Another month ends, so the main Brightdreamer Books site has once again been updated.
Enjoy!
Thursday, November 30, 2023
The Lost and the Found (Cat Clarke)
The Lost and the Found
Cat Clarke
Crown Books
Fiction, YA Thriller
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: Faith Long was just four years old when Laurel, her adopted older sister, was taken from their front yard in broad daylight. Since then, everything about her life has been warped around that absence. Her mother threw herself into the investigation, ensuring that the police and public didn't forget Laurel's face so long as she was missing. Her father, equally devastated, eventually had to leave, moving in with a boyfriend who becomes like a second father to Faith. As for Faith herself, she knows she'll never be anything but Laurel's sister, the pale imitation, the consolation prize who will never live up to the memory of the missing girl.
Thirteen years later, a miracle happens: a young woman turns up at the family's old house, clutching a battered teddy bear just like the one Lauren disappeared with... a young woman who claims to be Laurel Long.
She's reticent to discuss what happened, or where she's been, or how she managed to escape after so long. She's clearly been traumatized, and nobody (except maybe their mother) expects her to be the same sweet little girl she was when she vanished. But even Faith is surprised to find how many mixed emotions are dredged up when she lays eyes on the nineteen-year-old Laurel for the first time, and how much more chaotic her already-unstable life becomes... and that's before she begins to wonder about some of Laurel's behaviors and newly-acquired quirks. As much as the girl's disappearance threw the family into disarray, her return may destroy what little they salvaged.
REVIEW: The disappearance of a child has to be one of the greatest traumas a family can experience, especially when they are never found. Those left behind are left with questions that fester like open wounds, not helped by a media and society always hungry for salacious details and wild speculation. The Lost and the Found shows how even what should be a moment of closure and happiness can instead lead to more trauma, especially when new questions are raised.
Faith Long is a shy seventeen-year-old who only recently managed to make a few friends and even find a boyfriend; her entire life, she's learned to doubt that anyone could be interested in her as a person and not simply as Laurel's sister. Her mother never stopped her campaign to find Laurel, even at the cost of her marriage (and more than one accusation that she was milking the disappearance for the money and attention, accusations that may oversimplify her motives but aren't entirely without merit), and sometimes doesn't even seem to see Faith. Her father, at least, is a steadying presence, no less involved or loving despite living elsewhere, though it's his French boyfriend Michel who becomes the real rock Faith can lean on in hard times. Faith is slowly, tentatively looking forward to college and adulthood and leaving the toxic family nest, becoming her own person at last... at least, until Laurel turns up again.
If Laurel the absent sister was an inescapable shadow over Faith's life, Laurel the returned is a veritable black hole, sucking everyone into her presence. She has been through indescribable Hell - the book never gets graphic but makes more than enough allusions and hints - and Faith knows she needs to be understanding and patient, but can't help feeling that her life has been upended yet again, and yet again nobody seems to notice how she's being trampled underfoot and forgotten... not helped by how their mother immediately latches onto the returned Laurel, elevating her to saintly status and even arranging fresh press conferences and media outings touting the "happy ending" to their long years of suffering. Faith struggles to relearn what it means to be a sister and to not lose what little life and independence she managed to attain from before, even as she tries to reconnect with someone who sometimes seems so familiar, and other times seems like a total stranger. Along the way are hints that there are important things Laurel isn't telling anyone, hints that could destroy the fragile new normal Faith and her family are trying to build.
A couple subplots felt like they didn't quite go anywhere by the end, a few hints that were never followed up. For the most part, this is a solid thriller about the struggles of a shattered family to come to grips with the unthinkable twice over (both the abduction and the return), and the struggle of one teen girl to reconcile the oddly ambivalent feelings and conflicting instincts raised by the "miracle" that was supposed to fix everything.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Like Never and Always (Ann Aguirre) - My Review
Down Among the Sticks and Bones (Seanan McGuire) - My Review
In An Instant (Suzanne Redfearn) - My Review
Cat Clarke
Crown Books
Fiction, YA Thriller
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: Faith Long was just four years old when Laurel, her adopted older sister, was taken from their front yard in broad daylight. Since then, everything about her life has been warped around that absence. Her mother threw herself into the investigation, ensuring that the police and public didn't forget Laurel's face so long as she was missing. Her father, equally devastated, eventually had to leave, moving in with a boyfriend who becomes like a second father to Faith. As for Faith herself, she knows she'll never be anything but Laurel's sister, the pale imitation, the consolation prize who will never live up to the memory of the missing girl.
Thirteen years later, a miracle happens: a young woman turns up at the family's old house, clutching a battered teddy bear just like the one Lauren disappeared with... a young woman who claims to be Laurel Long.
She's reticent to discuss what happened, or where she's been, or how she managed to escape after so long. She's clearly been traumatized, and nobody (except maybe their mother) expects her to be the same sweet little girl she was when she vanished. But even Faith is surprised to find how many mixed emotions are dredged up when she lays eyes on the nineteen-year-old Laurel for the first time, and how much more chaotic her already-unstable life becomes... and that's before she begins to wonder about some of Laurel's behaviors and newly-acquired quirks. As much as the girl's disappearance threw the family into disarray, her return may destroy what little they salvaged.
REVIEW: The disappearance of a child has to be one of the greatest traumas a family can experience, especially when they are never found. Those left behind are left with questions that fester like open wounds, not helped by a media and society always hungry for salacious details and wild speculation. The Lost and the Found shows how even what should be a moment of closure and happiness can instead lead to more trauma, especially when new questions are raised.
Faith Long is a shy seventeen-year-old who only recently managed to make a few friends and even find a boyfriend; her entire life, she's learned to doubt that anyone could be interested in her as a person and not simply as Laurel's sister. Her mother never stopped her campaign to find Laurel, even at the cost of her marriage (and more than one accusation that she was milking the disappearance for the money and attention, accusations that may oversimplify her motives but aren't entirely without merit), and sometimes doesn't even seem to see Faith. Her father, at least, is a steadying presence, no less involved or loving despite living elsewhere, though it's his French boyfriend Michel who becomes the real rock Faith can lean on in hard times. Faith is slowly, tentatively looking forward to college and adulthood and leaving the toxic family nest, becoming her own person at last... at least, until Laurel turns up again.
If Laurel the absent sister was an inescapable shadow over Faith's life, Laurel the returned is a veritable black hole, sucking everyone into her presence. She has been through indescribable Hell - the book never gets graphic but makes more than enough allusions and hints - and Faith knows she needs to be understanding and patient, but can't help feeling that her life has been upended yet again, and yet again nobody seems to notice how she's being trampled underfoot and forgotten... not helped by how their mother immediately latches onto the returned Laurel, elevating her to saintly status and even arranging fresh press conferences and media outings touting the "happy ending" to their long years of suffering. Faith struggles to relearn what it means to be a sister and to not lose what little life and independence she managed to attain from before, even as she tries to reconnect with someone who sometimes seems so familiar, and other times seems like a total stranger. Along the way are hints that there are important things Laurel isn't telling anyone, hints that could destroy the fragile new normal Faith and her family are trying to build.
A couple subplots felt like they didn't quite go anywhere by the end, a few hints that were never followed up. For the most part, this is a solid thriller about the struggles of a shattered family to come to grips with the unthinkable twice over (both the abduction and the return), and the struggle of one teen girl to reconcile the oddly ambivalent feelings and conflicting instincts raised by the "miracle" that was supposed to fix everything.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Like Never and Always (Ann Aguirre) - My Review
Down Among the Sticks and Bones (Seanan McGuire) - My Review
In An Instant (Suzanne Redfearn) - My Review
Wednesday, November 29, 2023
My Sister, the Serial Killer (Oyinkan Braithwaite)
My Sister, The Serial Killer: A Novel
Oyinkan Braithewaite
Anchor
Fiction, Humor/Thriller
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: From childhood, Korede and her sister Ayoola have been opposites. Korede is tall, homely, disciplined, and obsessed with order and cleanliness, while Ayoola is the messy, flighty, petite beauty of the family, the one their mother coddles and has the highest of hopes for (insofar as landing a wealthy and influential husband). But Ayoola does have a few little quirks that have kept her single, that her mother doesn't know about... such as her habit of stabbing boyfriends to death. Three to date, as Korede knows too well. After all, she'd hardly be a supportive sister if she didn't help Ayoola clean up her little messes (and keep their mother in the dark). It's a tedious, lonely life, but family must come first, always and forever.
Until Ayoola turns up at Korede's job and steals the heart of the doctor Korede has secretly pined for for years.
Now Korede is torn. She can't warn him without exposing Ayoola's secret - and her own. She can't just stand by and let him sleepwalk into a knife, either. Has Ayoola finally crossed an uncrossable line, or are the bonds of sisterhood still thicker than yet another boyfriend's blood?
REVIEW: With a certain deadpan humor and some wrenching emotion, My Sister, the Serial Killer explores the fallout of family abuse, the consequences of generations of cultural denigration of women to mere object status (even in their own eyes), the unfair weight society puts on physical appearance as predictor of personal virtue, and the complicated and contradictory bonds of sibling rivalry and sibling loyalty.
From the start, where Korede is helping clean up yet another crime scene with jaded exasperation, the twisted nature of the girls' relationship is front and center in the tale, which focuses on Korede as she wrestles with the monstrous, bloody-tusked elephant in the middle of their Nigerian home. As the story unfolds, flashbacks to previous boyfriends/"incidents" and their abusive, shady father show the roots of the dysfunctional mess. It's not just that Ayoola is basically a psychopath, who has to be reminded to show some appearance of empathy when her boyfriend goes "missing", nor is it just that Korede has been pressured all her life to enable her more beautiful (and therefore more desirable and liked) sister; it's that becoming a killer and a killer's accomplice was almost a sane and rational response to extremely oppressive and abusive situations, compared to how other women in the story end up handling their own stomped-down lives and the men who too often do the stomping (as much out of active malice as out of casual ignorance). Korede's few attempts to speak out are usually met with derision and disbelief, with listeners suspecting her of jealousy over her prettier sister's success with boys and social media. The one man Korede does have feelings for, and has spent years earning the respect of in the workplace, is a goner the moment he lays eyes on Ayoola. Meanwhile, the girls' mother obliviously criticizes Korede for not being more supportive of Ayoola, and the family of Ayoola's last boyfriend start pushing the police (who are generally more interested in coercing bribe money from the populace than actually investigating crimes) for answers... all of which tests just how far Korede is willing to go for the sake of a sister who inherently cannot feel gratitude for the effort, or the willfully ignorant mother who will never see her as anything other than an ugly failure.
I thought the ending felt a bit flat after the buildup, and sometimes it leaned a little hard into the horrific way women are treated by men (and by each other), which managed to shave a half-star off the rating. Other than that, though, it's quite memorable, if also quite dark.
You Might Also Enjoy:
The Echo Wife (Sarah Gailey) - My Review
Comfort Me With Apples (Catherynne M. Valente) - My Review
Oyinkan Braithewaite
Anchor
Fiction, Humor/Thriller
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: From childhood, Korede and her sister Ayoola have been opposites. Korede is tall, homely, disciplined, and obsessed with order and cleanliness, while Ayoola is the messy, flighty, petite beauty of the family, the one their mother coddles and has the highest of hopes for (insofar as landing a wealthy and influential husband). But Ayoola does have a few little quirks that have kept her single, that her mother doesn't know about... such as her habit of stabbing boyfriends to death. Three to date, as Korede knows too well. After all, she'd hardly be a supportive sister if she didn't help Ayoola clean up her little messes (and keep their mother in the dark). It's a tedious, lonely life, but family must come first, always and forever.
Until Ayoola turns up at Korede's job and steals the heart of the doctor Korede has secretly pined for for years.
Now Korede is torn. She can't warn him without exposing Ayoola's secret - and her own. She can't just stand by and let him sleepwalk into a knife, either. Has Ayoola finally crossed an uncrossable line, or are the bonds of sisterhood still thicker than yet another boyfriend's blood?
REVIEW: With a certain deadpan humor and some wrenching emotion, My Sister, the Serial Killer explores the fallout of family abuse, the consequences of generations of cultural denigration of women to mere object status (even in their own eyes), the unfair weight society puts on physical appearance as predictor of personal virtue, and the complicated and contradictory bonds of sibling rivalry and sibling loyalty.
From the start, where Korede is helping clean up yet another crime scene with jaded exasperation, the twisted nature of the girls' relationship is front and center in the tale, which focuses on Korede as she wrestles with the monstrous, bloody-tusked elephant in the middle of their Nigerian home. As the story unfolds, flashbacks to previous boyfriends/"incidents" and their abusive, shady father show the roots of the dysfunctional mess. It's not just that Ayoola is basically a psychopath, who has to be reminded to show some appearance of empathy when her boyfriend goes "missing", nor is it just that Korede has been pressured all her life to enable her more beautiful (and therefore more desirable and liked) sister; it's that becoming a killer and a killer's accomplice was almost a sane and rational response to extremely oppressive and abusive situations, compared to how other women in the story end up handling their own stomped-down lives and the men who too often do the stomping (as much out of active malice as out of casual ignorance). Korede's few attempts to speak out are usually met with derision and disbelief, with listeners suspecting her of jealousy over her prettier sister's success with boys and social media. The one man Korede does have feelings for, and has spent years earning the respect of in the workplace, is a goner the moment he lays eyes on Ayoola. Meanwhile, the girls' mother obliviously criticizes Korede for not being more supportive of Ayoola, and the family of Ayoola's last boyfriend start pushing the police (who are generally more interested in coercing bribe money from the populace than actually investigating crimes) for answers... all of which tests just how far Korede is willing to go for the sake of a sister who inherently cannot feel gratitude for the effort, or the willfully ignorant mother who will never see her as anything other than an ugly failure.
I thought the ending felt a bit flat after the buildup, and sometimes it leaned a little hard into the horrific way women are treated by men (and by each other), which managed to shave a half-star off the rating. Other than that, though, it's quite memorable, if also quite dark.
You Might Also Enjoy:
The Echo Wife (Sarah Gailey) - My Review
Comfort Me With Apples (Catherynne M. Valente) - My Review
Lifeboat 12 (Susan Hood)
Lifeboat 12
Susan Hood
Simon and Schuster
Fiction, MG Action/Chiller/Historical Fiction/Poetry
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: When war comes to London, it brings rations, air raid sirens, gas masks, and bombs falling from the skies... all of which could hardly make thirteen-year-old Ken's life much worse, thanks to an overworked father, a stepmother who hardly seems to care for him, and a kid half-sister who steals all the love and attention in the household. Now he's been told that he is to be one of countless children to be shipped away from the city due to the threat of German attacks - all the way across the ocean to Canada. Dad tells him it'll be his own grand adventure, like the ones in the books he's always reading (that of course he can't take with him), but to Ken it feels more like his stepmom has finally found a way to get him out of the house once and for all. Still, once he's on his way, he begins to warm to the prospect, especially when the food aboard the transport ship - luxury liner SS City of Benares, out of India, pressed into national service - is miles above anything he's had in his impoverished, ration-restricted home in memory.
Then the German submarine finds the convoy, and everything goes wrong all at once.
Now Ken is in a cramped lifeboat with hardly any food, not enough water, and odds of rescue diminishing by the hour. What happened to the other passengers and crew of their ship? Where is the British Navy, who was supposed to be following the convoy? And how is anyone ever going to find one tiny, overloaded lifeboat in the middle of the vast Atlantic Ocean?
This story was inspired by true events in World War II.
REVIEW: Melding the horrors of war and ocean survival, the confusion of growing up in turbulent times, and the excitement of discovery and adventure as a young man is pushed into the wider world on his own for the first time (even if that excitement too often runs face-first into the unforgiving chasm of reality), Lifeboat 12 makes a pivotal moment in world history relatable to readers of all ages.
Ken starts out a mere boy, casually selfish in the way of many children, prone to mischief like stealing apples as he acts out anxieties about his home life: he still carries a certain guilt knowing that his mother died shortly after giving birth to him, and has never warmed up to his stepmother, nor she to him. When he finds that his parents are sending him halfway around the world, he sees it as ultimate proof that he's unwelcome in his own home... until the bombs begin to fall, and he realizes the danger they claim they're trying to protect him from is all too real. In the way of children, he adapts quickly to the new reality, becoming obsessed with airplanes and ships until he can identify them at a glance, and thus thinks himself more prepared for the journey to Canada than he really is - even when the trip itself proves at least as dangerous as staying in London, and that's before they even reach the docks and the ship. Along the way, he begins to make new friends and even step up to small leadership roles over younger children. Soon enough, he's forgotten all about the potential dangers of the war... but the war has not forgotten about him, as he learns the hard way in the dead of night. In the mad scramble to escape, he ends up in the wrong lifeboat, one of many crowded into too small of a space with inadequate emergency supplies (there isn't even simple fishing gear on board to supplement canned rations). The emergency levels playing fields almost across the board; boy or girl, passenger or crew, officer or civilian, adult or child, even white English or other (the crew of the luxury liner are Muslims and foreigners, most of them just service crew and not even working sailors), all are literally in the same survival boat. The desperation and tedium are at least as dangerous as exposure and dehydration, and Ken and others try desperately to keep themselves sane... not all of them succeeding.
The story is told in a sort of free verse, with short chapters that have little fat in them, adding an almost surreal overtone. The ending felt a trifle abrupt, and I almost wanted an afterword outlining the original true story and what was kept or changed about Hood's take on events, but other than that it's a solid tale.
You Might Also Enjoy:
The Wreck of the Whale Ship Essex (Owen Chase et al.) - My Review
Adrift (Paul Griffin) - My Review
The Cay (Theodore Taylor) - My Review
Susan Hood
Simon and Schuster
Fiction, MG Action/Chiller/Historical Fiction/Poetry
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: When war comes to London, it brings rations, air raid sirens, gas masks, and bombs falling from the skies... all of which could hardly make thirteen-year-old Ken's life much worse, thanks to an overworked father, a stepmother who hardly seems to care for him, and a kid half-sister who steals all the love and attention in the household. Now he's been told that he is to be one of countless children to be shipped away from the city due to the threat of German attacks - all the way across the ocean to Canada. Dad tells him it'll be his own grand adventure, like the ones in the books he's always reading (that of course he can't take with him), but to Ken it feels more like his stepmom has finally found a way to get him out of the house once and for all. Still, once he's on his way, he begins to warm to the prospect, especially when the food aboard the transport ship - luxury liner SS City of Benares, out of India, pressed into national service - is miles above anything he's had in his impoverished, ration-restricted home in memory.
Then the German submarine finds the convoy, and everything goes wrong all at once.
Now Ken is in a cramped lifeboat with hardly any food, not enough water, and odds of rescue diminishing by the hour. What happened to the other passengers and crew of their ship? Where is the British Navy, who was supposed to be following the convoy? And how is anyone ever going to find one tiny, overloaded lifeboat in the middle of the vast Atlantic Ocean?
This story was inspired by true events in World War II.
REVIEW: Melding the horrors of war and ocean survival, the confusion of growing up in turbulent times, and the excitement of discovery and adventure as a young man is pushed into the wider world on his own for the first time (even if that excitement too often runs face-first into the unforgiving chasm of reality), Lifeboat 12 makes a pivotal moment in world history relatable to readers of all ages.
Ken starts out a mere boy, casually selfish in the way of many children, prone to mischief like stealing apples as he acts out anxieties about his home life: he still carries a certain guilt knowing that his mother died shortly after giving birth to him, and has never warmed up to his stepmother, nor she to him. When he finds that his parents are sending him halfway around the world, he sees it as ultimate proof that he's unwelcome in his own home... until the bombs begin to fall, and he realizes the danger they claim they're trying to protect him from is all too real. In the way of children, he adapts quickly to the new reality, becoming obsessed with airplanes and ships until he can identify them at a glance, and thus thinks himself more prepared for the journey to Canada than he really is - even when the trip itself proves at least as dangerous as staying in London, and that's before they even reach the docks and the ship. Along the way, he begins to make new friends and even step up to small leadership roles over younger children. Soon enough, he's forgotten all about the potential dangers of the war... but the war has not forgotten about him, as he learns the hard way in the dead of night. In the mad scramble to escape, he ends up in the wrong lifeboat, one of many crowded into too small of a space with inadequate emergency supplies (there isn't even simple fishing gear on board to supplement canned rations). The emergency levels playing fields almost across the board; boy or girl, passenger or crew, officer or civilian, adult or child, even white English or other (the crew of the luxury liner are Muslims and foreigners, most of them just service crew and not even working sailors), all are literally in the same survival boat. The desperation and tedium are at least as dangerous as exposure and dehydration, and Ken and others try desperately to keep themselves sane... not all of them succeeding.
The story is told in a sort of free verse, with short chapters that have little fat in them, adding an almost surreal overtone. The ending felt a trifle abrupt, and I almost wanted an afterword outlining the original true story and what was kept or changed about Hood's take on events, but other than that it's a solid tale.
You Might Also Enjoy:
The Wreck of the Whale Ship Essex (Owen Chase et al.) - My Review
Adrift (Paul Griffin) - My Review
The Cay (Theodore Taylor) - My Review
Friday, November 24, 2023
Thornhedge (T. Kingfisher)
Thornhedge
T. Kingfisher
Tor
Fiction, Fantasy
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess trapped in a cursed sleep, high in a tower hidden by an impenetrable tangle of vines and thorns... but were the brambles there to keep brave knightly rescuers out, or something else in?
Toadling - once a human child until snatched by fairies, raised in their world, and returned irrevocably changed by her experiences - lives in the hedge, protecting the secret within as she was bound to do many mortal lifetimes ago. As time passes, it seems that people have finally forgotten all about the tower, to her relief... until a curious knight turns up, determined to unravel the mystery of the hedge, the tower, the princess, the curse - and Toadling herself.
REVIEW: Thornhedge puts an interesting spin on the Sleeping Beauty story, weaving in elements of fae lore and changelings. It starts out a little slow, playing it cagey about what's going on and why a young woman with fairy powers - raised by marsh-dwellers known as greenteeth in the fairy realm, she learned small magics over water, as well as how to talk to animals and turn into a toad - is hiding out in Sleeping Beauty's hedge. Watching as time passes and a road is built past the hidden tower, Toadling reveals mixed feelings about humans, fearing them and longing for their company at the same time, while ultimately burdened by the task/curse that shackles her to the forgotten tower on the forgotten hill. Time meanders past, centuries drifting by, before the knight shows up and kicks off the story proper. As she tries to discourage him from his explorations of the hedge, her backstory is revealed, as well as what really happened in the lost kingdom of the tower, from the fateful christening to the day the thorns grew - not at all the story one knows from popular fairy tales. After the initial meandering, the tale picks up very nicely, developing into a dark retelling that highlights the casual cruelty of both fate and the fairies, how beauty and virtue are not always bedfellows, how misplaced love and loyalty can do great damage, and how family can be found in the most unexpected places and people. It all wraps up with a strong finish, though that earlier dithering just barely held it down to four stars.
You Might Also Enjoy:
A Spindle Splintered (Alix E. Harrow) - My Review
Spindle's End (Robin McKinley) - My Review
Princess Floralinda and the Forty-Flight Tower (Tamsyn Muir) - My Review
T. Kingfisher
Tor
Fiction, Fantasy
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: Once upon a time, there was a beautiful princess trapped in a cursed sleep, high in a tower hidden by an impenetrable tangle of vines and thorns... but were the brambles there to keep brave knightly rescuers out, or something else in?
Toadling - once a human child until snatched by fairies, raised in their world, and returned irrevocably changed by her experiences - lives in the hedge, protecting the secret within as she was bound to do many mortal lifetimes ago. As time passes, it seems that people have finally forgotten all about the tower, to her relief... until a curious knight turns up, determined to unravel the mystery of the hedge, the tower, the princess, the curse - and Toadling herself.
REVIEW: Thornhedge puts an interesting spin on the Sleeping Beauty story, weaving in elements of fae lore and changelings. It starts out a little slow, playing it cagey about what's going on and why a young woman with fairy powers - raised by marsh-dwellers known as greenteeth in the fairy realm, she learned small magics over water, as well as how to talk to animals and turn into a toad - is hiding out in Sleeping Beauty's hedge. Watching as time passes and a road is built past the hidden tower, Toadling reveals mixed feelings about humans, fearing them and longing for their company at the same time, while ultimately burdened by the task/curse that shackles her to the forgotten tower on the forgotten hill. Time meanders past, centuries drifting by, before the knight shows up and kicks off the story proper. As she tries to discourage him from his explorations of the hedge, her backstory is revealed, as well as what really happened in the lost kingdom of the tower, from the fateful christening to the day the thorns grew - not at all the story one knows from popular fairy tales. After the initial meandering, the tale picks up very nicely, developing into a dark retelling that highlights the casual cruelty of both fate and the fairies, how beauty and virtue are not always bedfellows, how misplaced love and loyalty can do great damage, and how family can be found in the most unexpected places and people. It all wraps up with a strong finish, though that earlier dithering just barely held it down to four stars.
You Might Also Enjoy:
A Spindle Splintered (Alix E. Harrow) - My Review
Spindle's End (Robin McKinley) - My Review
Princess Floralinda and the Forty-Flight Tower (Tamsyn Muir) - My Review
Wednesday, November 22, 2023
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves: The Road to Neverwinter (Jaleigh Johnson)
Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves: The Road to Neverwinter
The Dungeons and Dragons series
Jaleigh Johnson
Random House Worlds
Fiction, Adventure/Fantasy/Media Tie-In
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: Edgin Davis was once a dedicated Harper, his lute and his easy, smiling banter a cover for his work ferreting out evil and danger across the land... until enemies made on the job followed him home. When his wife was murdered, all he has left is his infant daughter Kira and a deep chasm of bitter regret and self-recrimination that no amount of alcohol can fill, hard as he tries. It's not until an encounter with the barbarian woman of few words Holga that he begins to scrape himself off the tavern floor... and it's not until desperation leads him to his first theft, raiding the shop of the local corrupt pawnbroker, that he finds a new calling. Thus the years pass, with a growing Kira joining them on heists (protected somewhat by an invisibility amulet), but it's only after a chance encounter with card sharp and con man Forge Fitzwilliam that their little team begins to aim higher - and later, when they happen across an amateur sorcerer with a hot tip on a big score, their reputation may be truly made... assuming they survive.
This story is a prequel to the 2023 movie Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, based upon the popular fantasy role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons.
REVIEW: I watched and thoroughly enjoyed the 2023 movie Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, which was the kind of fun, adventurous romp of a film you don't really see much of anymore. This is one of the prequel novels written to tie in with the budding presumed-franchise, filling in backstory on the Harper-turned-thief Edgin (played by Chris Pine in the film) and the origins of the adventuring band whose reunion forms the core of the movie plot. Sometimes tie-ins like this add interesting twists and can even stand on their own. Unfortunately, this is not one of those tie-ins.
After a prologue, the book starts with exhausted and heartbroken young widower/father Edgin, an inconsolable infant Kira, and a fateful trip to the tavern of their small town where the Davis family's lives will be forever changed by the irascible, potato-obsessed Holga. This is a scenario the movie already covered, a scene that really doesn't need this print expansion to get the point across. Much of the book, actually, feels like it rehashes similar notes that the movie effectively covered, either in the backstory montage Edgin relates during his parole hearing early in the film or in the overall spirit of the movie itself, with characters growing up and coming through for the sake of their found family bond and Edgin crawling out of the pit of self-pity that grief had dropped him into to reclaim some of his former Harper integrity and honor. There is foreshadowing of later events, but that sometimes feels a touch clunky. Kira also comes across as far too much of a plot device, the precocious little scamp who wins over even the most jaded of hearts and seems incapable of comprehending how maybe her putting herself in danger also puts people she loves in danger, that her actions can have tangible and potentially negative consequences. I almost wondered if the story had been intended to be from her point of view as a middle-grade novel, as much of her arc (which isn't really much of an arc, as she doesn't really learn lessons or grow, save in the physical sense of no longer being an infant by the end) reads like wish fulfillment adventure where she gets to show up the adults who underestimate her while experiencing just enough potential peril to make things a little interesting. Edgin, at least, does do some growing and healing through the story, even if he, like more than one other character, has to be whacked by the in-world equivalent of a two-by-four to get some lessons through his skull and the clouded lenses of his grief and self-absorpion.
Things do happen, at least, almost from the first page. Like any good role-playing game campaign, there are plenty of adventurous encounters and improvised escapes (and some decent looting opportunities) and a colorful collection of characters and locales to visit, with some decent little adventure puzzles to tease out. Sometimes the metaphoric dice just aren't the players' friends and things go sideways, but between them they usually manage to get by. Nobody is especially deep and there's a general feeling of emotional immaturity about them, or at least a lack of overall complexity; they ultimately have just enough backstory and personality to them to make for an exciting and adventurous team and campaign, which does indeed occur. This is not unlike the movie that the book ties in to, of course, and on that level I could enjoy it for some stretches, but for some reason what was easily rolled with and enjoyed on screen just doesn't quite play out the same in print. Maybe I'm just conditioned to expect a little more of a book, in a way that ultimately cost it that full fourth star in the ratings. While I can't say I was never entertained or that nothing happened, I just plain enjoyed the movie better, and this book felt too much like a pale shadow retreading emotional beats and character territory that the film covered, making this prequel feel unnecessary.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Kings of the Wyld (Nicholas Eames) - My Review
Caverns of Socrates (Dennis L. McKiernan) - My Review
The Dragons of Autumn Twilight (Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman) - My Review
The Dungeons and Dragons series
Jaleigh Johnson
Random House Worlds
Fiction, Adventure/Fantasy/Media Tie-In
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: Edgin Davis was once a dedicated Harper, his lute and his easy, smiling banter a cover for his work ferreting out evil and danger across the land... until enemies made on the job followed him home. When his wife was murdered, all he has left is his infant daughter Kira and a deep chasm of bitter regret and self-recrimination that no amount of alcohol can fill, hard as he tries. It's not until an encounter with the barbarian woman of few words Holga that he begins to scrape himself off the tavern floor... and it's not until desperation leads him to his first theft, raiding the shop of the local corrupt pawnbroker, that he finds a new calling. Thus the years pass, with a growing Kira joining them on heists (protected somewhat by an invisibility amulet), but it's only after a chance encounter with card sharp and con man Forge Fitzwilliam that their little team begins to aim higher - and later, when they happen across an amateur sorcerer with a hot tip on a big score, their reputation may be truly made... assuming they survive.
This story is a prequel to the 2023 movie Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, based upon the popular fantasy role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons.
REVIEW: I watched and thoroughly enjoyed the 2023 movie Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves, which was the kind of fun, adventurous romp of a film you don't really see much of anymore. This is one of the prequel novels written to tie in with the budding presumed-franchise, filling in backstory on the Harper-turned-thief Edgin (played by Chris Pine in the film) and the origins of the adventuring band whose reunion forms the core of the movie plot. Sometimes tie-ins like this add interesting twists and can even stand on their own. Unfortunately, this is not one of those tie-ins.
After a prologue, the book starts with exhausted and heartbroken young widower/father Edgin, an inconsolable infant Kira, and a fateful trip to the tavern of their small town where the Davis family's lives will be forever changed by the irascible, potato-obsessed Holga. This is a scenario the movie already covered, a scene that really doesn't need this print expansion to get the point across. Much of the book, actually, feels like it rehashes similar notes that the movie effectively covered, either in the backstory montage Edgin relates during his parole hearing early in the film or in the overall spirit of the movie itself, with characters growing up and coming through for the sake of their found family bond and Edgin crawling out of the pit of self-pity that grief had dropped him into to reclaim some of his former Harper integrity and honor. There is foreshadowing of later events, but that sometimes feels a touch clunky. Kira also comes across as far too much of a plot device, the precocious little scamp who wins over even the most jaded of hearts and seems incapable of comprehending how maybe her putting herself in danger also puts people she loves in danger, that her actions can have tangible and potentially negative consequences. I almost wondered if the story had been intended to be from her point of view as a middle-grade novel, as much of her arc (which isn't really much of an arc, as she doesn't really learn lessons or grow, save in the physical sense of no longer being an infant by the end) reads like wish fulfillment adventure where she gets to show up the adults who underestimate her while experiencing just enough potential peril to make things a little interesting. Edgin, at least, does do some growing and healing through the story, even if he, like more than one other character, has to be whacked by the in-world equivalent of a two-by-four to get some lessons through his skull and the clouded lenses of his grief and self-absorpion.
Things do happen, at least, almost from the first page. Like any good role-playing game campaign, there are plenty of adventurous encounters and improvised escapes (and some decent looting opportunities) and a colorful collection of characters and locales to visit, with some decent little adventure puzzles to tease out. Sometimes the metaphoric dice just aren't the players' friends and things go sideways, but between them they usually manage to get by. Nobody is especially deep and there's a general feeling of emotional immaturity about them, or at least a lack of overall complexity; they ultimately have just enough backstory and personality to them to make for an exciting and adventurous team and campaign, which does indeed occur. This is not unlike the movie that the book ties in to, of course, and on that level I could enjoy it for some stretches, but for some reason what was easily rolled with and enjoyed on screen just doesn't quite play out the same in print. Maybe I'm just conditioned to expect a little more of a book, in a way that ultimately cost it that full fourth star in the ratings. While I can't say I was never entertained or that nothing happened, I just plain enjoyed the movie better, and this book felt too much like a pale shadow retreading emotional beats and character territory that the film covered, making this prequel feel unnecessary.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Kings of the Wyld (Nicholas Eames) - My Review
Caverns of Socrates (Dennis L. McKiernan) - My Review
The Dragons of Autumn Twilight (Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman) - My Review
Friday, November 17, 2023
The Lady from the Black Lagoon (Mallory O'Meara)
The Lady from the Black Lagoon: Hollywood Monsters and the Lost Legacy of Milicent Patrick
Mallory O'Meara
Hanover Square Press
Nonfiction, Biography/History/Media Reference
****+ (Good/Great)
DESCRIPTION: When she was a little kid, sitting in front of the TV at her grandparents' house, Mallory was entranced by the demon lord Chernabog in Disney's iconic animated feature Fantasia. Thus began a lifelong love affair with movies in general and horror in particular. The Universal classic monster pantheon held a special place in her heart, particularly the iconic Creature from the Black Lagoon. The costume, a stunning melding of man and fish, was officially credited to makeup master Bud Westmore, but it was not until the advent of the internet that most modern fans learned who really designed it: a woman named Milicent Patrick, whose identity and legacy others tried to erase. To rectify this injustice, O'Meara sets out to uncover the truth about Patrick, an enigmatic woman whose life and struggles in Tinsel Town seemed at times to parallel her own journey.
REVIEW: The story of Milicent Patrick is a story that should be relegated to the history books: a woman struggles to break in to an industry where her talent shines through, but instead of a brilliant future finds herself shut out by men who cannot stand a girl in their clubhouse or "stealing" the limelight they think should be theirs alone, where legacy names and money and soothing a tyrant's ego matter more than justice and truth. Unfortunately, it's a story that has played out numerous times before and since, up through today. O'Meara does not paint her subject as a superheroine or flawless icon, or as a relentless fighter who pushed back against the patriarchy at every turn, but as a human whose only extraordinary gift was staying true to herself no matter what happened. From a childhood under an iron-fisted father (an architect and structural engineer whose work kept the family traveling for years, eventually contributing to Hearst's massive California estate) and conservative mother, Milicent grew up to study art and land a job with Disney's animation studio - then one of the best places for a woman artist to be, for all that Disney was no saint or savior himself - while also pursuing acting work to capitalize on her striking looks, though she never moved much beyond bit parts. Eventually, her on-set sketches caught the attention of Bud Westmore, but the man's notorious cruelty, petty jealousy, and fragile ego would eventually cut her down just when she stood on the threshold of movie immortality. Even at the time, many people knew just how wrong it was, but not a one managed to stop it from happening, nor did they do anything to mitigate the aftereffects.
O'Meara intercuts the story of Milicent Patrick with her own efforts to research a woman who proved remarkably hard to track; she had a habit of changing her name and reinventing her own backstory over the years, making it that much harder to figure out her movements. She was also estranged from her family from an early age, which further limited the potential pool of resources. Add to that the way that women are still generally overlooked and undervalued in the entertainment industry, their contributions conveniently swept into the corner and forgotten, and the task became that much harder. Still, even though she's primarily a film producer and not a researcher, O'Meara pushed onward, finding more reasons to admire Milicent Patrick even as she acknowledges the woman's faults... and more reasons to be incensed that, since Patrick's day, the needle on industry misogyny and under-representation of women and nonwhites and other minorities has still not moved much, despite moments like the #MeToo movement shining spotlights on the ugly secrets of Hollywood. There are several incidents in Patrick's life that directly resonate with O'Meara's, and doubtless others who push their way into spaces and industries that have traditionally been dominated by white cishet males. The way in which someone who created such an important movie icon can be nearly forgotten - when she was the subject of numerous public interviews and served as a major face of Universal's promotion of The Creature from the Black Lagoon - all because one monster of a man couldn't stand seeing a woman outshine him and a studio decided appeasing him was more important than cultivating the talent so obviously visible in her is unsettling. One is left wondering how many other people have been erased through the decades, and are being erased right now, because the same dynamics that led to Milicent Patrick's removal from movie history are still very much evident. (And that's not counting the ones who are cut down long before they got in the door in the first place.) Will anything ever change? Can anything ever change? I honestly don't know, but that's why we need more Milicent Patricks... and more Mallory O'Mearas to make sure the Milicent Patricks aren't left on history's cutting room floor.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Never Say You Can't Survive (Charlie Jane Anders) - My Review
AVIATRIX: First Woman Pilot for Hughes Airwest (Mary Bush Shipko) - My Review
Mallory O'Meara
Hanover Square Press
Nonfiction, Biography/History/Media Reference
****+ (Good/Great)
DESCRIPTION: When she was a little kid, sitting in front of the TV at her grandparents' house, Mallory was entranced by the demon lord Chernabog in Disney's iconic animated feature Fantasia. Thus began a lifelong love affair with movies in general and horror in particular. The Universal classic monster pantheon held a special place in her heart, particularly the iconic Creature from the Black Lagoon. The costume, a stunning melding of man and fish, was officially credited to makeup master Bud Westmore, but it was not until the advent of the internet that most modern fans learned who really designed it: a woman named Milicent Patrick, whose identity and legacy others tried to erase. To rectify this injustice, O'Meara sets out to uncover the truth about Patrick, an enigmatic woman whose life and struggles in Tinsel Town seemed at times to parallel her own journey.
REVIEW: The story of Milicent Patrick is a story that should be relegated to the history books: a woman struggles to break in to an industry where her talent shines through, but instead of a brilliant future finds herself shut out by men who cannot stand a girl in their clubhouse or "stealing" the limelight they think should be theirs alone, where legacy names and money and soothing a tyrant's ego matter more than justice and truth. Unfortunately, it's a story that has played out numerous times before and since, up through today. O'Meara does not paint her subject as a superheroine or flawless icon, or as a relentless fighter who pushed back against the patriarchy at every turn, but as a human whose only extraordinary gift was staying true to herself no matter what happened. From a childhood under an iron-fisted father (an architect and structural engineer whose work kept the family traveling for years, eventually contributing to Hearst's massive California estate) and conservative mother, Milicent grew up to study art and land a job with Disney's animation studio - then one of the best places for a woman artist to be, for all that Disney was no saint or savior himself - while also pursuing acting work to capitalize on her striking looks, though she never moved much beyond bit parts. Eventually, her on-set sketches caught the attention of Bud Westmore, but the man's notorious cruelty, petty jealousy, and fragile ego would eventually cut her down just when she stood on the threshold of movie immortality. Even at the time, many people knew just how wrong it was, but not a one managed to stop it from happening, nor did they do anything to mitigate the aftereffects.
O'Meara intercuts the story of Milicent Patrick with her own efforts to research a woman who proved remarkably hard to track; she had a habit of changing her name and reinventing her own backstory over the years, making it that much harder to figure out her movements. She was also estranged from her family from an early age, which further limited the potential pool of resources. Add to that the way that women are still generally overlooked and undervalued in the entertainment industry, their contributions conveniently swept into the corner and forgotten, and the task became that much harder. Still, even though she's primarily a film producer and not a researcher, O'Meara pushed onward, finding more reasons to admire Milicent Patrick even as she acknowledges the woman's faults... and more reasons to be incensed that, since Patrick's day, the needle on industry misogyny and under-representation of women and nonwhites and other minorities has still not moved much, despite moments like the #MeToo movement shining spotlights on the ugly secrets of Hollywood. There are several incidents in Patrick's life that directly resonate with O'Meara's, and doubtless others who push their way into spaces and industries that have traditionally been dominated by white cishet males. The way in which someone who created such an important movie icon can be nearly forgotten - when she was the subject of numerous public interviews and served as a major face of Universal's promotion of The Creature from the Black Lagoon - all because one monster of a man couldn't stand seeing a woman outshine him and a studio decided appeasing him was more important than cultivating the talent so obviously visible in her is unsettling. One is left wondering how many other people have been erased through the decades, and are being erased right now, because the same dynamics that led to Milicent Patrick's removal from movie history are still very much evident. (And that's not counting the ones who are cut down long before they got in the door in the first place.) Will anything ever change? Can anything ever change? I honestly don't know, but that's why we need more Milicent Patricks... and more Mallory O'Mearas to make sure the Milicent Patricks aren't left on history's cutting room floor.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Never Say You Can't Survive (Charlie Jane Anders) - My Review
AVIATRIX: First Woman Pilot for Hughes Airwest (Mary Bush Shipko) - My Review
Thursday, November 16, 2023
Dusk or Dark or Dawn or Day (Seanan McGuire)
Dusk or Dark or Dawn or Day
Seanan McGuire
Tordotcom
Fiction, Fantasy
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: It was 1972 when teenager Jenna's older sister Patty, who had left small town Mill Hollow, Kentucky to chase big city dreams in New York City, returned home in a wooden box, having ended her own life. Ravaged by grief and guilt, Jenna ran out into the stormy night - and over the edge of a ravine, leaving a broken body to wash downriver.
But death was not the end of Jenna.
In 2015, Jenna has settled into existence in Manhattan, one of numerous ghosts who dwell in the vast city. Like other ghosts, she barters in time - time borrowed from mortals and time paid back. Once she has repaid her debt to the cosmos, the difference between when she actually died and when she was destined to die, she can pass on to whatever comes after this world, a place where Patty must be waiting for her kid sister. Able to take on corporeal form for a limited time each day, she has a job at a coffee shop and volunteers at a suicide prevention hot line (where every life saved earns her some credit), and has an apartment where she looks after aging cats: the sort of life Patty might once have aspired to if her depression hadn't driven her to suicide. Jenna had hoped to go on like this for as long as it takes to balance the spiritual books and earn her release... until the other ghosts in the city start disappearing. Something seems to be hunting them down - and Jenna, who earned her place in the afterlife by running away, might not be able to outrun this danger.
REVIEW: Though it feels tangentially connected to other works by McGuire (such as her Ghost Roads trilogy), this novella works well enough as a standalone, creating a mythos of ghosts and witches, where the afterlife is part of a greater ecosystem of time whose collapse would have terrible consequences in the mortal world and beyond. Jenna herself barely understands it, for all that she's been a ghost for forty-odd years; this is not a world of rigidly defined rules and magical systems, but something far more complicated and esoteric and beyond the grasp of humans, where even experts like witches are often groping in the dark about their own powers and limitations. What rules there are, though, provide some framework for what the characters can or cannot do in any given situation, enough to keep the plot from being utterly random (and enough to demonstrate the stakes). Jenna often feels lost and over her head trying to parse it all, especially when the danger strikes very close to home, but she's not the same scared runaway girl she was when she died. The story takes a while to get itself off the runway, and when it gets to the final act some elements and at least one character motivation felt a bit underdeveloped. Despite that, it has the sort of atmospheric writing I've come to expect from McGuire, and evokes some real emotions.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Under the Whispering Door (TJ Klune) - My Review
Sparrow Hill Road (Seanan McGuire) - My Review
The Screaming Staircase (Jonathan Stroud) - My Review
Seanan McGuire
Tordotcom
Fiction, Fantasy
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: It was 1972 when teenager Jenna's older sister Patty, who had left small town Mill Hollow, Kentucky to chase big city dreams in New York City, returned home in a wooden box, having ended her own life. Ravaged by grief and guilt, Jenna ran out into the stormy night - and over the edge of a ravine, leaving a broken body to wash downriver.
But death was not the end of Jenna.
In 2015, Jenna has settled into existence in Manhattan, one of numerous ghosts who dwell in the vast city. Like other ghosts, she barters in time - time borrowed from mortals and time paid back. Once she has repaid her debt to the cosmos, the difference between when she actually died and when she was destined to die, she can pass on to whatever comes after this world, a place where Patty must be waiting for her kid sister. Able to take on corporeal form for a limited time each day, she has a job at a coffee shop and volunteers at a suicide prevention hot line (where every life saved earns her some credit), and has an apartment where she looks after aging cats: the sort of life Patty might once have aspired to if her depression hadn't driven her to suicide. Jenna had hoped to go on like this for as long as it takes to balance the spiritual books and earn her release... until the other ghosts in the city start disappearing. Something seems to be hunting them down - and Jenna, who earned her place in the afterlife by running away, might not be able to outrun this danger.
REVIEW: Though it feels tangentially connected to other works by McGuire (such as her Ghost Roads trilogy), this novella works well enough as a standalone, creating a mythos of ghosts and witches, where the afterlife is part of a greater ecosystem of time whose collapse would have terrible consequences in the mortal world and beyond. Jenna herself barely understands it, for all that she's been a ghost for forty-odd years; this is not a world of rigidly defined rules and magical systems, but something far more complicated and esoteric and beyond the grasp of humans, where even experts like witches are often groping in the dark about their own powers and limitations. What rules there are, though, provide some framework for what the characters can or cannot do in any given situation, enough to keep the plot from being utterly random (and enough to demonstrate the stakes). Jenna often feels lost and over her head trying to parse it all, especially when the danger strikes very close to home, but she's not the same scared runaway girl she was when she died. The story takes a while to get itself off the runway, and when it gets to the final act some elements and at least one character motivation felt a bit underdeveloped. Despite that, it has the sort of atmospheric writing I've come to expect from McGuire, and evokes some real emotions.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Under the Whispering Door (TJ Klune) - My Review
Sparrow Hill Road (Seanan McGuire) - My Review
The Screaming Staircase (Jonathan Stroud) - My Review
Odd and the Frost Giants (Neil Gaiman)
Odd and the Frost Giants
Neil Gaiman
HarperCollins
Fiction, CH Fantasy
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: Odd was a small boy even before his leg was crippled. Now, he's that much less of a proper Viking, that much more of an embarrassment to his oafish stepfather and stepbrothers (for all that his mother still loves him, and his late father always adored him). One March, when the long winter refuses to break into proper spring and the bullying becomes too much, Odd heads out to an old cabin in the woods, determined never to return... only for a strange fox to lead him into a most magnificent adventure, far away from his little Viking village and into the realm of the gods.
REVIEW: This is a fun little story drawing on Norse mythology (if somewhat toned down for the audience, though there are references to the wilder, darker original tales around the edges), with a decently brave little hero in Odd. He only wanted to be a good son and a woodsman like his true father, and make his mother proud, until the accident shattered his leg and left him with essentially no prospects in his town, where a man who can't man a ship or go on raids or carry his weight is hardly a man at all. Fate has other plans for him, though, when he encounters a fox, a bear, and an eagle who are more than they seem, and learns that a cruel frost giant has tricked the gods of Asgard out of their proper forms and proper home. But what can one scrawny, limping mortal boy hope to do, when Odin, Thor, Loki, and the entire Norse pantheon can't free themselves? Odd isn't sure himself, but darned if he isn't going to try, even when the gods are ready to give in. The tale moves fast, with several amusing moments and some great images, coming to a satisfactory conclusion.
You Might Also Enjoy:
How to Train Your Dragon (Cressida Cowell) - My Review
Fortunately, the Milk (Neil Gaiman) - My Review
Northwind (Gary Paulsen) - My Review
Neil Gaiman
HarperCollins
Fiction, CH Fantasy
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: Odd was a small boy even before his leg was crippled. Now, he's that much less of a proper Viking, that much more of an embarrassment to his oafish stepfather and stepbrothers (for all that his mother still loves him, and his late father always adored him). One March, when the long winter refuses to break into proper spring and the bullying becomes too much, Odd heads out to an old cabin in the woods, determined never to return... only for a strange fox to lead him into a most magnificent adventure, far away from his little Viking village and into the realm of the gods.
REVIEW: This is a fun little story drawing on Norse mythology (if somewhat toned down for the audience, though there are references to the wilder, darker original tales around the edges), with a decently brave little hero in Odd. He only wanted to be a good son and a woodsman like his true father, and make his mother proud, until the accident shattered his leg and left him with essentially no prospects in his town, where a man who can't man a ship or go on raids or carry his weight is hardly a man at all. Fate has other plans for him, though, when he encounters a fox, a bear, and an eagle who are more than they seem, and learns that a cruel frost giant has tricked the gods of Asgard out of their proper forms and proper home. But what can one scrawny, limping mortal boy hope to do, when Odin, Thor, Loki, and the entire Norse pantheon can't free themselves? Odd isn't sure himself, but darned if he isn't going to try, even when the gods are ready to give in. The tale moves fast, with several amusing moments and some great images, coming to a satisfactory conclusion.
You Might Also Enjoy:
How to Train Your Dragon (Cressida Cowell) - My Review
Fortunately, the Milk (Neil Gaiman) - My Review
Northwind (Gary Paulsen) - My Review
Wednesday, November 15, 2023
Vessel (Lisa A. Nichols)
Vessel
Lisa A. Nichols
Atria
Fiction, Sci-Fi/Thriller
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: When the wormhole appeared beyond Mars, NASA sent a ship investigate... and discovered a shortcut to the Trappist star system. Thus, the Sagittarius was launched with a six-person crew, destined to be the first humans to set foot on an alien world. But shortly after reporting the discovery of microscopic life, all signals vanished. Back home, their loved ones mourned the losses and slowly got on with their lives, even as NASA began working on the next mission. Then the impossible happens: the Sagittarius returns. But while it left Earth with six astronauts, it returns with only one.
Commander Catherine Wells does not know what happened on the alien world. She does not remember what happened to her companions and friends, or how she came to be the last survivor piloting the ship home. There are disturbing holes in the ship logs, as well, and signs of a catastrophe of some sort on board, but she has no clue what happened, or why. She struggles to reconnect with the husband she left behind and the daughter who went from being a little girl to a college-bound teen in seemingly the blink of an eye, trying to put the trauma behind her, until the blackouts start - moments where she'll blink and be somewhere else, hours missing from her memory. Then there are the intrusive, violent thoughts, where even her closest friends seem like strangers. Maybe it's just post-traumatic stress, or the physiological strain of her prolonged isolation or years spent in deep space; after all, the first astronaut to investigate the wormhole wound up cracking. But Catherine can't shake the feeling that there's more to it than mere stress, that something very important and very terrible happened in the Trappist system - and that many more lives may be in danger if she can't remember just what that something is.
REVIEW: Vessel starts with a compelling mystery and a traumatized, amnesiac woman, but sometimes doesn't quite seem sure what to do with either. Catherine sets out to be a strong, self-sufficient commander, but for at least the first half she feels more like a passive victim of her circumstances, refusing to heed the little voice in her head that keeps telling her something is not right, not with her or with the NASA party line she's expected to follow. And, in her defense, she does have some pressing problems Earthside to keep her occupied: her husband David, assuming she had died, moved on, bringing a new woman (an old friend) into his life and a new mom into her daugher Aimee's. It doesn't help that parts of the mission that she does remember cast doubt on the stability of her relationship... parts that she tries to hide from her superiors and therapist. She feels almost like a stranger in her own life, now, having missed so much. But dealing with a marriage on the rocks and a daughter who has grown into a veritable stranger (and a mother whose dementia diagnosis further alienates her) can't keep her from thinking about the mission she can't remember, or noticing the blackouts and "sleepwalking" incidents, and no matter what the NASA commanders and staff therapist insist, she just knows in her gut that this is no passing psychological issue but something bigger.
The only one who seems to share Catherine's suspicions is a stranger: Cal Morganson, part of the ground crew for the impending Sagittarius II mission - a misson that started after contact with Catherine's crew was lost, to follow up in the reports of alien life. He hasn't even left Earth and never trained for space missions, but he's the one who grows suspicious about Catherine's answers and the party line. He's the one who pushes and digs and investigates, while Catherine flails and frets and struggles to hide her dangerous blackouts and other symptoms, eventually resorts to anesthetizing her troubles with alcohol, before finally - finally - reaching out for help... and even then, she sometimes feels like a passenger on Cal's quest for the truth, rather than the one with the most skin in the game.
It goes without saying that there is, indeed, more going on than mere stress (and anyone who has read or watched tales with even vaguely similar setups can probably guess the jist of it), though there are some logic holes with that aspect... as well as why NASA keeps throwing live astronauts at problems that robotic probes might be better suited for, at least until answers are forthcoming as to why things keep going so disastrously wrong when humans poke their noses through the wormhole. (Catherine is not the first to come back altered by the journey, and NASA's ostracization of the previous astronaut to report odd side-effects really should've been a bigger red flag much earlier than it was for everyone involved.) Despite the logic holes, and the way characters start feeling like picks from the stock bin rather than their own people, things do pick up and start moving well in the back half of the book, though the conclusion feels too neat, even as it shows hints that it wants a sequel.
Vessel isn't a bad little science fiction thriller, but a few too many quibbles held it back from a solid fourth star.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Retrograde (Peter Cawdron) - My Review
To Be Taught, If Fortunate (Becky Chambers) - My Review
Saturn Run (John Sanford and Ctien) - My Review
Lisa A. Nichols
Atria
Fiction, Sci-Fi/Thriller
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: When the wormhole appeared beyond Mars, NASA sent a ship investigate... and discovered a shortcut to the Trappist star system. Thus, the Sagittarius was launched with a six-person crew, destined to be the first humans to set foot on an alien world. But shortly after reporting the discovery of microscopic life, all signals vanished. Back home, their loved ones mourned the losses and slowly got on with their lives, even as NASA began working on the next mission. Then the impossible happens: the Sagittarius returns. But while it left Earth with six astronauts, it returns with only one.
Commander Catherine Wells does not know what happened on the alien world. She does not remember what happened to her companions and friends, or how she came to be the last survivor piloting the ship home. There are disturbing holes in the ship logs, as well, and signs of a catastrophe of some sort on board, but she has no clue what happened, or why. She struggles to reconnect with the husband she left behind and the daughter who went from being a little girl to a college-bound teen in seemingly the blink of an eye, trying to put the trauma behind her, until the blackouts start - moments where she'll blink and be somewhere else, hours missing from her memory. Then there are the intrusive, violent thoughts, where even her closest friends seem like strangers. Maybe it's just post-traumatic stress, or the physiological strain of her prolonged isolation or years spent in deep space; after all, the first astronaut to investigate the wormhole wound up cracking. But Catherine can't shake the feeling that there's more to it than mere stress, that something very important and very terrible happened in the Trappist system - and that many more lives may be in danger if she can't remember just what that something is.
REVIEW: Vessel starts with a compelling mystery and a traumatized, amnesiac woman, but sometimes doesn't quite seem sure what to do with either. Catherine sets out to be a strong, self-sufficient commander, but for at least the first half she feels more like a passive victim of her circumstances, refusing to heed the little voice in her head that keeps telling her something is not right, not with her or with the NASA party line she's expected to follow. And, in her defense, she does have some pressing problems Earthside to keep her occupied: her husband David, assuming she had died, moved on, bringing a new woman (an old friend) into his life and a new mom into her daugher Aimee's. It doesn't help that parts of the mission that she does remember cast doubt on the stability of her relationship... parts that she tries to hide from her superiors and therapist. She feels almost like a stranger in her own life, now, having missed so much. But dealing with a marriage on the rocks and a daughter who has grown into a veritable stranger (and a mother whose dementia diagnosis further alienates her) can't keep her from thinking about the mission she can't remember, or noticing the blackouts and "sleepwalking" incidents, and no matter what the NASA commanders and staff therapist insist, she just knows in her gut that this is no passing psychological issue but something bigger.
The only one who seems to share Catherine's suspicions is a stranger: Cal Morganson, part of the ground crew for the impending Sagittarius II mission - a misson that started after contact with Catherine's crew was lost, to follow up in the reports of alien life. He hasn't even left Earth and never trained for space missions, but he's the one who grows suspicious about Catherine's answers and the party line. He's the one who pushes and digs and investigates, while Catherine flails and frets and struggles to hide her dangerous blackouts and other symptoms, eventually resorts to anesthetizing her troubles with alcohol, before finally - finally - reaching out for help... and even then, she sometimes feels like a passenger on Cal's quest for the truth, rather than the one with the most skin in the game.
It goes without saying that there is, indeed, more going on than mere stress (and anyone who has read or watched tales with even vaguely similar setups can probably guess the jist of it), though there are some logic holes with that aspect... as well as why NASA keeps throwing live astronauts at problems that robotic probes might be better suited for, at least until answers are forthcoming as to why things keep going so disastrously wrong when humans poke their noses through the wormhole. (Catherine is not the first to come back altered by the journey, and NASA's ostracization of the previous astronaut to report odd side-effects really should've been a bigger red flag much earlier than it was for everyone involved.) Despite the logic holes, and the way characters start feeling like picks from the stock bin rather than their own people, things do pick up and start moving well in the back half of the book, though the conclusion feels too neat, even as it shows hints that it wants a sequel.
Vessel isn't a bad little science fiction thriller, but a few too many quibbles held it back from a solid fourth star.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Retrograde (Peter Cawdron) - My Review
To Be Taught, If Fortunate (Becky Chambers) - My Review
Saturn Run (John Sanford and Ctien) - My Review
Friday, November 10, 2023
Fat Kid Rules the World (K. L. Going)
Fat Kid Rules the World
K. L. Going
Penguin Books
Fiction, YA General Fiction
****+ (Good/Great)
DESCRIPTION: Seventeen-year-old Troy Billings doesn't fit in - not in his family, not in school, not in Manhattan, not anywhere. Over six feet tall and nearly 300 pounds, not a day goes by when he doesn't seem to be the butt of everyone's joke and the object of everyone's disgust and utter loathing - his own, most of all. He was about to end it all by stepping in front of the subway when a voice stops him... a voice belonging to the dirtiest, skinniest young man Troy's ever seen. But the moment he hears the man's name, he's starstruck: this is none other than Curt MacCrae, a legend in the local punk rock scene, if a notoriously elusive one. He even went to the same high school as Troy, though he dropped out and disappeared a couple years ago. For some strange reason, Curt not only stopped him from ending his own life, but recruits him into a new band he's forming as the drummer (disregarding Troy's insistence that he last played drums in junior high and was never much good even back then). But there are reasons a prodigal guitar player like Curt has never moved beyond occasional gigs at a local dive known as the Dump, reasons that could drag Troy down just when the teen has started to think he can rise up.
REVIEW: One of the truest bits of dialog I've heard in a movie is in the animated feature Kung Fu Panda, when the hefty panda/unpromising student Po finally talks back to kung fu master Shifu, who has been disparaging and discouraging him since they met. Po tells him that all the insults Shifu and the other students have hurled at him hurt no worse than every day of his life just being him, then says he only stuck around because he figured if anyone could change things, make him not him, it was Shifu. That vibe, the desperate bone-deep desire to not be what one sees in the mirror, is amped up to eleven in Fat Kid Rules the World.
It starts with Troy quite literally on the edge, standing on the subway platform, wondering grimly if even his grisly suicide by subway train would do no more than make people laugh at him. Even his own kid brother, who once looked up to him (nine years ago, before the weight and before their mother died), seems to think the world would be better off with no Troy in it. Curt's intervention saves his life and forges a bond not easily broken, not even when Curt's erratic behavior becomes harder and harder to chalk up to artistic eccentricity. At first, it's just the push Troy needs to get out of his own head and his own miseries and push some boundaries (internal and external). The "band", which is apparently just Curt's guitar and Troy's as-yet-nonexistent drums, seems at first just to be a spur-of-the-moment lie Curt trots out to shut up Troy's obnoxious kid brother... but Troy slowly realizes he's serious. Worse, he's finagled a debut for them at the Dump in just over a month, when Troy hasn't so much as looked at a drum in years. Dazed and bedazzled and more than a little starstruck, he finds himself pulled into Curt's orbit, as others have been before (and still are), but that orbit is not exactly a safe place to be, and Curt isn't exactly a stable star at the heart of his little solar system, but one likely to go supernova at any moment. Even as Troy finds himself warming up to this new possible future, this new possible him - who learns drumming from one of the members of his favorite local punk band, who cuts school, who aids and abets the odd nonviolent crime, and who actually hangs out with someone as legendary as the Curt MacCrae - he can't help seeing the problems and the wreckage strewn in Curt's wake... just as he can't help noticing the many different "prescriptions" Curt takes, and how he can't reliably remember from one minute to the next what he's committed himself (or others) to. As much as Troy needs someone to rescue him from himself, it's possible Curt needs someone even more, but many have tried and failed, while Curt continues to spiral further and further out of control. It all swirls around the pull of punk rock, not just the music and the rock scene but the mindset and attitude - all of which Troy has secretly yearned toward for years, even if he's never had the courage to embrace punk openly, certain it'll be just one more thing he fails at and one more reason for strangers to ridicule the big, clumsy fat kid.
Troy's journey is not the quick and easy march from "self-loathing, insecure boy" to "successful young man who has found his calling and future" that some might have written. There is no great montage moment where he casts aside all doubts and lives up to a higher version of himself, with Curt as the eccentric but ultimately wise beyond his years mentor. Troy stumbles more than once, and Curt falls down on the "mentor" job with increasing frequency, building to his own crisis where their bond faces what might be a tipping point or a breaking point, depending on how they both react.
There are one or two points near the ending that I wasn't quite sure felt right, particularly in regards to Troy's father (who, despite the potential stereotype of the widower ex-military father who appears deeply disappointed in his decidedly non-military-grade eldest son, actually has a lot more to him than first appearances indicate) and brother (a character who could've used a little bit more fleshing out). Despite that, there are innumerable moments that rang true about being an awkward outsider who can't seem to figure out how to fit in to the life they've found themselves living, or even if there's anywhere they can fit in, and what a many-layered, self-perpetuating, personal Hell such an existence can be, related in Troy's point of view that's funny and gut-wrenching by turns. That was enough to earn it an extra half-star in the ratings. Been there, done that, still living it in too many ways...
You Might Also Enjoy:
Light From Uncommon Stars (Ryka Aoki) - My Review
Wolfwood (Marianna Baer) - My Review
Ghost (Jason Reynolds) - My Review
K. L. Going
Penguin Books
Fiction, YA General Fiction
****+ (Good/Great)
DESCRIPTION: Seventeen-year-old Troy Billings doesn't fit in - not in his family, not in school, not in Manhattan, not anywhere. Over six feet tall and nearly 300 pounds, not a day goes by when he doesn't seem to be the butt of everyone's joke and the object of everyone's disgust and utter loathing - his own, most of all. He was about to end it all by stepping in front of the subway when a voice stops him... a voice belonging to the dirtiest, skinniest young man Troy's ever seen. But the moment he hears the man's name, he's starstruck: this is none other than Curt MacCrae, a legend in the local punk rock scene, if a notoriously elusive one. He even went to the same high school as Troy, though he dropped out and disappeared a couple years ago. For some strange reason, Curt not only stopped him from ending his own life, but recruits him into a new band he's forming as the drummer (disregarding Troy's insistence that he last played drums in junior high and was never much good even back then). But there are reasons a prodigal guitar player like Curt has never moved beyond occasional gigs at a local dive known as the Dump, reasons that could drag Troy down just when the teen has started to think he can rise up.
REVIEW: One of the truest bits of dialog I've heard in a movie is in the animated feature Kung Fu Panda, when the hefty panda/unpromising student Po finally talks back to kung fu master Shifu, who has been disparaging and discouraging him since they met. Po tells him that all the insults Shifu and the other students have hurled at him hurt no worse than every day of his life just being him, then says he only stuck around because he figured if anyone could change things, make him not him, it was Shifu. That vibe, the desperate bone-deep desire to not be what one sees in the mirror, is amped up to eleven in Fat Kid Rules the World.
It starts with Troy quite literally on the edge, standing on the subway platform, wondering grimly if even his grisly suicide by subway train would do no more than make people laugh at him. Even his own kid brother, who once looked up to him (nine years ago, before the weight and before their mother died), seems to think the world would be better off with no Troy in it. Curt's intervention saves his life and forges a bond not easily broken, not even when Curt's erratic behavior becomes harder and harder to chalk up to artistic eccentricity. At first, it's just the push Troy needs to get out of his own head and his own miseries and push some boundaries (internal and external). The "band", which is apparently just Curt's guitar and Troy's as-yet-nonexistent drums, seems at first just to be a spur-of-the-moment lie Curt trots out to shut up Troy's obnoxious kid brother... but Troy slowly realizes he's serious. Worse, he's finagled a debut for them at the Dump in just over a month, when Troy hasn't so much as looked at a drum in years. Dazed and bedazzled and more than a little starstruck, he finds himself pulled into Curt's orbit, as others have been before (and still are), but that orbit is not exactly a safe place to be, and Curt isn't exactly a stable star at the heart of his little solar system, but one likely to go supernova at any moment. Even as Troy finds himself warming up to this new possible future, this new possible him - who learns drumming from one of the members of his favorite local punk band, who cuts school, who aids and abets the odd nonviolent crime, and who actually hangs out with someone as legendary as the Curt MacCrae - he can't help seeing the problems and the wreckage strewn in Curt's wake... just as he can't help noticing the many different "prescriptions" Curt takes, and how he can't reliably remember from one minute to the next what he's committed himself (or others) to. As much as Troy needs someone to rescue him from himself, it's possible Curt needs someone even more, but many have tried and failed, while Curt continues to spiral further and further out of control. It all swirls around the pull of punk rock, not just the music and the rock scene but the mindset and attitude - all of which Troy has secretly yearned toward for years, even if he's never had the courage to embrace punk openly, certain it'll be just one more thing he fails at and one more reason for strangers to ridicule the big, clumsy fat kid.
Troy's journey is not the quick and easy march from "self-loathing, insecure boy" to "successful young man who has found his calling and future" that some might have written. There is no great montage moment where he casts aside all doubts and lives up to a higher version of himself, with Curt as the eccentric but ultimately wise beyond his years mentor. Troy stumbles more than once, and Curt falls down on the "mentor" job with increasing frequency, building to his own crisis where their bond faces what might be a tipping point or a breaking point, depending on how they both react.
There are one or two points near the ending that I wasn't quite sure felt right, particularly in regards to Troy's father (who, despite the potential stereotype of the widower ex-military father who appears deeply disappointed in his decidedly non-military-grade eldest son, actually has a lot more to him than first appearances indicate) and brother (a character who could've used a little bit more fleshing out). Despite that, there are innumerable moments that rang true about being an awkward outsider who can't seem to figure out how to fit in to the life they've found themselves living, or even if there's anywhere they can fit in, and what a many-layered, self-perpetuating, personal Hell such an existence can be, related in Troy's point of view that's funny and gut-wrenching by turns. That was enough to earn it an extra half-star in the ratings. Been there, done that, still living it in too many ways...
You Might Also Enjoy:
Light From Uncommon Stars (Ryka Aoki) - My Review
Wolfwood (Marianna Baer) - My Review
Ghost (Jason Reynolds) - My Review
Wednesday, November 8, 2023
Retribution Rails (Erin Bowman)
Retribution Rails
The Vengeance Road series, Book 2
Erin Bowman
Clarion Books
Fiction, YA Western
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: The frontier public knows him as the Rose Kid, a cold-blooded boy who, at only fifteen, slaughtered an entire family of farmers and ran off to join up with the notorious Rose Riders. But they have it all wrong: Reece was about to be slaughtered, too, until the leader of the Riders, Luther Rose, decided he'd be more useful alive than dead. Reece had on him a distinctive gold coin, one very much like the kind carried by the gunslinger who killed Luther's half-brother ten years back, and the boy insists he could identify the man who gave it to him. A day hasn't gone by that Reece hasn't hated himself for what he's had to do to stay alive, that he hasn't dreamed of escape, but the one time he did try sneaking away they made him pay dearly. Which is how he wound up on the train to Prescott with the other Riders, stealing a lucrative payroll and robbing the passengers while they're at it... and how he nearly got shot by a young woman.
Charlotte knows she should've stayed behind in Yuma, like her mother told her. Only one week ago, her beloved father died after a long illness, willing the family fortune to his wife and daughter... and bringing trouble from a devious uncle who wants those riches for himself. Mother went to Prescott to sort things out with the lawyer, but Charlotte isn't about to be pushed aside like a little girl. Besides, she aspires to follow in the footsteps of pioneering lady reporter Nellie Bly, and how is she going to find anything worth reporting on if she sits meekly in her room? She didn't count on her train being held up, but fortunately she had her father's Colt on her when it was... and she kept her cool enough to be able to describe the robbers when she came to the next town. As if anyone west of Colorado wouldn't know the Rose Riders - or the face of the notorious killer, the Rose Kid, when he's staring right at her.
Bad luck lands Charlotte and Reece together, one as he flees from both the law and his former crewmates, the other as a hostage of circumstance. Though they start as rivals, they soon find their goals unexpectedly aligning - but can that bond last against scheming relatives, relentless outlaws, complicated histories, and flying bullets?
REVIEW: This "companion novel" takes place ten years after Bowman's top-notch Western adventure Vengeance Road, and crosses over with a couple of the characters from that book, but more or less stands on its own.
Arizona has changed substantially in that decade, most notably with the arrival of the railroad and the prosperity (and problems) that brings. The characters are also their own people, and not rehashes of the ones in the first story. Charlotte is nothing like the tough, vengeance-driven Kate (teen protagonist of the first book, now a young married woman and soon-to-be mother), being a daughter of privilege and less country-wise (and people-wise; she takes the printed word of news articles as gospel, as well as the notion that people tend to be either Good or Bad and that's all there is to it). Still, she's no fainting flower, and pursues her dreams despite the naysayers who insist that journalism is an improper and impractical pursuit for a woman. Reece, on the other hand, was dealt a bad hand in life, first from a drunkard father, and then when the farm family he was boarding with was struck by the Rose Riders, and yet again when Luther not only took him as an essential hostage to point the way to the gunslinger, but seems intent on turning him into a true outlaw and Rose Rider, taking on a paternal role that Reece can't help responding to. From their first meeting aboard the train, Reece and Charlotte's association is bound to be rocky, and it doesn't notably improve for some time later. Meanwhile, Charlotte discovers just what lengths her crooked uncle has gone to in order to ensure her father's will is disregarded and the family fortune willed to herself and her mother instead go to him... an inheritance to be sealed by a forced marriage, either of her mother to the uncle or herself to her uncle's son. Worse, the very people Charlotte and her mother were counting on to protect them and enforce the will seem to have been paid off or persuaded by the man's unfounded slander against them. Reece finds himself pursuing the gunslinger alone, knowing that he will never be free of Luther Rose until he delivers the outlaw's brother's killer to the Rose Riders, but instead finds himself pulled into a story of lost gold and vengeance sought and found a decade earlier when the trail leads to the homestead of Kate Colton, nee Thompson. Kate has ridden the road Charlotte and Reece are on now, a road of vengeance and justification of all means to their desired ends, and knows where it leads - to rash actions you can never undo, consequences you cannot control, and a dark cloud of regret that you can never outrun but only learn to live with. Of course, the youngsters don't really understand, not even Reece with his hard and compromised life, until it's too late and they have their own dark clouds.
As in the first book, everyone has extra sides to them, even the baddies, and nobody is beyond mistakes, nor does anyone get through the book without some blood on their hands. For some reason, I found it a little weaker than the first story; Kate was just such a strong character in her own book that her arrival threatens to swamp Reece and Charlotte, and neither of the new characters really grabbed me the way the ones did in Vengeance Road. Still, it's a well-paced, active novel with few slow spots, quite enjoyable on the whole.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Vengeance Road (Erin Bowman) - My Review
Thieving Forest (Martha Conway) - My Review
The Misadventures of Maude March (Audrey Couloumbis) - My Review
The Vengeance Road series, Book 2
Erin Bowman
Clarion Books
Fiction, YA Western
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: The frontier public knows him as the Rose Kid, a cold-blooded boy who, at only fifteen, slaughtered an entire family of farmers and ran off to join up with the notorious Rose Riders. But they have it all wrong: Reece was about to be slaughtered, too, until the leader of the Riders, Luther Rose, decided he'd be more useful alive than dead. Reece had on him a distinctive gold coin, one very much like the kind carried by the gunslinger who killed Luther's half-brother ten years back, and the boy insists he could identify the man who gave it to him. A day hasn't gone by that Reece hasn't hated himself for what he's had to do to stay alive, that he hasn't dreamed of escape, but the one time he did try sneaking away they made him pay dearly. Which is how he wound up on the train to Prescott with the other Riders, stealing a lucrative payroll and robbing the passengers while they're at it... and how he nearly got shot by a young woman.
Charlotte knows she should've stayed behind in Yuma, like her mother told her. Only one week ago, her beloved father died after a long illness, willing the family fortune to his wife and daughter... and bringing trouble from a devious uncle who wants those riches for himself. Mother went to Prescott to sort things out with the lawyer, but Charlotte isn't about to be pushed aside like a little girl. Besides, she aspires to follow in the footsteps of pioneering lady reporter Nellie Bly, and how is she going to find anything worth reporting on if she sits meekly in her room? She didn't count on her train being held up, but fortunately she had her father's Colt on her when it was... and she kept her cool enough to be able to describe the robbers when she came to the next town. As if anyone west of Colorado wouldn't know the Rose Riders - or the face of the notorious killer, the Rose Kid, when he's staring right at her.
Bad luck lands Charlotte and Reece together, one as he flees from both the law and his former crewmates, the other as a hostage of circumstance. Though they start as rivals, they soon find their goals unexpectedly aligning - but can that bond last against scheming relatives, relentless outlaws, complicated histories, and flying bullets?
REVIEW: This "companion novel" takes place ten years after Bowman's top-notch Western adventure Vengeance Road, and crosses over with a couple of the characters from that book, but more or less stands on its own.
Arizona has changed substantially in that decade, most notably with the arrival of the railroad and the prosperity (and problems) that brings. The characters are also their own people, and not rehashes of the ones in the first story. Charlotte is nothing like the tough, vengeance-driven Kate (teen protagonist of the first book, now a young married woman and soon-to-be mother), being a daughter of privilege and less country-wise (and people-wise; she takes the printed word of news articles as gospel, as well as the notion that people tend to be either Good or Bad and that's all there is to it). Still, she's no fainting flower, and pursues her dreams despite the naysayers who insist that journalism is an improper and impractical pursuit for a woman. Reece, on the other hand, was dealt a bad hand in life, first from a drunkard father, and then when the farm family he was boarding with was struck by the Rose Riders, and yet again when Luther not only took him as an essential hostage to point the way to the gunslinger, but seems intent on turning him into a true outlaw and Rose Rider, taking on a paternal role that Reece can't help responding to. From their first meeting aboard the train, Reece and Charlotte's association is bound to be rocky, and it doesn't notably improve for some time later. Meanwhile, Charlotte discovers just what lengths her crooked uncle has gone to in order to ensure her father's will is disregarded and the family fortune willed to herself and her mother instead go to him... an inheritance to be sealed by a forced marriage, either of her mother to the uncle or herself to her uncle's son. Worse, the very people Charlotte and her mother were counting on to protect them and enforce the will seem to have been paid off or persuaded by the man's unfounded slander against them. Reece finds himself pursuing the gunslinger alone, knowing that he will never be free of Luther Rose until he delivers the outlaw's brother's killer to the Rose Riders, but instead finds himself pulled into a story of lost gold and vengeance sought and found a decade earlier when the trail leads to the homestead of Kate Colton, nee Thompson. Kate has ridden the road Charlotte and Reece are on now, a road of vengeance and justification of all means to their desired ends, and knows where it leads - to rash actions you can never undo, consequences you cannot control, and a dark cloud of regret that you can never outrun but only learn to live with. Of course, the youngsters don't really understand, not even Reece with his hard and compromised life, until it's too late and they have their own dark clouds.
As in the first book, everyone has extra sides to them, even the baddies, and nobody is beyond mistakes, nor does anyone get through the book without some blood on their hands. For some reason, I found it a little weaker than the first story; Kate was just such a strong character in her own book that her arrival threatens to swamp Reece and Charlotte, and neither of the new characters really grabbed me the way the ones did in Vengeance Road. Still, it's a well-paced, active novel with few slow spots, quite enjoyable on the whole.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Vengeance Road (Erin Bowman) - My Review
Thieving Forest (Martha Conway) - My Review
The Misadventures of Maude March (Audrey Couloumbis) - My Review
Friday, November 3, 2023
Little Fuzzy (H. Beam Piper)
Little Fuzzy
The Fuzzy Sapiens series, Book 1
H. Beam Piper
Audio Realms
Fiction, Sci-Fi
**+ (Bad/Okay)
DESCRIPTION: On the frontier world of Zarathustra, a seemingly endless supply of natural resources is making a lot of people - particularly the Chartered Zarathustra Company that controls the Class 3 world - very rich. Jack Holloway is hoping to be one of them; a lone prospector, he works his claim for sunstones, gemlike fossils of an extinct native jellyfish, that fetch a hefty price on many worlds. He never expected to find anything of true interstellar significance... but then he discovers the strange, fuzzy little biped hiding in his home. Since the planet has only been inhabited for a couple decades or so, there are numerous native animals yet to be discovered, and at first Jack thinks this is just one of those. But "Little Fuzzy" seems unusually clever to be just another animal, even using basic tools - and after the rest of the creature's family shows up, Jack soon has no doubts that they're sapient, if very primitive, people. If true, this would have ramifications across Zarathustra: worlds with native sapient species are Class 4, not Class 3, and an exploitative monopoly contract like the one held by the colony company would be rendered null and void. Of course, that would only happen if word got out to the interstellar human Federation - and the Chartered Zarathustra Company isn't about to let that happen, even if it means eliminating a troublesome prospector and his little fuzzy "pets"...
REVIEW: This is something of a genre classic, but, as it was first published in 1962, it definitely shows its age, and not in any good way. The parallels to colonialism and efforts to reduce native cultures to lesser or even flat-out inhuman status (efforts driven by profit potential at least as much as racism, the two motives frequently combined) are quite clear, which makes it extra cringeworthy how the author and the protagonist Jack treat the Fuzzies (no prizes for guessing whether or not they're sapient). The old prospector immediately adopts a patronizing, fatherly role with his new little friend, calling himself "Pappy Jack" and consistently talking down to the Fuzzies, treating them as something between a pet and a small child. This treatment is echoed by most every "good" human throughout the story, and the Fuzzies continually live up to (or rather, down to) this expectation, apparently wanting nothing more than to abandon their native lifestyle and live like glorified pets at the feet of the wise and powerful human invaders - invaders who, incidentally, have already damaged the planet to the point of altering the climate, a little throwaway subplot that's never followed up on. It's also yet another very white, very male, very mid-20th century vision of an interstellar future; women exist to be secretaries or wives almost exclusively, while men smoke like chimneys and always have alcohol near at hand while doing all of the hard, important work of civilization. Beyond that, it does earn some marks for trying to tease out a solid definition of what makes a being sapient, when examples on numerous worlds keep contradicting every definition humanity comes up with. There are some echoes here with more recent studies that reveal just how little we understand the inner workings of animal minds here on Earth, and how little of what we used to think of as exclusively human actually is unique to our species. The plot at least moves fairly well, for all that the ending involves pulling a few plot twists out of thin air.
The rating I gave it takes into account the fact that it was written in an entirely different era, and for an entirely different audience, than I embody. Even given that, there are some things that happen after the climax and the resolution of the sapience issue that just induced one too many cringes for me to overlook. (Potential Spoiler: when the very judge who, moments ago, ruled that Fuzzies were people and not mere animals, then inquired about acquiring a pair of cute little Fuzzies for his pampered wife much as he might ask for a pair of Bichon Frise puppies, followed by Jack deciding he needed to start an adoption service to home all the natives with human homes without even thinking to ask the Fuzzies what they thought of the plan ('cause of course the human Pappy Jack knows best) - blatantly treating them like the dumb animals they were just ruled not to be, and with terrible echoes of how colonizing people throughout history considered that native cultures should be "grateful" to be taken from their homes and raised with white people in "superior" white ways... yeah, there are some things I just can't overlook because "things were different then".)
You Might Also Enjoy:
Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card) - My Review
Quozl (Alan Dean Foster) - My Review
Children of Time (Adrian Tchaikovsky) - My Review
The Fuzzy Sapiens series, Book 1
H. Beam Piper
Audio Realms
Fiction, Sci-Fi
**+ (Bad/Okay)
DESCRIPTION: On the frontier world of Zarathustra, a seemingly endless supply of natural resources is making a lot of people - particularly the Chartered Zarathustra Company that controls the Class 3 world - very rich. Jack Holloway is hoping to be one of them; a lone prospector, he works his claim for sunstones, gemlike fossils of an extinct native jellyfish, that fetch a hefty price on many worlds. He never expected to find anything of true interstellar significance... but then he discovers the strange, fuzzy little biped hiding in his home. Since the planet has only been inhabited for a couple decades or so, there are numerous native animals yet to be discovered, and at first Jack thinks this is just one of those. But "Little Fuzzy" seems unusually clever to be just another animal, even using basic tools - and after the rest of the creature's family shows up, Jack soon has no doubts that they're sapient, if very primitive, people. If true, this would have ramifications across Zarathustra: worlds with native sapient species are Class 4, not Class 3, and an exploitative monopoly contract like the one held by the colony company would be rendered null and void. Of course, that would only happen if word got out to the interstellar human Federation - and the Chartered Zarathustra Company isn't about to let that happen, even if it means eliminating a troublesome prospector and his little fuzzy "pets"...
REVIEW: This is something of a genre classic, but, as it was first published in 1962, it definitely shows its age, and not in any good way. The parallels to colonialism and efforts to reduce native cultures to lesser or even flat-out inhuman status (efforts driven by profit potential at least as much as racism, the two motives frequently combined) are quite clear, which makes it extra cringeworthy how the author and the protagonist Jack treat the Fuzzies (no prizes for guessing whether or not they're sapient). The old prospector immediately adopts a patronizing, fatherly role with his new little friend, calling himself "Pappy Jack" and consistently talking down to the Fuzzies, treating them as something between a pet and a small child. This treatment is echoed by most every "good" human throughout the story, and the Fuzzies continually live up to (or rather, down to) this expectation, apparently wanting nothing more than to abandon their native lifestyle and live like glorified pets at the feet of the wise and powerful human invaders - invaders who, incidentally, have already damaged the planet to the point of altering the climate, a little throwaway subplot that's never followed up on. It's also yet another very white, very male, very mid-20th century vision of an interstellar future; women exist to be secretaries or wives almost exclusively, while men smoke like chimneys and always have alcohol near at hand while doing all of the hard, important work of civilization. Beyond that, it does earn some marks for trying to tease out a solid definition of what makes a being sapient, when examples on numerous worlds keep contradicting every definition humanity comes up with. There are some echoes here with more recent studies that reveal just how little we understand the inner workings of animal minds here on Earth, and how little of what we used to think of as exclusively human actually is unique to our species. The plot at least moves fairly well, for all that the ending involves pulling a few plot twists out of thin air.
The rating I gave it takes into account the fact that it was written in an entirely different era, and for an entirely different audience, than I embody. Even given that, there are some things that happen after the climax and the resolution of the sapience issue that just induced one too many cringes for me to overlook. (Potential Spoiler: when the very judge who, moments ago, ruled that Fuzzies were people and not mere animals, then inquired about acquiring a pair of cute little Fuzzies for his pampered wife much as he might ask for a pair of Bichon Frise puppies, followed by Jack deciding he needed to start an adoption service to home all the natives with human homes without even thinking to ask the Fuzzies what they thought of the plan ('cause of course the human Pappy Jack knows best) - blatantly treating them like the dumb animals they were just ruled not to be, and with terrible echoes of how colonizing people throughout history considered that native cultures should be "grateful" to be taken from their homes and raised with white people in "superior" white ways... yeah, there are some things I just can't overlook because "things were different then".)
You Might Also Enjoy:
Ender's Game (Orson Scott Card) - My Review
Quozl (Alan Dean Foster) - My Review
Children of Time (Adrian Tchaikovsky) - My Review
Thursday, November 2, 2023
The Adventurer's Son (Roman Dial)
The Adventurer's Son: A Memoir
Roman Dial
Mariner Books
Nonfiction, Memoir
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: As a boy, Roman Dial became enamored with the wilderness. He pursued a degree in Alaska just to be nearer to the wild places that called to him, the mountains and rivers and deep trackless woods that challenged him, and dedicated his career to studying ecology and wildlife around the world, often in the most remote and inhospitable places. When he married, he introduced his wife Penny to these wonders, and when they had children the couple ensured that young Cody and Jasper, too, were exposed to the wonders and adventures to be found out of doors.
Later, he would wonder if perhaps it was his fault that his son followed in his footsteps.
In the summer of 2014, Cody Roman Dial, then in his twenties, was traveling solo in Central America. Like his father before him, he was an explorer at heart, a wanderer who was always looking toward the next challenge, the next adventure. He'd done several solo trips before, at least as challenging as the one he had planned for Costa Rica, and always kept in touch through e-mail with his family. But in early July, Roman would receive what would turn out to be the last contact he would have with Cody: a map and loose itinerary, and a promise to e-mail again after a planned five-day excursion into some of the wildest rainforests left in the country. But that e-mail never came, and Cody was never seen again.
As Roman heads to Costa Rica to search for his missing son, he confronts language and cultural barriers, indifferent local authorities, and other obstacles, not the least of which is the rainforest itself, brimming with treacherous terrain and deadly snakes and numerous poachers and drug smugglers. Even as he looks, he reflects on his own life and Cody's adventurous childhood - a childhood that may have led him to this beautiful, dangerous land that might have killed him.
REVIEW: Another random selection from the library's audiobook offerings, The Adventurer's Son is the story of one man's love of - and borderline addiction to - the wilderness, and how he wrestles with the legacy of that love when it's picked up by his son. Starting in Roman's own childhood, the book follows him through his discovery of the outdoors, the adventures (and near-disasters) that love led him to, the friends he made, and the career paths it opened up for him. Though his would-be wife was at first not that much of an outdoor junkie herself, and never reaches his level of obsession, he introduces the wilderness to her, and they have their own adventures, adventures they would share with their young family - camping trips in their home state of Alaska, journeys to Borneo and Australia, and more. Introducing his children, particularly his son (who took after his dad in so many ways), to that passion was one of the greatest joys of Roman's life, watching the boy rise to the challenges presented by a hike or unmarked trail or foreign country... and one of the greatest devastations when his adult son goes missing in the very wilderness Roman taught him to respect and explore and embrace so wholeheartedly. The great pride and sense of wonder of the earlier portions of the book, the author's passion fairly leaping off the page, turns quickly to the devastation and frustration of a father pursuing answers about his son's disappearance in a remote area replete with criminals and other dangers, as well as spotty law enforcement that seems to have already made up its mind about Cody's fate before even beginning its investigation... an investigation that would pursue numerous false leads and dead ends for over two years. In pursuit of answers, Roman and Penny even turn to a "documentary" television team, with results that demonstrate how far from reality a lot of so-called "reality" television ends up becoming and how manipulative and exploitative the crews can be, on and off camera. Eventually, closure is reached and answers (some, at least) are forthcoming, but there are clearly some wounds that will never fully heal. Did the father's obsession lead his son to tragedy, or did he simply awaken in the boy a passion of his own, one with certain inherent risks that living fully and deeply always entails? There can be little doubt that Cody Roman Dial lived a full and vivid life, a life made fuller and more vivid by his father's adventurous legacy, no matter how that life ended.
Some of the earlier material can feel a bit meandering, even if it's always decently written. Overall, it's as much about the love of one man for the wilderness (dangers and all) as about the love of a father for his son, and the complicated feelings when those loves seem to collide and end in tragedy.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Gone to the Woods (Gary Paulsen) - My Review
The Lost City of the Monkey God (Douglas Preston) - My Review
The Invention of Nature (Andrea Wulf) - My Review
Roman Dial
Mariner Books
Nonfiction, Memoir
**** (Good)
DESCRIPTION: As a boy, Roman Dial became enamored with the wilderness. He pursued a degree in Alaska just to be nearer to the wild places that called to him, the mountains and rivers and deep trackless woods that challenged him, and dedicated his career to studying ecology and wildlife around the world, often in the most remote and inhospitable places. When he married, he introduced his wife Penny to these wonders, and when they had children the couple ensured that young Cody and Jasper, too, were exposed to the wonders and adventures to be found out of doors.
Later, he would wonder if perhaps it was his fault that his son followed in his footsteps.
In the summer of 2014, Cody Roman Dial, then in his twenties, was traveling solo in Central America. Like his father before him, he was an explorer at heart, a wanderer who was always looking toward the next challenge, the next adventure. He'd done several solo trips before, at least as challenging as the one he had planned for Costa Rica, and always kept in touch through e-mail with his family. But in early July, Roman would receive what would turn out to be the last contact he would have with Cody: a map and loose itinerary, and a promise to e-mail again after a planned five-day excursion into some of the wildest rainforests left in the country. But that e-mail never came, and Cody was never seen again.
As Roman heads to Costa Rica to search for his missing son, he confronts language and cultural barriers, indifferent local authorities, and other obstacles, not the least of which is the rainforest itself, brimming with treacherous terrain and deadly snakes and numerous poachers and drug smugglers. Even as he looks, he reflects on his own life and Cody's adventurous childhood - a childhood that may have led him to this beautiful, dangerous land that might have killed him.
REVIEW: Another random selection from the library's audiobook offerings, The Adventurer's Son is the story of one man's love of - and borderline addiction to - the wilderness, and how he wrestles with the legacy of that love when it's picked up by his son. Starting in Roman's own childhood, the book follows him through his discovery of the outdoors, the adventures (and near-disasters) that love led him to, the friends he made, and the career paths it opened up for him. Though his would-be wife was at first not that much of an outdoor junkie herself, and never reaches his level of obsession, he introduces the wilderness to her, and they have their own adventures, adventures they would share with their young family - camping trips in their home state of Alaska, journeys to Borneo and Australia, and more. Introducing his children, particularly his son (who took after his dad in so many ways), to that passion was one of the greatest joys of Roman's life, watching the boy rise to the challenges presented by a hike or unmarked trail or foreign country... and one of the greatest devastations when his adult son goes missing in the very wilderness Roman taught him to respect and explore and embrace so wholeheartedly. The great pride and sense of wonder of the earlier portions of the book, the author's passion fairly leaping off the page, turns quickly to the devastation and frustration of a father pursuing answers about his son's disappearance in a remote area replete with criminals and other dangers, as well as spotty law enforcement that seems to have already made up its mind about Cody's fate before even beginning its investigation... an investigation that would pursue numerous false leads and dead ends for over two years. In pursuit of answers, Roman and Penny even turn to a "documentary" television team, with results that demonstrate how far from reality a lot of so-called "reality" television ends up becoming and how manipulative and exploitative the crews can be, on and off camera. Eventually, closure is reached and answers (some, at least) are forthcoming, but there are clearly some wounds that will never fully heal. Did the father's obsession lead his son to tragedy, or did he simply awaken in the boy a passion of his own, one with certain inherent risks that living fully and deeply always entails? There can be little doubt that Cody Roman Dial lived a full and vivid life, a life made fuller and more vivid by his father's adventurous legacy, no matter how that life ended.
Some of the earlier material can feel a bit meandering, even if it's always decently written. Overall, it's as much about the love of one man for the wilderness (dangers and all) as about the love of a father for his son, and the complicated feelings when those loves seem to collide and end in tragedy.
You Might Also Enjoy:
Gone to the Woods (Gary Paulsen) - My Review
The Lost City of the Monkey God (Douglas Preston) - My Review
The Invention of Nature (Andrea Wulf) - My Review
Wednesday, November 1, 2023
Over the Moon (Natalie Lloyd)
Over the Moon
Natalie Lloyd
Scholastic
Fiction, MG Fantasy
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: Once, the skies over Coal Top Mountain were full of stars, and the houses were full of spun starlight, luminous material used in everything from clothing to book covers and more. There were also flying horses who would carry children on their backs above the high peaks. The people were happy, then, full of songs and laughter... but not now, not in the decades since the Dust choked off the stars and spread sorrow and misery everywhere in a gritty, toxic soot. Even to sing is discouraged, lest inhaled Dust plunge one into deep despair or worse. As for the flying horses, they vanished with the stars, leaving the forests full of monsters.
Mallie Ramble's father, like all the men of Coal Top, used to work in the mines seeking gold, the town's only livelihood without starlight to spin. But the deep, dark places of the mountains are as tainted as the skies above. First it steals the color from the eyes, leaving them inky black. Then it steals voices. When an accident left Papa blind, he was blamed and not even paid when they sent him away. To keep her little brother Denver from the same fate, Mallie works as a maid in the rich houses down in the valley, backbreaking work made harder by her only having one arm. Still, she'd do anything to spare her brother and keep her mother from one more worry... only the valley folk look for any ways they can to cheat those from the hilltop, and the few Feather-coins Mallie earns for her labors aren't nearly enough to keep the family fed, let alone pay the massive debt the Guardians insist the Rambles owe. She needs a miracle - and she thinks she finds one, when she spots the flyers around town asking for children willing to risk great danger for a great reward.
The town leader has learned that some winged horses are still lurking in the woods... and, with them, a brave enough rider might reach the mountains beyond Coal Top, each peak glimmering with layers of gold dust. It's a dangerous proposition, especially as nobody has ridden a flying horse in a generation, but there's hardly a mountain child in Coal Top who doesn't need that money like they need air or water - and even children from the valley are tempted by the rewards. Mallie doesn't care what the dangers are; she'll do whatever it takes. But there's another danger lurking around Coal Top, a secret worse than the dust or the monsters... a secret that could destroy everything Mallie loves and every dream she's clung to all her life.
REVIEW: The setup here is interesting, if a bit formulaic, and Mallie's a determined young heroine who doesn't set out to save the world, just her little family in their mountaintop cottage. If characters came across as simplified sketches, if the worldbuilding didn't withstand too close a scrutiny (how has the constant layer of sun-smothering dust not choked off all the town's agriculture and not just the decorative flowers?), and if there were a few points on which Mallie was willfully obtuse in order to stretch the story, I could roll with it... for a while, at least. But at some point those accumulated little nitpicks started weighing on my suspension of disbelief, especially toward the end of the tale as it ramps up to a climax that feels a little too trite and convenient (and has more than a whiff of faith allegory).
That's not to say there's nothing to enjoy here. Mallie is, for the most part, a solid heroine, working hard and driven to overcome any obstacle, especially when it comes to keeping her little family together. Indeed, she bristles at being told she has limits, be it because of her gender or because of the arm she wasn't born with (she has a "Popsnap" artificial arm of undetermined construction and practical usefulness; this is one of those flimsy worldbuilding points that could've used more clarification, as the tech levels are distinctly plot convenient). The fears she lives with are not just in her head, either; it's clear from early on that the "monsters" in the wood are real things that represent a real threat. Despite the drudgery of her life and the literal weight of doom and gloom over Coal Top, she holds impossible dreams close to her heart, dreams of starlight and happiness, imagining herself as "Mallie Over the Moon" instead of what the spoiled son of the valley family she works for calls her, "Mallie in the Muck". Still, it's hard to hold on to those dreams when the rich folk short her most of a week's wages for imagined shortcomings (mostly just because they're rich and can do whatever they want to poor people). Surrounding her is a cast of fairly expected supporting characters and enemies, few of whom bring any surprises to anyone who has read any similar stories. Things move fairly well, and there are some nicely described scenes and action sequences, but it becomes harder and harder to buy into the whole thing as the bad guys and problems become more and more caricature-like, in service to a building Message that dominates more and more of the plot. By the end, that Message has opened its maw and swallowed the story whole, striking the reader's skull like the hooves of a kicking horse.
This is a case where I strongly suspect younger readers will enjoy it more than I did... and even I admit that the flying horses and some of the imagery were kinda cool. I just felt like it started to disintegrate by the end, and would've benefited from a little more nuanced characterization. (Even in middle grade titles, there's usually a bit more to characters nowadays.)
You Might Also Enjoy:
Race the Sands (Sarah Beth Durst) - My Review
The Unwanteds (Lisa McMann) - My Review
Windsworn (Derek Alan Siddoway) - My Review
Natalie Lloyd
Scholastic
Fiction, MG Fantasy
***+ (Okay/Good)
DESCRIPTION: Once, the skies over Coal Top Mountain were full of stars, and the houses were full of spun starlight, luminous material used in everything from clothing to book covers and more. There were also flying horses who would carry children on their backs above the high peaks. The people were happy, then, full of songs and laughter... but not now, not in the decades since the Dust choked off the stars and spread sorrow and misery everywhere in a gritty, toxic soot. Even to sing is discouraged, lest inhaled Dust plunge one into deep despair or worse. As for the flying horses, they vanished with the stars, leaving the forests full of monsters.
Mallie Ramble's father, like all the men of Coal Top, used to work in the mines seeking gold, the town's only livelihood without starlight to spin. But the deep, dark places of the mountains are as tainted as the skies above. First it steals the color from the eyes, leaving them inky black. Then it steals voices. When an accident left Papa blind, he was blamed and not even paid when they sent him away. To keep her little brother Denver from the same fate, Mallie works as a maid in the rich houses down in the valley, backbreaking work made harder by her only having one arm. Still, she'd do anything to spare her brother and keep her mother from one more worry... only the valley folk look for any ways they can to cheat those from the hilltop, and the few Feather-coins Mallie earns for her labors aren't nearly enough to keep the family fed, let alone pay the massive debt the Guardians insist the Rambles owe. She needs a miracle - and she thinks she finds one, when she spots the flyers around town asking for children willing to risk great danger for a great reward.
The town leader has learned that some winged horses are still lurking in the woods... and, with them, a brave enough rider might reach the mountains beyond Coal Top, each peak glimmering with layers of gold dust. It's a dangerous proposition, especially as nobody has ridden a flying horse in a generation, but there's hardly a mountain child in Coal Top who doesn't need that money like they need air or water - and even children from the valley are tempted by the rewards. Mallie doesn't care what the dangers are; she'll do whatever it takes. But there's another danger lurking around Coal Top, a secret worse than the dust or the monsters... a secret that could destroy everything Mallie loves and every dream she's clung to all her life.
REVIEW: The setup here is interesting, if a bit formulaic, and Mallie's a determined young heroine who doesn't set out to save the world, just her little family in their mountaintop cottage. If characters came across as simplified sketches, if the worldbuilding didn't withstand too close a scrutiny (how has the constant layer of sun-smothering dust not choked off all the town's agriculture and not just the decorative flowers?), and if there were a few points on which Mallie was willfully obtuse in order to stretch the story, I could roll with it... for a while, at least. But at some point those accumulated little nitpicks started weighing on my suspension of disbelief, especially toward the end of the tale as it ramps up to a climax that feels a little too trite and convenient (and has more than a whiff of faith allegory).
That's not to say there's nothing to enjoy here. Mallie is, for the most part, a solid heroine, working hard and driven to overcome any obstacle, especially when it comes to keeping her little family together. Indeed, she bristles at being told she has limits, be it because of her gender or because of the arm she wasn't born with (she has a "Popsnap" artificial arm of undetermined construction and practical usefulness; this is one of those flimsy worldbuilding points that could've used more clarification, as the tech levels are distinctly plot convenient). The fears she lives with are not just in her head, either; it's clear from early on that the "monsters" in the wood are real things that represent a real threat. Despite the drudgery of her life and the literal weight of doom and gloom over Coal Top, she holds impossible dreams close to her heart, dreams of starlight and happiness, imagining herself as "Mallie Over the Moon" instead of what the spoiled son of the valley family she works for calls her, "Mallie in the Muck". Still, it's hard to hold on to those dreams when the rich folk short her most of a week's wages for imagined shortcomings (mostly just because they're rich and can do whatever they want to poor people). Surrounding her is a cast of fairly expected supporting characters and enemies, few of whom bring any surprises to anyone who has read any similar stories. Things move fairly well, and there are some nicely described scenes and action sequences, but it becomes harder and harder to buy into the whole thing as the bad guys and problems become more and more caricature-like, in service to a building Message that dominates more and more of the plot. By the end, that Message has opened its maw and swallowed the story whole, striking the reader's skull like the hooves of a kicking horse.
This is a case where I strongly suspect younger readers will enjoy it more than I did... and even I admit that the flying horses and some of the imagery were kinda cool. I just felt like it started to disintegrate by the end, and would've benefited from a little more nuanced characterization. (Even in middle grade titles, there's usually a bit more to characters nowadays.)
You Might Also Enjoy:
Race the Sands (Sarah Beth Durst) - My Review
The Unwanteds (Lisa McMann) - My Review
Windsworn (Derek Alan Siddoway) - My Review
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