Reviews

GOING OFFLINE FOR THE SUMMER…

maddalena@spaceandsorcery21 Comments

Once again I find myself on the eve of the departure for a long vacation with friends, in a wonderful but isolated place where searching for an internet connection is not unlike the hunt for mythical Shangri-La 😆 so that I must put any blogging and reviewing activities on hold.

This year the enforced stop comes at a very right time, since I’ve been experiencing some “reviewing fatigue” of late: while reading remains the great pleasure that it has always been, writing reviews seems more of a chore than anything else, a clear sign that I need to take some time off if I want to find new motivation and new energy,

Hopefully, I will be able to come back in September refreshed and eager to find new titles to read and new journeys to share with you.

See you soon!

Reviews

GHOST STATION, by S.A. Barnes

maddalena@spaceandsorcery14 Comments

After my previous encounter with S. A. Barnes’ intriguing mix of SF and Horror, Dead Space, I was curious to see where this author would take her readers next, and I was not disappointed: as a fan of atmospheric horror, which for me works much better than the usual blood & gore, I quite enjoyed this new book and I look forward to Ms. Barnes’ next endeavors.

Ghost Station’s main character is Ophelia Bray, a psychologist working for Montrose Corporation, the commercial rivals of her family’s own company, Pinnacle: estranged from her family for a number of reasons we learn about along the way, Ophelia is eager to prove herself, particularly after a recent disaster with one of her patients. Life in space, or in isolated outposts, often results in ERS, or Eckart-Reiser Syndrome, an affliction that can lead to severe forms of depression and even turn the victim into a homicidal maniac: Ophelia’s task, once attached to the crew of the ship Resilience, will be to monitor her crewmates and intervene, if necessary, to prevent tragic outcomes.

Unfortunately the crew of the Resilience, tasked with the exploration of a planet abandoned by a previous Pinnacle team, want nothing to do with Ophelia and react to her presence with open hostility, particularly because she has taken the place of a deceased crew member: even when one of them starts to open up a little, Ophelia must wage an uphill battle to be accepted by the others – and what’s worse, she must also battle with many personal demons which weigh heavily on an already difficult situation. The planet where the crew landed is an inhospitable place, plagued by icy storms and harboring the remnants of an alien civilization that seems to have ended in a cataclysmic event: the eerie setting and the hastily abandoned Pinnacle station where the team makes camp act like an irritant on already frayed nerves, and soon it becomes clear that ERS might not be the worst problem they will have to face…

Besides the mystery at the root of the novel, there are many themes explored in Ghost Station: the problems of living in an artificial environment, be it a ship or a space station or a mining colony; the greed of corporations, which look more to profit than the well-being of their employees, often sending out prospecting teams with outdated or poorly-maintained equipment; the competition between space-faring teams, whose livelihood – and that of their families – is often directly proportional to the risks they take, and so forth. But it’s the inter-personal dynamics that are front and center here, and the climate of resentment and suspicion fueled by old and new ordeals, and by the weird phenomena that the crew of the Resilience faces once making landfall.

It does not help that climate that Ophelia, the main point of view, comes across as something of an unreliable narrator: there is a huge trauma in her past (we discover what it is in small increments throughout the novel) and it has informed her personality even more than she cares to admit. It might look counterintuitive that someone tasked with the psychological well-being of a space-faring crew would be so oppressed by doubts and, at some point, by the fear that she might not be in control of her actions, but in reality it does add a further layer to the claustrophobic atmosphere that pervades the station and, to a certain extent, it hides the real reason for the strange happenings that beleaguer the crew and make the reader wonder if there will be an actual ERS outbreak and what its consequences will be.

The story’s pacing is somewhat slow and it takes its own sweet time before reaching its climax, but on the other hand it serves well in establishing the various personalities and the air of suspicion and resentment that hangs over the team: the other characters, besides Ophelia, don’t enjoy her same level of detail, but enough of their quirks and mannerisms comes across and sketches a picture of each of them that is enough to distinguish them and flesh them out.

While the overall novel worked quite well for me, there are a couple of instances where it somehow failed to meet my expectations: for starters, like its predecessor, Ghost Station creates a sense of impending doom that is resolved far too quickly and neatly in comparison with the buildup of suspense; once again, this choice robbed me a little of the enjoyment I might have derived from a more organically developed resolution. And then the dual timeline in Dead Silence worked far better for me than the background presented here through Ophelia’s musings and recollections, which somehow felt more like info-dumping than anything else.

Still, the novel proved to be a satisfying read, and I know I will keep this author on my radar, waiting for her future works.

My Rating:

Reviews

A MARRIAGE OF UNDEAD INCONVENIENCE, by Stephanie Burgis

maddalena@spaceandsorcery15 Comments

I received this novella from the author, in exchange for an honest review: my thanks for this opportunity.

A new work by Stephanie Burgis is always something I greet with enthusiasm, because I know it will both entertain and delight me – and this novella met once again all my expectations.

Margaret Dunhaven is simply furious: not only has she been snatched away from her beloved academic studies, and taken on a long journey with no stops and no rest. No, she has been forced by her guardians to enter a marriage of convenience with a total stranger to avoid her aunt and uncle’s utter financial ruin, and this total stranger is a vampire to boot… But that’s not the worst detail of the whole, crazy situation: what’s absolutely, wretchedly unacceptable is that in her new husband’s house there are no means to prepare a decent cup of tea!

This… ahem… horrifying discovery is the one that sets the tone of the story, an entertaining take on the subject of convenience marriages and of the enemies-to-lovers theme that here is explored through Ms. Burgis’ trademark brand of whimsy, portraying a no-nonsense heroine who refuses to bend or break under the weight of circumstances and manages to overcome the obstacles on her path. While the course of the novella might look predictable, with the initial clash between Margaret and her new husband lord Riven slowly turning into complicity first and then love, what matters here is not so much the destination as the journey, and the latter is indeed an enjoyable one, carried by Margaret’s indomitable spirit and her hands-on approach to the matter at hand.

And the way the story ends is equally enjoyable because it takes an unexpected direction from what it might appear at first: I don’t want to share any more details here because I would do a disservice to other readers, but I was happily surprised by the resolution and by its potential (hope springs eternal here…) about possible sequels, which I would be more than happy to read (no pressure, of course… 😉 ).

A Marriage of Undead Inconvenience will be published at the beginning of August, so my recommendation would be to make some space on your TBR for this very delightful novella!

My Rating:

Reviews

A DRIFTING SUN (The Exiles Trilogy #1), by Ashley Capes

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Ashley Capes is an Australian author whose books I have reviewed before, and this time I want to share his new writing adventure: the Exiles Trilogy is a book series that saw the light as a Kickstarter program to which I was happy to participate and which saw Mr. Capes work to present the whole trilogy as a finished work instead of having his readers wait from one book to the next.

A Drifting Sun is the first volume of this saga and it serves to present its four main characters and to set the background in which they move: as such it’s a little shorter than its companions and its main aim is to showcase the playing field, so to speak, so that I believe it’s left to the other two books – The Faceless Moon and Stars Burning – the job of getting into the heart of the story.

Siblings Mei and Iggy live in a remote area with their people, the Inora: these folks possess telekinetic powers in varying degrees and seem to be able to replenish their powers by direct exposure to the sun. They have chosen to dwell in isolation from the rest of the world, which certainly plagues them with some short-sighted points of view: Iggy was born without a face, and had to deal with his own people’s distrust and superstition, enhanced by the fact that his telekinesis is quite strong and he’s given to extreme reactions when provoked. One such incident leads to his banishment from the Inora’s lands and his sister Mei, the only one who always rose to his defense, decides to follow on his tracks to keep protecting him as she’s done all her life.

On another track, Rokura – who is one of the king’s Greyshields, or warrior/assassins – is searching for the king’s bastard son who was kidnapped by rebels bent on destabilizing king Mutolo’s reign, and he’s as relentless as he is honest, but the novel’s opening shows us that Mutolo might not be a trustworthy ruler, particularly because (and this is no spoiler since it’s revealed in the very first chapter) he’s not who he purports to be, but rather a shady individual named Thorn with his own inscrutable agenda.

And lastly there is Anyo, also known as the Beggar Prince, who together with a handful of companions is looking for a precious artifact that will enable him to reclaim his heritage, and he’s not beyond using gifted people, like Mei, to further his goal.

A Drifting Sun does a good job in showcasing these four main characters and their backstories – even though Anyo is not given as much narrative space as the other three – and it’s clear that they are fated to cross their paths: here readers are made privy to Iggy’s encounter with Rokura and the meeting of Mei and Anyo, but I’m sure that their journeys will soon bring them together and uncover the deeper mysteries that this story still holds.

Like other novels I’ve read from Ashley Capes, this fantasy setting is a blend of natural landscapes and intriguing magic, and there are several tantalizing mentions of a past where momentous events occurred: I would have liked to learn more about them because they hint at a more complex background, and I hope that more will be revealed in the next two books as the story gains more depth. As I said above, this first book looks more like an introduction to more complex events and what promises to be a multi-layered quest.

My only problem with this saga is that I would have liked a map of the world to be able to better follow the characters’ journeys: the places mentioned and the characters’ movements can be often confusing and I had some trouble in envisioning the… lay of the land, so to speak, which deprived me of some of the enjoyment in the story. But hope springs eternal and maybe that map is forthcoming… 😉

My Rating:

Reviews

THE TAINTED CUP (Shadow of the Leviathan #1), by Robert Jackson Bennett

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So far, my only experience with the works of Robert Jackson Bennet comes from Foundryside, a novel I enjoyed and a world I intend to return to, as soon as my messy TBR will allow it, but I have to say that with The Tainted Cup this author was able to fire my imagination even more, so I don’t regret having temporarily forgotten his previous series to launch myself into his newest endeavor.

The novel opens with a most horrific sight: a high-ranking officer is found dead in the mansion of a prominent family, killed by a tree that apparently grew out of his body. The investigator tasked with the case, eccentric Ana Dolabra, sends her assistant Dinios Kol to the mansion for a first inspection of the site: Din is an engraver, an individual altered to possess eidetic memory, and as he and Ana proceed with their investigation, they encounter evidence that this murder might only be the proverbial tip of a larger iceberg, one that might carry a great danger for the empire.

The story itself is much more convoluted and layered than it might look from my short synopsis, but it deserves to be approached knowing as little as possible, to be able to appreciate all its intriguing hints and misdirections. Besides, what makes this novel so fascinating lies more in the imaginative world-building and – of course – in the characters. This is a world where plants are everywhere: they are used as construction materials and they are also employed, together with other natural “ingredients”, in the physical alterations that gift people with special abilities, like increased strength or – as is the case for Din and other engravers – eidetic memory. But they can also produce infestations, a kind of danger that always lurks in the background and keeps people on edge about the possibility of contamination: the anomalous tree growth that led to the initial victim’s demise is indeed one of these contaminations that people are afraid of. And that’s not the only trouble afflicting this world, one in which civilization is threatened by incursions from gigantic sea creatures, called leviathans, against which three concentric rings of walls have been erected, with the ruling power – and the high aristocracy – residing in the innermost one. Leviathans always attack in the world’s wet season, and as the story starts it’s that time of the year, so that the monstrous creatures’ inland forays add another layer of trouble to an already troublesome situation.

Ana and Din are an apparently mismatched but very effective investigative team: she is a bizarre individual, to say the least, one graced with a brilliant mind and impressive deductive powers, but also with a quirky disposition and the habit of going about blindfolded so as not to be overwhelmed by sensory input. To call her “eccentric” would be a huge understatement, but little by little we discover that the surface eccentricity hides a very sharp mind and the ability to draw unexpected conclusions from the collected evidence: she might come across as both harsh and mercurial, and at times she reminded me of the character of Avasarala in The Expanse, but as the story progresses we understand that there are untapped depths to her and also a great capacity for empathy.

Din changes quite a bit in the course of the story: at first he looks somewhat uptight and stiff, but as we get to know him we understand where he comes from and what the source of his constant anxiousness is – besides his humble origins, Din is plagued by what amounts to dyslexia, a problem that affects his work as an engraver and one he has found some runarounds to, but still worries about being discovered. I have to say that his struggles managed to make me root for him quite soon, and to admire his efforts in compensating for this problem.

If Bennett throws his readers into the story with little or no previous information, he manages to bring them up to speed with his world through the investigation itself, entwining the world-building with the accumulation of clues that Ana and Din pursue through a compelling escalation that never forgets its character development while carrying the plot forward: there is a great deal that I would like to learn about this world, its rich background and history, and I more than look forward to learning more with the next books in the series. This first installment proved to be a very powerful “hook” for an equally strong story I can’t wait to see where it will lead me…

My Rating:

Reviews

THE WONDER ENGINE (Clocktaur War #2), by T. Kingfisher

maddalena@spaceandsorcery28 Comments

This second book in the Clocktaur War duology begins where the first one ended, with the four protagonists arriving in Anuket City and starting their undercover work to sabotage the dangerous clocktaurs. Learned Edmund enrolls the help of a master artificer, Ashes Magnus (discovering to his enormous surprise that she’s a woman, and therefore further eroding his misconceptions about the other sex), while Slate, Brenner and Caliban must infiltrate the city’s seedier quarters in search of information while Grimehug, the gnole they encountered along the way and who attached himself to Slate, is revealed as a very helpful co-conspirator.

As for Slate, the dangers inherent in returning to Anuket City, which she left to escape the retaliation of crime lord Horsehand, manifest quite suddenly and with potentially deadly consequences, while the foursome’s investigation on the origin of the clocktaurs leads to a terrible discovery and a dangerous infiltration mission from which not all of them will return…

Much as I enjoyed the first part of this duology, I have to admit that this second installment, while still reasonably engaging, did not work as well: for starters, the growing attraction between Slate and Caliban did not feel quite integral to the story, and it pushed the true reason for the quartet’s mission somewhat in the background. It was not because of my aversion to romance, because usually T. Kingfisher manages this element quite well in balancing it with a good dose of humor, but rather because there were no sufficient elements in the relationship to make it believable: there is no doubt about the mutual physical attraction, but their personalities are often in conflict, with no apparent possibility of common ground on which to establish a love story – this is quite different from other relationships portrayed in Kingfisher’s later books, and a bit disappointing. On top of that, the rivalry between Caliban and Brenner over Slate’s affections moves from the first book’s amusingly barbed banter into what looks like hormone-fueled clashes, sliding into the trope of the love triangle and robbing this side of the story of its entertainment value.

Luckily for me, I could focus on the very intriguing aspect of gnole culture: thanks to Grimehug we are made privy to the rich and layered gnole society and the way these creatures, alternately despised, feared and ignored, have carved their niche into human society. Grimehug himself is a delightful character, particularly when he shares his (not very flattering) views on humanity’s behavior, and I liked the way he attached himself to Slate: the bond of friendship between them was indeed one of the higher points in the story, as was Learned Edmund dedication in compiling a treatise on gnoles so that they could be better understood – and appreciated.

When not mooning over Slate, Caliban offers another interesting peek into the paladin mentality, particularly where the connection to one’s god is concerned: there is a fascinating dichotomy here, because on one side we are told about this connection to the divine and the constant battle with demon possession, on the other a paladin’s role seems mostly mundane – at least according to Caliban whose activities largely consisted in the exorcism of possessed animals. And yet, Caliban feels the absence of his god most keenly, and at one point seems almost tempted to accept the offer of another god to fill that void – which made me wonder if his attachment to Slate was not an attempt to do exactly that, rather than a genuine feeling…

Story-wise, The Wonder Engine sees the culmination of the four characters’ mission and the discovery of what originated the creation of the clocktaurs, and does so with a good deal of suspense laced with humor that kept me turning the pages at a fast pace: the steampunk element introduced with the clocktaurs is a nice touch in this fantasy setting and also adds a few gory details that heightened the tension. I must add that there is a surprise development concerning one of the main characters which I suspected must be there since the first book, but still managed to appear surprising thanks to its unexpected placement in the story: without spoiling the surprise, I have to say that Slate’s reaction to this revelation and its consequences played very well and served to depict her personality even more accurately.

When all is said and done, I enjoyed the conclusion of the duology even though it did not feel on the same level as other works by T. Kingfisher: still, the entertainment value of her stories remains high and I’m not going to let this slightly disappointing encounter distract me from reading her other novels.

My Rating:

Reviews

THE CLOCKWORK BOYS (Clocktaur War #1), by T. Kingfisher

maddalena@spaceandsorcery38 Comments

Moving backwards through the works of an author whose latest books I greatly enjoyed can sometimes be a disappointing journey, because I might not encounter the same level of storytelling of the later books, but this is definitely NOT the case with T. Kingfisher’s earlier novels, and I’m glad to report that I had a wonderful time with her Clocktaur War duology, which compelled me to read both books back to back, something I don’t usually do.

The Clockwork Boys starts with your typical quest undertaken by a group of people of disparate origin, but soon deviates from the usual narrative norm because both the quest and the characters are not what one would expect: Anuket City is waging war against its neighbors and does so not with conventional troops but through an unstoppable army of centaur-like mechanical constructs which lay waste to everything they find on their path, so that the ruler of the nearest realm recruits three convicted criminals for what amounts to a suicide mission to Anuket City – their goal is to learn where and how the clocktaurs are built and to obliterate the impending menace, even at the cost of their lives.

The unlikely trio is composed by Slate, a master forger and the only woman of the band; Brenner, an assassin-for-hire, and Caliban, a disgraced paladin who became a mass murderer when the demon he was exorcising took possession of him. To ensure that the three complete their mission, they are marked with a special kind of tattoo which will literally devour them if they deviate from their assignment. The fourth member of the group is no criminal, but a volunteer – Learned Edmund, a nineteen-year old scholar from a very misogynistic religious order who fears that prolonged contact with Slate will shrivel his private parts and liquefy his bowels. The four mismatched companions’ journey to Anuket City takes them through expected dangers and unexpected surprise encounters, while the personal dynamics between them shift and change, slowly but surely turning them into the cohesive group needed to unravel the clocktaurs’ mystery – and possibly to survive another day…

As is the case with all the Kingfisher novels I read so far, the characters are the unquestionable pillars of the story, particularly Slate and Caliban whose POVs take the readers through the risky journey, one where the perils of the roads go hand in hand with various discomforts, like Slate’s and Brenner’s unfamiliarity with horse riding, which offers the opportunity for some very amusing scenes. Their different personalities often clash, which doesn’t bode well for the success of the mission but on the other hand enables the author to develop her characters well through a few deft touches. At the start of the adventure, each of them is wrapped up in their own self-centered troubles: Slate feels like a dead woman walking, having fatalistically accepted that her demise might come either because of the mission or because of the past unfinished business awaiting for her in Anuket City; Caliban struggles under the weight of guilt for his actions and the loss of his god’s presence, while the remnants of the demon that possessed him still occasionally stir in the back of his mind; Learned Edmund teeters between lore-gathering and his fear of Slate’s proximity. As for Brenner… well, he’s something of a dangerously inscrutable presence and there’s always a not-so-faint air of menace hanging over him.

I warmed quite quickly toward Slate: her competence as a forger and her self-reliance go hand in hand with a fatalistic attitude that made her stand out immediately – that is, when she was not explosively sneezing from one of her many allergies. I knew from the start that her aversion to Caliban’s chivalrous attempts at protection (he’s still a paladin, after all) would put these two into an antagonistic relationship destined to transform into something quite different along the way: the slow-burn of it was handled with the usual dose of humorous incidents and misunderstandings that I’ve come to appreciate in T. Kingfisher’s romances, and in this particular case she also introduced the potentiality of a triangle thanks to Brenner and Slate’s past affiliation and the former’s constant, sneaky innuendo delivered with rapier-like subtlety.

Caliban is another intriguing character: he’s been cut off from the only life he knew after being subjected to the horrific control of a demon that compelled him to kill a number of people, and he’s looking, if not for redemption, for a way to atone for those actions. There are many layers to Caliban, and this first book in the duology only starts to peel a few of them off, but the best will be revealed only later on; what I found fascinating here, having encountered other paladins in the author’s subsequent novels, is the deconstruction of one of them as he’s presented after everything that made him a holy warrior has been stripped away from him.

Brenner remains quite enigmatic throughout this first book, and he reveals fairly little of himself, which sounds appropriate given his “profession” and the need to be invisible to be effective in his chosen line of work, while Learned Edmund is given more narrative space, particularly in his oh-so-difficult dealings with Slate as she never misses an opportunity to send barbed comments his way.

This was probably the most entertaining Kingfisher novel I read so far, peppered as it was with many giggle-worthy sentences: luckily for me, I read it only while at home, otherwise I might have risked looking like a crazy person when I burst out laughing in some of those instances. The only negative element I can think of is the abrupt conclusion of the book as the foursome reaches Anuket City, and I imagine how that would have annoyed me if I had encountered The Clockwork Boys at the time of its publication, but being able to move immediately to the second volume I did not have to suffer needlessly….

My Rating:

Reviews

LONG LIVE EVIL, by Sarah Rees Brennan – DNF@25%

maddalena@spaceandsorcery23 Comments

I received this novel from Orbit Books through NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review: my thanks to both of them for this opportunity.

Deciding to DNF a review book is never an easy choice for me, since I always feel an obligation to fully read the ARCs that publishers make available to the blogging community, but in this case the struggle to keep going proved to be too hard: Long Live Evil is not a bad book in itself, but it turned out to be the wrong fit for my tastes, and to be something different from its premise and promise.

Rae is a young woman dying of cancer: while she lays in her hospital bed, her younger sister Alice keeps her company by reading aloud from her favorite fantasy series, Time of Iron, a saga over which the two of them bonded despite the differences in age and reading tastes: where Alice prefers the positive characters, Rae always had a penchant for the series’ villains and the sisters often debate the various merits of the two sides of the story. One night, a strange woman materializes at Rae’s bedside with a strange proposal: to cross over to the fictional realm of Time of Iron and collect a special flower that will cure her. Once she crosses into the fictional world, Rae discovers she’s impersonating Rahela, the arch-villainess of the saga, and she proceeds to collect allies and minions to avoid her impending execution and to fulfill the task that will ensure her survival.

As a premise this sounded very intriguing, with the promise of poking some fun both at the general themes of fantasy literature and at the tropes typical of YA sagas burdened by purple prose. Unfortunately the execution, at least from my point of view, fell quite short of its mark: for starters, there is a huge amount of info-dumping due to the necessity of acquainting the readers with the overall story of Time of Iron, and with the individual stories of the various characters – this of course considerably slows down the narrative, and since it happens very often, it soon breeds annoyance and impatience for the plot to move forward. Which does not happen, at least as far as I managed to read…

Also, it does not help that what promised to be a tongue-in-cheek humorous delivery does not feel like it: in my opinion the book tries far too hard, and in so doing defeats its own purpose. An example? Every single character, besides their own name, sports a moniker – and for the most part they sound either goofy or absurd – so that the plethora of characters is further saddled by these nicknames that always, always accompany their mention. After a while what little amusement I could derive from that swiftly evaporated.

As I stated, this is clearly not the right kind of story for me, and despite my negative outlook I’m comforted by the fact that the overall reception for this book is positive, so that I feel a little less guilty in expressing my unpopular opinion….

My Rating:

Reviews

NIGHT OF THE MANNEQUINS, by Stephen Graham Jones

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Oh my goodness! What did I just read? Certainly not what this novella promised (pretended?) to be, i.e. a horror story about murderous mannequins: most of the blurbs I read online spoke of “a teen prank going wrong and leading to mayhem”, but things turned out to be very different. The title itself is misleading since, for starters, there is just one mannequin involved, and then that solitary mannequin’s rampage never really happens – not outside of the unreliable narrator’s twisted imagination, that is.

When reviewing the books I read I always try to keep story details or spoilers to a minimum, but in this case I need to make an exception because otherwise I could not detail the reasons why this novella did not work for me – and anyway the author himself spoils everything in the very first sentence when Sawyer, the narrator, shares the fact that “now most of us are dead, and I’m really starting to feel kind of guilty about it all”.

Sawyer and his friends – Tim, JR, Shanna and Danielle – have known each other since kindergarten or thereabouts, quite inseparable and prone to more or less successful practical jokes. Many of those involve a male mannequin – named Manny in an underwhelming show of inventiveness – that they dressed in their parents’ discarded clothes and displayed in various poses all around their neighborhood. When they decide to use Manny for a last prank in the movie theater where Shanna works part-time, posing him as a moviegoer to scare the theater’s assistant manager, something does not work as planned and what’s more, Manny seems to have disappeared as if he walked out on his own power.

Sawyer’s terrified consideration that Manny might have acquired independence, together with that newfound mobility, takes on further strength when a few days later a freak accident kills Shanna and her family: he’s now convinced that Manny is out for vengeance and will target them all, together with their loved ones. Moreover, Sawyer is certain – given the recent theft of fertilizer pellets all over town – that Manny has grown all out of proportion and that he must be able to stomp them like insects, so he decides to kill all his surviving friends himself, to spare the life of their families.

To call his reasoning – and therefore the development of this story – preposterous feels to me like the understatement of the year: should I consider Sawyer’s actions the workings of a deranged mind that pieces unrelated happenings into an insane puzzle? In that case the story lacks any connection to mental troubles, because there is no prior indication of them, even taking into account the unreliability of the narrator himself. Or is Sawyer’s killing spree something he always had in mind, so he used the excuse of Rampaging Manny to justify his actions? Again, there is no indication of that: one moment he sounds like your typical teenager, then he turns into a serial killer hiding behind the twisted logic of saving a greater number of lives by taking those of his friends.

The absurdity of the story goes hand in hand with a tone that probably wants to be humorous, but fails to achieve this goal for me, just as it fails to create any suspense because it’s clear from the start that there will be no murderous mannequin roaming the streets, since it’s all a product of Sawyer’s mind…

This story did not scare, did not amuse and in the end only managed to annoy me – its only redeeming quality being that it was mercifully short.

My Rating:

Reviews

THESE BURNING STARS (The Kindom Trilogy #1), by Bethany Jacobs

maddalena@spaceandsorcery22 Comments

Book blurbs that compare any given story to other published works can often lead a potential reader astray: that’s what happened to me when the ARC for These Burning Stars became available, because it was often compared to Ann Leckie’s Radch saga, and since unfortunately those works never seemed to meet my tastes, I decided not to request Ms. Jacobs’ book. Luckily for me, however, some of my fellow bloggers did read the book, and their enthusiastic reviews compelled me to rethink my approach: once again I am very thankful for their recommendations, because These Burning Stars proved to be not only an excellent read, but also a debut novel that feels like the work of a very accomplished veteran.

This novel is a perfectly balanced mix of intriguing world-building and fascinating characterization, and even though it throws the reader into the middle of things with very little explanation, soon enough this story of a years-long cat-and-mouse chase sweeps you up in its powerful current and never lets you go until the very end.

The Kindom is a civilization composed by a number of planets ruled by what looks, for all intents and purposes, like a theocracy controlled by three powers: clerics, secretaries and cloaksaan – in other words, the spiritual guides, the administrators and the enforcers. It’s a harsh universe, one where the people who wield power can oppress those who don’t, and often do it with unmitigated brutality. Enter Esek Nightfoot, member of one of the most influential families in the Kindom, and a powerful cleric: she is brilliant, capriciously cruel, and relentless and when we meet her she’s visiting one of the kinschools where the future generations are taught. Academy children are assigned no gender and no name, and Esek’s attention is caught by the child named Six, a very promising pupil whose family is linked to an infamous character, so she decides to ruin Six’s future prospects while challenging it to do something extraordinary that will wow her. Six leaves the kinschool shortly thereafter and over the years poses a constant, elusive threat to Esek and to her family’s interests, compelling her to launch into a relentless chase that leaves a trail of blood and no prisoners in its wake.

Chono is a cleric as well and used to be one of Esek’s acolytes; she’s the complete opposite of her mentor’s character and also the thin connection between her and Six, since she was their schoolmate when she herself was named Four: Six keeps sending their taunting messages to Esek through Chono, whose loyalties are quite torn between her admiration and, yes, love for Esek and her horror at her mentor’s ruthlessness.

Jun Ironway is another one of Esek’s victims: her family was almost totally exterminated by the senior cleric and she now lives a precarious life as a caster (which is something like a very sophisticated hacker): that ’s how she comes into possession of a memory chip that could not only ruin the Nightfoot family and their lucrative business, but also destabilize the whole Kindom, so that Esek’s hunt for Six becomes inextricably linked with her search for Jun and the damning evidence she possesses.

This summary hardly pays justice to what turned out to be a many-layered narrative told in alternating timelines, where both the past and the present add to the labyrinthine mosaic of this engrossing story: Bethany Jacobs does an excellent job in creating a rich and intriguing universe and building it in bits and pieces as she moves forward with the narrative and adds shades and complexity to her characters. And the characters are indeed the most fascinating aspect of the novel…

Esek is certainly the most intriguing one among them: she is vicious, cold-blooded and merciless, she possesses all the attributes to be someone we would love to hate, and yet she is also mesmerizing and larger than life and totally fascinating. Her obsession over finding Six is as layered as her personality, because it’s composed in equal parts of hatred and admiration, need to destroy and desire to understand: these are also the reactions that she provoked in me as a reader, because I found her both despicable and spellbinding. This dichotomy also stands at the basis of Chono’s relationship with Esek, which goes beyond the mere link between master and disciple and is compounded by her natural empathy and by the unexpressed gratitude for the circumstances in which she became part of Esek’s retinue, an event that is probably one of the rarest instances in which the senior cleric was “guilty” of a good deed.

Besides being the story of a dogged hunt, These Burning Stars is also one that touches on sensitive themes like the harnessing of finite resources, the subjugation and exploitation of defenseless people and the callous use of those same victims as political scapegoats, and does it through a perfectly paced narrative that never confuses despite its complexity and that keeps you riveted from start to finish. And I have not yet mentioned the truly massive twist that will hit you toward the end of the book, one that comes so unexpectedly that it will have you reeling in shock for quite a while, so that I can hardly wait to see how it will impact the next books in the series.

Well done, well done indeed….

My Rating: