Friday, August 5, 2022

SciFi/Fantasy Book Review: The Monsters We Defy by Leslye Penelope

 


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 August 9, 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.     


The Monsters We Defy is the latest novel by author Leslye Penelope, who previously had published (and first self-published) a number of romantic (epic) fantasy novels under the name L. Penelope.  Unlike those novels, The Monsters We Defy is a different genre: Historical Fantasy, taking place in Washington D.C. during Prohibition, using a real life person - Clara Johnson, a black girl who shot a white policeman in self-defense - as the basis for its heroine.  In this setting, in which humans, particularly black humans, kind find themselves in debt to the trickster Enigmas of the spirit world, Clara and a cast of others will have to pull of a heist for the sake of the entire Black community.

The result is a really well done novel, and while it never goes full on into heist mode like you might imagine it would by the midway point, it features some really great strong characters, a great setting, and some really strong themes.  Its heroine Clara deals with severe anxiety around people relating in part to her tragic past and magical curse, and the story features themes of class, greed and exploitation even among people of the same oppressed group...and all of this works very well.  A very enjoyable piece of Historical Fiction/Fantasy, and definitely recommended.  

----------------------------------------------Plot Summary-------------------------------------------------
Clara Johnson could always see into the Spirit World....for all the good it did her in her past...even before she used that talent to make a devil's bargain with a powerful spirit - an Enigma called the Empress.  Unfortunately, the "Trick" (downside) of that bargain is that she has no choice but to help others seeking supernatural help obtain a bargain with their own Enigma....even as she knows those bargains will always turn out poorly for the maker.  Still, she has little else to do but survive in her life, no matter how much her carefree roommate, the albino girl Zelda, tries to forcer her to live a little.  

But when poor black folk Clara knows begin to go missing, and others seem to be cursed into a seemingly zombie-like state, Clara discovers that the cause is a magical ring belonging to one of the wealthiest Black women in the community, one who isn't just a major jazz singer, but also is at the head of a major bootlegging enterprise.  To get the ring and to save those in danger, Clara will need help: not just from Zelda's thieving ways, but from a series of others with their own magical Enigma-given gifts...and curses.  But she's not the only one who wants the ring, and the Enigmas have their own eyes on it for their own purposes....purposes that don't suggest anything good for DC's struggling and not-so-struggling Black communities....
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The Monsters We Defy takes place in 1925 Washington DC, dealing near entirely with the black community living there during the height of Prohibition - while issues of racial inequality and oppression are very much in the background (and limit somewhat what the lead characters can do), this story sticks mainly to the Black Community itself and how its organized.  And its not some single unified community - it's one very much gripped by inequality and its own forms of both classism and racism, with some rich black women looking down on Clara for her poverty - even as they are revealed to have exploited it - and some Black doctors are revealed to have as much eugenic/racist ideas as the White ones.  It's this type of world that leads so many characters to make their own bargains with the sinister Enigma spirits...bargains that contain "Tricks", drawbacks that are far worse than their benefits, over and over.  

In this world we have Clara Johnson, a really strong protagonist from whose perspective we get most of the story.  Clara is based on a real life person and she has tremendous trauma from both that experience - shooting a white policeman in self defense, being thrown in prison and forced (unlike in real life) to use a magical power she is afraid of to survive.  She also has trauma from her childhood, where her sight of the Spirit World eventually drove away her mother, leaving her feel tremendous guilt.  And so Clara finds herself struggling to be around other people or to even trust other human people (she trusts the lingering ghostly spirit of her grandmother and is pulled into things by Zelda but that's about it), meaning that when circumstances force her to need other people's help, and to risk themselves alongside her, she struggles mightily.  She also finds herself surviving more than finding happiness in anything, something that she comes to realize over the course of the story is something she might actually deserve to get.  

Thankfully the plot forces her to work alongside a cast of characters who are really great and can get her to possibly loosen up a bit as needed.  First of all there's Zelda, the albino girl who escaped from a circus and who uses her pickpocketing and acrobatic skills - and a daring happy-go-lucky attitude - to get the bits of happiness she deserves and who pushes Clara to get out there.  Then there's Israel Lee, the love interest musician whose bargain allows him to spellbind with his music in exchange for being stuck with sycophants, and who has a similar tragic childhood in some ways to Clara.  Then there's Aristotle, a gay actor whose bargain makes him able to magically camouflage himself as anyone else he wants...except for himself, making him unable to truly be himself with the man he has a crush on.  And finally there's Jesse Lee, who has the power to steal memories....in exchange for the person he cares about the most having no memory of him.  

They're a great crew who are a lot of fun together as they investigate what's truly going on with the missing people and the cursed ring, and try to come up with a way to save everyone....without getting themselves killed or worse.  The story never quite goes full the way into Heist-mode as much as you might imagine, even their final plans tend to be somewhat impromptu and require less of each of their individual skills (Israel's skills are pretty much unused for instance) than Clara's quickwitted thinking, but it works well enough, and the interplay between this real world setting and the invented magic and spirit worlds all come together to keep this story moving really well, as it deals with the above-mentioned themes of class, race, and the battle to survive vs the battle to find happiness along the way.  

It's just a really great and enjoyable historical fantasy story, and I definitely recommend it.  

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