SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Mage Against the Machine by Shaun Barger

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Mage Against the Machine by Shaun Barger: https://t.co/nneKWi9KI9 Short Review: 5.5 out of 10 (1/3)

— garik16 (@garik16) November 30, 2018

Short Review (cont): This book that's decently described as an attempt to merge Harry Potter (kinda) with The Terminator (definitely) has some promise, but has some major pacing problems, one main character who's a bit of a jerk, and was a bit too dark for me. Alas. (2/3)

— garik16 (@garik16) November 30, 2018

Mage Against the Machine is one of the science fiction/fantasy books with an obvious selling hook: it's a hybrid of The Terminator and Harry Potter!  Marriage of SciFi and Fantasy concepts into a single book is hardly that unusual in the genre - 2016's "All the Birds in the Sky" by Charlie Jane Anders is an example of it done wonderfully for example.  Still, Mage Against the Machine wears its influences, particularly that of The Terminator, on its sleeve.

It's not wholly successful unfortunately, as the book takes way too long a time to merge its two elements and features one main character who is kind of a jerk and hard to like.  It's also a very very dark book with few moments of lightness whatsoever - if this book isn't quite "grimdark," it's really close.  The result is a book that shows elements of promise, but never quite fulfills them and as a result I can't really recommend it too highly.


-----------------------------------------------Plot Summary-------------------------------------------------------
Nikolai "Nik" Strauss is a orphaned young mage and a newly minted member of the Edge Guard, the agents of the Mage King trusted to keep the mage civilization inside the Veils safe.  Years ago, non-mage humanity was destroyed after a powerful mage used weaponized magic and technology to cause the apocalypse.  Now Nikolai and the Edge Guard are meant to protect the Veils - the areas magically protected from the doomed outside world - from what remains.  But when an old mentor of Nikolai's, seemingly mad, confronts Nikolai with the possibility that the world outside the Veils is not what he's been taught, and that his mother didn't die in an accident but was a traitor trying to prove this, Nikolai's life turns upside down.

Jemma "Jem" Burton is a runner for the human resistance.  Years ago, the AI Synths that humanity relied upon on Earth turned against humanity and the humans outside Earth in the Solar System abandoned the humans on Earth to their fate: enslavement by the Synths, either in an oppressed real life or in an artificial virtual reality.  Jem and her best friend were the most advanced cybernetically enhanced humans before the Synths went mad, and with her friend gone, Jem is the best agent the Resistance has left.  But when the Resistance gains an unexpected boon that could change the tide of the conflict, Jem finds herself right in the middle of a conflict that could change everything.

Unbeknownst to both Jem and Nik, their versions of the Earth coexist alongside each other in secret, and soon Nik and Jem will meet and be forced to take action upon learning the truth - an action that could save humanity....or possibly destroy not just the enslaved humans, but the entire magical world that Nik has known all his life......
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Mage Against the Machine is broken up into three parts, with each part split into chapters that alternate between Nik and Jem's third person point of view.  Through this method, the book is really good at worldbuilding - and really it has to do that worldbuilding twice, as Nik and Jem's worlds are very very different.  But both worlds come out really damn well and setup a plot that has a lot of promise, as the Nik's magical world collides with Jem's terminator-esque dystopia.

Despite the promise, Mage Against the Machine has a few major problems.  The first is pacing: everyone coming into this book knows going in that Nik and Jem are going to collide and that the magical and technological worlds are going to meet (and if you somehow came into this book blind, you'd realize this by the end of the second chapter), but it takes basically half the book for one of them to enter the other's world and takes even longer for the two protagonists themselves to meet up (over 200 pages).  It's not that the events before hand lack dramatics - plenty of stuff happens to both before then believe me - but that their two stories feel completely separate.  And when the two do finally meet up, the merger isn't clean, with Jem's story being subsumed near entirely into Nik's.

That's a problem because Nik isn't a likable character, and it's kind of hard to root for him (or root against him).  His pre-Jem storyline involves him reacting to perhaps understandable stress with an absolutely assholish response, making him seem like a child throwing a tantrum. And well, he doesn't get much better.

Jem's a better character that's a lot easier to root for, but her story is really really dark and the story throws her from tragic situation to tragic situation rather quickly, which is really brutal to read.  There's one moment early on where she has some happiness, but the book yanks it away rather quickly and it only gets worse from there.  And while I don't mind darkness in my reading, there needs to be a point to it and I don't think this book ever gets there.*

Spoiler in ROT13*:  Wrz snyyf va ybir jvgu n lbhat certanag jbzna rneyl, Oyhr, jub fur'f punetrq jvgu cebgrpgvat orpnhfr gur Flaguf unir hfrq n ivehf gung unq znqr uhzna ercebqhpgvba vzcbffvoyr.  Gura Wrz svaqf bhg gung Wrz'f ybfg sevraq Rin vf nyvir, ohg cynaavat ba hfvat n ivehf gb sbepr rafynirq uhznaf gb fhssre jung vf rffragvnyyl n zvaqencr va beqre gb ghea gurz vagb fbyqvref gb hfr ntnvafg gur Flaguf, va n svtug gung vf fgvyy nyzbfg pregnva gb abg shyyl fhpprrq (naq bayl xvyy n srj bs gur NVf).  Bhgentrq, Wrz fgbcf Rin'f cyna (naq Rin'f nggrzcg gb zvaq-encr/zvaq-pbageby Wrz) naq thvqrf Oyhr gb n uhzna-pbagebyyrq zvyvgnel onfr jvgubhg gryyvat Oyhr.  Ohg jura fur gryyf Oyhr, Oyhr erwrpgf Wrz naq oynzrf Wrz sbe fgbccvat gur cyna naq Wrz yrnirf Oyhr va grnef....bayl sbe Oyhr gb cebzcgyl or pncgherq ol gur Flaguf jvgubhg Wrz'f cebgrpgvba.  Vg'f n lnaxvat bs Wrz'f punva gung vf whfg oehgny naq cnvashy gb ernq, naq V qba'g guvax ure zvfrel qbrf gur cybg nal tbbq bgure guna gb erzbir cvrprf sebz gur obneq fb Wrz pna or nybar orsber zrrgvat Avx.  Oyrpu.

The book ends in a way that suggests this will be the first in a series/trilogy, although it's a satisfying ending to this story in a way.  But overall, this book's pacing, darkness, and character problems made it a bit hard for me to enjoy, and I wouldn't recommend it despite the premise.