Tuesday, January 7, 2020

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: Chilling Effect by Valerie Valdes



Chilling Effect is the first in a fun space opera trilogy by debut author Valerie Valdes.  Set in a universe that feels like a more humor filled version of Mass Effect (although not quite a comedy like say Hitchhiker's), it is definitely the type of book I've found myself to enjoy quite a lot.  So you have a rag tag crew, led by an adventurous captain dealing with a shadowy organization with plans for ancient artifacts left around the galaxy, with multiple different races and set pieces throughout as the plot expands, to go along with the character work.

And that character work, particularly our lead character, but also the rest of the main crew, is really good, making this an incredibly fun book to enjoy.  And given that the lead character makes exclamations frequently in Spanish slang (and half the chapter titles are in Spanish), it means that there's a good shot I missed some of the humor involved here...and I still enjoyed this book quite a bit.  The book's descriptions may not be the best honestly, but it really doesn't matter, this book is a blast.


---------------------------------------------Plot Summary-------------------------------------------------
Captain Eva Innocente and her crew on the La Sirena Negra make a living traveling the galaxy and doing odd jobs for money, with one major rule: the jobs have to be legal - a rule she and her ship doc and good friend Pink stick to after her bad experiences working for her criminal dad went wrong.  But when Eva gets a message from the criminal conspiracy known as The Fridge that they have held her sister Mari hostage, Eva is forced to undertake a number of questionably legal jobs at their behest....and even worse, to hide her true motives from a crew she cares about.

Yet as the Fridge's requests become more and more difficult, and put Eva and her crew in even more danger, Eva finds the situation untenable and aims to try and find a way to strike back.  But to do so, Eva will have to deal with a number of problems: psychic cats, a egotistical alien ruler who wants Eva to be his personal toy, and her criminal family, among many other things.  Not to mention Eva will have to deal her feelings towards her alien engineer Vakar, whose alien body chemistry projects scents showing the interest is mutual....something Eva isn't quite sure what to do with.
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As I mentioned above the jump, Chilling Effect is a novel with a really humorous tone, to go along with its Mass Effect-esque space opera setting (if I had to compare it in tone to another novel, I'd go with Alex White's "Salvagers" trilogy).  I mean, the novel starts off with Eva and her crew having to round up hypnotic cats that have spread all across the ship (spoiler alert: the cats never quite leave), at one point features futurama-esque brain slugs to go along with things like gigantic aliens with cheesy soap opera-esque dialogue/romances and far far more.  It's not a full on comedy - Douglas Adams this is not - but it's always fun even in its darkest moments.  And I haven't even gone into the crazy alien emperor nutjob who keeps showing up an inopportune times to trying and kidnap our heroine.

All this we see through the eyes of our lead character Eva, who is a load of fun and really fun to read - she's quick thinking and clever, capable with her equipment (gravity boots are fun!) and utterly reckless and batshit insane with her planning as she tries to get through mission after mission.  This is Eva's story more than the rest of the crew - she also has a mysterious background that's never quite explored yet but obviously will come to roost later - and she shines as our heroine, especially as the book goes on and she finds herself thrown into shitty situations over and over again even by those who she'd hope were on her side.  The rest of her crew is excellent as well, especially her best friend and ship doctor Pink, her engineer and alien potential love interest Vakar, and a couple of others, so I really can't wait to read more of this cast.

And then there's the plot, which moves at a really fun pace from zany situation to zany situation, giving everyone more and more time to shine.  Some of the twists you'll see coming - a big one midway through the book is so obvious anyone could spot it - but they're pulled off well, and lead to more fun zany situations, so it all works out, and led to me finishing this book in a single day, despite me not intending to finish it in less than 3.  That's a pretty good sign.  I don't know what else I can say positively without spoiling some of the fun moments, so just trust me, it's great.

The book's only real weakness is that the book's use of descriptions is not the greatest - for example, Vakar is the love interest as well as a general important character, but his alien race is never really described all too well, which hurts envisioning a bit (in retrospect, I'm awfully suspicious he's meant to be Garrus Vakarian from Mass Effect).  And then there's the action scenes, some of which seem ripped from certain good video games, which work in the macro but can be confusing to follow.  The character work and plot is good enough to overcome these difficulties, and god knows I'm not a huge action scene person, but it's a flaw that prevents Chilling Effect from being a truly great novel.

Still, everyone could use some fun novels here and there, especially me, and Chilling Effect is definitely that.    The book contains a teaser for the sequel, which doesn't seem to be dated yet, but I know I'll be there for it when it comes out, for sure.  Recommended.
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