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Timebound

Aug26

Title: Timebound (The Chronos Files)

Author: Rysa Walker

Genre: Science Fiction

Length: 374 pages

Read: April 14-18, 2015

Summary: Highly recommended

I found Timebound while searching for best sellers to use as advertising targets for my own time travel novel Untimed (I’ve been experimenting with Amazon’s new do-it-yourself ads).

I’m glad I found the Chronos Files.

At a certain level Timebound shares common DNA with Untimed. They both feature teen protagonists who discover they are time travelers and get dragged into a complex temporal war. There are other time traveling relatives and both mythologies even have “books” that to some extent chronicle/reveal/inform. But most of these similarities fall naturally out of the basic “teen discovers they’re a time traveler” idea. I will note that Untimed was published a year earlier, but even if Rysa Walker happened to read it, she has her own tale to tell.

I should note that I half read half listened this this book, utilizing Amazon’s awesome Whispersync. The narrator is phenomenal too.

Kate’s first person narrative is extremely compelling. She speaks in typical past tense in this first outing, but switches into a lightweight present tense in the second book. The voice is light on description, sticking mostly to people, clothing, time travel equipment, and necessary details. It’s longer on Kate’s internal processing, but uses this to deftly bring our plucky protagonist to life. While she superficially resembles many modern YA heroines, being smart, pretty, courageous, resourceful, and the like, Kate manages to maintain a unique personal feel. Namely, she feels real and essentially human. She acts consistently, and has her own constantly evolving opinion and a strong moral compass.

The balance in this first book favors characterization and “world building” over action and even historical exploration. The opening stresses the family dynamics almost more than the time travel revelations. The inciting event (act 1/2 break) is a 1-2 punch as much about meeting her Grandmother and discovering she’s dying as the temporal shift that deletes Kate’s reality and parents (shades of Untimed as well!). There is a well handled but highly deliberate love triangle involving present day boyfriend and a time traveling past boyfriend who remembers her from another timeline. This is actually one of the better love triangles I’ve seen, because it feels both natural and has a natural pathos that flows out of the timeline shift. Book 1 concentrates on present boyfriend — and on the present itself as well as time travel mythos and mechanics. We don’t actually travel anywhere substantial until about the 75% mark. The romantic elements feel slightly injected at times, but are natural enough and not in the least melodramatic.

This is not really an action book, although it is fast paced and tense. There is a lot of talking and planning and perhaps 75% of the novel occurs inside Kate’s house! The narrative and characters are compelling enough to overcome that locational limitation.

Both boyfriends are well developed, although past boyfriend is mostly a child in this first book (sounds more twisted than it is). The parents, aunt, etc are well characterized. The villains are not as strong as the positive supporting characters. We have the time wrecking mastermind grandfather (barely seen but much heard), medium-bad prophetess aunt, the smirking thug Simon, bitchy Eve, and the creepy and effective 1893 serial killer Holmes (my favorite, as I love a good creep).

The past, when Kate gets around to visiting it, is confined to Chicago’s 1893 World’s Columbia Exposition. The overall focus is more personal, involving the survival of Kate’s grandmother and the interaction of the time travelers, than largely historical. Untimed explores the role of the individual in big historical techno-socio-political currents, Timebound focuses on the relationships and cat and mouse between the travelers. Walker did a good job with her period research. Her 1893 feels like late 19th century America. It’s not highly descriptive, but the behavior of the people and general attitudes seem appropriate. It even smacks slightly of Bioshock Infinite, without all the steampunk and weirdness (although I loved that too). I’ll contrast this with a book like Clockwork Angel (gag me with a spoon) where everyone acts like a 21st century snarky teen in Victorian clothes (except the outfit on the cover is more Edwardian — sorry Cliff). As I mentioned before, I like the addition of the authentically creepy real-history serial killer. But part of my point here is that the “scope” of historical interaction isn’t huge in this first book, but it is a decently different era. This is no Tempest where all the time travel is within 15 years. It’s clear Walker loves history, but she concentrates her efforts more on the characters, time travel mechanics, and meta plots.

Which brings us to bad grandpapy Saul and his evil Cyrist church takeover. Liked it. This was both a sensible take on world domination, a clever way to utilize the abilities of a time traveler for “gain,” and a felt creepy and realistic. Somehow, the Cyrists seem very American and perhaps makes me wonder if Walker is an apostate member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Or maybe she just really enjoyed The Book of Mormon (the musical).

What follows now is a fairly technical discussion of time travel mechanics:

Walker’s time travel mechanic is very different than in Untimed, and simultaneously easier to write and more complicated. It would never work, and doesn’t really make total sense (more on this in a second), but it serves up compelling time travel fiction. It falls into the un-predetermined category like Untimed (Time Traveler’s Wife featuring the predetermined type with a single complex timeline). She does support an endless changing “leading edge” or five dimensional meta-timeline like Untimed, but it’s probably closer in spirit to Back to the Future’s system. Causality loops back endlessly in a way that would be very difficult for the Universe to actually compute. Essentially, changes are percolated forward, recomputing everything that is not protected by a technological field (maintained by the Chronos Medallions). This recompilation is apparently instantaneous and continuous as things leaving the field will “correct” (disappearing photos or people and the like) and that new computation will percolate forward. Where it breaks down is that there is no clear elucidation of the relationship between 5th dimensional time in normal 4th dimensional advancement. Let me (partially) explain.

If Kate were to change something in the past, then hop forward to her home time. Another traveler uptime of the change, say Pru, protected by her Chronos field, would notice. Kate and Pru are both free to react to this change and proceed with their next meta-temporal move. But who gets to go first? Well in this case, whoever the author feels like it. Say this attempted change is far back in the past. All (or many) uptime versions of the effected individual would have the opportunity to notice the changed timeline and decide to take action. But which one does? Is it 1:28pm Kate or 2:05pm Kate who takes action? Clearly they all can’t. In practice, while writing the book, there is a “current” narrative version who reacts. But the time travel mechanic doesn’t appear to actually narrow this down. This is why Untimed‘s system allows only one actual version of a time traveler in the timeline at any given 5th dimensional meta-moment.

Timebound also allows loopbacks, self changes, dual memory headaches and the like which don’t make total computational sense. How does the Universe even keep track of all that? Does it have unique IDs for every molecule? Some kind of object tracking system? Computing the loops is a form of the Halting Problem and has been proven (by genius Alan Turing) to be unsolvable in the general case. But none of these technical problem really matter in a work of fiction. From a storytelling point of view Timebound offers a very compelling time travel system with lots of interesting characteristics, limitations, and powers. Book 2 explores it more fully too.

There is also a fairly consistent but loosey goosey treatment of the “butterfly effect.” In this book, things tend to mostly play out the same way if the people basically do the same thing. There doesn’t seem to be a huge sensitivity to minute changes. I.e. slightly altering the timing and whereabouts of the young Katherine in 1893 doesn’t seem to drastically alter her later life and its relationship to the time modifications. People also tend to mostly be preserved, with their circumstances changing around them. This is people centric and I did basically the same thing in Untimed when repurposing the same people in Philadelphia 1.0 and 2.0 (British America 2012). It makes for better storytelling.

All in all, a great novel, and a fabulous addition to the time travel genre (which clearly I have a positive bias toward). I jumped right into book 2, read that, and am sad I have to wait six months for book 3.

Check out my own time travel novel or

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By: agavin
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Posted in: Books

Tagged as: 2013 Winner — Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, Book Review, Rysa Walker, Time travel, Timebound

Truly Deeply Sick and Twisted 2

Jan02

Title: Wetlands

Author: Charlotte Roche

Genre: WTF NSFW

Length: 241 pages

Read: December 30, 2014

Summary: Fascinating… oddly

I stumbled across this short oddball novel last night, grew curious, given that it sold a million copies in Germany, and was made into a film — so read it today in an hour and a half. It’s not very long. I’m not even sure it’s very good, but it was very quick. The film version recently toured Sundance, so you can get a glimmer via the preview.

Wetlands is a sort of literary equivalent of Human Centipede. In some ways, it’s so perverse you just can’t help reading/watching. There are two things going on in this tight little first person tale. First is Helen’s “unusual” (many would say grotesque) point of view and its inherent fascination — and I have to admit, it’s perversely fascinating. Second there’s an attempt to make the delivery of said POV actually have a meaning.

The first works. The second doesn’t (for me).

Helen is a girl who likes sex, avocados, and bodily fluids. She has a particular fondness for anything “dirty.” She spends the entire novel in the hospital reminiscing. She’s there for a shaving cut gone particularly bad, in a place where the sun don’t shine. And she falls in love with her male nurse for no particular reason. During her mental wanderings she explores all aspects of her particular “tastes” for what one might consider the gross. No body fetish is left untouched. No fluid unspilled. No orifice is safe. She likes it all. Wallows in it really. Roche has a knack for this — and we have to wonder about the warm wet corners of her own mind — but it’s quite effective. Probably shocking for many. Really. I’m not easily shocked, but I was impressed by the lengths to which she went (as an author). I’m not sure I’ve ever read anything short of a twisted internet story quite so NSFW.

I’m fairly convinced the above ick factor was the major driving force behind the book. And the resultant buzz behinds sales. That and it being Germany. Not that any of this offended me — I can not be offended by such things — but the author tried to give meaning to this poor disturbed teen’s emotional state by interjecting a “plot” involving her divorced parents, her one sided attraction to her nurse, and her need for attention. In general, the dialog is impoverished and no one other than the narrator/protagonist has any development. So when what seems to be a totally one sided affair reverses on the penultimate page, it felt entirely forced and hollow.

So in terms of the book’s conventional character arc the novel fails miserably. But it does succeed at painting this oddball, fascinating, rather perverse character portrait. And I “enjoyed” my 90 minutes.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Anal fissure, bodily fluids, Book Review, Charlotte Roche, NSFW, Wetlands, WTF

Outlander – Real Men Wear Kilts

Oct15

Title: Outlander

Author: Diana Gabaldon

Genre: Time Travel Romance

Length: 642 pages

Read: October 3-13, 2014

Summary: long but good

I’ve been meaning to read Outlander for years. Part time travel, part historical fiction, big best seller… it’s also fundamentally a Romance (cough). This last gave me pause, but finally, after checking out the show (to be reviewed later) I bit the bullet.

It’s funny how bestselling series drive against the current of writing “shoulds.” This book is long. It’s detailed. The protagonist is often adrift without clear “motivation” or “agency.” The prose can be highly redundant. There are countless scenes that don’t serve the spine of the plot.

But these “problems” also help make for a good read, and a good read it is. Fundamentally this is a novel about interesting, and well developed (if sometimes problematic) characters, caught in an unusual and fascinating blend of setting and situation.

What girl doesn't dream of a man in a kilt?

Back when men could wear skirts and still be real men

Setup: It’s 1945 and Claire Randall is a happily married nurse. On holiday in Scotland with her husband, a circle of ancient stones mysteriously teleports her to 1743. Stuck there, she meets and falls in love with sexy highlander Jaime Fraser against the backdrop of the coming Jacobite rising.

This sounds fairly trite, and it is, but the historical detailing of 18th century Scotland is very well done. The author clearly did her research, and she builds a cast of interesting characters and a rather fascinating world on the edge of war. There is an intrinsic tension between Claire’s two lives. Her modern husband isn’t a bad guy at all, even if he lacks Jaime’s manly-man energy. But she finds herself in this new place and in love — so what does she do? This dilemma provides for most of the conflict during the first two thirds of the novel.

Let’s back up and discuss prose and voice. Gabaldon is a good writer. Her prose is energetic and descriptive, often erudite. The voice is completely first person from Claire’s POV. She has an engaging, if a bit overly clinical viewpoint. I had small problems with repetition. Gabaldon often repeats words a sentence later without reason of parallelism and has a tendency to elaborate on a point more than necessary. This is a book where a great deal of the subtext is in the text. Claire spells it out. Sometimes twice. Sometimes thrice. This, by the way, is another of those writing “shoulds.” You’re not supposed to “tell,” but “show” (imply). That’s “better writing.” But as far as I can tell, bestsellers don’t tend to be subtle.

There is a lot of Scottish accented dialog in this book, and it’s very well handled.

Claire’s POV is generally excellent, but it does result in a few issues. Occasionally (particularly in the later part of the novel) some events occur “off screen” (when she isn’t there). Gabaldon then results to gratuitous retellings where other characters relate the event to her in unlikely detail. Occasionally, a briefer recounting leads to some reader confusion. Claire is also hyper aware and overly clinical. As the author likes to handhold us through her thought process, it sometimes feels like exactly this, author handholding rather than genuine cognition. This leads to one of my bigger “motivational gripes” with this generally excellent novel, that Claire often feels fairly selfish and overly analytic. Particularly in the middle of the novel, Claire is nominally still plotting to head back to the future, but this tell feels incongruous with the emotions the author has her “show” toward Jaime.

Crumbling castles and sweeping mountains make for a juicy setting

As I mentioned, the historical details are good. The attitudes of the 18th century men and women are well handled and relatively free of anachronism. Things are properly grungy, sexist, and occasionally brutish. It is occasionally a little odd that Claire herself is not terribly discomforted by this. She points out plenty of good stuff, particularly having to do with justice, medicine, and punishment, but she doesn’t really seem to miss toilets, showers, medical care, comfortable clothes, or well preserved food. Perhaps her life as a nurse during WWII was grungy enough to prepare her. She occasionally mentions discomforts flipply, but less than I’d imagine. She never really complains (or seems to suffer) with regard to food, sleeping in haystacks, or walking barefoot across the chilly Scottish moors.

The time travel element is very light SciFi/Fantasy in this first novel at least, but is used to good effect. There is no mumbo-jumbo explanation to gum things up.

Claire and Jaime’s situation — and relationship — really is pretty sexy

Being a romance, and a fairly erotic one, this is also a novel full of sex. Jaime and Claire go at it like rabbits — and things are often fairly explicit, at least in a literary way. I have no problem with most of this, as it’s actually pretty hot, and I imagine that for many women it’s insanely hot (see, word repeated deliberately for effect!). But there are aspects to the sexuality in this novel that are weird. Two huge ones (spoiler alert):

1) In the middle, after Claire disobeys him, Jaime “punishes” her by strapping her bare ass (to put it bluntly). To tell the truth, his reasoning is perfectly typical by 18th century standards, but comes off as a bit twisted by ours. And some readers will be bothered by the otherwise very spunky Claire’s fairly rapid absolution of her wife-beating lover. In fact, it’s clear that Gabaldon has a bit of a “thing” for corporal punishment as it’s a constant theme in the book. Jaime goes way overboard to emphasize how much hiding her turned him on.

2) More disturbingly, Gabaldon probably isn’t the biggest fan of Homosexuality. The novel’s villain (Black Jack) is not only gay, but she goes to great lengths to integrate his evil tendencies and his sexual proclivities. Otherwise, he’s actually a rather excellent villain, but she goes big time overboard in Jaime’s recounting of the intensely odd and twisted “final hours” between Jaime and the menacing Black Jack. It’s pretty darn nasty and twisted. This, along with a retelling of an older encounter between Jaime and a gay Duke feels like an overzealous attempt to demonize… to quote the novel: “poofters.”

Overall, this is an excellent novel. None are perfect, and it’s engaging throughout. The place/time is vividly depicted, and the characters are boldly executed. Both stay with you — which is no small feat for any author.

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Claire never offers her opinion on Haggis

By: agavin
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Tagged as: Book Review, Claire Randall, Diana Gabaldon, Highlander, Outlander, Scotland

Revenge is Best Served Cold

Aug20

Title: Best Served Cold

Author: Joe Abercrombie

Genre: Epic Fantasy

Length: 640 pages

Read: July 21-31, 2014

Summary: fun revenge fantasy

Best Served Cold is a stand alone fantasy set in the same world as his more ambitious First Law trilogy. None of the main characters or plot from that larger work appear in this novel, but a whole host of minor characters do, often in much expanded roles and the overall style and tone are very similar.

First a note about that. This is very adult fantasy with its share of graphic sex and a whole lot of gritty violence. In fact, one of the great pleasures of Abercrombie is his strength at describing combat. He loves both sieges (all four of his books I’ve read feature them), duels, and melees. He has a particular knack for blow by blow combat — literarily. He doesn’t spare you the crunch of bone, the spray of blood, but makes it seem very accurate and visceral. His protagonists take a beating — again literally — and come out worse for the wear (if sometimes swift recovering). Each battle has its clever turns and reversals. The only thing you can expect is a bit of the unexpected.

This is also fantasy without a ton of life saving, healing, resurrecting magic. What magic there is is mostly used for disguise, or more often as more amped up lethal methods of slayage. All this makes the stakes fairly high.

Abercrombie is also a very good prose smith. He has a particular style, full of stylistic word repeats, witty turns, and a sort of darkly comic tone. Don’t get me wrong, these are pretty serious books, but the tone is a bit ironic. His characters are extremely interesting, highly flawed, sometimes self aware, and often quite amusing. Best Served Cold‘s prose is just ever so less slick than the First Law, and somehow its tone just a tiny bit less sarcastic. Then again, maybe it’s just the absence of Glokta, a character from the longer books who really is exquisitely crafted (and darkly funny).

Like the bigger work, there are multiple POV characters. The story is told in rapidly shifting tight first person. Some of the characters are more likeable than others, but all are pretty fun to read. The opening chapters are very effective in particular with Monza, a female mercenary captain, who in the first few pages is betrayed and horribly maimed. Abercrombie loves a good crippling and swiftly builds sympathy for her this way — but then he throws it mostly to the side by avoiding her POV for quite some time. The story still focuses on her, but its told by others. This felt like a significant lost opportunity.

There are also a lot of reoccurring themes and even “types” of characters. Shivers, along with Monza the most important character, shares a great deal in common with Logen Ninefingers. Say one thing of Joe Abercrombie, say he’s consistent.

Overall, a fabulous fantasy action book with very human characters, but just a hair less great than the First Law trilogy. Also, while the novel is quite stand alone, it does explain/reveal elements of the world already explained/revealed in the earlier books, and certain major plot motivations could seem extremely mysterious to those reading it first.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Best Served Cold, Book, Book Review, First Law, High fantasy, Joe Abercrombie

Words of Radiance

Aug06

Title: Words of Radiance [1, 2]

Author: Brandon Sanderson

Genre: High Fantasy

Size: 1088 pages!

Read: 6/30-7/8 2014

Summary: Great followup

After a 3+ year hiatus, I return to Brandon Sanderon’s epic fantasy world. And if any new fantasy can be considered epic, it’s certainly this one. Planned at 10 books the first two are each over 1,000 pages! But don’t let that scare you off. For fantasy lovers this is some serious entertainment.

As I mentioned in my review of the first volume, that book possessed some (minor) structural problems partially addressed in this excellent followup. Two point of view characters (Kaladin and Shallan) dominate the narrative, and while last time the ratio was about 70/30 it’s now closer to 50/50. This improvement feels more balanced. Both stories are gripping and don’t let up — during those parts I didn’t want to put the book down even for a minute. There is a small percentage of the story told from the POV of other major players. While not quite as good, these at least remained in the same theatre of action. Unfortunately a few “interludes” with one-off stories from people all over the world remain. These stand outside the main narrative flow and are a tad annoying. As an editor I probably would have cut/shortened most — but they aren’t too long.

I loved these books, but be aware this is no Game of Thrones with a fairly realistic world. It’s alien. Full of strange creatures, terms, politics, magics and a dizzying and complex mythology that is as mysterious to the characters as to us. Therein lies one of Sanderson’s many strengths as he doles out the answers to the mysteries at a satisfying rate without giving away the whole kit and caboodle. The writing itself is clear, confident, and polished. Not literary exactly, but quite first rate. And for a book with such a byzantine plot and titanic length, highly engaging and fast paced. There is a good amount of action and it’s very well described. The powers of the Shardbearers and Surgebinders are pretty epic and you can really imagine them whirling through the air in complex battles. During the most exciting parts (usually near the end of the various “books” that break up the long story) the various narratives converge and alternate back and forth more rapidly in a tense and well engineered way.

All and all, I’m not sure these books are for everyone as they are imaginative to an extreme, but if you like made up worlds this is one of the best. It’s highly complex, well designed, elegantly plotted, well told, and just a darn fine fantasy read. Few writers have the imaginative scope required to create such an exotic beast. The Stormlight Archive harkens back to Eddings, Jordan during their glory days — but somehow much more modern.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Book Review, Brandon Sanderson, Fantasy, High fantasy, Stormlight Archive, Way of Kings, Words of Radiance

The Republic of Thieves

Jul19

Title: The Republic of Thieves

Author: Scott Lynch

Genre: Epic Fantasy

Length: 609 pages

Read: June 23-30, 2014

Summary: a bit weaker

Most of the good things about books 1 and 2 of the Gentleman Bastards are also true of The Republic of Thieves. The latest installment serves up good fun, great characters, and all that. Lynch again moves the setting, this time to the city of the Magi, Locke’s bitter enemies from book 1. It brings into the foreground Locke’s mysterious and absent former lover/rival. Again the story is told both in the present and in flashback.

The two timelines don’t fit together entirely harmoniously. The present focuses on a contest/rivalry between Locke and Sabetha (his former lover) while the backstory details their childhood relationship and a long episode where the Gentleman Bastards crime gang played Elizabethan Actors for a summer. Partly, this addition feels gratuitous, like the pirate episode in Red Seas Under Red Skies, and certainly it exists because Lynch read a lot about this period and wanted to include it. It’s also (IMHO) the best part of the novel. We get to see a few of our favorite dead bastards alive and well (the twins) and (briefly) Chains. Plus, it’s just a fun romp and a bit of a caper.

And that’s sort of the problem with the main story. The back and forth with Sabetha was great, but the “caper” wasn’t really a caper. Both rivals are chosen by the Magi to run two sides of a strange election process — which is entirely trumped up and serves as a human proxy for the nearly all-powerful Magi. It just never felt very real, urgent or exciting.

Still, it’s an enjoyable book, and if you enjoyed the other two, read it. But The Republic of Thieves is a notch below its predecessors, perhaps 4 stars instead of 5.

But the epilogue was interesting!

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Book Review, Fantasy, Lies of Locke Lamora, Locke Lamora, Lynch, Oceans Eleven, Red Seas Under Red Skies, Renaissance, Scott Lynch, The Republic of Thieves, Venice

Yar Maties – Pirate Fantasy!

Jul17

Title: Red Seas Under Red Skies

Author: Scott Lynch

Genre: Epic Fantasy

Length: 786 pages

Read: June 5-22, 2014

Summary: Possibly best of the series

The first book in this series, The Lies of Locke Lamora, was one of the better novels I read last year. Red Seas picks up right after and avoids Sophomore Slump by switching up the scenario and the location fairly substantially. Our heroes have left their Venice-like hometown of Camorr and venture off to a new city (Tal Verrar) and a new (and even more elaborate) scam with even bigger stakes.

The first third of the novel is Oceans Eleven in the Renaissance, and it’s real good fun. The world is enormously detailed and Scott Lynch is very sharp with the dialog. He has come into his own in this second book, as it’s wittier than ever. There is a very slight overwriting to the style, but you get used to it quickly and the huge novel flies along. The dynamic between Locke and his partner/friend Jean is fabulous and they are very well drawn characters.

This is aided enormously by a series of flashbacks. In the first novel, which also crossed two timelines, it was a little confusing which was which. This time around, Lynch has clearly labeled the flashback chapters. Because the novel begins essentially in the middle of the current heist, these are used to fill in the setup and the complex relationship between the two men. Walking a delicate line, Lynch has to maintain his suspense by NOT telling us how exactly the heist is actually going to work. We are tolled out bits and pieces until the very end.

Then about a third of the way in we take a hard tack to starboard and enter a high seas pirate tale. The entire middle act is shipboard and has less to do (directly) with the heist of the . At first I was like woah, but hell, I like pirates and this was good fun. Somewhere in Lynch’s brain there exists a different novel, about half the length, without the whole pirate part. You can tell this was self indulgent, that he really researched period nautical life and wanted to really use it. From a structural sense, the pirate thing isn’t even necessary, but because this world and its characters are so rich, and it was so fun, I think it’s a net win.

Hell the whole act of reading a fantasy novel is escapist, who cares if it’s too long as it’s a great read — which Red Seas absolutely and definitely is. A pure pleasure and a work of delightful fantasy. Plus, so strong are it’s characters, that it actually has a good bit to say on the nature of friendship.

Oh, and if you really like pirate fantasy two other favorites of mine over the years are On Stranger Tides and Wyvern.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Book Review, High fantasy, Lies of Locke Lamora, Locke Lamora, pirates, Red Seas Under Red Skies, Scott Lynch, Venice

Beautiful Creatures

Nov06

Title: Beautiful Creatures

Author: Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

Genre: YA supernatural

Length: 592 pages, 147,000 words

Read: Nov 6-20, 2011

Summary: Fun read

This is a pleasant YA supernatural romance. At a certain structural level it’s a blend of reverse Twilight (boy is normal, girl is supernatural), Carrie, and modern Southern Gothic. The opening third or so gets off to a strong start. The male first person past POV is engaging, and the character likable, although nicer and far less lusty than any sixteen year-old boy I remember (my own interior monologue was decidedly raunchy). The prose is workmanlike. It isn’t pretty, but it doesn’t get in your face. There’s a touch of overwriting, the occasional sentence that rephrases what the previous did. I never do that myself. I don’t. Nope. Positively not.

As the first act breaks into the second, the supernatural lore structure is revealed to us. There are a lot of name changes here which seems fresh but slightly forced. Wizards or witches are called “casters,” which shades of World of Warcraft, makes me wonder if they’re ranged dps or healers? Both actually. The different schools or talents of magic have names like thaumaturge which are probably novel to many younger readers. Me, having read 7,000 fantasy books, can’t help but think of Master of Five Magics, which is a great book, uses that word, and has no resemblance to Beautiful Creatures :-). In any case, the magical world building in Beautiful Creatures is about 3/5. There’s some interesting stuff going on, but the depth is only hinted at, and it is not heavily based on either some other existing fictional school of magic or traditional occult.

The book is quite long, particularly for a YA. How this got past the editorial zeal and lust for brevity of today’s publishing world is a slight mystery. And I don’t mean this as a bad thing. The trend toward cutting every unnecessary word, sentence, paragraph, and scene has made for a lot of choppy books. The space allows Beautiful Creatures to feel a little less rushed, and develop a bit of relationship and a broader cast of family members. The second act is certainly slower than the first and third, and there are scenes that could’ve been cut, but their presence does help bolster the authentic relationship between the two leads. It’s not a super deep relationship, but since when is teenage love the Mariana Trench? I definitely enjoyed the back and forth between Eathan and Lena. Less so with the high school social conflicts in the middle. There are perhaps a few too many elements mixed into the pot: The romance, the school drama, a best friend, family dynamics (for two families), the magic system, telepathy, preternatural dreams, and a vague Civil War ghost story. It’s this last that feels the least integrated as even by the end the parallelism isn’t made totally clear. I can certainly forgive this debut-author-style zeal. It’s just a desire to put in too much cool stuff. I did it myself in The Darkening Dream. Then my editor made me chop half of it out. There’s still at least as much as in this book.

The final quarter of Beautiful Creatures, which is basically one evening, races to a conclusion at breakneck pace. A midnight deadline adds a sense of urgency. The obligatory party scene had me cringing (although no more than the weekly Vampire Dairies party or Buffy‘s obligatory visit to the Bronze) but then we get on to the actual supernatural resolution. I had slightly mixed feelings , as some of the conversation with the older casters reminded me of Scooby Doo, but the action part was fine. The brief POV reversal though… hmmm. This, I think, was trying to get around the first person narrator limitation, but there might’ve been a more elegant solution. After 570 pages with “I” being Ethan I just couldn’t switch my brain over to Lena for 5-10 pages.

But all those nitpicks aside, I very much enjoyed the book, which is what matters. I suspect that mostly had to do with the the core romance (I would’ve enjoyed more R — or X) and the fairly novel mythos. There are worse foundations to build a book on.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: American Civil War, Beautiful Creatures, Book Review, Carrie, Fiction, Kami Garcia, Margaret Stohl, Southern Gothic, Supernatural, Young-adult fiction

Serene Republic of Quippy Thievies

Oct28

Title: The Lies of Locke Lamora

Author: Scott Lynch

Genre: Epic Fantasy

Length: 752 pages

Read: October 15-25, 2013

Summary: Best fantasy I’ve read in a while

The simplest pitch for The Lies of Locke Lamora would be Thieves World Venice. Fantasy often borrows heavily from history, and LLL is no exception. I’d place the era as roughly 17th century. The book is set entirely in the fictional city of Camorr. It’s got canals, bridges, Italian names, a Duke (Doge), nobles, masks, and pretty much all the trappings of the real Venince. It’s also got sorcerers, alchemy, and giant towers built of indestructible Elderglass.

Like the brilliant Perdido Street Station, LLL features the city as character. This outing isn’t quite as purely imaginative, but also isn’t nearly as weird, and far more approachable. I’m a big Venice fan anyway, and so I very much enjoyed the feel. There is a nice balance struck here between atmosphere and pacing. LLL is a fast book with a lot of flavor. The underworld and the city proper are both excellently realized. I particularly enjoyed the glimpses into a well developed religion. Camorr is a city of 13 gods, and as such borrows more religious spirit from antiquity, but at the same time Lynch colors it with an extremely Renaissance/Baroque feel.

The novel is fairly focused. No Game of Thrones, LLL concentrates on a single hero and a few of his friends. It’s written in a slightly bizarre third person omniscient, without a heavy distinct narrator, but feels free to flit around between time and characters (even if it hovers 90% on our protagonist, Locke). Interludes discussing historical aspects of the city or flashing back to (mostly) relevant childhood events in the lives of our heroes are frequent. While these stray from the spine of the story, they are entertaining and add depth. There is some slight of hand played with the chronology. Occasionally some action is undercut with the preparations for the same action in a way which is a little confusing.

At the prose level, Lynch is a good writer, with some style and flair. He does a nice job dotting the text with certain archaic words that lend flavor, but all the while keeping the text modern and lively. And he has a knack for deft and humorous descriptions. At the same time, there is a hint of anachronism. LLL isn’t a Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell with pitch perfect historical tone — but it is also much faster paced and transparent to the reader.

The action of LLL is part heist, part swashbuckling adventure, part orphan tale. Like a Venitian Ocean’s Eleven, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Oliver Twist all rolled into one. The tone is quippy and cavalier, but also contains a dose of nastiness and torture (night that I mind). The dialog is full of zingers — many hit, some miss. And often it sounds oddly modern. The plot is easy enough to follow but has a certain byzantine quality — and more than its share of deus ex machina — but essentially it all works. The action is fast, furious, and easy to follow. A dizzying mix, but one that works well.

I pounded through the second half (at 752 pages, hardly a novella) in one sitting. Flaws aside, it’s fun and ambitious without being overwrought in scope. All in all, The Lies of Locke Lamora was no chore, instead a genuine pleasure, and certainly the best fantasy I’ve read this year!

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Book Review, Epic Fantasy, Fantasy, Locke Lamora, Reading (process), Red Seas Under Red Skies, Republic of Thieves, Scott Lynch, The Lies of Locke Lamora, thief, underworld, Venice

Blood Song

Aug28

Title: Blood Song

Author: Anthony Ryan

Genre: Epic Fantasy

Length: 591 pages

Read: July 23-August 24, 2013

Summary: Excellent, but flawed

Structurally, this book borrows heavily from The Name of The Wind. It opens with a box story about a famous military man and then slowly dolls out the (first) chapters of his long career, beginning with his schooling. Blood Song is well written, with solid practical prose that doesn’t get in the way. There is none of the elegant and overwrought voice of the aforementioned Rothfus, or the descriptive nuance of Martin, but it’s well written.

Even though the scope is big, this is a more focused story than A Song of Ice and Fire or A Wheel of Time. We follow our single hero fairly tightly (even if his life meanders). Except for the occasional return to the frame story there are no other points of view. Al Sorna, our protagonist, rises within a kind of military-religious brotherhood perhaps most akin to the Knights Templar. The world building is very solid and the author clearly knows something about the late medieval period. There are several religions and nations and they clash in a fairly realistic way.

The overall effect is one I’m still processing. I liked the book. A lot. It’s one of the better epic fantasies I’ve read lately (and that is my favorite genre). The first third is great, during the youth and training of our hero. Some of the characters are excellent. My biggest problem is from about the 50-94% point. Here Al Sorna is commander of a big military expedition and the narrative became a little harder to follow. It’s not that I couldn’t tell what was going on from scene to scene, but they didn’t fit together seamlessly. Unlike the earlier sequences, they also didn’t seem to have the weight that I think the author was intending. There is similar stuff in The Name of The Wind (not so military), but it resonates much more emotionally in that novel.

I’ll explain what I mean. Al Sorna has this “unrequited love of his life” (just like Kvothe and Denna in TNOTW), but their interactions, while fine, lack the heavy sense of tragedy of Rothfus’ superior novel. It’s not bad, but it just comes off a little weak.

The end of the book is good. There are two big “fights.” But the sequencing felt a bit disconnected. And that’s basically the thing with this novel. It needs editing. The parts are good, but the sum doesn’t reach greatness.

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As an after-note, I’m a little mystified as to how this book has such incredible ratings on Amazon. At this writing: 1003 total, 863 5-star, 108 4-star, 22 3-star, 7 2-star, and 3 1-star. This is very very slanted toward 4-5 star. Now, it’s got enough good stuff going for it to be a 4 star novel, and epic fantasy unfortunately is full of some serious duds. But an average of 4.8? This is higher than A Game of Thrones which is the best series start in the last 20 years. I can’t help but wonder what weird factor is going on here.

By: agavin
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Tagged as: Anthony Ryan, Blood Song, Book Review, Epic Fantasy, High fantasy, Knights Templar, Name of the Wind

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Mar11

Title: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Author: Stephen Chbosky

Genre: Coming of Age

Length: 224 pages

Read: March 2, 2013

Summary: intensely readable

To be clear, I actually saw the film before I read the book, but I’ll discuss the novel first as its the original. Perks is a teen coming of age novel set in 1991. It has no supernatural elements at all.

This is a compulsively readable book. Casually, before picking at the flaws, this is the kind of book you read in one sitting. Every time I run across something this engaging, I feel an intense relief — pleasure really — because so much of what I read is a bit of a chore. Probably just me being jaded. So while I’m going harass Chbosky on a few fronts, any criticism should be framed in context: This is a novel that really sucks you in and holds you.

As to voice. Technically, the book is epistolary. The protagonist, Charlie, writes letters to some imaginary friend. It’s a gimmick that neither adds or subtracts. This is basically a first narrative with a slightly confused back and forth between past and present tense. The writing is deliberately clunky. Chbosky is trying to sound like a 15 year-old boy — and a gifted one at that — but he does it by being wordy and stilted. I’ll give an example:

I am trying now to practice not to do that. He also said that I should use the vocabulary words that I learn in class like “corpulent” and “jaundice.” I would use them here, but I really don’t think they are appropriate in this format.

My inner editor would rewrite this as:

I’m trying to practice not to. He also suggested I use the vocabulary words from class like “corpulent” and “jaundice.” I would, but they might not be appropriate in this format.

This clunk-factor lessened after the first third, and I’m not sure if it was because I adapted or because the character was maturing. Either way, it does provide a bit of youthful feel and the frank honesty of the voice is highly engaging. Charlie is a straightforward reporter, cold even, rarely leaping to extreme judgement. He is most definitely not snarky.

For me, the early 90s setting was a big plus, as it’s free of some of the annoying distractions of the post internet age (cel phones, Facebook, etc). It’s also nostalgic, being closer to my own high school era, even if Charlie is a good seven years younger (my Freshman year was 1984, his 1991).

The character development is very good. Charlie, Sam, and Patrick are all very well crafted and distinct. Likable too.

In retrospect, after finishing the book, I feel several elements of the story construction are a little forced. It seems unlikely that two seniors like Sam and Patrick would take a Freshman under their wing and into their social circle quite so easily. Not impossible, just a bit contrived. More substantially, the major “twist” in the story feels a bit forced, unnecessary even. This is a book with a clear theme. The writer even states it, several times: “We accept the love we think we deserve.” Fine. But there sure is a lot of abuse flying around. Like 90% of the major characters experience it at some time or another in their lives. I don’t mind these themes, but to have the same “startling” thing happen to not one, not two, but many characters feels forced. All this thinking was only in retrospect. While reading, the novel just draws you in from start to end.

Having seen the film first, which is sexually rather tame, I was pleasantly surprised to find quite a bit of frank sexuality in the novel. I’m not sure why it was removed, and it’s presence provided punch. Nevertheless, it’s pretty incomprehensible that a smart well read 15 year-old like Charlie wouldn’t already know about masterbation. Again, a little forced. This book has a lot of forced moments, they just play off well.

So I must reiterate, these are intellectual nitpicks on a compulsively readable novel. One last observation: It’s odd that Chbosky published this in 1999, went on to sell a bundle, yet has never published another novel.

My review of the film can be found here, or

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Arts, Book, Book Review, Literature, Perks of Being Wallflower, review, Stephen Chbosky, The Perks of Being a Wallflower

The Godling Chronicles: The Sword of Truth

Feb25

Title: The Godling Chronicles: Book One (The Sword of Truth)

Author: Brian D. Anderson

Genre: YA Epic Fantasy

Length: 344 pages

Read: February 2-15, 2013

Summary: Fun teen epic fantasy

Recently, I’ve noticed a lot of epic fantasy novels in the Kindle top sellers, and taking a look at the epic fantasy category list many are Indie publications. This being my favorite genre, I figured I’d give some a try.

The Godling Chronicles: The Sword of Truth (don’t confuse with Terry Goodkind’s series of that name) adheres to many of the classic tropes: a sort of Indie The Book of Three meets The Eye of the World. Plotwise, we have a kind of Dark Lord, and we have a young guy from the country with a destiny. He has a mentor, he goes on a journey. There are girls (but no sex – boo!). The (relatively) unique element is that he’s really a god — albeit a reduced in-human-form god who doesn’t know it.

I liked this book, and if I were 13-14 again, I’d have loved it. The plot is straightforward but fine and it’s actually a bit refreshing harkening back to those classic “Shanara type” fantasies of the 80s. With the exception of the brief prologue, the narrative sticks tightly to a single protagonist and that keeps the pace up. As an added bonus, the story was co-written by the author’s 9-10 year-old son, which is very cool.

It’s not a long novel, 344 pages, and represents an opening salvo, more of a “first part” than a traditional “giant chunk” like a Wheel of Time book. This is fine, as it’s inexpensive and you can just download part 2 when you get there. I actually like that changes in publishing are allowing for more flexibility of form.

But I do have a few problems with the mechanics. The sentence work itself is fine. Workman like, but never awkward. However, the novel is simultaneously both over and underwritten. Let’s start with the under part. The book is written in 3rd person omni with no strong narrative voice and a focus on a few of the characters. Fine. But, the author mainly uses two tricks from his narrative toolbox to advance the plot: dialog and inner dialog. There is some action, but it’s fairly thinly painted. There is almost no narrative description, or description at all for that matter. This keeps the story lean and moving, but leaves us with a very thin sense of place and world. We pass through several cities and various countryside, but I was left with no particular sense of any of them. Most of the words are devoted to conversation and almost all plot points are revealed (and re-revealed) this way.

Which comes to the overwriting part, which isn’t so much at the sentence or fragment level (this, as I said, was decent) but occurred as (often) characters felt the urge to repeat news and revelations to new parties. Of course this happens in real life, but as a reader, once we know something we don’t usually need to hear it again. This is a first novel, and probably not HEAVILY edited, so I expect this kind of thing has improved by book 2, but in general fictional dialog (in books, movies, TV, etc) is like a facsimile of real dialog. It gets the point across in an ideally witty way (probably with more arguing than in real life) and stripped of a lot of the glue that real conversations contain. Those mechanics like “hello” “how are you?” and “Meet me at the fountain.” “You mean the one past the statue around the corner from the butcher shop?” “No the other one, um, um, past the Inn with the greenish turtle sign and the tree that got hit by lightning the other year.” I.e. Stuff we don’t really care about.

The whitespace style in this book is very horizontal (i.e. few line feeds) and I think actually having more can make this sort of thing clearer to author and reader alike. Each line must strive to say something new — ideally even several new things. These things can be plot points, details about the world, revelations of character, or general nuance. If a line can’t defend its right to exist, several ways, well as Faulkner said, “In writing, you must kill all your darlings.”

But that being said, if you’re a young fantasy fan, The Sword of Truth is still a fun little romp. It’s straightforward, and unapologetic about the genre. That’s fine with me. I’ve got nothing against some good Dark Lord action.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Book Review, High fantasy, Literature, reviews, Reviews and Criticism, Sword of Truth

Adventures in the Screen Trade

Feb01

Title: Adventures in the Screen Trade

Author: William Goldman

Genre: Memoir / Writing Guide

Read: January, 2013

Summary: Fascinating and Terrifying

Having recently begun adapting my novel Untimed into a screenplay, I’m doing my usual slog through the relevant homework. What more can we say about William Goldman than: The Princess Bride (both the novel and the screenplay). If that doesn’t make you feel invincible, then take Marathon Man, All the Presidents Men, or Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. And those are but a few of his produced films. Last year, I read the equally famous Save the Cat, which is a good book, but I marveled that the late author, while a hugely touted screenwriter, hadn’t written any good (produced) films. So not true of Goldman.

This work is fascinating, but it’s only about a third writing manual. It’s really three books: 1) a witty and insightful skewering of Hollywood, 2) personal stories from the trenches about each of Goldman’s pre 1982 films, 3) the Butch Cassidy screenplay, discussions of its strengths and weaknesses, and an adaption of a short story into a screenplay.

The skewering is caustic, hilarious, and even thirty years later, dead on. Goldman is famous for his “nobody knows anything” quote and how true it seems. His discussions of studio executives, agents, stars, and the intertwined nightmare of power is insightful bordering on clairvoyant. Most of the trends that he sees in motion in 1982 have continued and accelerated to bring us to the moderately dismal state of contemporary filmmaking (there are exceptions of course). Think both Entourage and the brilliant “The Day the Movies Died” GC article. Also, having worked with/for Universal, Sony, and Fox… well it was just all too funny and familiar.

The personal section terrified me. I hope to see Untimed make the leap to film, as it will make a great one, and it’s made vividly clear in Adventures that even a major screenwriter like Goldman is but a candle in the wind before the studio gale. This is made all the more peculiar by the fact that the screenplay is the single most important ingredient that goes into a movie. Film is a highly collaborative and commercial medium, but you really can’t make a good movie out of a bad script (unless you rewrite it to be a good script). You can however, make a lousy film out of a great script, or a hit film out of a bad one (Transformers anyone?).

Part three isn’t a good introduction to either writing screenplays or writing, but I sure did find it useful. Goldman hammers home many of the oft-repeated (but for a reason) messages of screenwriting, particularly his emphasis on structure. He’s a wonderful storyteller and his adaption example is so ridiculous, that it’s impressive to watch how he makes such a trite concept almost work.

If any of these topics fascinate you, give Adventures a read. Besides, Goldman’s such a good writer, he could make cereal-box copy a bestseller.

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By: agavin
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Posted in: Books, Writing

Tagged as: Arts, Book Review, Reviews and Criticism, Screenplay, Screenwriting, William Goldman, Writing

Losing It

Dec05

Title: Losing It

Author: Cora Carmack

Genre: Contemporary Romance

Read: November 21, 2012

Summary: Great voice, fun, but slightly trite, romp

This novel is an indie publishing effort, released just last month, that has shot up the charts. It’s a debut, and the author has no previous platform, so this means its success is based on its own merits — or blind luck. Let’s look closer.

As of this writing, the book is #143 in the Kindle list and #36 in Kindle Contemporary Romance, as best as I can tell, this translates to between 500-1000 copies a day. It’s $3.99 and there is no paper edition. This is really good, and as a side note, reminds me that Romance is hot hot hot as there are 67 OTHER Romances doing better on the Kindle list. Wow! That’s half the top books.

As to Losing It, the novel is without a doubt, totally “publishable” by New York standards. There is nothing particularly amateur about the writing. The cover is decent and the title — even if used by several previous novels — catchy. There are a few typos, particularly omitted trailing double-qoutes from dialog (and no, this is not a case of long dialog that flows from paragraph to paragraph where obscure typographic rules permit an elided middle quote). There is a minor amount of overwriting, but plenty of New York books are guilty of this too.

The story chronicles a female acting student’s final semester at college and her halfhearted efforts to lose her virginity and confused efforts to woo one of her professors (a popular theme lately, as I’ve seen it in Pretty Little Liars and Life Unexpected too).

Fundamentally it’s a fun book with great voice and an adorable protagonist. I read it in one sitting, which is always a good sign. The first 70% was first rate fun. There’s nothing super revolutionary here, and romances, or even books without fantastical elements aren’t my thing, but the protagonist was endearing enough to trump all that. Things moved in a fairly breakneck way and the characters felt defined and real. I enjoyed the final act of the book a bit less. It wasn’t bad, but it was highly predictable and a little underwelming. For my taste, the whole thing was a bit of a sexual tease. It felt steamy, or at least seemed to promise steamy, but never delivered any real smut.

I can’t say I understand exactly why the book went viral, but it is a well written and enjoyable romance, well worth a read, and far, far above most of the dreck I try to wade through.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Book Review, Cora Carmack, Losing It, romance

Wool – Life in a Tin Can

Aug20

Title: Wool (Omnibus)

Author: Hugh Howey

Genre: Science Fiction

Length: 550 pages

Read: August 11-12, 2012

Summary: Classic. 5/5

While this Omnibus feels like a novel, it was originally published as a series of five novellas — and self-published at that. But don’t let that scare you, it’s better written, better edited, and far more engaging than 95% of New York published SciFi. In some ways a throwback, in some ways very modern, Wool is a contained (in both the literary and literal way) post apocalyptic tale in the mould of Larry Niven or A Canticle for Leibowitz. Technically this is an ARC story, about an isolated world built to survive a destroyed environment. The people in Wool live in a 148 floor Silo in the ground. To leave is to die.

The book is written in first person tight from multiple points of view. Each section has a fairly clear POV character and the narrative voice highlights their perspective. There is no single protagonist. The first novella is basically a short story introducing the world and ending with the usual short story twist. It did very well on Amazon and the author wrote a second (using a minor character from the first as the POV) and then a third which essentially transitions to the larger story’s most important character (Jules). It’s very much to Howey’s credit that this serial construction does not feel artificial. The works holds up both individually as a cohesive and epic novel.

Several things lead to the overall excellence: The characters are well developed and mostly likable (the main villain is a little thin, but interesting enough). The world is intriguing and detailed with an appropriate pacing of reveals. There is a good amount of death and suffering in this novel and it lends a generally tragic air to the whole situation as well as the specific events. There is also a lot of tension despite what might nominally be plotting that doesn’t showcase a lot of overt external conflict (in the first 2-3 books). Basically it’s just very good.

The silo is well thought out. My only real beef at a technical level (and this doesn’t distract from the book at all) is the unlikelyhood that such a contained ecosystem (in all senses of the word) could remain so functional over several centuries. On a practical level earthly eco-systems function because of the ENORMOUS quantity of solar energy constantly added. Wool features a pretty big system powered by a single main fossil-fuel generator. Maybe that’s possible, and Howey’s navel background lends copious verisimilitude and gritty detail, but I suspect to really make a big spaceship or ARC last a long time you’d need some really serious juice. Large scale hydroponic farming alone would require a hell of a lot of power. But as fiction, it’s really well worked out.

Additionally, at a realistic level, I’m not a big believer in the predictability of human large scale behavior (aka history), but in the context of Science Fiction like this (taking its queue from Asimov’s Foundation), there’s no problem. In the real world, despite the endlessly repeating basic patterns of history, no human has ever proven to be a great predictor and controller of the long term specifics.

Another minor peeve is that the Kindle version, while well proofread, has a very unusual formatting with a tiny font oversized spacing between paragraphs. I had to jack the Kindle scale feature up several notches to even read the text. There’s (currently) really no reason not to use the default font style for MOBI/EPUB body text in a novel.

But if you like Science Fiction, post apocalyptic worlds, or just plain old good novels. Read this. Seriously, it’s one of the most enjoyable speculative novels I’ve read in years. Bravo.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, Book Review, Fiction, Hugh Howey, Larry Niven, Science Fiction, Wool

The Alchemist – Fantasy Snack

Aug08

Title: The Alchemist

Author: Paolo Baciqalupi

Genre: Fantasy Novella

Length: 96 pages

Read: July 28-30, 2012

Summary: Nice little short

Having recently read Baciqalupi’s excellent Ship Breaker I thought I’d breeze through his fantasy novella — and breeze I did. Written in first person, yet with a bit of almost Arabian Nights allegorical style, this is a story about a world where all magic has consequences, specifically in that it feeds deadly bramble vines, causing them to choke and strangle the city. As usual for Baciqalupi the world building and the writing is first rate. This a very contained story with a small character count and a lot of focus so it isn’t bogged down by some of The Windup Girl’s problems. The mains are good too, but I did find the villains slightly contrived. Like many shorts there is a bit of a twist.

Overall, the vibe of the story is excellent, and this is conveyed through the skilled use of voice. A tasty snack indeed.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Alchemist, Book Review, Fantasy, Fiction, Paolo Baciqalupi, review, The Alchemist

Maximum Weird – Perdido Street Station

Aug06

Title: Perdido Street Station

Author: China Miéville

Genre: Gothic Steampunk Fantasy Scifi Horror

Length: 710 pages and lots of words

Read: July 16-24, 2012

Summary: Astonishingly Imaginitive

I am in utter awe with regard to the creativity oozing from this novel.

While perhaps not for everyone, and not perfect, this is a first rate work of fantasy. And I mean that in the broadest sense because the book is set in a unique milieu that is part Dickens, part steampunk, part fantasy, part Blade Runner, part Lovecraft and a whole lot more. As one agent said of my first novel’s early drafts: Perdido Street Station suffers from an extreme case of too-much-ness. It has too many words, too many characters, too many points of view, too much description, too many subplots, too many races, too many kinds of magic, too many villains, too many heroes, too many really really big words, or old words (I had to use the dictionary every couple of pages). Still, it works, even rises to greatness.

Amazing things about this book:

1. The prose: which is highly descriptive, deft, and subtle, building elaborate piles of intricacy out of slashes of words.

2. The main characters: Isaac, Yag, and Lin all have some real depth.

3. The world: is just so creepy, slimy, and cool — although not for the faint of heart. This book is dark. It makes The Darkening Dream seem like vanilla icing.

4. The monsters and the weird: nice and creepy. This is a book where human on bug sex is the sweet part!

5. The clarity: for all its length and bewildering array of everything, the book is easy to follow and read (provided you have a dictionary handy).

6. Imagination: No shortage of amazingly cool ideas, images, races, monsters, technologies, places, etc. in this puppy.

Things that aren’t as strong:

1. Pacing: the masses of description, which while evocative, effective, and downright creepy, are constant and unrelenting. The city itself is a character and this slows things down a bit. It doesn’t drag, but it isn’t lightning fast either.

2. The tangents: there are more than a few here, and not all of them worth it.

3. The minor points of view: A number of characters pop in, have their couple POV pages in the sun, and then vanish (usually into the deadpool). This isn’t always maximally effective.

4. The baroque plot: The story is easy enough to follow, but it does take A WHILE to get going and is not always full of classic drama created from thwarted desire. In fact, the first third or so is distinctly short on that, but is fast paced mostly because the world is so fascinating.

5. Actions of the government and other non-protagonist forces: There are some big chunks in here where the government is trying to do stuff, and only indirectly involves the regular characters. This stuff is less effective because of the emotional disconnect.

6. Deus ex machina: oh-too-coincidental happenings and escapes occur a number of times.

Overall, in the same way that Vegas transcends cheese by way of pure magnitude, Perdido climbs to greatness on the strength of its positives, rising above any petty flaws. If you appreciate flights of imagination, good writing, and the weird, it’s required reading. No question. Not for the square, the staid, the boring, or the grounded who do not at least dream of flying.

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By: agavin
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Tagged as: Arts, Bas-Lag, Book Review, China Mieville, Fantasy, Perdido Street Station, Science Fiction, Steampunk

A Princess of Mars

Jun20

Love the 1917 cover

Title: A Princess of Mars

Author: Edgar Rice Burroughs

Genre: Science Fiction

Length: 81 pages

Read: June 16-19, 2012

Summary: Pulp fun

Watching John Carter got me to reread A Princess of Mars. I barely remembered anything of the book, and it’s only 81 pages, plus the Kindle version was free!

It’s definitely superior to the film, and good campy pulp fun. Plus, when you take into account it’s 1917 publication date, it’s actually pretty impressive!

This was the cover I had as a kid

The writing itself is fast and clean, even if the sentences include copious subordinate clauses, high falutin vocabulary, and the occasional archaic turn of phrase. Like “fetich” which my Kindle dictionary informed me is a dated spelling of “fetish.” The style suffers a little — by modern standards — from an overabundance of “tell.” The book moves rapidly and the narrator tells you in a straightforward first-person past what happened. He doesn’t illustrate the points by action, but calls it as he sees it. Even the action is given to narrative summary rather than blow by blow description. This is compact and functional but feels dated.

The plot is a straightforward adventure. Our protagonist, who is pretty much great at everything, hurls himself from one predicament to the next, all the while extracting maximum drama and showmanship. Things rarely go badly for him, and there is little subtly of choice. I can see how significant an effect Burroughs had on mid century pulp Science Fiction masters like Phillip Jose Farmer or L. Ron Hubbard (I’m ignoring the religion and talking about the writer). Farmer adventures like Dark is the Sun, World of Tiers, or The Cache feel like direct descendants of A Princess of Mars.

For 1917, the world building is fairly extensive. There aren’t too many outer space adventure novels before this, so he must have invented a lot of the tropes. There are flying craft, exploding bullets, terraforming machines, and all sorts of goodies. And all in an era when the biplane was the height of aeronautical tech.

Every decade has it’s variant

The book’s biggest weakness is the utter lack of subtlety. John Carter is able to instantly read into alien situations and ferret out the meaning — even when he can’t understand the language. He is an instant master of the new tech, a perfect navigator, etc. The solution to his problems are usually readily available. Burroughs resorts to certain devices — like convenient eavesdropping — multiple times. The “romance” between Carter and Dejah Thoris is formulaic at best. Still, she is described repeatedly as gorgeous and nearly naked, which sets the standard for pulp heroines.

As a student of media conversions, I continue to wonder at the bungles in the recent film adaptation. Read my thoughts on the John Carter film here, but while they borrowed most of the characters, situations, and feel from the novel, they made many plot changes for the worse. Some of the camp factor does come from the source material, and there would probably be a need to simplify the action, however this doesn’t excuse the addition of multiple prologues, and ridiculous meta-villains. Pulp action is pulp action. Dressing it up with an extra layer of plot complexity doesn’t change that.

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Or read about my own historical fantasy novel here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Books

Tagged as: A Princess of Mars, Book Review, Dejah Thoris, Edgar Rice Burrough, Fantasy, John Carter, Princess of Mars, Pulp magazine, Science Fiction

The Way of Shadows

May03

Title: The Way of Shadows

Author: Brent Weeks

Genre: Fantasy

Length: 688 pages

Read: March 23-24, 2012

Summary: Great epic fantasy!

Despite the cheesy “hooded dude” cover, this was a great bit of epic fantasy. It was recommended by a twitter follower and turned out to be one of the better “classic medieval fantasy” books I’ve read in recent years. Certainly the best since I found The Name of the Wind in 2008.

Weeks borrows heavily and to good effect from 80s fantasy tropes. This is city fantasy, almost entirely set in a corrupt capital. Our protagonist is a young boy who apprentices with a deadly “wetboy” (assassin who uses magical powers). The prose is clean and workmanlike, sometimes even modern and flip. Weeks doesn’t bother to make anything sound too medieval, in fact, it’s so modern as to sometimes sound anachronistic. Still, despite the length, the novel is not overwritten and the writing doesn’t get in the way of the excellent storytelling and world building.

For fantasy fans, this book is an appealing ride. We have good characters, sordid and ambiguous underworld figures. We have a well conceived world with detailed and engaging political intrigue. We have a decent, albeit minimalist, magical system. And we have a lot — I mean a real lot — of very well written action scenes. Weeks is a great writer of physical action and he uses it to good effect. This book contains fight after fight. Plus lots of sneaking around. And it’s not overdone. Each individual skirmish is compact enough, well integrated into the intricate plot, and brilliantly executed.

Again, despite the length, this makes for a breakneck pace and near total immersion into the seedy underworld. The book is pretty dark too, with some serious abuse in the early chapters. It’s not A Song of Ice and Fire dark, but there is some good insight into the nature of meanness. Bravo. The adventures continue into two sequels.

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Or read about my own historical fantasy novel here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Books

Tagged as: Book Review, Brent Weeks, Fantasy, Fiction, High fantasy, Name of the Wind, Song of Ice and Fire, The Way of Shadows

The Lost Gate

Apr05

Title: The Lost Gate

Author: Orson Scott Card

Genre: Paranormal / Fantasy

Length: 385 pages

Read: March 17-20, 2012

Summary: Fun read!

It’s been awhile since I read a book by Card, although in eons past I read dozens and he was one of my favorite authors. He’s certainly lost none of his talent or voice. This young adult adventure hooks immediately with its fairytale-like narrative tone and engaging magic system. Danny belongs to the North (read Norse) family of degenerate mages. Their talents and legacy effectively covers a large swath of myth and superstition including the powers and belief in historic pagan deities. In fact, his relatives include Odid, Loki, and the like. Nor to say that they are degenerate deities ala American Gods or The Darkening Dream, but just that ancestors with similar powers were taken as such.

We learn about this stuff from the inside, with Danny already steeped in the knowledge of his clan. But soon enough he’s on the run in the normal world and his antics — fueled by powerful magics — are equally engaging. Woven in with this is a more mythic type tale set on the world of the Mithermages origin. The relevance of this eventually comes clear, but for a while it feels quite separate, and as we learn in the afterward it had its roots as a separate and older short story. The writing is snappy and the characters likable. If there is any problem during this stage, it’s that there isn’t really that much conflict. Danny’s powers are so strong that we don’t really worry too much.

The story races along until the 80% point when both threads come together. This last bit feels over rushed and over narrated. And the coda afterward even more hurried. I really enjoyed most of the novel, but this hyper-fast and hyper-forced end bugged me. It’s a common problem. Still, I’ll read the sequel.

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Or read about my own historical fantasy novel here.