Thursday, March 30, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

 

Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on July 18, 2023 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

Silver Nitrate is the latest horror novel from Mexican-Canadian author Silvia Moreno-Garcia, who gained well deserved attention (and long overdue attention) for her recent horror novel Mexican Gothic. Mexican Gothic is not Moreno-Garcia's only great work in my opinion - basically her entire bibliography is phenomenal even as it spans multiple genres - so I was excited to get an early copy of this one. Like many of Moreno-Garcia's novels, Silver Nitrate is a period piece set in Mexico - in this case, taking place in the 1990s but reflecting some events in the 1950s. And while this novel deals with new ideas and concepts in its setting and plot - a film created by a Nazi occultist that was never finished stumbled upon by our pair of protagonists that when finished unleashes power and dangers that the protagonists could not have expected - the story still deals with some common Moreno-Garcia themes such as discrimination on color/race and sexist lines in Mexico, as well as ideas about love and family.

The result is, as usual for Moreno-Garcia, pretty strong, although I don't think the book ever gets particularly scary (if that's what you're looking for in your horror). Protagonists Montserrat, a woman struggling to help her ill sister and to survive as a talented sound editor in an industry that is both dying and more and more a boys club that refuses to let a woman like her in, and Tristán, a faded soap opera star who has fallen apart after an accident killed the troubled actress he dated and he took the blame for it, are excellent as they get involved helping an old Mexican horror director who once tried to make a movie with a ex-Nazi occultist. The story deals well with its themes as it shows how ridiculous the Nazi's and his follower's prejudices are as they try to steal ideas from those who are indigenous and of color and rationalize it away, and the magic involved works generally pretty well up to the story's conclusion. That said, it isn't quite as memorable as some of Moreno-Garcia's other works, so it's merely another strong novel rather than a truly great one.

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Tuesday, March 28, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez (Translated by Megan McDowell)

 


Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on February 7, 2023 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

Our Share of Night is a novel from acclaimed Argentine author Mariana Enriquez, and is apparently (per the publisher statement that comes with the novel) her first novel to be translated into American English, even as her earlier novels were well acclaimed internationally. The novel is a 600 page historical fantasy horror novel, taking place largely in Argentina and Britain from the 1960s through the 1990s, and deals heavily with the Argentine politics of the time, as the nation struggles with a dictatorship, than a struggling democracy, and political and economic crises during and thereafter. Of course these historical events are often in the background (but well present) as the novel deals largely with a father and son who are involved with a Cult dedicated to a Supernatural Darkness that consumes, marks and sacrifices in exchange for cryptic messages about immortality - a cult led by a trio of rich loaded and politically connected families with little concern for who they destroy along the way.

The result is a fascinating novel which at times feels overwritten - with excessively long paragraphs and long passages without interruption - that somehow still is enthralling, as the story takes place in six parts that jump forward and backwards in time and perspective to reveal what is happening and what has already happened. So we get large parts taking place from the perspectives of the father Juan and mother Rosario in which they reveal their actions within the cult and their connections to the supernatural but also two large parts taking place from the perspective of their son Gaspar, who is ignorant of what dark magic his parents are/were a part of and why his father is acting strange and occasionally violent, and just trying to grow up and live his own life with his three friends. There's some strong themes here of class, of family, and some horrifying moments to go along with it, although I do think the novel falters a bit in the end when it all has to come together ridiculously quickly.

TRIGGER WARNING: Child Abuse, Rape off page, Torture off page, Mass Murder, and Mental Illness. One part deals heavily with trauma and how different people experience it, etc. Nothing done gratuitously, but serious topics are of issue in this book.
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Thursday, March 23, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Dim Stars by Brian P. Rubin

 


Dim Stars is a Young Adult Space Opera novel by Brian P. Rubin, which was self-published in 2020. The novel is one of this year's semifinalists in the Self-Published Science Fiction Competition (SPSFC2 - my reviews of these books can be found here) and is one of six books my team and I have been assigned to read and Judge to see if they will make the finals. The first few semifinalists that I read were real good contenders, so I had some high hopes for Dim Stars, especially as it began with a tone that made it sound like it would wind up being another wacky hijinx humorous/comedic space opera, like some of my favorites from the earlier rounds of the competition.

However while Dim Stars does have a humorous tone and some weird quirkiness, it largely is instead something else: a take on a classic story - the young teenager who looks up to a hero and wants to be like them, only to meet up with them and discover that person is a cynical somewhat jaded take on what they thought the hero was...and where the two of them wind up having to work together, and for the hero to discover real heroism alongside them, in order to save the day. That's what we have here, with teen Kenzie - super capable, and yet also naïve and lacking in interpersonal skills - joining the crew of her idol Dash, who supposedly saved the galaxy years ago from the alien forger menace....except Dash now is just a bitter older freighter pilot struggling to get by. This combination is fine, but basically never takes the trope to new or interesting directions, and the humorous bits and pieces of the setting aren't significant enough to make much of a difference there. As a result, the book failed to live up to my expectations - it's fine, but rather unremarkable and not quite what I hoped for in a semifinalist.

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Wednesday, March 22, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Wildblood by Lauren Blackwood

 


Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on February 7, 2023 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book. 


Wildblood is a new Historical Young Adult Fantasy novel written by author Lauren Blackwood (who previously wrote Within These Wicked Walls). The novel takes place in a jungle reserve in 1893 Jamaica, but not just any jungle: a jungle filled with supernatural creatures and spirits, led by a river spirit/goddess that isn't happy about human intrusion. But a tour company opens up and offers adventure into the jungle anyway, with trips guided by indentured young black men and women known as "Wildbloods", who have the magical "Science" to manipulate blood - their own and others - into weapons (or just to manipulate it in general. Naturally like in our world, the fact that Wildbloods have this power makes them "different" and not human, leading to them being treated horribly, and protagonist Victoria is desperate to prove herself, grab a leadership role in the company and make things better for her fellow Wildbloods, especially the 14 year old boy she thinks of as a little brother who can barely control himself and his own powers.

The result is a story dealing strongly with prejudice, with human greed, and with the impacts of abuse and trauma as it follows Victoria guiding a group of miners into the jungle, led in part by an alluring black man, along with the former best friend who betrayed her and now helps her boss oppress her and the other Wildbloods. It's a story that is dark, but not for darkness sakes, and hits its themes really well, thanks largely to a very strong lead character and a narrative that doesn't hold back. At the same time, the book's core romance doesn't really work for me, and the book's setting is very unexplored and underexplained, to the point where it's almost a little distracting when things in the plot possibly reach the outside world. Overall though this is a pretty solid young adult novel dealing well with some really strong and important themes, making this a worthy recommend.

TRIGGER WARNING: RAPE, Sexual Abuse, Physical and Mental Abuse by a Boss, Racial Discrimination and more. None of this is superfluous and it all works in context, so these triggering events are used properly and appropriately in furtherance of the book's themes.

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Monday, March 20, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Night Music by Tobias F. Cabral

 


Night Music is a short self-published science fiction novel by author Tobias F. Cabral. The novel is now part of this year's Self-Published Science Fiction Competition (#SPSFC2 - See my earlier SPSFC2 reviews here), of which I a Judge, and has made the Semifinals, meaning it was one of the 30 top books submitted to the competition. Now the book, which I knew nothing about going in, is part of my group's semifinal pool of books to review and rank for possible elevation into the Finals.

Given the novel's place as a semifinalist, I had decent expectations for Night Music, and the novel certainly intrigued enough to kind of meet them. This is a novel of a future world where a team is sent from their deployment near the moon to investigate the loss of communication from a scientific base on Mars...a loss of communication that seems to have been caused by alien influence. The result is a novel that is less about conflict with some antagonist, but more about exploration and discovery and wonder, as our protagonist Seth and the rest of the team find more and more strange things occurring on Mars. There isn't really a plot arc here...or even much of character arcs (although character development does happen), and yet Night Music manages to weave it all together with wonder and fascination in a way to still be oddly enthralling.

More specifics after the jump.

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Wednesday, March 15, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Bang Bang Bodhisatva by Aubrey Wood

 


Full Disclosure:  This book was read as an e-ARC Audiobook (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on May 9 2023 in exchange for a potential review.  I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.


Bang Bang Bodhisatva is the debut novel of trans Kiwi (from New Zealand) author Aubrey Wood. The novel features a cyberpunk world that is just a decade beyond our own somehow but which includes a ton of geek references that are very in your face - subtlety this book is not. It also features a trans woman protagonist in a world that has only gotten worse for people who don't fit the cis white gender norm, with fascist police still prejudiced as hell even despite technology perhaps making changing your body even easier than ever before. It takes this world and pairs that protagonist with an older private eye for a sort of buddy-cop-esque atmosphere (young hacker "kid" (age 30) and older former cop PI!) as they deal with a serious of strange murders that pull them in.

And parts of the novel work better than others - for example, the lead duo work really well as characters, especially geeky hacker trans woman Kiera, as she tries to be who she really is amongst a world that makes that incredibly hard, finds a possible love who turns out missing or dead, and winds up on the run with a man who feels way too often to be from an older generation. Kiera's great and her story is really well done, and second lead Angel is solid as the gruff noir-ish detective who is somewhat old fashioned while also being open to the new (and being Ace himself), even if less of a highlight. But the constant geek references kind of are offputting and sometimes threw me out of the narrative, as the novel at times wants to feel far in the future cyberpunk and at other times wants to feel like its set basically tomorrow, and it makes things very awkward. The result is a novel that I enjoyed but didn't quite love.

Trigger Warning: Police Brutality, Homophobia, Transphobia and Deadnaming, Racism, Suicide as backstory, Self-Harm.

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Tuesday, March 14, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: A Restless Truth by Freya Marske

 


A Restless Truth is the follow up to A Marvellous Light, Freya Marske's M-M Fantasy Romance featuring a version of Victorian England complete with a secret magical underbelly that a nonmagical man Robin discovered when he was accidentally appointed as a liaison in the government to the magical world...and found that position putting him in contact with gruff serious knowledgeable magician Edwin. The book featured the two of them falling for each other (with great magical sex scenes) despite a world where such attraction is forbidden and a conspiracy of Magicians that winds up after the two of them after they discover a dangerous magical secret first unearthed by a cabal of older women magicians. It was a book that had some issues with its problematic setting honestly - it clearly is aware of the issues of Colonialism and Racism that its world was built upon and would reference it on occasion, but also fail to interrogate those issues and just accepts them to focus on its White leads (as opposed to a half Indian woman magical secretary who was a hoot). And yet at the same time its romance and romantic chemistry was just so so good, and its sex scenes incredibly well written, that I couldn't help but love it anyway.

A Restless Truth switches the focus to a F-F romance featuring old protagonist Robin's sister Maud, a young woman desperate to prove herself to the brother who's supported her through everything despite Maud having little experience with the world, and Violet, a much more experienced - and scandalous - young woman who is on her way back to Britain reluctantly due to a sudden unexpected inheritance. The setting this time also moves to a ship as Maud, Violet and a few others are forced to deal with a murder mystery and a search for a magical macguffin all at the same time, with dangerous magician murderers also after the same dangerous artifact, adding tension and intrigue to the story. And while the story suffers through the same problem of recognizing the inequality, racism, and injustice of this society - and only really dealing with the sexism issue in this book - it once again features a romance with such chemistry, and such great side characters, that made me unable to put this book down once more. If you're looking for sex love and romance amidst dangerous adventure? Well A Restless Truth will absolutely satisfy you.

More Specifics after the Jump:

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Thursday, March 9, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Nubia: The Awakening by Clarence A. Haynes and Omar Epps

 


Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on November 8, 2022 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

Nubia the Awakening is the first in a YA SciFi/Fantasy novel series written by actor/producer Omar Epps and writer/editor Clarence A. Haynes. The novel weems like an example of a famous person in media opting to go into genre fiction, with the help of an established writer, and that sort of combination can bear some really successful fruit at times (see Janelle Monae's The Memory Librarian). So I was curious to see how this attempt would pan out.

The result is mixed - Nubia: the Awakening takes a lot of pretty typical YA and SF/F concepts: the climate and uprising ravaged future New York City, the wealthy people all moving into a city in the sky, the leader with good publicity manipulating people and creating havoc that he can then take advantage of the PR of stopping, etc. and merges them all together into an afrofuturist novel. And the story's lead protagonists, meet quiet intellectual Uzochi, fierce reckless Zuberi and rebellious angry and abused Lencho all have interesting aspects here, even if they themselves are also pretty typical archetypes. But the book doesn't have the space to do much super interesting with them, with character development rarely having time to actually play out before major events happen to change things, and the main antagonist is such a well-worn archetype that I found it hard to really care by the end of the book, as things played out as anyone could have expected. The book deals with themes of inequality, of discrimination, and more with an unsubtle approach, but it doesn't do so in a way to say anything new or interesting, which makes this a hard recommend, even for Black readers who are looking for such YA featuring Black characters like themselves.

Trigger Warning: Parental Abuse of one of the main characters.

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Tuesday, March 7, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Dead Country by Max Gladstone

 


Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on March 7, 2023 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

Dead Country is the latest book in Max Gladstone's "Craft Sequence" series and the first book in his "Craft Wars" trilogy that is meant to conclude his work in the series. The Craft Sequence, one of my favorite series over the last few years, features a fantasy world where magic is based upon law and economics, with gods essentially being corporations - so for example, the main character Craftspeople, who use law, logical arguments, and economic principles to do what is essentially magic: so for example, if a god is a being whose power comes from offerings and beliefs of its worshippers and who can die if it expend too much of that power such that it has none left, well in that case resurrecting that god is essentially not just necromancy, but bankruptcy. I'm making this sound drier than it actualy is, with Gladstone combining the concepts in such a way that its always fascinating and makes sense, featuring really great characters (often queer and people of color), and some very serious themes that are dealt with in ways that are usually very fun. It's been a really balanced series six books in, and the wait for this new book over the last few years has been long, even if Gladstone has written some good stuff in the interim outside the series.

Dead Country is an interesting return to the series. The book is very short, the shortest in the series by far, and is basically a fantasy Western using Craft concepts and loses a good amount of the fun and humor that colored some of the earlier books. At the same time, the story still works really well, as it features one of the series' old protagonists, Tara Abernathy (a main protagonist in Three Parts Dead and Four Roads Cross and a minor character in The Ruin of Angels), as she goes home to the town that cast her out with torches and pitchforks upon the death of her father....only to find a young orphaned woman there with a natural gift for the Craft, and raiders touched by a Craft-related Curse making more and more incursions on the town. The result is a story that works generally well, except for a final act reveal really, and deals touchingly with themes of home and what it means to a person, as well as the value of people among prejudice and systems, over the course of its plot. It really works for the most part even if the tone of the book is kind of different.

NOTE: The Blurb for this book advertises Dead Country as the first of a trilogy concluding the Craft Sequence and also as "the perfect entry point to this incomparable world." I would disagree - this book relies heavily on knowledge of the prior Craft works, particularly Three Parts Dead and Four Roads Cross, where our protagonist was introduced and to a lesser extent Ruin of Angels (also featuring her). Readers who go into this book blind are likely going to be very confused and missing some of the important character background that I had, which made things have such impact here in this book. So I would not recommend starting the series here, and this review is based upon the reader having some foreknowledge of the series.

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Monday, March 6, 2023

SciFi Novella Review: The Mimicking of Known Successes by Malka Older

 

Full Disclosure: This book was read as an e-ARC (Advance Reader Copy) obtained via Netgalley from the publisher in advance of the book's release on March 7, 2023 in exchange for a potential review. I give my word that this did not affect my review in any way - if I felt conflicted in any way, I would simply have declined to review the book.

The Mimicking of Known Successes is a new novella from author Malka Older, whose novel Informocracy managed to garner a bunch of nominations at awards (including a Hugo Nomination for Best Series). To be honest, I kind of hated Informocracy, which I found to be both ridiculous in characters and concepts and in themes. But Older's social media presence and other work on SciFi/Fantasy kept me interested in her, so I was willing to give her another try in this shorter work, a novella, that takes place in a different setting altogether.

And I'm really happy I gave it a chance, because the Mimicking of Known Successes is a terrific novella, one which carries interesting themes, a Sherlock Holmes/Watson-esque setup that I'm always a sucker for, and a pair of central neurodivergent protagonists with an understated lesbian romance that work incredibly well. The story takes place in a distant future in which humanity fled the Earth and now, living on platforms built around what is essentially a gas giant, where humanity struggles to survive while also longing for their home planet...and that longing leads to research into the old Earth's ecosystem back when it was healthy and functional, so that the researchers can come up with a way to restart that ecosystem for humanity's long-sought return. This setting makes for a fascinating backdrop to a mystery featuring neurodivergent investigator Mossa and her ex, Scholar Pleiti, as they investigate the disappearance of another Scholar. Really Really liked this one and would be surprised if it's not on my 2024 Hugo Award Nomination List.

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Thursday, March 2, 2023

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Naylor

 


The Mountain in the Sea is in acclaimed philosophical science fiction novel by author Ray Naylor, who had previously only written short fiction. The novel came highly recommended to me by a fellow reviewer, so I actually bought the novel when it was on sale at a physical bookstore. I say "philosophical" science fiction because, while this novel is described in advertisements as a thriller, it's a really a story that makes arguments through a main story-arc dealing with the discovery of a possibly sentient species of octopus that lives outside an archipeligo in Vietnam, and how the attempted examination of that species by the book's main protagonist Ha and android scientist Evrim reveals things about consciousness, language, and interactions between other people. Such novels, which are based less on character development and more on ideas, aren't my usual reads, but the acclaim for this was so high I couldn't resist giving it a try.

Unfortunately The Mountain in the Sea isn't really a hit for me. The book's main plot and its two side plotlines do sort of come together okay in a philosophical sense, but I'm not really sure there is too much here honestly all that interesting, at least to me. The exploration of language and differences in species work really well I do think, but the exploration of consciousness really wasn't that special for me, and I'm not sure the book's ideas about empathy and really its opposite, indifference, is that impressive - it kind of feels like an essay in novel form, and I'm not sure the fiction helps anymore there. Add in some thriller elements that I thought distracted from the main ideas, and well I largely felt like just going "huh" when this was finished rahter than feeling like I learned much or had a revelation about this world or our own.

Note: I read this in part also as an audiobook. The audiobook reader is very good, but the book relies in part upon symbols drawn in the text, so you're missing a little if you read it in this format.

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