End of Spring Update
Time is flying by, and it’s a week before Memorial Day weekend. Summer has, to all intents and purposes, settled into residence in DC. The temperatures touched 90F today, with a line of quality summer evening thunderstorms to cool things off. The garden is blooming. So I think Spring is basically over. And with the turn of the seasons, a new batch of reading.
Perennials
Tordotcom: Wells, Tesh, Polk, Martha Wells, Emily Tesh and C.K.Polk.
This was a freebie from Tor.com -- I’d already read Wells’ All Systems Red, part of my favorite series. Silver In The Wood (Tesh) and Witchmark (Polk) were new.
Tesh’s Silver In The Wood is a charming tale of the guardian of a forest -- I’m sure I’m not doing that 100% justice -- and the unusual modern visitor who finds out who and what he is. Tesh writes skilled and polished prose; the story line could be somewhat elliptical, and was occasionally hard to follow.
Smirk factor: All clear 2 pts (Carefully crafted words)
Immersion factor: Shallow: 1 pt
Writing quality: Above average: 1.5 pts
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Average: 1 pt
Total: 6.5/10
Witchmark is a chilling tale. Polk builds a vaguely Steampunk-like world whose mundane surface level hides trickery and evil. Starting with a doctor’s quest to protect vulnerable war veterans, we are quickly dragged into a whirlwind of deception and danger. Excellent writing, and although the story takes a little time to really get going it went in a (good) direction I didn’t expect.
Smirk factor: All clear 2 pts (Clear, readable use of language)
Immersion factor: Chest high: 1.5 pts
Writing quality: Above average: 1.5 pts
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Above average: 1.5 pts
Total: 7/10
Fury, (Tales from Beyond These Walls #1) Michael Robertson
Reuben has been waiting to be old enough to serve his city in the endless battle against Fear’s army and the zombie masses who inhabit the wasteland outside the city walls. But not all -- maybe nothing -- is as it seems. Decent plot, reasonably interesting protagonist with lots of future potential for development, but hamstrung by a relatively flat writing style. Generally fell into what I think of as “YA Adjacent” in terms of sophistication and use of language. Very long series -- there appear to be (at least) 11 more.
Smirk factor: All clear: 2 pts (no smirks to be found)
Immersion factor: Damp: 0.5 pts
Writing quality: Average: 1 pt
Character/plot development: Below-average: 0.5 pts
Innovative/interesting: Average: 1 pt
Total: 5/10
Collected Stories, Richard Fox
No cover thumbnail for this collection, but an interesting combination of titles.
An author website freebie. Among my favorites: The Achenean Reception revels in a wedding gone really, really lethally bad. Fathers bond unexpectedly in Status: Inactive. And Of Shadows and Caves matches Fox with David “Honourverse” Weber. All of the stories were good, although a few, like Cold Call, were heavier on the shooting than I prefer--but even that was well-crafted.
Smirk factor: Plus que acceptable: 1.5 pts (“Title not indexed, try again later.” But seemed solid.)
Immersion factor: Shallow: 1 pt
Writing quality: Above average: 1.5 pts
Character/plot development: Average: 1.5 pt;
Innovative/interesting: Average: 1 pt
Total: 6.5/10
Caution: May Cause Unexplained Ocular Bleeding, Nikolas Robinson
An interesting but uneven collection of horror shorts. The first two are probably the best. Drive Me Home which delivers a chilling reminder about not driving/murdering under the influence. Hell Is For Rabbits is a darkly funny jaunt into the dangers of mixing Satanism and household pets. The rest varied from a little odd but interesting to one or two (Midnight Massacre) which seemed like left-over creative writing assignments. Overall a decent, entertaining collection.
Smirk factor: All clear: 2 pts (1 smirk, used appropriately)
Immersion factor: Damp: 0.5 pts
Writing quality: Average: 1 pt
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Average: 1 pt (stories were uneven)
Total: 5.5/10
Into The Black: Odyssey One #1, Evan Curry
Earth’s first faster than light vessel heads to the stars, finds other humans and war ensues. Decent mil SF. High science quotient (11 references to gravity wells) and at least a nod towards physics and science! I downloaded the “Remastered Edition” and didn’t see the editing errors various Goodreads reviewers noticed. Story was solid if unimaginative. Character development was mixed -- the captain of the ship has what seems like improbably terrible strategic judgment, for example. Entertaining, though!
Smirk factor: 0verdone: 0 pts (21 “smirk/smirked/smirking” in 587 pages)
Immersion factor: Shallow: 1 pt
Writing quality: Average: 1 pt
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Average: 1 pt
Total: 4/10
Stringers, Chris Panatier
The sleeper hit of my spring! Ben can’t explain why he knows a lot about watches and insects -- particularly reproduction -- but until he’s catfished and kidnapped along with his stoner best friend and their jar of pickles, he has no idea how valuable he is, literally or figuratively. Fun, funny, and relatively light, great hammock reading.
Smirk factor: All clear: 2 pts (No smirks given.)
Immersion factor: Chest-high: 1.5pts
Writing quality: Average: 1 pt
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Above-average: 1.5 pt
Total: 7/10
The Phlebotomist, Chris Panatier.
Another Panatier novel, this one explores a darker future. Think of it as the world of Blade without Blade the character and with the repressed population kept segregated by blood type. A twisty story with a strong female lead and some good surprises thrown in. Published in 2020, the writing is less polished than Stringers, but it’s good to see Panatier evolving and improving.
Smirk factor: Acceptable: 1 pt (10 smirks, borderline overdone)
Immersion factor: Shallow: 1 pt
Writing quality: Average: 1 pt
Character/plot development: Average: 1.5 pts
Innovative/interesting: Above-average: 1.5 pts
Total: 5.5/10
Kundo Wakes Up, Saad Z. Hossain.
Kundo is an artist, resident of the dying city of Chittagong. The city’s omniscient AI has gone silent, and Kundo’s wife has disappeared. As he sets out look for her, what he winds up discovering goes far, far deeper than he’d have suspected.
Hossain looks at two themes here. One is how we respond to the decay of the world around us. Some hang on, some adapt, some fail -- and some opt out entirely. All of the choices have consequences, though. And Kundo’s awakening, while it starts out very literally, is of course at its most significant on a symbolic level. As his life and city fall apart, Kundo has metaphorically slept through it. The awakening is gradual but profound.
This novella is another brilliant book from Hossain, whose work continues to captivate and delight.
Smirk factor: All clear: 2 pts (2 smirks, both appropriate)
Immersion factor: Chest-high: 1.5 pts
Writing quality: Above-average: 1.5 pts
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Above-average: 1.5pts
Total: 7.5/10
Tordotcom: Chambers, Scalzi, Wagner, Becky Chambers, John Scalzi, Erin K. Wagner.
What does it mean to belong? What does it mean to be different? When and how do we bridge the gaps that divide us, and what happens if we don’t? These questions hint at the theme uniting the three works in the Tor.com monthly book club’s May 2022 edition.
Becky Chambers has set A Psalm For The Wild-Built in a beautiful, evocatively-written world. An itinerant tea-serving monk in the middle of a crisis of identity comes face to face with a robot, descendant of self-emancipating industrial age machines. Together, they wind up exploring what it means to be, what people need, and who each of them are. Not my usual cup of tea, but a quality story by a talented writer.
Smirk factor: All clear: 2 pts
Immersion factor: Chest high: 1.5 pts
Writing quality: Above average: 1.5 pts
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Average: 1 pt
Total: 7/10
My inner cheapskate’s eyes are watering at the idea of a $11 e-book novella — I normally wouldn’t pay that much for a whole series. On reflection, it was probably worth more than that price to get that much excellence in one small place.
Comment (5/26/2022): The always-excellent Track of Words has a review up of A Psalm For The Wild-Built. The review is worth a read, as it covers much more than I did above, and does it well.
I also noted that the list price for the novella was £16.98. Checked on Amazon’s US site and found that was roughly the case for the printed version, and even the e-book is pricey. A good reminder that quality doesn’t always come free or cheap, and sometimes you do get what you pay for.
Scalzi’s Unlocked is a documentary-style look at the background to Hayden’s Syndrome, the disease which sets the stage for his very clever books Lock In and Head On. I found this less compelling than the two novels, but still interesting. Scalzi is a close observer of human nature and society, and could turn an owner’s manual for a car into interesting reading. This is the least favorite thing of his I’ve read, it’s still well above average.
Smirk factor: More than acceptable: 1.5pts
Immersion factor: Shallow: 1 pt
Writing quality: Above average: 1.5 pts
Character/plot development: Above-average: 1.5 pts
Innovative/interesting: Above-average: 1.5 pts
Total: 7/10
Erin Wagner’s An Unnatural Life is a tightly-written story about prejudice, structural injustice and the human cost of doing the right thing. Aiya is an immigrant to a colony on the Saturn moon Europa, who finds herself taking on the cause of an AI construct who has been convicted of murder. The allegory writes itself, but Wagner does a very nice job of being compelling without slipping into preachiness.
Smirk factor: More than acceptable: 1.5pts
Immersion factor: Chest-high: 1.5 pts
Writing quality: Above average: 1.5pts
Character/plot development: Above average: 1.5 pts
Innovative/interesting: High: Above average: 1.5 pts
Total: 7.5/10
Vulnerable, Patricia Loofbourrow.
This is a prequel (number 0.5) to the Red Dog Conspiracy series. A very short 24 pages, Vulnerable is a quick but vivid trip into the misery of the patriarchal system in the Dickensian future city of Dickens. (See what Loofbourrow did there?) It’s more polished than I remember the longer stories being, despite the dystopian plot.
Smirk factor: All clear: 2 pts (Clear, accessible, literate word use.)
Immersion factor: Shallow: 1 pt
Writing quality: Average: 1 pt
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Average: 1 pt
Total: 6/10
Annuals
Best of Planet Stories: Eric John Stark, Leigh Brackett/Shelf Space Sci-Fi.
Leigh Brackett (1915-1978)
“Queen of Space Opera” and much more!
An uber-retrospective look at classic SF from a pioneering woman writer. Leigh Brackett (1915-1978) was called the “Queen of Space Opera”. She may be best remembered for the screenplay of The Empire Strikes Back, which is dedicated to her memory. She was a prolific producer of screenplays and SF, from the later of which is drawn the Stark series, named for planet-trotting ur-hero Eric John Stark.
The writing is definitely stamped with the impact of the age in which it was produced. It is of a noticeably higher standard than most of what I’ve read lately -- Brackett was definitely a professional, and it tells. Plot lines are simple and direct, characters simple and direct as well. I have had trouble getting traction with it, and want to come back later. 19% finished.
Birth of Heavy Metal, Michael Todd, Michael Anderle.
More industrial-scale independent writing from a team anchored by the über-productive Anderle. This covers material from the Zoo setting -- an alien enclave in the midst of the Sahara alternately coveted, studied, and fought over by governments, corporations and shadowy teams of mercenaries doing the bidding of both. I’ve read several other novels from the Zoo, but am finding this oddly painful. There’s nothing particularly wrong with it, but sustaining creativity over 2314 pages is a heavy lift. 17%
(or 393 pages, take or give 0.38ths of a page -- which is root of the problem, I think.)
No Good Men Among The Living: America, The Taliban, and the War Through Afghan Eyes, Anand Gopal.
Much awarded, including with a Pulitzer Prize nomination, this is a bleak journey through hubris, chaos and suffering. A good example of an otherwise excellent piece of nonfiction which may be just a little too serious for me to face now. Paused at 56%.
Weeded Out
Don’t judge a book by its…
Fall of Zona Nox (Warpmancer Saga #1), Nicholas Woode Smith.
Originally released in 2013, and slated to be republished in mid-2022, hopefully with significant revisions and editing. This isn’t completely unreadable. It is close, though. The writing has moments of humor (“He’d always been one for free markets. Especially when it came to freeing markets of their goods.”) but they’re bracketed by lumpish, distracting turns of phrase. Many are redundancies: “One of his surviving section members, the others were MIA or KIA...” (Well, yes. That’s how it works. Unless they’re wounded, in which case...) There are also many a non sequitur: “He may have been an opportunistic Galisian mobster, but he was loyal to whatever group he joined.” Dude, what does that mean?
The plot isn’t terrible, and the characters have potential, but the writing quickly scuttled my will to continue. Put down at a somewhat mind-numbing 37% through.
Smirk factor: Dangerously close to overdone: 0 pts (7 smirks, but perfectly un-cromulent words choices abound)
Immersion factor: Damp: 0.5 pts (Perverse interest doesn’t count)
Writing quality: Needs work: 0 pts
Character/plot development: Average: 1 pt
Innovative/interesting: Below-average: 0.5 pts
Total: 2/10
…or by their awards. I didn’t read far enough into this to figure out what the symbolism with the fingers and flames means.
Middlegame, Seanan McGuire.
A Hugo award nomination, along with whatever other awards or nominations come to a book, normally dispose me very favorably towards a book. This is the exception. I may perhaps be ground down by the sheer volume of indie/self-published space opera I encounter, but my overwhelming reaction to this so far has been the ever-popular “Are we there yet?” No, we are not. And there is no sign of when the trip will end.
I think this is me more than the book, because there are flashes that kept pulling me back in. I love the villain, but the twins, Roger and Dodger, just seemed cutesey. The leaden pacing is an issue, though. Ultimately, there are other--albeit clearly less accomplished--authors offering more compelling fare in my reading queue. Put down at 23% done.
Smirk factor: Acceptable: 1 pt (7 smirks in 492 pages, mostly by adolescents so...yeah, okay)
Immersion factor: Shallow: 1 pt
Writing quality: High: 2 pts
Character/plot development: Below-average: 0.5 pts (Roger and Dodger? <Sigh>)
Innovative/interesting: Above-average: 1.5 pts
Total: 6/10