Fury from the Tomb, S.A. Sidor

Received to review via Netgalley

I loved the idea of this, a pulpy horror story in the tradition of something like The Mummy (not that I’ve seen that film). And honestly, it was quite a lot of fun, in a fast-paced way, with interesting stuff going on with the various mythical stuff brought into the story. It’s fairly tropey and predictable, and the pacing is a bit jerky, but I stuck with it and had a reasonable amount of fun. Not something that I’d recommend unless you really love pulpy Penny Dreadful type stories with mummies and vampires and all kinds of weirdness, but it wasn’t the worst way to spend the time either.

Things that would have made me like it more… more of Evangeline, less of Evangeline being an object of desire for Rom and apparently everyone else; more flesh on the bones of McTroy and what went on in his head; and… some kind of change to Rom’s character. He struck me as stuck up and ignorant in many ways, and the effect was something like Simon Tam from Firefly, except with no willingness to get his hands dirty (except maybe with grave dirt) and no trust of the people around him. Basically, Simon Tam without the good bits.

Rating: 2/5

At Amberleaf Fair, Phyllis Ann Karr

This is a relatively quiet fantasy with a spot of mystery and romance, with a rather fascinating world. I didn’t follow the economics entirely, but the magic, the metaphors, the people’s roles in lives — it was very clear that this was all set up with a great deal of thought and care. I didn’t absolutely love the characters — and I have no idea why Torin liked Valdart at all, or thought he wanted to marry Sharys — but some of the interplay was pretty good, and I enjoyed the fact that the gender of the judge was never mentioned at all.

If you read the author’s note, it’s obvious she envisioned it as our world, post-apocalypse and a lot of growing up for the species. In that light, it’s interesting to see what she thought would change and what she thought would stay the same, and why she thought that (for example, she thought that theft would continue to be a problem, largely because the idea of individual property was breaking down; I’m not sure that follows, since we have a pretty robust idea of individual property now and plenty of theft).

All in all, it’s not groundbreaking, but it works as a gentle read for a quiet evening.

Rating: 3/5

Strange Practice, Vivian Shaw

It hasn’t been that long since I first read this book, but the sequel is now out and I wanted to refresh my memory, and honestly I found Strange Practice just delightful. I adored what it did with the idea of a doctor for the monstrous/undead/etc, and I don’t know who would fail to smile at the idea of treating a banshee for a sore throat or a ghoul for depression (I’m not sure I agree with the choice of venlafaxine for the reasons actually mentioned — it’s nasty for withdrawal — but that’s by the by). I loved Ruthven and his concern for all the supernatural denizens of London, his hospitality and generosity, along with his little flaws and quirks. I loved the examination of what it might be like to be immortal, to be Ruthven or Varney or Fass: the years seeing other people die, the years of having to come up with something to do all the time.

I adore that Ruthven drove an ambulance in the Blitz, speaks a bunch of languages and knows how to darn socks. It just makes sense.

The plot itself is maybe less delightful, because hey, crazy cult, but the way the characters come together is glorious, and the climax of the story is just whoooa. The Devil himself shows up, and nothing is quite how you’d expect.

Greta Helsing, who is really the main character, is pretty awesome too. She’s the kind of doctor who recognises her duty to help people, but she’s also a brave young woman who is determined to do what she can, no matter what. She’s not perfect, and sometimes her reactions are very human — there’s a bit at the climax where she’s meant to be helping her friends, something goes wrong concurrently, and just… aaah.

Normally I can see why other people don’t like books (apart from personal taste stuff on the genre level), but I don’t really get it with this one. I enjoyed the heck out of it and I want some of my other friends (and my wife, hello dear) to read it soon so we can discuss Ruthven’s silk curtains and whether Varney is ever going to stop being melancholy.

Rating: 4/5

The Battle of the Sun, Jeannette Winterson

I remember quite enjoying Tanglewreck, so I was somewhat surprised to be rather unhappy with The Battle of the Sun. The opening is fairly promising — the description of Jack being so, so eager for his spaniel, so full of thoughts of the spaniel, that he’s practically a spaniel himself, it really works and paints exactly the picture it needs to. Not that vivid imagery has ever been a problem for Winterson, and it’s so surprise that her writing is poetic and vivid and phantasmagoric.

However, it’s also quicksilver, jumping from thought to thought, and things aren’t explained — they just happen, one after another, and who knows why? I can’t remember if I found Tanglewreck to be like that, but I can’t say I enjoyed it in this book. In the end, I zipped through to the end on my ereader and put it down with a sigh of relief. Just not one that worked for me.

Rating: 2/5

Crooked Kingdom, Leigh Bardugo

It took me a while to get into this — around 50% of the book, actually — because it all felt like Kaz was being driven by Van Eck, instead of the crew banding together and calling the shots, which I badly wanted after the ending of Six of Crows. Kaz felt too cold and distant for a lot of it, and his POV took a long time to come round. Still, once it did, I did enjoy the way Kaz’s need for vengeance was handled, and his difficulties in touching people and expressing his feelings, etc. There’s a great bit which just describes perfectly how those OCD behaviours get established if you don’t fight them every step of the way.

And once you hit that 50% mark, the crew really start to take back what’s theirs and fight back, and it’s a lot of fun. Wylan and Jesper’s relationship is adorable, and I rather enjoy Jesper’s father’s part as well. The comeuppance is great, and the end of the book did not go quite exactly as I’d pictured. Gah, some of the last imagery of Nina and Matthias… But ahh, Inej’s ending is everything I needed, and Wylan’s position at the end is awesome.

If you enjoyed Six of Crows, you’ll probably enjoy this, and if you find it slow at first you probably just need to hold out for about 50% of the way through.

Rating: 4/5

Children of Time, Adrian Tchaikovsky

As an idea, this is a really fascinating novel. There’s the fall of human civilisation, a not-quite-a-generation-ship ark of humanity trying to find old terraformed worlds after humanity began to rebuild itself, there’s genetic experiments, there’s a whole novel society in the form of uplifted arachnids… For me, it was more of a novel of ideas than one in which I got to care about any particular character — especially since the spider characters may have shared names, but weren’t the same people or even roles across generations. There was some pathos in the relationship between the main crew member we follow and Lain, but… Mostly it wasn’t about individuals.

As a biologist, I’m not sure I agree with how Tchaikovsky has set up the uplift story. He uses a nanovirus, which… I guess is basically magic handwaving, because an actual virus wouldn’t be able to do nearly what he suggests. The ‘message’ of the virus would be scrambled within a couple of generations, if not immediately, and a virus couldn’t work intelligently toward a particular goal — especially not with multiple different species. It sounds like hard science because the explanation is there and holds up if you don’t have detailed knowledge of viruses, but it isn’t really hard science because once you’re talking about a “nanovirus” that isn’t really a virus (which it manifestly can’t be) then you’re just magically handwaving. We can’t do accurate gene editing yet at all, even with CRISPR/cas9, let alone with a viral vector, so he’s extrapolating way too far from the data for it to be hard science (which is how the person who recommended me this sold it, as an antidote to wishy-washy socially based science).

Obviously, that’s all a bit of a personal peeve since I love CRISPR and understanding diseases: most people wouldn’t want to argue so much with it, I think! After all, it’s really just there to explain how the uplift happens — and one key event at the end. As far as I’m concerned, hard science should be much more closely beholden to known facts and existing technology, or it’s just magic. (Any sufficiently advanced technology appears to be magic…)

That aside, I did enjoy the book as an exploration of uplift, as an exploration of the uplift of an Earth species very different to us, and as an exploration of the clash between that species and what’s left of the human race. The AI and her struggle to understand herself and what happened is also well done: her loneliness and obsession is well depicted, even if you can’t really like her as a character. I’m not sure how to feel about the ending, how the spiders resolved things, but all in all… definitely worth chewing on and thinking about some more.

Rating: 4/5