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Book Reviews - Romance, Fantasy, Science Fiction - By an Adult for Adults

The Galactic Peace Committee – Great Fun Read, Humor, Science Fiction

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I love this book.  I read it a few months ago and needed to re-read to write this review and once more loved the zany, off-the-wall plot and back story.  It probably says something about my low brow tastes, but I’m giving this 5 stars, just because it was much fun to read the third time as the second and the first.

The Galactic Peace Committee of the title is a cross between a bad joke, a con job and a deadly necessity.  You see, there are thousands of races throughout the galaxy, most love war and fighting far more than we humans do, and most will gladly go slaughter another race for the horrible crime of insulting their hats or preferring pizza to pancakes.   The Committee exists to keep the peace, more or less, or at least keep someone from engulfing the entire galaxy in war or, worst of all, annoying the Ancient Ones.

Ah yes, the Ancient Ones.  One race of Ancient Ones looks like cuddly teddy bears.  The space teddy bears were the first alien race to contact us when Earth developed faster than light travel, and the bears kindly put Pluto and a minor Saturn moon back together, then helped us get over the hump on a few technological travails.

Then the space teddy bears pulled the ultimate con.  They convinced a gullible humanity to accept the immense honor to run the Galactic Peace Committee, while they and the other Ancient Ones, extend their holidays on their favorite beach worlds and enjoyed more drinks with umbrellas in them.  We’re a bunch of optimists with good opinions of ourselves so it tkes a while for humanity to realize they had been had.  No one wants to be in charge of Galactic Peace!

That’s the back story.  Our hero, Jake, is a mid level diplomat on a space station who would like to be successful enough to survive until he can retire on a pension that is very generous, mostly because the Committee rarely has to pay them out.  Jake needs to keep the peace and uses every skill he has and all his patience to stop two interstellar wars.  How Jake works these miracles is the crux of the novel.

The Galactic Peace Committee pulls off the hat trick:  humor, plot with enough science-fiction-y events to feel like we’re reading space opera without all the operatic trappings, intriguing characters, and did I mention humor?  Unlike several wanna-be humorous novels this one uses the ridiculous specifics to contrast with the generally serious back story to make a very good, fun novel.

There are a few minor problems.

  • Jake has a few woe-is-me moments in the beginning that stopped just before they got tiresome.
  • The Galactic Peace Committee is more a novella than a novel.
  • Not sure I like the super robot idea.  In this novel author L. G. Estrella avoids relying on the robots to make everything magically work out (these are military/assassin/bodyguard robots), but he must feel the temptation to have Jake narrowly escape because his bodyguard saves him.

The only one of these problems is number 2.  I want more Galactic Peace!

5 Stars

No Time Like the Past: The Chronicles of St. Mary’s Book Five – Breakneck Pace

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Wow.  No Time Like the Past has plot, plot and plot.  Our fearless Max does:

  • Travels back to St. Mary’s during the Cromwell revolt, saves 3 people and discovers why Markham sees a ghost;
  • Rescues people from the fire at St. Paul’s cathedral and nearly ends up dead;
  • Organizes Open Day with plenty of excitement and nearly ends up dead;
  • Re-structures the entire training program and enjoys the kind Mrs. Shaw as her temporary PA;
  • Travels back to rescue Botticelli paintings and nearly ends up dead
  • Witnesses the Spartans holding off the Persians at Thermopylae and gets wet on by one of the Spartans
  • Makes her first ever serious emotional commitment (and does not end up dead).

In addition we have the usual explosions and faux pas and near-catastrophes.

No Time Like the Past is fun to read and reread, and I guarantee each time you read it you’ll find something new to laugh at.  Author Jodi Taylor has a gift for vivid descriptions that make us feel like we are perched above the Spartans holding the Hot Gates, feeling the terror of a cathedral exploding in flames.  She brings the vivid imagery to life with wit and wry observations that make us feel like we are inside Max’s head.  The novel is successful at making history come alive.

There is character development in the sense that we get to know Peterson and Markham and Helen Foster better.  It is as though these are acquaintances whom we now are traveling with, learning about, becoming friends.  None of the characters undergoes any Eureka moments or has major emotional growth, but that’s not the point.  Taylor makes us feel like we work at St. Mary’s and all these people are real colleagues and friends.

My only real complaint with No Time Like the Past is that it is very hard to recall all Max’s adventures and accurately assign them to the right novel.  Since the books move one to the next, and all at the speed of light, the whole great cacophony gets bundled up my mind and the individual novels blur.  It makes it hard to write reviews!

4 Stars

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Excalibur Rising – What Happens When a Crime Boss Wants a Sword?

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Author Eileen Enwright Hodgetts has a unique answer to why the legend of King Arthur is so strong yet we have little to no historical evidence the man existed.  (Best theories put him as a war leader fending off the Saxon invasion, not as a larger-than-life heroic king of all Britain.)  Her answer?  The king ruled in an alternate Britain around the 1100s and his knights slid through into our world to quest and run off their wild oats.

The novel Excalibur Rising picks up today, when an English historian offers an acquisitive Las Vegas crime boss the chance to purchase King Arthur’s legendary sword.  The boss assigns his curator, Marcus, a former television treasure hunter, to verify the details and get the sword if it’s authentic.  That starts a whirlwind of murder, trips to Florida, England, environmental protests, kidnapping, car chases, and semi-psychic tracking.

 

Characters

The main characters are Marcus and Violet, the semi-psychic that the mob boss contacts to help with the search.  Both are well written. We meet Marcus first and he’s about what you would expect from a man once famous, now slightly on the seedy side.  His television show is long gone as is his money and most of his self-respect.  He has not contacted his ex-wife or children in years and lives in his boss’s casino hotel.

Violet is pretty but plump, not at all active and lives in Key West with her brother and sister.  All three were adopted and no one knows anything about Violet’s background.  Violet’s brother is a wannabe actor and adds a lot of humor and snark to the story.  Violet herself is pretty greedy – that Conch house eats money! – and can often find recent history just by touching something.  She wants the mafia boss’s reward.

Despite initial reservations and distrust the two join forces before the meet a whole crowd of extra characters, some nasty, some nice and all too many dead.

Mordred (or his latest descendant) makes an appearance and is the same conniving, greedy, care-for-nobody that we all detested in the original Arthur stories.  His evil minions are alive and well and join to terrorize the people in their version of Albion.  King Arthur himself is the central point of the novel but appears only at the very end.

Plot

The author is telling a fantasy and writes well.  She sets her plot to move fast, from Las Vegas to London to northern England to Wales, picking up people and clues along the way.  The book moves fast enough that it’s easy to suspend disbelief, although after Marcus once more said there was no evidence for King Arthur whatsoever I wanted to raise my hand and point out the Saxon invader theory.  (As a theory it explains a leader, but none of the knightly trappings or round table or any of the Grail quest.)

Overall

I thoroughly enjoyed Excalibur Rising, in fact it was a very pleasant surprise to read a book as well-written with so many engaging characters.  It sets up for a sequel at the end, but can be read and enjoyed as a standalone.

Excalibur Rising is right between 4 and 5 stars.  It’s not quite there to get 5, but better than many 4 star novels.  I eagerly look forward to reading the sequel.

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Gilded Cage by Vic James – Excellent Fantasy Set in Alternate England

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Gilded Cage by Vic James will be released on Valentine’s Day, 2017.  This is an excellent novel with a rich backstory and detailed world building, interesting characters and plenty of plot.  Don’t go by the blurb for this novel which make it sound like YA fantasy with teen romance and devoid of original ideas.  It has plenty of themes that adults will enjoy:

  • Slavery.  No, not based on race but on sheer power and ability to dominate.
  • Revolution
  • Peace and prosperity based on a grotesque social compact
  • Power

Gilded Cage postulates an England where Charles I died when overthrown by Skill users, men and women from certain families who have immense mental abilities.  The Skilled can heal themselves, raises entire buildings, adjust the minds of others and kill.  The Skilled didn’t only kill Charles, they abrogated all political power to themselves and now call themselves Equals.

Unskilled people, commoners, live ordinary lives, marrying, having children, raising families, going to school, working, saving, enjoying life, retiring.  Except that everyone – truly everyone outside the 300 or so Skilled families – must spend 10 years as a slave.  The slaves have zero rights, are legally not people.  Some serve the Skilled as unpaid servants while most live and work in slave towns.  Food, shelter, clothing are minimal and work is long and brutal, 12 hours 6 days a week.  Slavery is nothing like our community service and no one comes out the same as they went in.

Backstory – Slavery

James built a detailed and richly thought-out world.   Consider her treatment of slavery, a repulsive idea in any context however configured.

The slavery concept as executed in the novel is unique.  The Equals could  have forced everyone to work 1 week a month for 41 years, which would be about the same total as 10 years all at once.  But if you think about it, a 1 week per month routine would quickly become just a duty, onerous, unpleasant, but not soul-shattering.  To make their power and position absolutely, unequivocally clear, Equals force the 10 years.

When do you do your 10 year slave days?  Young so you have the rest of your life free (if you aren’t killed or maimed)?  At 55 so you can enjoy 35 years of adulthood first?   Alone or with a spouse?  With your children? It’s a horrible choice and there is no good answer.

The Equals also were smart to leave commoners alone to live normally outside the 10 year slave days.  They could have made everyone permanent slaves but that would have been unwise for economic and security reasons.  The commoners are the prime market for the goods that slave towns produce, and the guards and managers are all free people.

I wondered too about the guards, especially the sadistic bullies.  You would think that word would get around and they would be paid back when they too eventually had to serve their days, even if they went to a different slave town.

Anytime an author establishes a framework so carefully structured that readers think about the economic and political (to say nothing about moral) ramifications we have the makings of a great fantasy.  Once the author sets up the structure then she must create characters and a story that are equally vibrant.  James has done that here.

Characters

James does an excellent job showing us the characters, especially Skilled brothers Gavar and Silyen, one expected to pursue political leadership and the other scheming and exploring his Skill, Gavar’s repulsive fiancee Buoda, commoner Luke and would-be revolutionary leader Dr. Jackson.

She uses small details to show us the people.  For example, Bouda wants to force anyone who is unemployed long term back into slavery and can’t understand why her perfectly logical idea was not adopted.  That tells us about Bouda.  We see people interacting, many interesting minor players and some take risks and some do not.

Gilded Cage stands alone as an excellent, thought-provoking novel but it is also set up for sequels.  It is character-driven with several minor characters positioned for larger roles in the next books as conflicts are primed to start.  I expect we will see more of Luke’s older sister Abi as she escapes at the novel’s end, heartsick at Luke’s fate and from leaving Gavar and Silyen’s UnSkilled (but still noble) brother.  We will see more of Daisy, Abi and Luke’s young sister and her charge, Libby, Gavar’s illegitimate baby daughter who may provoke Bouda to ill-advised cruelty.

I Want to Know More – Skill and Equals

It’s clear that some Skilled can steal Skill from others, some do so unknowingly, and that some are overly fond of humiliating and hurting others.   Gavar’s father mentions he enjoyed his time using “special techniques”, i.e., using Skill to force commoners’ minds or torture.  He expects Gavar to do the same and seems to have almost no normal familial feelings beyond pride.

The man who founded Gavar’s family is the one who killed Charles I in an agonizing, extended execution.  That man’s son established the Equal leadership and set the Skilled as the only ones who lead and govern.  These people are repulsive, but there are hints that some may be rethinking their role.

Silyen wants to learn everything he can and he has more than his share of power, possibly stolen from his UnSkilled brother.  And what about Libby?  Does she have Skill?  Can she play a role to reconcile the commoners and Equal?

Overall

Vic James has given us a fascinating novel with a genuine plot, world and characters.  She balanced writing a solid story with setting up sequels and I hope to follow her through her next novels.

5 Stars

I received an advance copy from NetGalley in expectation of a review.

All Our Wrong Todays – Jetsons World or Ours? Loneliness or Love?

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All Our Wrong Todays is an imaginative time travel story starring Tom Barren as a guilt-ridden doofus in a Jetsons world who never seems to quite get it right.  Tom’s world diverged from ours in 1965 when scientist Lionel Gottreider demonstrated a power source that used the Earth’s motion – clean, non-polluting, infinite.  The power source gave off radiation; in Tom’s original world Gottreider leaves it run and he and the 12 scientists observing the experiment die a few months later, but only after Gottreider gives the technology to the world.

Tom is miserable for lots of reasons and impulsively jumps into the time travel machine his father invented.  Unfortunately, true to his track record, he forgets to use the suit designed to keep time travelers invisible and unable to interact with the past and unable to change history.  When Tom goes back to the crucial moment he startles Gottreider and interrupts the experiment.  Gottreider survives and Tom returns to the present.

Our present.  No flying cars, no fantastic gadgets, good-bye peace and hello to the world we know, as mucked up as ever.  Tom is now John Barren, a visionary architect with loving parents and a sister.  Tom has much happier life as John but is torn by grief and guilt for destroying his original world and causing millions of people to never be born.  Of course it could be worse.  Gottreider’s experiment has a third possible outcome, a massive meltdown that destroys North America and causes Tom to be Victor, a vicious special ops agent.

Characters

What makes All Our Wrong Todays work is the character, Tom/John/Victor.  He stays himself, Tom mostly, as he tries to integrate Tom and John, learns to enjoy his family, falls in love.  We walk along with Tom as he develops a personality, possibly the first time he’s ever been himself and not just his father’s son or the famous architect.  He meets Penny and learns to love, meets his sister and learns what it is like to have a family that cares about him.  He gives a talk about his architectural vision and learns what it is like to be successful.

All through Tom never stops thinking of himself as at least part doofus, trying to figure out what to do to correct the world – and trying to decide whether that’s the right thing to do if it is even possible.  We can imagine ourselves in the same situation because Tom isn’t a miracle worker or a hero, he is just a guy and kind of a failure.

Tom learns to enjoy his new world, despite the guilt, decides flying cars are no match for a happy, fulfilling life.  Still he knows the world as a whole is less well-off, less peaceful and he wrestles with the question whether to risk everything to put the world back even if he loses himself.

A Lot of Fun

Some time travel stories are awful, with bad plots or cardboard characters or too much technical jabber.  Most lack a sense of fun.  All Our Wrong Todays feels right.  We can imagine being Tom, making the wrong choice, ending the world as he knows it, trying to discover what is true vs. imaginary, trying to correct the problem.

All Our Wrong Todays reminded me of The Door Into Summer, one of my favorite novels from Robert Heinlein.  It has a similar sense of an individual who is caught up in time gone wrong and who then must correct the outcome.  The Door Into Summer was about one person with little sense that his mix up affects the world, while All Our Wrong Todays has a more consequential change and Tom has a personal and global impact.

Debut Novel

All Our Wrong Todays is the first novel by Elan Mastai who is screenwriter.  I don’t see room here for a sequel, unless Mastai uses the same setting and it will be interesting to see where he goes next with writing.  Dutton will publish All Our Wrong Todays  in February 2017 and Paramount has already picked it up for film.

4+ Stars

I received All Our Wrong Today’s from Net Galley in expectation of a review.

Dragons, Mummies, Remnants from Merrie England – Chasing Embers by James Bennet

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If anyone asks you the riddle, “What do Merrie Olde England, Celtic stories, the Queen of Punt, evil mummified priests, Queen Hatshepsut and drought in Ethiopia have in common?” you now know the answer.  Chasing Embers by James Bennet combines all of these into an interesting story.  Hero Ben Garston is a Remnant, the single member of his magical race allowed to live awake in our world by virtue of the ancient Lore, the agreement brokered by King John of England between men and magical beings in 1215.

Ben is a dragon, and if another dragon awakens then the Lore will break and humans and the magicals will once more be at war.  So how do Hatshepsut, mummies and Punt get in the middle of this?  Simple. Hatshepsut’s evil undead priest Baba Kamenwati wants to entice Anubis to the world and uses Ben’s girlfriend Rose as bait.  A young girl hoping for a miracle to end the hideous drought that is killing everyone wakes up Atiya, Queen of Punt, a demigoddess of sorts, who can take on dragon form.   Clear yes?

Chasing Embers is easier to follow than it sounds but it took me several pages to get into the story.

Characters

Chasing Embers is not a character-centric novel, in fact Bennet builds only enough character to prop up the story. Characterization is weak and people seem to do things just to do them.

Despite spending nearly the entire novel with Ben we don’t know him well.  He is idealistic, cynical, acts to protect his girlfriend Rose, curious, resourceful but felt like a character and not a person.  Ben is a dragon who can shapeshift to human, and as a human youth he fell in love and agreed to stop hunting people to please his beloved.  He has loved other human women and loves and wants to protect Rose, but she senses there is something off about Ben and rejects him.

Ben isn’t a happy person and he’s lonely and feels sorry for himself.  He isn’t happy with his life and does nothing to change it.

The most interesting character is Blaise Van Hart, the Fae envoy, a remnant himself in a way, left behind when the other Fae withdrew after King Arthur died at Camlann.  He plays a major role that gives the story a backbone.  We don’t know him well either, which makes sense since he cultivates mystery.

Villains read like comic book characters, seeming to enjoy villainy for evil’s sake.  Undead priest Baba Kamenwati wants Anubis God of Death to rule the world, not a wise desire.  The Coven Royal is three nasty witches, happy to hurt anyone but it’s not clear what they want to obtain beyond making trouble.  Minor villain Fulk Fitzwarren wants to reclaim the title, house and lands that his ancestor lost back in 1215.  I don’t think he would be all that happy owning a ruined castle but his family has schemed and fought Ben Garsten for the last 800 years to reclaim it, so why not.

Setting

The best parts of the book are in Egypt and Punt/Ethiopia.  Bennet helps us feel the hopeless drought, the hot dry air, the sand that gets into everything, the spectacle of Hatshepsut’s entourage, the sun baking Punt and the people who eack out their living in ancient Egyptian tombs today.

Writing Style

Bennet manages to juggle all the pieces and keep his complex plot up in the air.  While he isn’t a gifted storyteller he writes clearly enough that this complicated story with jogs back in time to 1215 AD and 1470 BC makes sense and we can keep the various characters clear.  Chasing Embers is Bennet’s first published novel and writing is fairly decent considering that.

The first part of the story is boring and doesn’t make a lot of sense as we hop from modern New York to modern Ethiopia.  When Chasing Embers finally got interesting and I was compelled to keep reading, my tablet said I was 18% through the novel.  If you are like me, 18% is a long way to go before a story coalesces and starts to move forward.

Overall

Chasing Embers is fantasy with an unusual, interesting premise (the Lore and Remnants), a vivid glimpse of ancient Punt and the meeting of two queens.  Ben is a dragon but this is not just another dragon story as it combines history and myths from multiple eras and peoples.  The weak characters are offset by the setting and Bennet’s imaginative use of Egypt ancient and modern, Ethiopia and Punt.

I enjoyed reading Chasing Embers – once past the magic 18% point it was no hardship to finish unlike many fantasies – but didn’t like the novel enough to look for the sequel, if one is written.  Overall 3+ stars.

NetGalley gave me a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

Kingfisher – Fantasy with Subtle Magic – Patricia McKillip

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Patricia McKillip is one of my favorite authors for her atmospheric novels that combine down to earth characters with love and forgiveness, wispy magic, inexplicable happenings, good and evil and pure imagination.  Kingfisher uses the Grail myth as a theme on top of a world that combines magic in the foggy coast, a basilisk cum temptress, humor, a traffic-snarled bridge, a castle’s kitchen plus characters seeking for themselves and their hearts.

If this sounds confusing, well, the novel is a bit.  I find McKillip’s plots seem to have small (or large) holes that I simply overlook, jump in the torrent and move along with the characters.  We get bewildered together. (I re-read Kingfisher as I do most of her novels and the plot was clearer and more seamless the second time.)

Kingfisher is no exception.  Don’t expect detailed explanations of how the world is set up, or seamless transitions.  Things happen.  Characters do things, sometimes for reasons even they don’t understand.  It’s real life.

People

Our main character Pierce is a straight arrow who somehow finds himself taking a knife from an inn (actually he left his credit card so it wasn’t technically stealing – or so he told himself).  Pierce and his brother Val are the down-to-earth characters that McKillip uses to move the story along, while the main plot revolves bastard prince Daimon and the secondary plot has Carrie contending with Stillwater for the soul of the town and family.

Kingfisher is about people, with magic and its world providing part of the challenge and decorating the main thrust, which is the tangle between family, loyalty, love, forgiveness and ambition.

Daimon’s story is love fueled by enchantment augmented with glamour and sex, meant to be strong enough to set him against his father, the king whom he loves. His family – his real family, not his biological mother’s family – sends Dame Scotia to watch over him and she entangles herself in his dreams enough to break them both free of the enchantment.

Magic and World Building

McKillip’s magic is understated.  Pierce and Val are children of a powerful sorceress and she works magic to free them from the basilisk who holds their father. Chef Stillwater uses magic and malice to imprison an entire town feeding them food that looks beautiful but is empty of flavor and nutrition.  The Ravenhold women use glamour to enchant first the king, then his son.

Everyone accepts magic as real and powerful, but we never see how it works or whether only some have the ability.  It’s a fact of life, not the be-all and end-all of the novel.

Kingfisher’s world is our world complete with cell phones and bad traffic plus magic and a plethora of gods and goddesses.  McKillip doesn’t spend time telling us much about this world beyond letting us feel its familiarity.

We are in the Kingdom of Wyvernhold, which has knights and tournaments on special occasions; think of England but with the full-color ceremonial trappings that have meaning, and are not just decorations. The king mentions that one reason he wants to promote the Quest is that now with times so good, some of his subjects are restless and looking for trouble, wanting their own tiny domains’ independence.

Summary

Most of McKillip’s novels have gorgeous covers and Kingfisher’s is a bit blah; maybe she felt the modern setting needed a more modern cover picture.  That’s about my only quibble.  Some Amazon reviewers complained about the lack of a clear magic system or more explicit world building but I don’t agree.

Kingfisher is about people caught up in snarls due to love and loyalty with magic adding twists.  It is a fantasy because it is set in another world and there is some magic in the background.  I always feel tossed in the middle of McKillip’s fantasy novels, like I should know these people, these situations.  Kingfisher is no exception.  It is overall excellent.

5 Stars

Foxglove Summer – City Boy Goes to Country – Rivers of London – Ben Aaronovitch

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Ben Aaronovitch’s Rivers of London series gets better and better.  We last left Peter Grant devastated by a massive betrayal in Broken Homes.  Weeks later in Foxglove Summer he’s off to Herefordshire to check a former Folly member, now retired, as a possible suspect in a case of two missing 11 year old girls.  Peter quickly rules the former wizard from suspicion and offers his help to the local police who are overwhelmed.

Peter is pretty sure this will be a straight forward police case and is looking forward to something simple – no wizardry, no Faceless Man, no Tasers, no Mother Thames or her brood.  His happy certainty lasts right until he checks out the girls’ cell phones, found abandoned and non functional.  Peter recognizes the tell-tale pitting of electronics exposed to magic.

This is our first time seeing Peter operate alone and he does a grand job.  He searches all the past witness statements for “oddities” and sure enough, finds that one of the girls had an invisible friend. Sleuthing the modern way, with cheapo cell phones set up to register magic, plus plenty of gumshoe work and listening to what’s not said yields success.

Peter’s developed his magic skills immensely, witness the fact he could blow out fence gates on the run, something Nightingale said only about half the older generation could do.  He gets tantalizing clues about Nightingale and the debacle at Ettersberg and further insight into magic’s place in the world beyond London.

New Characters

Peter’s been entranced by Beverly Brook, sort-of 20-something daughter of Mama Thames and this time she shows up to help him out.  He helps her too, in several interesting ways.  Beverly is more human when she’s with Peter but she still has her river goddess innate presence.

We meet several new characters:  DCI Windrow and Inspector Edmondson, the leads on the kidnapping case, Dominic Croft, whom Windrow assigns to work with Peter, normally shrewd journalist Sharon Pike who bizarrely accuses the cops of covering up the real culprit, offering as evidence a piece of the plastic backing from a candy bar, the parents, Hugh Oswald the former wizard now bee keeper and Mellissa his granddaughter who may be part bee herself.  I wouldn’t be surprised to see Dominic or Sharon knock on the Folly door sometime to learn magic.

Aaronovitch makes these people real to us.  We don’t get a full character dissection on any of them but he shows us enough that we recognize them.  They are types yes, but with enough added humanity that they are people, not cardboard cutouts.

Setting

Peter’s way out of his element in the wilds of  Herefordshire but in true Peter Grant spirit quickly learns his way around and gets familiar enough with the local background to spot anomalies in the reforestation efforts.  He’s a amazing person whom I’d like to meet sometime.

The only map is on the front cover and I’m not familiar with Herefordshire – good thing we have Google maps and Google Earth! – but you don’t need to know the real countryside to follow the idea of wooded hills, pastures, fields, small towns, ridges and creeks.  Aaronovitch gives enough detail to make it interesting without trying to make it too realistic.

Plot

The plot was great.  As with all the Rivers of London novels we have lots of unanswered questions.  Who is the fairy queen and why did she want the girls?  Why did she want Peter and what did she plan to use him for?  Why did the unicorns chase the escaping girls right into the arms of Peter, Beverly and Dominic?  How did the fairy queen make a second, identical girl?

And last, how on earth would Peter et al explain the second daughter? And that they were giving the spare girl, who happened to be the biological human daughter, to Fleet to raise?

Summary

I have loved all the Rivers of London novels, but if I had to pick a favorite it would be a tie among Midnight Riot, Broken Homes and this one, Foxglove Summer.  It’s fun seeing Peter grow personally and as a wizard, London commentaries are hilarious, tension ever increasing, and minor characters are fun and well developed with just a few sentences.

5 Stars

 

The Martian – People, Science and Constraints

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The Martian is a wonderful combination of realism, science, hard facts and most of all, real people.  The Ares 4 mission had to bug out in a hurry ahead of a sandstorm and thinking crew member Mark Watney was dead, left him behind.  Mark is alive and now stranded – alone – on an inhospitable rock in a habitat meant to last a month, with very little food, no method to contact Earth and facing near certain death since his only chance to catch a ride back home is 4 years away.

Author Andy Weir doesn’t sugar coat the situation: Being on Mars is dangerous and being alone on Mars is very dangerous.  Mark will most likely die, whether from starvation, oxygen depletion, CO2 overload, freezing or pure chance.

The best two parts of the novel were the people back on Earth and Mark’s resilience and creative methods to win through.  In the end, the book is about people.  The science is realistic and it adds to the interest; the constraints are deadly and keep us turning the pages, but it is the people that make it memorable.

5 Stars

Broken Homes – Supernatural Mystery Suspense Fantasy – Ben Aaronovitch

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Picking favorite books is a little picking favorite kids; you can’t.  So far I’ve loved all of Ben Aaronovitch’s Peter Grant/Rivers of London series; Midnight Riot was grand, introducing us to Peter, his buddy Lesley, boss Inspector Nightingale, crypto-pathologist Dr Walid, assorted semi-supernatural rivers and semi-dead bad guys.  Moon Over Soho gave us jazz vampires and introduced the Faceless Man.  Whispers Underground was just a tiny step down the wow! scale as we plodded through London’s sewers and discovered the Quiet Folk.

Now we’ve Broken Homes, combining the best of the first three with more suspense and mystery.  Inspector Nightingale goes into action, Peter and Lesley chase bad guys, and best of all, Peter does his usual intuitive/random/unfocused policing.

I enjoy Peter’s curiosity and intuitive feel for hidden problems.  Combined with his talent for messing up, his unique approach to problems makes him feel like someone I know.  Peter tells the story himself, using his own colloquial slang grammar (“me and Lesley”) and shares his thoughts as he goes.  He is refreshing, honest with himself and it’s fun to ride along inside his head.

The book works on multiple levels.  It’s a police/mystery/suspense story as Peter discovers the plot and sleuths connections that are as wispy as cobwebs, a character story, and a wizard/magic fantasy.  Peter is the common element and he’s a great character, well thought out, rounded, real.

Broken Homes ramps up the stakes for Peter and Nightingale.  Earlier we danced around small disasters and caught glimpses of a larger threat; this time we can see more.  The Faceless Man is an example. Inspector Nightingale calls the Faceless Man a criminal, and so he is, but his aims are hidden until the end when he tells Peter he is pursuing power, more magic power than he can safely use within himself.

Broken Homes has great secondary characters, Betsy and Kevin of the slightly shady Tankridge family and Jake Phillips, socialist activist and balcony gardener.  (His garden sounded wonderful.)

Aaronovitch uses tiny details to make bit players real.  Example is how he presents Jake Phillips as dignified, older, dedicated in just a short paragraph.  Jake is completely unembarrassed when Peter catches him stooping to put a notice in Peter’s Skytower mail slot – a vastly undignified position.  Jake needs help to stand up, so we feel his age and arthritic back.

These encounters make the story richer, more real and add humor.  In fact Broken Homes had several laugh out loud scenes, particularly Peter’s comments on architecture and decorating.  Plus we got a rich list of new British slang terms and food types; I particularly liked reading about suet jam pudding.  For the uninitiated it is not the English version of Eskimo ice cream but a cross between a shortening-rich pastry, a steamed bread and jelly roll.  Maybe someday I’ll make one.

Broken Homes took the Rivers of London series on a slight turn that should result in better stories, a longer series, more difficulties and more realistic suspense.  Earlier we tiptoed through the tulips with Peter – despite horrible moments and murders in Midnight Riot it mostly seemed like magic was fun – but now it’s serious.  There are ethically-challenged wizards who don’t care whom they hurt (even if they do draw the line at mass murder) and there is something in the Folly basement…

Five Stars.