Koontz has provided us with a razor-sharp thriller involving a rogue FBI agent on the run, mind-control, twisted conspiracies, bizarre suicides, hi-tech surveillance, hidden pockets of survivors, distrust, paranoia, gun battles, and all kinds of continual non-stop action. He effectively combines elements of crime thrillers and science fiction elements and provides one helluva rocking story.
Thanks to Random House -Ballantine for providing an advance readers copy of this book. Normally I avoid popular airport newsstand authors, but I am glad to have finally discovered Koontz. This is actually book two in the series, but I found that, while reading “The Silent Corner” would have been helpful, it was not a prerequisite. What was at stake – freedom, individuality, personhood – was made quite clear.
Jane Hawk is a bold new heroine in a strange new world where no one can ever be fully trusted again. Do you want to play Manchurian?
A Boy and his Dog at the End of the World
Fletcher’s “A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World” shares a title with Harlan Ellison’s classic “A Boy and His Dog.” This resemblance at first dissuaded me from giving Fletcher’s book a try. Both stories concern a post-apocalyptic world and a young kid on his own trying his best to survive. But, nowadays, post-apocalypse stories are a dime a dozen and most feature moaning dead people roving in herds. So, really, the question becomes what does this new novel offer about the post-apocalyptic world we haven’t already heard about, particularly when it comes to the bond between a Boy and His Dog.
For one thing, decades ago, the apocalypse was always the result of nuclear Armageddon such as when Taylor leaves Ape City and rides along the beach until he finds the crown of Lady Liberty poking up through the sand. We still have thousands of nuclear warheads, but they generally don’t bother anyone much anymore.
Fletcher has civilization ending because of the “Gelding,” a worldwide infertility crisis that lays waste to humanity in just a couple of generations. But, not unthinkable. In developed societies now, fertility rates are way down and there are theories about the negative effects of the use of modern pesticides in our food supply and the consequences for generations to come. The dinosaurs were wiped out pretty quickly and what gets us might just be things we least expect.
In any event, In this novel, the post-apocalypse world is sparsely inhabited. Griz (that’s the kid’s name) can wander for days and never see another soul. For the most part, that loneliness and solitariness is reflected in the mood and pacing of the novel which is often quiet and reflective as Griz wanders the empty towns and countrysides.
Furthermore, this setting of scarcity and sparseness allows reflection on what matters and what’s important.
What really makes this lengthy soliloquy work is the narration in the form of journal entries to an imaginary friend. It gives the narrative a kind of authenticity.
The Taste of Different Dimensions
Sometimes you are lucky enough to stumble on an author you’ve never read before and find a really high quality of writing. His collection is terrific. Each story is so well-crafted that you know you are in the hands of a master storyteller. These are fifteen brief flights of fantasy, strangeness, and haunting horror from ghosts to dreams to frogs to living castles to outsmarting a genie in a bottle to wandering around endless hotel corridors. But, it really doesn’t matter what the subject is, these are just good stories. Highly recommended.
The Best of Greg Egan
At 736 pages, the Best of Greg Egan is an enormous volume, but it’s well worth digging into. “”Learning to Be Me” explores what we’ve all been waiting for, a cure for dementia, a cure for the rapidly aging brain. And why not? The organic brain deteriorates every second after maturity is reached. Things are forgotten. Replace the brain with a computer chip and become a jewelhead and live forever. Where is the line between human and artificial intelligence?”
“Axiomatic” delves into the rapidly shrinking lines between human and artificial intelligence. What if instead of drinking to oblivion or taking drugs to deaden our senses and allow us to release our inhibitions, you simply went to a store and bought a program to download and let go of your inhibitions for a short period of time? How would that work out?
“”Appropriate Love” is another trip through a future of mind and body alterment. This time it’s the insurance company’s bizarre means of preserving life that makes the reader gasp.
These are but a few examples of the unique gems found here. Egan explores how technology changes us and makes us something different. Or does it? What is human and what is cyborg?
Duke of Caladan
Frank Herbert’s Dune series, particularly the original title work, is one of the seminal creative works of imagination, combining science fiction, economics, political intrigue, and mysticism. Herbert followed that up with five more books and, after his death, his son, Brian Herbert and Kevin Anderson added perhaps fifteen more books to the Dune universe. Duke of Caladan is the latest entre into this universe, being the first of a new trilogy chronicling the year or so leading up to the events of Dune when the Emperor assigned Arrakis to the Atriedes family, forcing the Harkonens out.
Duke of Caladan follows a number of threads as the Emperor, the Atriedes, and the Harkonens are all faced with rebellions. Duke Leto struggles with finding a match for his son and with what place his Bene Gesserit concubine Jessica will play. Paul is fourteen and starting to come of age. The Baron plots on Geidi Prime and on Arrakis. The Guild, the Landsraad, and CHOAM all have prominent roles. Count Fenring is keeping an eye on Arrakis for the Emperor. For those familiar with the Dune Universe, you can see the threads beginning to weave as these schemes become tangled and Arrakis becomes the center of the play. This, however, is part one of a trilogy, so there is far more to play out before the chess pieces find their familiar places.
Artemis
Artemis is not a sequel or in any way a continuation of the Martian. It is a fully self-contained story.
Forty years ago you couldn’t catch most people reading a science fiction story. It’s a genre that has really gone mainstream and has a wide appeal.
Having read lots of classic science fiction, this story really brings me back to Asimov and his Caves of Steel with an otherworldly crime story, to Herbert’s Dune with his giant spice harvesters and the Fremen sabotaging them in the battle against the Harkonnens, and to Edgar Rice Burroughs’ Princess of Mars and Carter’s desperate efforts to save a dying world by breaking into the atmosphere factory. This is not to say that Weir consciously copied ideas, just that I can hear the echoes and feel the shadows of earlier giants.
What I’ve always liked about this particular genre is that the author can create an entirety new society with entirely new rules and traditions and here Weir gives us a new city on the Moon with new ways of doing things brought on both by conditions on the moon and by the human need for reinventing society. Weir really excels in painting details about how things work. He’s quite technical.
But the hero -or rather heroine – of this novel is no James T Kirk. Jazz is a small statured woman who has cornered the smuggling market and kind of feels like some hip skateboarding chick on the moon. Although she has her own code of conduct, she gets involved in quite an unusual caper with devastating consequences.
The Sky Done Ripped
In the Sky Done Ripped, Lansdale offers us a tongue-planted-firmly-in-cheek tribute to H.G. Wells, E. R. Burroughs, Dr. Who, Planet of the Apes, Titanic, and Douglas Adams. The story is irreverent, absurd, but the elements move the story along. If you are familiar with Wells’ War of the Worlds, you’ll recognize the opening invasion, except here it’s an Earth civilized by apes, not humans. You’ll also recall Wells’ Time Machine, but here it’s more like Dr. Who’s TARDIS since it goes through time and different dimensions. Also, this Time Machine is huge on the inside (like the TARDIS) and inhabited by HG Wells himself and Ned, an intelligent seal, who gets around on an electric sled, writes on a chalkboard, and is obsessed with fish. And, when they get to Burroughs’ Pellucidar, they meet dinosaurs and Tarzan (only here he’s Tango). And, well, instead of facing off Daleks, they face off against a giant monster blob on an electric machine that runs over everything, ” She Who Must Be Obeyed and Eats Lunch Early.” It’s irreverent. It’s crazy. Don’t take it too seriously and enjoy.
It’s Not the End and Other Lies
Moore offers us a collection of 21 stories of varying lengths, styles, and themes, ranging from horror to crime fiction to science fiction. When you read his stories, you often are sort of peeling back the layers of an onion. Not everything is obvious at first. Stories start in one place and take you to different places than you expected. A hunter takes on ferocious six-legged monsters to save a pioneer town. Three teenage boys break into an old man’s house to torment him and get more than they expected. Pi is the one constant, but what happens if it’s not constant. What would the world look like if a different religion was dominant in the West, one which says a newborn can only exist if an old soul is extinguished. Odd, different, offbeat, and mind provoking stuff, indeed.
Legion
Blurring the lines between reality and imagination and between sanity and its opposite, Sanderson offers us three interlinked novellas, two of which were previously published. Stephen Leeds is a genius, but he is crawling along a tightrope perched precariously over a steep drop. In order to solve cases such as missing corpses, he calls upon his aspects or hallucinations, forty varied and extraordinary beings who no one can see but him. Although he sets chairs out for them. Offers them drinks. Hears about their awkward social lives. It’s like schizophrenia on steroids and then some. Lots of voices. Like Alia Atriedes calling on her past genetic ancestors. Sort of. But, anytime Leeds needs help he can plug into their vast knowledge like Neo plugging into computer files in Matrix. It’s an exciting concept and the raw banter between Leeds and his aspects is the best part of these stories.
FKA USA
FKA stands for “Formerly Known As.” Sort of like AKA is “also known as.” This novel presents a post-dissolution view of North America after wars, famine, etc., split the country up into different entities ranging from the corporate entities like Crunch to the Free State of Texas. It’s now in the 2070’s a divided country with borders, different currencies, etc. Crunch is a corporate run country on former Arkansas land, producing artificial chemical foods by workers living in hopeless shantytowns and plagued by drug addiction, boredom, angst. There’s still a World Wide Web of sorts, virtual reality, and androids, including mindless automatons, android whores, and androids developing consciousness and feelings. Many area of the country are desolate, depopulated, radioactive, strip-mined, fracked, and others hosting Russian and Chinese colonies. It’s sort of Mad Max country outside the corporate factory worlds. But not a dystopia since no one tried to create a utopia.
The book is irreverent, gritty, sarcastic. It pays homage to Hitchhiker’s Guide with each chapter featuring a selection from the Grifter’s Guide. A sixteen year old nobody makes his way cross country with a metal person (Sam), a Strawman whose brain has been sliced and diced (Tiny Tim), and a talking but cowardly goat ( Barnaby), paying homage to another legendary work. The book doesn’t sent always take itself too seriously and there’s gallows humor and scat humor abounding.
I enjoyed this a lot as the motley crew explored the world, although their underlying mission was a bit too goofy. I have a sense though the audience for this is more limited than expansive.
Those Crazy Books 