summary:

Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars.

Now, he’s sure he’ll be the first person to die there.

After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.

Chances are, though, he won’t have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old “human error” are much more likely to kill him first.

But Mark isn’t ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills—and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit—he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?

Review:

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

One of the best books I’ve read this year. Not devoid of flaws, but you know how sometimes, you’ll love a book in spite of those? That was one such time for me.

What I definitely liked:

Mark Watney is basically MacGyver stranded on Mars, trying to survive with whatever remains the Ares 3 crew left behind when they had to abort the mission and leave in a hurry. (Maybe readers who didn’t like that show won’t like this comparison either, but hey, I was 15 the last time I watched it, and I used to love it, so in this review, it’s going to mean “good”.) Surviving out of sheer dumb luck, when everybody believed him utterly lost and, well, dead, Mark has to use every bit of knowledge to make lemonade with all the Martian lemons he’s being thrown at. And there are a lot, from defective materials to his own mistakes. Fortunately, he’s both an engineer and a botanist, which means he does have enough know-how to improvise (as well as try to grow stuff; here go the first Martian potatoes). Unfortunately, he’s not a chemist or whatever else, so he also has to do things through trial and error. And while his predicament is absolutely horrible, since anything can go wrong anytime, it’s also funny and awesome.

Throughout the story, Mark’s voice is highly entertaining. Here’s a man who was picked for his skills, but also for his optimism and sense of humour, in the hopes that he’d be the social glue among the crew—who had to live together in close quarters for the long trip to and fro, as well as on Mars itself. And I think his way of apprehending his many problems was just as much a life-saver as his knowledge, because even though he sometimes lost it, it never lasted for long, and he went back to work soon after. This may seem weird and unbelievable to some, but in a way, I could relate to his character, although not to a complete extent, of course. (I’m the kind of person who’ll scream and run in circles for two minutes, out of panic, then will suddenly calm down and say “OK, back to solving that problem now; and if I can do so while throwing in some bawdy joke, I’ll do.” I kid you not.) So, yes, somewhat unbelievable—and somehow, I just couldn’t care less. I rooted for that character. I wanted him to survive. Period.

Simply put, this book was inventive and fun. I’m still laughing, thinking back to some of Mark’s antics:

He turned back to Venkat. “I wonder what he’s thinking right now.”

LOG ENTRY: SOL 61

How come Aquaman can control whales? They’re mammals! Makes no sense.

I couldn’t possibly comment. I’ve been known for worse silly random thoughts than that.

Also, please watch your language. Everything you type is being broadcast live all over the world.
[12:15] WATNEY: Look! A pair of boobs! -> (.Y.)

So totally the kind of crap I’d pull as well, just for the sake of light trolling.

I chipped his sacred religious item into long splinters using a pair of pliers and a screwdriver. I figure if there’s a God, He won’t mind, considering the situation I’m in.
If ruining the only religious icon I have leaves me vulnerable to Martian vampires, I’ll have to risk it.

That one, too, cracked me up.

Also, there was a lot of hope in this book, in that Mark wasn’t left to rot and die. People wanted him to survive. His crew wanted to believe that he could make it, that they could help—and they were a great bunch of girls and guys, ifyou like thespace cowboy type. Even other countries helped, even though there wasn’t that much in it for them. Too good to be true? Perhaps. But also beautiful, a beautiful lesson in how sometimes, humanity is still able to unite. Not to mention the bigger-than-life side of this novel: a coming back to older times, to a period when we thought Space was at the tip of our fingers. I’m a child of the eighties, and I still remember my own ideas back then. Colonies on the moon and Mars. Flying cars by year 2000. The space programs progressing to such an extent that we’d travel far, far away by the time I’d be an adult. “The Martian” brought me back to such thoughts: a man able to survive for so long with not the best means, wouldn’t his experience help further the next missions, allow people to believe that so much more could be done, that they could push boundaries a little further?

Potentially problematic:

The scientific explanations, which were to my liking, but may not be to other readers’. My own background in that regard isn’t very developed, so I can’t tell if everything was exact; at least, it seemed to me that things were very well-researched, and made sense (both to me as a neophyte, and when it comes to “science in general”). I enjoyed reading about how exactly Mark came to this or that solution. Like when he found a way to make water. Also hilarious, by the way:

Nitrogen: 22 percent. Oxygen: 9 percent. Hydrogen: 64 percent.
I’ve been hiding here in the rover ever since.
It’s Hydrogenville in the Hab.

There’s no deep psychological development here. Normally, this would be a problem for me, but not here. I can’t explain why. Mark’s humour? The way people banded to try and save him? As said above, I rooted for him. The author made him so likeable I just didn’t care about the rest.

The shift from 1st to 3rd person. It was a little unsettling. On the other hand, I don’t really hold it as a flaw, because I understand why it was done, and I couldn’t see any other way to achieve the same thing. Mark’s narrative just wouldn’t be the same in 3rd person; and if everything was in 1st person, then we’d have no means to see what was happening on Earth, nor what was set in motion to help Mark. This is why I’m not knocking down a star. Besides, at least in this book, I can clearly understand the reasoning behind it (other books I read used the same kind of switch, but with no apparent reason, so…).

As you can see, the last two paragraphs would logically be flaws. But, once again: I don’t care. This novel blew my mind, plain and simple.

Yzabel / April 20, 2014

Review: Have Wormhole, Will Travel

Have Wormhole, Will Travel by Tony McFadden

My rating: [rating=2]

Summary:

Vampires? No Such Thing.

Aliens, though, that’s something else.

They’ve been here, living quietly among us, since before the Industrial Revolution.

Their goal: To ensure we never leave our Solar System. We have a bad habit of wiping out indigenous populations, and theirs is the nearest inhabited planet to ours.

So when a scientist at Sydney University harnesses the power of wormholes, making interstellar travel a virtual walk in the park, one of these tall, pale-skinned aliens, Callum, is forced to choose: destroy us, or help us survive the inevitable Armageddon.

8 billion Earthlings, and our survival is in the hands of one guy – alien – meant to wipe us out.

Review:

[I got this book from NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.]

To be fair, I got it a couple of months ago, perhaps a little more, and should probably have read and reviewed it sooner, but… Oh, well.

I liked the basic idea: an alien race has been monitoring Earth (as well as other planets) to make sure none would develop interstellar travel—wormholes would allow just that. It seems we puny humans have a reputation of pillaging barbarians, so they don’t want us anywhere near their home. As a result, their agents have been on planet for centuries, squashing out scientific discoveries (such as cold fusion) as soon as they hit a little too close to home, so to speak. Callum and Jason (we can assume those aren’t their real names) are two such agents, currently living in Sydney, and so when Professor Sam Sheppard stumbles upon the perfect theory to create instant means of travel by way of wormholes, it’s up to them to report to their own bosses and try to fix the problem… or not.

(I won’t pass judgment on the science aspect. String theory isn’t my forte, and I honestly wouldn’t know if what was mentioned in the novel was true to real science or not.)

This premise raised interesting ethical questions, because the aliens are ready to wipe out all human beings just out of fear (but we are the ruthless barbarians). I definitely would’ve wanted to see this developed some more, especially considering the method used in the attempt to save our planet, because there was strong potential in that. On the one hand, it probably would’ve made for a less funny story; on the other hand, the comical aspects weren’t that funny for me, so I guess that’s why I wouldn’t have minded. The novel didn’t do anything for me in that regard, and I felt at times that it didn’t know where to go, whether to be comical or lean towards more serious science-fiction.

The plot was also a bit disjointed here and there, though nothing that prevented me from following what was happening. There was a lot of dialogue and not that many descriptions, so at times it was a little difficult to picture places and people. I’m usually not for long descriptions anyway, but I admit some more this time would have helped.

The characters, to be honest, left me cold. The three girls convinced that Jacob and Callum were vampires made me smile at first; however, their antics tended to become tiring, and I wasn’t sure in the end what was the point, since one of them is only really important because of where she lives, another is simply comic relief, and they were interchangeable. Same with Sheppard, insufferable prick as he was. Though I get those characters were likely meant to be on the cliché side for the sake of poking fun at clichés, it was hard to actually care about them, and consequently about the fate of Earth and how everything would end. They came off as mean and/or stupid more than anything else. Also, Callum definitely pulls a TSTL: what’s the point of being here to stop Sheppard if you give him the means to create wormholes by accidentally doodling equations on a sheet of paper right under his nose? Hadn’t he done that, the problem would’ve been solved from the beginning. I don’t like it when a plot rests on such “happenings” that aren’t too believable.

Some more background about the aliens would’ve been welcome, too. Since one of them appears to lean towards a relationship with a human being, I expected something to explain it. Their race as a whole brushes off humans as expendable, after all.

All in all, as I said, I liked the idea about wormholes, and the book was in itself an easy read. Unfortunately, the unsavory characters, a couple of plot holes, and the way the story seemed to hesitate between “comical” and “actually serious” didn’t allow me to enjoy this novel more.

Yzabel / April 17, 2014

Review: Cipher

Cipher by S.E. Bennett

My rating: [rating=3]

Summary:

Cipher Omega is a failed experiment, an identical clone of the brilliant, damaged woman whose genome the scientists of the Basement were trying to copy and improve. All her life she has dreamt of life outside the laboratory, on the surface world, but when her home is destroyed and she’s left the only survivor of a hundred-year human cloning project, she is forced to face the reality of the military-ruled nation that created her. Aided by the only other surviving child of the Basement, an enigmatic solider named Tor, and two rebel freedom fighters named Bowen and Oona Rivers, Cipher finds herself searching for answers, at any cost.

Review:

[I got a copy from the publisher through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.]

I quite liked this novel, though I must admit I didn’t enjoy it as much as I had expected.

The Basement setting and situation were intriguing, and I found the story as a whole pervaded with a feeling of oppression. It was more an impression than definite proof, but I had the nagging feeling that everyone was always being watched by someone else. Maybe because of the Feeds, maybe because Cipher remained aware that she had to watch her back at all times, and acknowledged that as soon as she’d let her guard down, it’d be the end. (And I agree she was right in thinking so!)

Cipher was a likeable character, one who was aware of the problems she was in, yet tried to keep fighting, even if it meant lying low for a while. She wasn’t a whiner, she kept focused on what she wanted and hoped for, and she knew how to put her coding and engineering skills to use in order to build a few backdoors. She only allowed herself to trust a handful of people, and wasn’t fooled by the shiny varnish and empty promises of the Municipality. While there were hints of a potential romance too (perhaps even a triangle), she kept her priorities straight and never let herself be engulfed into that, the way too many characters unfortunately seem to do as soon as a love interest appears. Love was an important motivator for her; however, it was ‘love’ in a wider sense, encompassing friendship and wanting to protect the few people she held dear—not the old-as-sin trope of True Love At First Sight Forever for a boy she had just met. And she remained ‘faithful’ to the Basement people, to her father, even to her sisters, in that she mourned them like the people they had been, and didn’t forget about them as soon as she was out, nor no matter how dire her own circumstances.

I also liked the siblings: Oona for her entusiasm for gardening and living things, in a world so devoid of positive life and new births; and Bowen for being overall sympathetic, understanding, and ready to take calculated risks to get the truth out.

A few things bothered me nevertheless. I expected Tor to be more… impressive when it came to planning, and the same went for Sally (deemed quite the strategist, after all). Some things are explained later when it comes to Tor, but I thought his mother wasn’t so foreseeing, and it seemed a little jarring. (Minor quibble about Tor: his way of calling Cipher ‘love’. It’s probably just me, but I can’t stand that, just like I can’t stand ‘babe’.) I wondered about a couple of inconsistencies, too: for instance, how come Cipher didn’t remember Tor from the Basement, when she was only two years younger, and she said she knew everybody there? She was rather young at the time, yet since she remembered classes she took when she was 4-5, I would’ve thought she would remember him as well?

At times, Cipher’s thoughts also intruded too much on the narrative. They weren’t useless, and contained important information, so they weren’t a problem in themselves; only they tended to interrupt the flow, and made me wonder if they wouldn’t have been better included elsewhere.

I wished Bowen and Oona had been given more importance, probably because of The Truth (the unauthorised Feed they broadcast in the beginning): the latter looked like a useful tool, able to ignite a lot of things, yet it just went away, and the siblings became more and more like ‘people to protect’, and not ‘people who mattered thanks to their actions’. (Perhaps I also slightly resented how Oona was important due to her pregnancy; it made sense within the context of that specific world, but I tend to find such things annoying. As a woman, I’m not at ease with the idea that what makes me important is my ability to have children; I want to believe we’re much more than that. This is however a very personal observation, and I doubt it’ll be a problem for every reader.)

In general, I liked this novel, and if there were to be a next installment—the ending kind of begs for one, especially now that Metis[Metis (hide spoiler)] has appeared—I’d probably want to read it. I just can’t push myself to give it more than 3 stars.