30
Oct
ISBN: 9780060506650
I received this book free through the LibraryThing Early Readers Program.
Manny Rupert, an addict, a cop kicked off the force, an the ex-husband of a murderer, is back for round two. This time he’s been hired to go undercover in San Quentin and determine whether a sick old man in for vehicular manslaughter is really who he claims to be—the infamous Nazi Doctor of Death, Joseph Mengele.
That’s where Pain Killers starts, but where it goes is on an insane, gritty, noir venture through the darkest parts of society. Pain Killers is a humorous black romp if by humorous you mean “Oh my God they went there” and by romp you mean going by limo from prison snail back love shack to Christian porn sets to meth houses and mansions and back again. This novel is, to steal a line, truly, truly outrageous.
Stahl’s humor is not for everyone, possibly not for anyone that possesses an iota of sensitivity about religion, psychology, the human condition, addiction, sex, or just about any subject. But there’s a sort of victorious feel to seeing character so truly messed up still intelligent and stubborn and taking on the face of human evil. There’s more talking than action, so the pace is not forceful or fast. At times the conversations while interesting and amusing come off as off topic, when the point is to solve a mystery. And the WTF factor is, at times, very high. But it’s a wild ride, different from everything else out there which certainly has an audience in today’s marketplace.
27
Oct
ISBN: 9780441017812
I bought this book.
Doubleblind, the third book in Aguirre’s SF-romance series, isn’t going to be my favorite book in the series. In this volume jumper (a special kind of person who can navigate the subspace area that makes deep space travel possible), ex-criminal and formerly broken Sirantha Jax lands on the infamously closed planet Ithiss-Tor, home of bounty hunter-turned-friend, Vel, on a mission to forge an alliance between humans and Ithtorians to save both from the savage cannibal Morgut who are raiding space ports and far planets, leaving occupants dead. With her mother (head of the criminal Syndicate) trying to make sure she fails, and lives depending on Jax’s success, not to mention the Ithtorian repulsion of humans, disaster is not just possible, it’s imminent.
First the good, Aguirre maintains a full cast of characters, each with unique strengths and weaknesses and stories. Jax’s struggle to shuck her selfish, party-girl past comes to odds with the responsibilities and expectations others unfairly put on her creating a tense, conflicted inner dialog as the story moves on. Jax’s personal quest to rebuild the mind of March, once her lover, a psi forced to cut himself off from his emotions to mentally survive a war thrust on him by manipulations of his personal honor, is especially heart breaking.
Aguirre spins a fascinating world in Ithiss-Tor, home world of a bug species that, true to type, communicate as much with body language and scent as with verbalized language. This is truly a reason to pick up this book, as the imagery is complex and solid, not to mention the Ithtorian characters are full developed despite being such a inhuman race.
Aguirre’s rich and descriptive world and characters are as solid as ever in Doubleblind, so already established fans will definitely want to continue with their story.
And, finally the bad. Aguirre, with Doubleblind clearly comes down on the side of romance rather than maintaining a fine split between romance and science fiction as in the previous novels. A large amount of the drama and tension has to do with the personal relationships between the characters. In the end I was left with a feeling that conflicts were tied up too neatly, with very little actually conflict, just emotional strain.
March’s method of recovery is truly interesting, but easier than I expected. Add to that only one true fight scene in the whole book, which Jax largely avoids, and a climax with wired in tension, but no conflict after all is said and done and I was left with a bit of a dissatisfied feeling with this addition to the Jax world.
I badly wanted to see Jax throwing down in some sort of ritual combat to prove her worth to the Ithtorians and earn at least some respect from them instead of primarily suffering emotionally and playing politics. She is such a contrary, stubborn and steel-souled character that all the politics, as Jax herself worries about in the book, neuters her too much for my tastes.
I hope Aguirre finds a place between emotionality and action for the next book. Coupled with the vivid details, fine characterization and inspired writing it makes for excellent writing, which is what I’ve come to expect from this series.
22
Oct
Hosts by Dylan J. Morgan
ISBN: 1934069
One snowy night Lauren Kemper, the only doctor in a small ski town, is called out to a building leased by a team of scientists doing research in the frozen hills. What she finds there is one of the scientists, sick, collapsed with her stomach bulging and squirming as if she was pregnant. But not ten minutes ago Marianne was in good health, with a stomach as flat as a board. It’s what Lauren finds inside, what Marianne’s corpse gives birth to in Lauren’s clinic and what escapes to terrorize a small ski town, that sets off this horror story.
Hosts reminds me a lot of Dean Koontz’s Phantoms, boiled down to all the action. It lands more on the mainstream side of horror, that with wide reader appeal, than with the more esoteric books available. The characters are developed enough, but remain typical, ordinary people. The danger is threatening enough to maintain suspense without losing readers with fuzzy logic, or horrendously bad science. It’s also not a completely insurmountable danger, so as not to drown readers in hopelessness and fear.
Hosts is a solid, if not short, and enjoyable read that’s probably best for readers who enjoy books by King and Koontz rather than Edward Lee. It’s a great time killer with few overt problems. A stronger touch from an editor could have helped some to strengthen the story itself, but rather than making a dismal book good it would have only made a good book better.
19
Oct
Murky Depths 7
ISBN: 9781906584115
Murky Depths stands out among the offerings of the small press, largely because it contains graphic strips and illustrations, as well as the mix of dark genre work that I find simply tantalizing.
Issue 7 features a large number of dark science fiction tales, each one excellent examples of the genre.
“Scratch” by Jason Palmer is half mystery and half psychological science fiction where people wear their obsessions and addictions on their arms, or legs, or tongues, and the battle to resist self destructive tendencies overshadows the battles of good and survival and everything else.
The first graphic offering, “A Brief History of Dogfighting” by James Johnson is a silent film, of sorts, with a deeply ironic tone and a fast pace. Following it and backing up the silent film feel, is a behind the scenes feature which chronicles the evolution of the storyline and the story as a piece of art.
“The Longest Road in the Universe” by CS MacCath is an incredibly emotion piece, easily the kind one might find in a larger publication, following a member of a species bred and genetically manipulated to love and serve a “higher species”. But when their parental figures who used and abused them vanish a whole race has to face their own abuse, with varying, and in this story almost lovingly detailed, results. This is definitely one not to miss.
The immediate follow up, “A Healthy Outlook” by Bill Ward, is a short, tight piece that shows the same sort of mental turmoil, from the point of view someone so die-hard-determined not to be a victim that the farce reaches a morbidly funny point.
“Viewer’s Choice” by Willie Meikle keeps to the themes of obsession while softening the science fiction focus. Here the lead can’t break away from his television, to the point that all the major memories in his life have a direct link to a television event. A situational story, it nonetheless clearly comments on our favorite societal past time.
“Bite the Bullet” also by James Johnson, is a fantastic romp through the limits of future technology, exploring how technology affects us, for good or ill.
“Psong” by Ian Rogers has less focus. A story about a futuristic assassin, the reader is loaded down with personality and detail without much context. Of course since the lead is a telepath and an object reader this adds more strength to the point of view of the assassin, but readers still have a very limited view of why this story is taking place at all.
“Survivalist” by Kevin Brown is one of the best vampire stories I’ve read lately, bringing the old Gothic critter into the modern world without turning it into a sex idol.
“Bait” by Paul Milliken follows the vampire story with its natural counterpart, a shape shifter story. This one follows the more traditional formula of an ordinary person whose life intersects with a monster. But this monster comes from the sea and remains more of a mystery than readers might like.
Luke Cooper’s “Flashback” adds another tale to the collection surrounding his gritty detective neck deep in the war between Heaven and Hell. In this addition to a potentially interesting plot, readers learn how Goulding got sucked into the Big War in the first place, but his role in it still remains a mystery.
Finally comes “Haruspex” by William Douglas Goodman, a second place finisher to the earlier “The Long Road Home” which brings the issue back around to tales of twisted mentality. In this story a boy finds that he’s gained the ability to get visions from dead animals, which has interesting results when your father is a trophy hunter.
All together here’s another fine issue that shows the people behind Murky Depths have their head on straight. I look forward to more.
16
Oct
ISBN: 9780061625121
From the back cover of Amberville one might expect a cross between Sesame Street and The Sopranos. Eric Bear, years after leaving behind a life of drugs and a job as a runner for a mafia king, opens his apartment door to find his former boss, the mafia head Nicholas Dove visiting with a request—take Dove’s name off the infamous Death List (literally a list of those slated to disappear from the world) or he will have his gorillas tear apart Eric’s beloved wife, Emma Rabbit.
This kicks off the reforming of Eric’s small gang, Tom-Tom Crow, Sam Gazelle and Snake Marek, who have all moved on from their criminal pasts in their own ways, and a desperate hunt for the society’s biggest secret, the Death List and its writer.
But after finishing Amberville readers will find it to be a very peculiar book. Somewhere between a mafia mystery and a higher-brow literary work addressing the nature of good and evil in the world, Amberville balances a deep mystery and action with deep, soulful contemplations (by mad men, or mad bears as the case may be). In fact the literary, contemplative sections which can, at times come off as lagging bits in the pacing of the plot, genuinely serve to distract and set up the reader, a sign of some truly clever writing.
Yes, the characters really are stuffed animals, living in a world where many things are very clearly defined for them (such as the good areas of town literally being painted different colors from the bad ones). And that analogy doesn’t go very far, in that the type of animal a character is doesn’t necessarily define who they are. And there aren’t really any musing on the nature of man versus beast. But each animal is a full, fleshy—or stuffed—whole with a parallel personality type in our world.
Amberville is the kind of book you wouldn’t think about reading, or you’d expect to not like, only to discover it has a lot more to offer than can be explained on the book jacket. It absolutely keeps you guessing, up to the last sentence, and asks questions but never presumes to offer answers, making it a very good read indeed.
Reviewed for MonsterLibrarian.com
While Shadow of the Dark Angel has similarities to Thomas Harris’ Hannibal Lector books it has differences as well. In this book, Katy Green and John Cato are a team of detectives hunting a sexual serial killer. However, unlike Harris’ books, Shadow of the Dark Angel is neither a mystery book nor a police procedural. Instead, O’Neill has filled his book with minute details that lead to explicitly fleshed out characters, at the expense of the storytelling. At best, it’s an extensive profile of the detectives and the killer but what it possesses in detail it completely lacks in tension and plot momentum.
O’Neill’s style of presenting characters and events without genuinely storytelling works in a short form, but keeps readers at an arm’s length in this novel. In the end the minutiae of the characters’ daily lives and psychological health take precedent over the story, leaving out the police work and much of the actual solving of the crime. It’s also frustrating that the author dedicates a lot of time to describing a book Katy Green is writing that is a blatant reference to another of O’Neill’s books, and the reader may feel cheated that the author is using the book to advertise his other works, while sometimes ignoring the plot of this one.
Although Shadow of a Dark Angel is not without its merits, it is a disappointing read. Available only as a pricey limited edition, Shadow of the Dark Angel is best left to O’Neill fans and collectors.
Contains: Explicit language, violent situations, sexual situations
Apex Magazine, August 2009
The August issue of Apex Magazine starts with “Kenny 149” by Brad Becraft, a fairly quick, definitely science fiction tale of war and humanity. It’s a solid Apex tale, of a soldier battling against an overwhelming number of alien invaders without straying into heavier territory.
“Pimp My Airship” by Maurice Broaddus decides to tackle all black-American issues at once by taking them to, not quite an extreme, but an advanced state (we hope). In Broaddus’s story the whole of America is enslaved by an alien race and blacks have been forced underground, literally, and are encouraged and able to dope themselves into passivity. In this world Knowledge Allah tries, with much scorn and difficulty, to get Sleepy, the lead character, to step up and stand up for himself, his race and the world. The language used to tell this potentially coarse and inflaming tale, is high brow and heavier than needed, which serves to make a point about Sleepy, the Every-black-man of the tale.
Eugie Foster’s novelette “Sinner, Baker, Fabulist, Priest;Red Mask, Black Mask, Gentleman, Beast” rounds out the August issue. A gorgeous, dark and unexpectedly creepy story, Foster spins a world where everyone plays certain roles, enforced physically by the daily donning of masks. With this tale Foster questions not just societal roles, but those of relationships, gender and caste as well. A highly recommended read.
This issue also features essays and columns from Jason Sizemore and Monica Valetinelli, as well as an interview with Gene O’Neill.
Apex Magazine, September 2009
“Fungal Gardens” by Ekaterina Sedia is the first story in the September issue of Apex Magazine. This tale is ripped straight out of an issue of Discovery, with creepy, insect “bad guys” with a very real origin. This tale is really a scientific mystery story, but makes for an interesting SF tale nonetheless.
“Advertising at the End of the World” by Keffy R.M. Kehrli is a metaphorical zombie tale, featuring a woman who might be the last survivor the human race living in a secluded cabin in the woods until a flock of mindless, shuffling creatures show up and mess things up. Only these critters aren’t the traditional undead. They are machines created by companies, technologically advanced door-to-door salesmen, more annoying and sad than fearsome. Kehrli’s story is subtle, creepy and sad, and a great read.
Last of the fiction features is “The Girl in the Basement” by Matthew Kressel, a tale that amps up the creepiness in the previous tale, and poses more questions than answers as it tells a story of the kind of marks abuse leaves on a child’s soul.
All together the September issue is stellar. Also included is an interview with Elizabeth Engstrom and essays by Monica Valentinelli and Jeff VanderMeer.
5
Oct
Thanks to this I will now be informing readers where I received the books I review. (Because an $11k fine per instance is not something I can afford.) I have not done this previously because I haven’t wanted publishers and authors who donate books to me to be harassed by the less than professional people out there who are looking for free books.
You’ll find this information in the categories section, meaning down at the bottom (or top, depending on the theme I’m using) you’ll see tags like “Horror”, “Fantasy”, “Zombies” and “YA”. I’ll be adding to this new categories which tell where I received the book in question.