Category: Authors Page 11 of 115

The Perception of Dolls by Anthony Croix, Edited by Russell Day: Creepy Dolls, Creepy dolls, and Creepy do!!s

On January 31, 2023

I did a lousy job on this…I’m just not capable of discussing this book properly. But I gave it a shot, though.

The Perception Of Dolls

by Anthony Croix, Edited by Russell Day

DETAILS:
Publisher: Fahrenheit Press
Publication Date: December 2, 2023
Format: Hardcover
Length: 277 pg.
Read Date: January 16-19, 2023

What’s The Perception Of Dolls About?

There’s no way to simply talk about this book. Period. So this is going to take a bit, bear with me. Let’s start with this from the Publisher’s site:

“It’s almost as if history is trying to erase the whole affair.” – Anthony Croix

The triple murder and failed suicide that took place at 37 Fantoccini Street in 2001, raised little media interest at the time. In a week heavy with global news, a ‘domestic tragedy’ warranted few column inches. The case was open and shut, the inquest was brief and the ‘Doll Murders’ – little more than a footnote in the ledgers of Britain’s true crime enthusiasts – were largely forgotten.

Nevertheless, investigations were made, police files generated, testimonies recorded, and conclusions reached. The reports are there, a matter of public record, for those with a mind to look.

The details of what took place in Fantoccini Street in the years that followed are less accessible. The people involved in the field trips to number 37 are often unwilling, or unable, to talk about what they witnessed. The hours of audio recordings, video tapes, written accounts, photographs, drawings, and even online postings are elusive, almost furtive.

In fact, were it not for a chance encounter between the late Anthony Croix and an obsessive collector of Gothic dolls, the Fantoccini Street Reports might well have been lost forever.

But that’s not all—the late Anthony Croix was an independent journalist, and from that encounter with the doll collector, he gets on the trail of 37 Fantoccini Street and what happened there—from the murders to the repeated trips by students from London North University looking into paranormal activity on the site.

Croix conducted those interviews with those from the visits who were still alive and capable of being interviewed, and wrote up descriptions of the photographs and videos (he wasn’t permitted to copy them or use them in his final work), compiling all this into a book that he was unable to finish before his death.

Enter Russell Day who took the notes and drafts compiled by Croix and assembled them into a (mostly) publishable form. (that’s not a knock on Day’s work, he did what he could to honor Croix’s particular style)

Reading a Documentary

Back in junior high/high school, I remember watching documentaries and documentary-style TV shows about paranormal investigations and unsolved crimes. This reads a lot like one of those. Those would feature a lot of intercut interviews telling the story—some contradicting the others—with a little, but not too much voice-over narration stitching them together. There’d also be some questionable photographs and some dark video clips that are hard to see a whole lot of detail in.

That’s pretty much what The Perception Of Dolls is—just in book form. It’s surprisingly effective—it doesn’t take a whole lot of imagination on the part of the reader to “see” the whole thing. Yeah, the format of interview transcripts and descriptions of the visuals are pretty bare-boned, but you’ll find yourself supplying all the necessary details with almost no prompting from the text.

When Style is Not a Style

Whether I’ve discussed a short story or a novel by Day, one of the things I inevitably talk the most about is his style.

None of that is evident here. Not one bit. As I said, this reads as dryly as a transcript of a documentary—which is exactly what Day was going for. The absence of style is as much work—if not much more—than Day’s typically flashy and gorgeous styles.

“Dry” doesn’t mean dull—not for a second. Day dives so far into the persona of Croix—eliding obscenities, odd typography, purposefully including typos, sentence fragments, etc. that the text of the novel itself becomes a character as vibrant as any of the others.

So, what did I think about The Perception Of Dolls?

So…when I first saw this advertised, I didn’t think this would be my cup of tea—it’s not really a genre I’m all that fond of, and rarely want to try. But then I remembered that the genre of “Things written by Russell Day” is definitely one of my favorites, so I went for it.

I’m so glad that I tried this.

Objectively, I’d say that there’s little reason on the page to feel unease, dread, anxiety, or much of anything actually. But because of the subject matter and/or the way that the story is told—I don’t see how you don’t feel dread, anxiety, and a growing sense of creepiness throughout. The last photograph described by Croix is going to stick with me a little longer than I’m comfortable with, I’ve got to say. It’s impossible to say what precisely happened—at almost any point the book describes—at 37 Fantoccini Street or with some of the related events, but something’s not right about that place. Everything that ever happened there needs to be narrated by Robert Stack.*

* I don’t know if that will mean anything to anyone who wasn’t watching U.S. TV in the late 1980s, but I assure you, it’s an apt observation.

Okay, I take that back—there’s objectively at least one scene that should make any reader feel creeped out and possibly anxious. Croix gets to view the doll collector’s collection. If imagining 897 dolls of various types and conditions in one room (I’ll leave the details to the book) doesn’t give you the heebie-jeebies, you should seek professional help.

Everything in this book is unreliable—the narratives in the newspapers from the original killings were only printed in a newspaper that doesn’t exist anymore, and the photographs from that story—or anytime after that, are only described. Even a documentary related to murder is of dubious quality. You’ll find plenty to question in the witness accounts of what happened—particularly when they differ (and, yes, I’m sure they’re all lying—it’s tough to decide which one is lying when). The reader is given plenty of reasons throughout to wonder about Anthony Croix’s accuracy—and there appear to be pages missing from his manuscript that could change our understanding of the whole thing. All of which serves to increase my general feelings of unease about the whole narrative.

Near the end of the book, Croix is talking about someone he interacted with a lot saying they’re a perfect “reflector”

of the overarching story of number 37. Facts present themselves but offer no revelations and produce questions, not answers.

That’s precisely what this book delivers—and it does so in a way that even people who demand a lot of resolution from a story can be satisfied with it. I wondered more than once what I’d end up thinking about this book as I walked through it, I was uncertain most of the time I spent reading. But the last few chapters solidified things for me. And the days I’ve spent afterward thinking about the whole thing make me even more sure—it’s one of those books that gets better the more you think about it—I’m dazzled by this book. I’m not in awe—and I certainly didn’t enjoy most of it (if by enjoy you mean “had fun while reading”). But I was hooked. I was captivated. I was (at least momentarily) obsessed with it.

5 Stars

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, the opinions expressed are my own.

Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire: Nothing Comes Free

By HCNewton

On January 26, 2023

In Fantasy, Fiction, Seanan McGuire, Wayward Children

Lost in the Moment and Found

by Seanan McGuire

DETAILS:
Series: Wayward Children, #8
Publisher: Tordotcom
Publication Date: January 10, 2023
Format: Hardcover
Length:  146 pg.
Read Date: January 12-13, 2023

This ended up being one of those books that I could say almost nothing about or could just as easily have said far too much about. It took me a week and a half just to figure out—I hope—the way to strike the balance.

What’s Lost in the Moment and Found About?

Antoinette (known as Antsy) is a little girl whose life is shattered when her father dies unexpectedly. Her mother quickly remarries for security and her stepfather is the stuff of nightmares. He dismantles her idyllic-sounding childhood, almost removing her from the family. When darker (much darker) things loom, Antsy runs away.

Naturally—well, supernaturally—as this is a Wayward Children book, she’s soon presented with a Door. She steps through it, as sure as someone who isn’t even ten can be. And enters a shop. Unusually for this series, she’s not in a new world—but a shop. The Shop Where the Lost Things Go to be precise.

The shop is managed by an old woman named Vineta and a very large (and talking) magpie named Hudson. In addition to the Shop being the place that Lost Things go—those that are needed by their owners can come be retrieved. There is a Door in the Shop that Antsy can open to other worlds (Antsy’s door, and that of those coming to Find something, appears in a different location)—there’s never any telling what world will be on the other side of the Door. If it looks appealing, Vineta and Antsy will go through and purchase some things to sell in the Shop (and feed themselves), otherwise Antsy will close the door and try again.

At some point, Antsy begins finding ominous notes trying to tell her something—will she figure out what the notes are trying to tell her in time?

Worldbuilding

One of the more entertaining things—for me, anyway—about this series is hearing about worlds that we don’t get to spend time in (or more than a quick glimpse, anyway). Just a brief mention along the way to some other point, and you get to fuel your imagination for a bit. Given this setting—and the way the Shop flits between worlds for Antsy and Vineta to go pick up stock, Lost in the Moment and Found is rife in these glimpses, hints of what else is out there. I had so much fun with that—McGuire’s really created a universe for these stories where she can indulge any whim she has for storytelling and it’d work.

But that’s not really what I wanted to talk about.

This entry would be a worthwhile read for fans if only for this one thing—we learn more about the Doors and how they work. I’m not going to go into it, obviously, nor am I going to promise that every question you had about the Doors will be answered—actually you’ll likely end up with new questions, but they’ll be informed questions.

Depth of Darkness

On the whole, this series hasn’t featured “bad guys”—largely, the antagonists have been people with competing visions for the way things ought to be. People who were trying their best, but who couldn’t understand their children (before and/or after their door)—and so on. A lot of people you don’t want to be around and you don’t want to see have much success as they are, but typically it’s possible to see where they’re coming from and why they do what they do (as much as you might object to it).

But in this book? There are a minimum of two evil characters. People that need to be stopped, and you sort of wish Toby Daye would make a cameo and do what she does best.

McGuire’s painted some bleak circumstances for her Wayward Children—but this seems bleaker (I haven’t spent a lot of time reviewing the older books, so I’m prepared to be corrected) and darker than we’re used to. There’s a period where you can forget that, where it almost feels like Antsy is out for a very long lark and everything will be a fun adventure.

I don’t know if this is a turning point and that we’ll see more books like this in the years to come. I doubt it—I think this is a story that needed to be told, but we’ll be back on more familiar ground—with a more familiar tone—soon.

So, what did I think about Lost in the Moment and Found?

This is clearly a personal story of McGuire (just read the Author’s note that precedes the text) and there’s a rawness to the writing that isn’t typical for this series (or McGuire, period). But it’s oh, so fitting.

I find myself slipping into misconceptions about this series—I enjoy the characters (so many of our protagonists are just loveable), the concept behind the series and West’s school, and so on—it’s easy to remember the nonsense worlds, the joy that characters frequently experience in finding a Door, going home, or leaving home that you forget that almost everyone goes through a Door from our world to get away from something. When I pause to write something like this or describe the series/a particular novella to someone—all of that comes rushing back. Only to be forgotten again until I start reading the next book.* Antsy’s situation is perhaps the most disturbing we’ve seen—and what she ultimately finds in the shop is equally (but in a very different way) unsettling.

* I hope I’m not alone in that, but I have to assume the rest of you are more careful in your reading/remembering.

The novella is not all dire and troubling—there’s a lot of fun to be had as we follow Antsy. The quick excursion to the lost animal department could’ve filled a novella or two. The reader might see some old friends out of the corner of their eye, too. Most importantly, there is hope. That last line is earned (as we’re told time and time again, nothing comes free), and is so reassuring.

Unsurprisingly, I recommend this book—unlike most in the series, I don’t think this would serve as a good entry point. It’s a good number 8 (these are all novellas, so reading eight of them isn’t that big of an investment). It’s raw, it’s unsettling (at the very least), it’s emotional, and it’s full of some of McGuire’s best prose. I’m sure those who’ve read 1-2 (or all seven) others don’t need me to say this, you’ve probably already read them. But for everyone else, it’s time to start reading these books.

4 1/2 Stars

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, the opinions expressed are my own.

REPOSTING JUST CUZ: The King of the Crows by Russell Day: Prescient. Gripping. Haunting. Unpredictable. What stories should be.

By HCNewton

On January 19, 2023

In Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, Russell Day

Things have gotten away from me today, so I don’t have anything new to share. But I’ve been thinking a lot about this book this week (I think about this book frequently, to be honest, but several times a day this week), so I figured I’d try to get others thinking about it, too. If you haven’t read this yet, you should strongly consider doing so, as I argue below. Incidentally, re-reading this now serves as a really good argument for me to adopt the current format of my posts using section headers and whatnot (I’d been rethinking them last week, but after this post? They’re sticking around)

King of the Crows

by Russell Day

Kindle Edition, 456 pg.
Fahrenheit Press, 2020

Read: April 28-May 9, 2020

… for me at least, the first week of the Lockdown was the worst.

Knowing it had happened to me. I hadn’t escaped, I wasn’t one of the lucky ones. Lucky to be safe or lucky to be dead. Take your pick. I was neither.

That right there gives you a pretty good idea what kind of light and fluffy read this is going to be.

There are two timelines in this story—the primary focuses on a post-pandemic London, while the other shows what happened to a couple of the characters mid-pandemic (with plenty of material describing what the pandemic was like for others). In the primary timeline, Europe is a disaster—a “wasteland”—and eight years after the Outbreak, it’s beginning to put itself back together. But it’s going to take a long, long time to recover from this. Don’t let the fact that “eight years after” this fictional outbreak is 2028 bother you at all.*

* Good luck with that. I’ll get back to this in a bit.

I’m not going to try to list all the various ways that Day uses to tell this story: I’m certainly going to forget several. So here’s a partial list: here’s a third-person 2028 narrator describing a police investigation, a first-person perspective on the same investigation; a first-person account of that same detective’s life during the Outbreak; selections from a screenplay made about a group of Londoners during the Outbreak; selections from the Outbreak-memoir of one of those Londoners; and third-person narration of the same (N.B.: these three will vary in telling ways); redacted 2028 prison correspondence about the Outbreak; excerpts from scholarly works on aspects of the Outbreak (including a very illuminating work on the slang of the time); graffiti from 2021; internet message boards. Day weaves these together to tell his story, build the world, and help you to understand it. Frequently, I read something from the 2028 timeline, and understood it—only to find a new depth to it several pages later after getting another piece of the puzzle from 2020/2021. It’s hard to juggle that many narrative forms/voices/perspectives/calendars as a reader or a writer—Day pulled it off better than I did (any problems I had following things I attribute to myself, and it was pretty easy to clear out my misunderstanding with a minimum of backtracking*). It definitely helps paint the picture of the scope and variety of effects the sickness had on the world more efficiently than a consistent first- or third-person narrative would be able to.

* This would be easier in hardcopy than on an e-reader in my opinion. But that’s just a guess.

There are times (several of them) when I felt that the characters were getting lost amongst the plot and worldbuilding and sickness. But when I stopped and thought about it—and eventually got to the point where I didn’t have to—I realized I had a pretty solid idea about who these people were and was more invested in them than I expected. I thought there was so much going on that the people were getting hidden, but really, Day’s work was subtle—working in the characters into my subconscious like you give a dog its medicine. Normally, this isn’t something I require (or would like)—and it’s not Day’s usual M. O. (quite the opposite), but I think this approach really fit the novel and the story/world.

“They weren’t zombies,” he says, softly. “Don’t call them zombies.”

No one who was involved in the Outbreak for real uses the zee word.

So exactly what was the sickness?

I remember reading a couple of years ago about these ants that would succumb to a fungus which would short-circuit their brain and make them do certain things before killing them—or something like that, vague memories here. Then there were stories about parasites controlling the host’s actions—both of these stories had their 15 seconds of fame on social media around the same time (I may be messing the details up a little bit, but I’m not writing history here).

In Day’s world, one of these kinds of parasites will reside—asymptomatically, I should stress—in cats, who would pass it on to humans. Skipping the details, the humans would get very sick and then, survivors would maybe succumb to a psychosis that would make them violent. This sickness, HV-Tg (Human Variant-Toxo gondii), in a little more than a year would kill more than 20 million in Europe (at least 33% of France’s population) Et voilà!—an easy to believe pandemic that results in Zombie-like people wandering around.

Now, if one of those who’d “switched” and become violent infected you during an assault, well, you were likely to succumb. There were enough of these (“psychos” or “Gonzos”), and the sickness was so widespread, that the police and military couldn’t keep up, that civilians were forced to take action and defend themselves, their family and neighbors. People quickly forming into gang-like associations for mutual protection. It was a literal kill-or-be-infected (and likely killed) situation.

One such association became known as The Crows or The Kings of the Crows. They developed a legendary status mid-and post-Outbreak—and are the subjects of the memoir and film mentioned above. One of their number who happened to survive (and gain notoriety enough to get a publishing deal for a memoir) is the subject of the 2028 investigation. They survived the worst of the worst in one of the hardest-hit cities. They did so via means and methods that many (including their own) would find deplorable, but under circumstances that not only permitted, but required, those actions.

We also see what happens to an American in Paris for work when the Outbreak reaches the point that International travel is canceled (particularly to the U.S.). Her allies will never be considered the Kings of anything, and the contrast between how she survives to what the Crows do is pretty striking.

In 2028…eh…you know what? You should read that for yourself. I’m going to say something I’ll regret.

The biggest killer in those days wasn’t the disease or the psychos, it was stupidity.

However, it has been pointed out by many historians, logic was one of the first casualties of the Outbreak.

Some of the best moments of this book have nothing to do with advancing the plot, they’re little bits showing what the world of the Gondii-pandemic looks like. The man telling the story about taking his girlfriend to the ER because of a burn—how they were treated, and how she became infected. The soldiers coming back from a Middle East deployment being completely unprepared for what had happened to their home country. The mother and son who traveled with the Crows for awhile.

Ultimately, it’s not the story you think you’re getting…or is it? The marketing tag line is, “Ocean’s Eleven meets 28 Days Later.” It is, all things considered, a good, catchy line. I’m not sure it’s all that accurate a description of the novel (but it’s not inaccurate). What it is, really slides up on you—and when you see it it feels like it was obvious all along (even if you wouldn’t have said that 20 pages earlier). There’s a straightforward crime story at the heart of this novel—it’s just surrounded by so many layers, that you can miss it—there’s the sickness, there’s the horrible social and political context (both mid- and post-Outbreak), there’s what the characters are going through otherwise—and the whole thing is drenched in social commentary about 2020 society, e.g., sexism, economics, medical care.

And that’s not even touching the context we’re reading it in now. I truly wonder what I’d think of this book if I’d read it last Fall. I’d still like it, I’d still be impressed by it—but I don’t know if it would resonate with me the same way. There’s almost nothing about Gondii that’s comparable to COVID-19. But the way that people and governments respond—well, that’s pretty different, too. but if you can’t see what’s going on around us reflected in this novel? You’re not paying attention. That Day appears so prescient says something about his skill and observation (and a lot about Western culture, too).

I can see why people cling to the idea that the Gonzos were trying to tell us something. Something’s out there trying to get a message through: there’s a plan. Compared to the idea that it was all just chance, it’s a comfort of a type. Chance doesn’t care and can’t be appeased and can’t be reasoned with. Chance means it could all happen again.

5 Stars

The Friday 56 for 1/13/23: Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire

By HCNewton

On January 13, 2023

In Currently Reading, Fantasy, Fiction, News/Misc., Quotations, Seanan McGuire, The Friday 56, Wayward Children

This is a weekly bloghop hosted by Freda’s Voice.

RULES:
The Friday 56 Grab a book, any book.
Turn to Page 56 or 56% on your ereader. If you have to improvise, that is okay.
Find a snippet, short and sweet.
Post it.

from Page 56 of:
Lost in the Moment and Found

Lost in the Moment and Found by Seanan McGuire

On the other side of the door, where the shop should have been, a jungle stretched all the way to the horizon, fat, round-trunked trees dripping with vines and flowers, their twisting branches reaching for the sky like the spread fingers of enormous hands. Something moved in the deep foliage, and brightly colored birds perched on the vines, clacking their beaks and calling to each other at the sight of her.

It wasn’t possible. It wasn’t logical. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real.

Antsy stepped through the door. Only one foot; she was at least clever enough to leave her other foot solidly on the wooden floor of the thrift store. One of the vast, bright-petaled flowers was close enough for her to lean over and pluck it before retreating back through the door and closing it behind her. The flower didn’t disintegrate when pulled into the thrift store. It remained in her hand, bright and blooming, petals almost the same color as a good, ripe watermelon.

She stared at it, trying to understand how this could be happening.

My Favorite Non-Crime Fiction of 2022

By HCNewton

On January 5, 2023

In Ben Aaronovitch, Faith Hunter, Fantasy, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, Harry Connolly, Jane Yellowrock/Soulwood, John Scalzi, News/Misc., Science Fiction, The War Arts Saga, Twenty Palaces, Urban Fantasy, Wesley Chu

2023 Favorite Non-Crime
Back when I started this site, I knew the content would be largely “genre”-oriented. I’d have wagered the content would be roughly 1/3 Mystery/Detective fiction, 1/3 Urban Fantasy, and slightly less than 1/3 SFF, with “non-genre” fiction, humor, and non-fiction being enough to make my one-thirds just an approximation (honestly, if you asked me what I read regularly, that’s pretty much how I’d describe it today). Actual numbers show that’s wrong—it’s almost 40% Crime/Thriller Fiction, the rest of fiction is around 30% combined. Which is just a long-winded way to get to these two points: because Crime Fiction takes such a big chunk of my reading, it gets its own “Favorite” list, but none of the others really garner enough numbers for their own.

When it comes to this list of favorites, I had to choose—top five or top eleven. There are six I just couldn’t choose between—but hey, it’s my list, so here are my favorite 11 non-Crime Fiction Novels of 2022. It took me very little time to regret trying to write anything new about these books—I’m supposed to cover these in a measly paragraph? I borrow from my original posts, and really say less than I wanted to (or this post would be about 5 times as long as it is).

As always, re-reads don’t count—only the works that were new to me.

(in alphabetical order by author)

Amongst Our Weapons

by Ben Aaronovitch

My original post
Any installment in this series is a strong contender for a favorite of the year even before I open it, and this one is a great example of why. While telling a pretty strong story, Aaronovitch expands this world and the reader’s understanding of it, a whole new magic system, and seemingly introduces the next major story arc for the series. We get to see almost every major (and more than a few minor) characters, too. For a fan, this book was a heckuva treat.

4 1/2 Stars

Wistful Ascending

by JCM Berne

My original post
This novel—a Space Opera/Super-Hero mashup—hit just about every button I have and probably installed a couple of new ones (talking space bears, for example). If I try to expand on that I’m not going to shut up anytime soon. Read my original post—or just read the book.

4 1/2 Stars

The Veiled Edge of Contact

by James Brayken

My original post
Brayken’s debut surprised me more times than I thought was possible. Every time I thought I knew what direction Brayken was taking for the story, the protagonist (or major characters), tone, or even genre—he’d make a sharp turn and make the book better than I thought it was. I have questions and qualms about some aspects of the novel—but this is going down as a highlight of 2022 anyway.

4 Stars

The Art of Prophecy

by Wesley Chu

My original post
In my original post, I said, “I don’t know that I can really express how excited I am about this book. The last time I was this enthusiastic about a Fantasy novel was Kings of the Wyld, and I’ve read some really good Fantasy since then. But this is a whole different level.” It features my favorite new-to-me-character of the year. It’s just a glorious read. I’ve read (and enjoyed) a lot of Chu’s previous work and this is so far beyond those that it’s hard to describe.

5 Stars

The Iron Gate

by Harry Connolly

My original post
Every Twenty Palaces novel is better than the last—and The Iron Gate is no exception. This novel is a better version of everything Connolly has delivered before. We get character growth in a character I’d have considered pretty unchangeable, a dynamite plot (two, actually), and a disturbing monster to boot. There’s just so much to commend here—both for this novel and what it promises for the future.

4 1/2 Stars

The Part About the Dragon Was (Mostly) True

by Sean Gibson

My original post
This is not a book to read if you’re in a “find out what happened and get to the end of the story” frame of mind. This is a “enjoy the trip, not the destination”/”stop and smell the roses” kind of book. The destination/what happens is fully satisfying, but the getting-there is so much better. This Fantasy/Comedy sends up and celebrates so many Fantasy mainstays that fans (and detractors) of the genre will have a blast on that front alone. The cast of characters is a blast and the protagonist, the bard Heloise, is even better.

4 Stars

Final Heir

by Faith Hunter

My original post
The fifteenth Jane Yellowrock novel was the series finale and the series went down the way it should—with a lot of heart, a lot of love, a lot of violence, and so many buckets of blood. I’ve been reading these for so long that I really didn’t want to see the series end (but it was time). From the jaw-dropping first chapter to the last lines that genuinely made me misty, Final Heir was a great ride.

5 Stars

The Kaiju Preservation Society

by John Scalzi

My original post
This book delivers all the ridiculous fun that the title (and premise) promises. Scalzi calls it a pop song, I tend to compare it to a popcorn movie. It’s not meant to provoke thought, to be pondered over, or analyzed. It’s meant to be enjoyed, it’s meant to be light and entertaining. Consider this me writing on the literary equivalent of a bathroom stall, “For a good time…”

5 Stars

Station Eternity

by Mur Lafferty

My original post
A Murder Mystery set on a living Space Station with only three human characters surrounded by some of the strangest alien species you’ve seen (those three humans are pretty odd, too). This novel is one for mystery fans open to aliens walking around, SF fans interested in a different kind of story, and readers who like good things. Social commentary, a twisty narrative, a clever mystery, and more chuckles than I expected to get from this. An inventive read that’ll leave you wanting more.

4 Stars

Theft of Swords

by Michael J. Sullivan

My original post
Multiple people over the years have told me to read this book (some multiple times). I finally did, and regret not paying attention to them earlier. It’s more “traditional” Fantasy than the others on this list, there’s almost nothing that someone who’s read/watched a handful of fantasy series hasn’t been exposed to before. It’s the way that Sullivan has assembled these tried and true elements that is going to make you happy. The sword fights are fantastic. The imagination showed in the magic system, the magical creatures, and the politics—between races, within the remnants of the human empire, and the ecclesiastical politics—are really well conceived and effectively portrayed. I can’t wait to dive into the rest of the trilogy.

4 1/2 Stars

Adult Assembly Required

by Abbi Waxman

My original post
This novel starts in the same bookstore that Nina Hill works in, and she’s around a lot—but this isn’t her book. It’s the story of a woman who moved across the country to start her life over, and the results aren’t what she expected. Adult Assembly Required is funny, it’s sweet, it’s heartwarming, and will make you feel good all over. It’s full of the Waxman magic.
5 Stars

The Neil Gaiman at the End of the Universe (Audiobook) by Arvind Ethan David, Neil Gaiman, Jewel Staite: Let’s Keep this Short and Sweet

By HCNewton

On January 4, 2023

In Audiobook, Neil Gaiman, Science Fiction

The Neil Gaiman at the End of the Universe

by Arvind Ethan David, Neil Gaiman (Narrator), Jewel Staite (Narrator)

DETAILS:
Publisher: Audible
Publication Date: March 18, 2021
Format: Audible Original
Length: 29 min.
Read Date: December 28, 2022

This is a short story, so I’m not going to keep this short and sweet. Let’s go with a Pros and Cons list:

Pros	Cons
Satisfying SF Story Jewel Staite Neil flippin’ Gaiman	Sound effects that are effective, but a little too loud

It’s 29 minutes of entertaining goodness.

’nuff said.

4 Stars

Scattered Showers: Stories by Rainbow Rowell: Some People Want to Fill the World with Silly Love Stories

By HCNewton

On December 30, 2022

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, Rainbow Rowel

Scattered Showers: Stories

by Rainbow Rowell, Jim Tierney (Illustrator)

DETAILS:
Publisher: Wednesday Books
Publication Date: November 7, 2022
Format: Hardcover
Length: 282 pg.
Read Date: December 26-27, 2022

He huffed out a laugh. “I thought you said no to prom because you didn’t want to ruin everything.”

“What’s everything?” She was still whispering.

“You and me. Friendship.”

“I don’t,” she said. “But I’d rather we ruin it together than you ruin it with somebody else.”

What’s Scattered Showers About?

This is the first collection of short stories by Rainbow Rowell—nine stories, four of which had been previously published.

They are, at their core, love stories—the beginning of a relationship, the change of a relationship, the maintaining of one—and a couple that are harder to define. Rowell’s signature style and sweetness fills these pages—her light humor and propensity for happy endings, too. (propensity, not universal practice)

Checking In On Old Friends

With three of these stories, Rowell revisits characters from previous novels. We get to see some of the primary characters from Attachments in “Mixed Messages,” and a character from Fangirl in “If the Fates Allow,” and some of the characters from the Simon Snow trilogy (and, I guess, from Fangirl, too?).

I didn’t get into the Simon Snow stuff in Fangirl (and even skipped most of it) and didn’t bother with those books—but I liked the fact that Rowell did revisit some of her previous work. (I do wish we’d gotten to see Eleanor and/or Park, but am pretty sure that I’d have been annoyed at whatever she told us about them, so I’m glad she didn’t include anything about them).

Now, it’s not essential that you’re familiar with the characters in these stories to enjoy them. I don’t honestly remember who Reagan was from Fangirl (hey, it was 9 years ago, cut me some slack), but I quite enjoyed this story featuring her. I did remember the characters from Attachments, but I don’t think it enhanced my appreciation of that story—but it was nice to see a little about what’s gone on with them.

The Illustrations

Opposite the first page of each story is a full-page illustration, sort of a cover image. There are also some accent illustrations scattered throughout the stories. They were attractive and fitting to the stories. I’m not sure that they added much to the book, but I did think they were nice touches.

So, what did I think about Scattered Showers?

I’m a sucker for Rowell’s love stories, and had a lot of fun with these.* When she’s not writing about teen wizards, I have a hard time resisting her work (and don’t find much inclination to try).

* Okay, true to form, I skipped “Snow for Christmas” after the first page and a half didn’t intrigue me at all.

Out of her norm were two stories: one that’s a strange fairy-tale of sorts that I found strangely appealing, but I’m not sure how to talk about it. The closing story is about some characters who’ve taken up residence in an author’s subconscious or imagination, while they wait for the author to put them into a story or novel. I thought this was a fantastic story—Pirandello-esque, but with a Rowell-twist.

All in all, this was a very pleasant way to spend a couple of hours.

3.5 Stars

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, the opinions expressed are my own.

Radio Radio by Ian Shane: A Tom Petty Song in Novel Form

By HCNewton

On December 27, 2022

In General Fiction/Literature, Ian Shane

Radio Radio

by Ian Shane

DETAILS:
Publication Date: July 17, 2008
Format: eBook
Length: 253 pg.
Read Date: December 7-8, 2022

And there goes the last DJ
Who plays what he wants to play
And says what he wants to say
Hey hey hey
And there goes your freedom of choice
There goes the last human voice
And there goes the last DJ

Sure, that’s Tom Petty and not Ian Shane. But I had that song stuck in my head for almost the entire novel, they might as well be writing about the same guy.

What’s Radio Radio About?

Erik Randall is a DJ—that’s all he’s ever wanted to do. He loves being on the radio, sharing music with whatever corner of the world he can. He comes alive on the microphone, he seems to be good at the technical bits, and he loves the medium. What it has been, what it is, what it could be—but he’s very much not a fan of what it’s becoming.

He’s a True Believer, though, and is convinced that if given the opportunity, radio can still be great. He’s even formulating a plan so that one day, he can make at least one station great.

We don’t meet him on that day—in fact, shortly after we meet him, his station comes under the thumb of a corporation that makes cookie-cutter stations all over the country. In the same way you know what you’re going to be served at an Olive Garden in a different state from home, you know what you’re going to hear on the radio in your rental car once you hear a familiar station tagline. That’s what they’re going to turn his radio station into.

About the same time, he meets a local singer/songwriter, Myra. Erik’s still reeling from a semi-recent breakup and isn’t in the right frame of mind to think about romance—but she’s the kind of woman he’s dreamed about. His co-worker/friend, Shakespeare, has been pushing him for months to date again, and once Shakespeare meets Myra, he increases the pressure.

His professional life is falling apart, his personal life is looking promising for the first time in forever—can Erik handle it?

So, what did I think about Radio Radio?

I thought there was something grating—something blindly immature about Erik’s attitude and antics at work. Yes, he’s firmly in the model of the rebel DJ who cares more about the art than the business side. And as such, I can enjoy the character. Maybe it’s because I’m reading this through the eyes of someone in 2022 so I have 14 years of insight to know just how Quixotic Erik is being and how reality is going to hit him hard. Shakespeare, on the other hand, I could get behind—he’s a realist. There’s a romantic streak in him—he wants Erik and his vision to have a chance, but he knows better. I was enjoying the novel, but I really wasn’t on board with it. Which isn’t to say I didn’t find Erik amusing—I just found him a grating sort of amusing.

But then, Myra comes on the scene and two things happen. Erik starts to change, the bits of his personality that grate on me get pushed to the background.* Secondly, Ian Shane writes this stuff really well—like the way that Erik and Myra interact, the way that Erik makes an utter fool of himself because of her, the way that Myra and Shakespeare interact—this is where Shane’s later novels shine, and you can see him building that ability here. If this was the first Ian Shane book I read, shortly after Myra comes on the scene is where I’d order his next two books.

* I am fine with a protagonist grating on me—as long as there’s something about them or their story I can get behind. But I prefer the alternative.

I should also note, that some of Erik’s work attitudes and behaviors remind me of other characters in similar situations—the works of Adam Shaw, Matthew Hanover, and Andy Abramowitz jump to mind—so I’m not trying to say that Shane messed up by having Erik be this way. I just find it grating. What he does and says are, by and large, what an immature twenty-something would think and do. As he is an immature twenty-something, he’s spot-on.

Speaking of needing to grow up a little—a lot of the ways he approaches the big changes he needs to make, the conversations around them, and the way he reacts to people like Shakespeare making those changes himself, displays that immaturity. In those cases, I find it endearing and relatable.

Maybe I’m just the office crank? Out of the office issues don’t bother me as much.

One other challenge for me is that like with Postgraduate, I felt like Shane was judging me for my musical taste. And he probably should—because my musical taste not the kind of thing that Erik Randal (or anyone at Championship Vinyl) would approve of—very I’m fairly plebian, really. Frankly, I’m okay with that—and I did make a note or two to follow up on some music. I do wish I could hear Myra’s stuff, because I think I could get into it. That’s not a reflection on the novel, I just wish Shane would write a character with mainstream taste who is seen in a positive light.

This is a sweet book—there’s good character development, a strong cast of supporting characters (most of whom I didn’t mention) that I would love to see again in some form, great banter, solid comedy in a variety of forms, insight into an industry I know practically nothing about, and a sweet and well-told romantic story. It’s not as strong as his later novels, but it’s easy to see that he’ll be capable of greatness. Buy this book, it’ll make you happy.

4 Stars

No Plan B by Lee Child and Andrew Child Is Good Enough

By HCNewton

On December 7, 2022

In Jack Reacher, Lee Child, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

No Plan B

by Lee Child, Andrew Child (Narrator)

DETAILS:
Series: Jack Reacher, #27
Publisher: Delacorte Press
Publication Date: October 24, 2022
Format: Hardcover
Length: 357 pg.
Read Date: December 1-3, 2022

…maybe the others were right. With Reacher running around out there, maybe the full ceremony isn’t the smart way to go. Maybe It’s time we switched to Plan B.”

“We don’t have a Plan B, We’ve never needed one.”

“Maybe it’s time to think of one.”

What’s No Plan B About?

Reacher sees something in a newspaper about a museum display nearby, so he goes to check it out. This leads to him being in just the right neighborhood to see someone being pushed in front of a bus. While others are calling 911 and trying to tend to the victim, Reacher pursues the pusher. This leads to a confrontation where Reacher’s size works against him for once, and with the help of his partner, the man gets away (a Tom Cruise-sized character probably would’ve got at least one of them). Before they slipped away, Reacher got a glimpse of something the man took off the victim that made him curious.

That glance starts a whole machine working—that man, his partner, and their bosses can’t have what he saw become public. They don’t know how much time he got with the information, how much he read/understood—but if he saw anything, it could make things go very wrong for them. So they dispatch another team to take care of Reacher (the two that escaped aren’t in any shape to do anything after tangling with our hero).

Meanwhile, Reacher tries to convince the police that the woman had been pushed. But there’s already a witness who’d been swearing she jumped, and no one confirms what Reacher saw. The detective in charge sympathizes with Reacher and wants to follow up on his statement, but his superiors like the tidy answer a suicide brings. He feeds Reacher a bit of information, and the former M.P. is off on his own investigation. When the new team tries to take him out, Reacher knows he’s on to something and digs in for the long haul. This will take him from Colorado to a small town in Georgia, home to a prison the murder victim worked at.

Two other parties are making a trip to that same town. One is a teen who just learned that his father is imprisoned there—in the same conversation that he learned his father’s identity from his dying mother. He steals some money from his foster mother (money that should’ve been used to care for him, I should note) and buys a bus ticket from LA. He’s in over his head, and as we follow him on his journey it becomes clear that the fact that he survives long enough to get to Georgia is a sign of divine blessing or dumb luck.

We also track a father out for revenge. He’s a professional arsonist—actually, he employs professional arsonists at this point in his career. Something happened that killed his son—the details are kept vague for the reader. The grieving father backtracks the supply chain that provided the product, determined to destroy the man at the top.

So, what did I think about No Plan B?

After last year’s Better Off Dead, I was prepared to put this collaboration/Reacher 2.0 in the “Not for Me” category. I’m glad that the brothers continue to have success, and that many, many readers are satisfied, but it might be time for me to disembark. I wanted to give them one more chance—everyone has an off-novel, right?—but I’d decided that this would be my last Reacher novel. This was good enough to get the brothers another. I guess my fandom is no longer a long-term lease, but the equivalent of a month-to-month rental.

One strategy I employed going into this was ignoring half of the names on the cover—this is an Andrew Grant/Child take on Reacher, not a Lee Child*. That adjustment to my expectations, helped a bit, too.

* I’ve heard and seen multiple interviews/features on the pair describing how they work together, so I know it’s not entirely true. But, it helped me.

The action was good—but hallway fights might be better left to Daredevil than print. I wondered for most of the book if they had one too many storylines, but I ended up buying into the idea. The first hundred pages were great (at least the Reacher vs. conspirators storyline, and maybe the foster kid)—particularly the first couple of chapters, it was a very effective hook. Pages 100-300 were good enough—some “meh” bits, enough good bits to keep me engaged and to push the narrative along, with a really nice uptick over the last chapter or two. The last 50 pages were rushed—you want things to move quickly in the end of the thriller, you need fast action to go along with the adrenaline of the big finish—but this was just too much happening, and it was hard to appreciate it all. There’s a fast momentum, and there’s careening out of control, and this came close to that.

Still, it was in those pages that I came around to liking the revenge storyline and getting why the Childs went with it.

This was a decent thriller with some really good moments featuring a character that reminded me a lot of that guy from 61 Hours, The Hard Way, and One Shot. It’s a fast, entertaining read that will do the job.

3 Stars

This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, the opinions expressed are my own.

Dead Lions by Mick Herron: An Overdue Read for Me, the Best of Both Worlds for Spy Fiction Fans

By HCNewton

On December 5, 2022

In Mick Herron, Slough House

Dead Lions

by Mick Herron

DETAILS:
Series: Slough House, #2
Publisher: Soho Crime
Publication Date: May 7, 2013
Format: Paperback
Length: 347 pg.
Read Date: November 21-24, 2022

…whatever we’re here for, Lamb’s not being punished. Or if he is, he’s enjoying it.”

“So what’s your point?”

He said, “That he knows where some bodies are buried. Probably buried a few himself.”

“Is that a metaphor?”

“I failed English. Metaphor’s a closed book to me.”

“So you think he’s handy?”

“Well, he’s overweight and drinks and smokes and I doubt he takes much exercise that doesn’t involve picking up a phone and calling out for a curry. But yeah, now you mention it, I think he’s handy.”

“He might’ve been once,” Shirley said. “But there’s not much point in being handy if you’re too slow to be any good at it.”

But Marcus disagreed. Being handy was a state of mind. Lamb could wear you down just standing in front of you, and you wouldn’t know he was a threat until he was walking away, and you were wondering who’d turned the lights out. Just Marcus’s opinion, of course. He’d been wrong before.

“I suppose,” he said, “if we stick around long enough, we might find out.”

Squirrel!

I read the first book in this series over 2 1/2 years ago. Since then, my friend Paul has been hounding me, nagging me, and generally pushing me to keep reading them. Insisting that I’m missing out. Etc. Etc. Etc. While I suspected he was right—and even if he wasn’t, I wanted to based on Slow Horses and everything I’d heard from Paul, Jeff at Barbican Station, and from several other fronts.

But we all know how easily distracted I can be. So…here we are 45 months later. And I know when I post this I’m going to get at least one text from Paul, saying things like: “I told you so!” and “It’s about time.”

I deserve both of those messages because he did tell me so; and yes, it is.

What’s Dead Lions About?

Jackson Lamb gets suspicious when an old, low-ranking spy from the Cold War era dies on a public bus. He follows Dickie Bow’s last movements and finds reason to indulge that hunch a little longer, bringing in one of Slough House’s new additions to do some more legwork. What they find doesn’t make him any happier—a bogey-man from the old days might be back. And that can’t be good.

Meanwhile, Spider—pardon me, James—Webb recruits Louisa Guy and Min Harper to help him with a little project he’s got going on. He’s trying to recruit a Russian oligarch—one with political aspirations—as an asset, and he needs some security work done by people who won’t get the attention of any of the bigwigs in MI5. Neither wants to work with Webb, but if they do, there’s a chance…not much of one…but a chance that at least one of them will be the first Slow Horse to move back to Regent’s Park. Both of them are ready to be that one—even at the expense of the other, no matter what relationship might be budding between the two of them.

Best of Both Worlds

While I have an appreciation for British Cold War Spy novels—they’re really not my thing. I’ve tried, both in print and on film—and they just don’t work. But that’s the kind of world that River’s grandfather, O.B., represents—and that Tavener and Lamb represent the end of. They have one foot in that world still, it defines them—but they’re both (especially Tavener) also part of the War on Terror, financial crimes/terrorism, etc. of our current moment. River, Ho, and the rest of the Slow Horses belong to the latter.

What this book does so well is to marry the two schools—we have a very Cold War holdover storyline, and a Putin-era storyline. Now, I can’t imagine that Herron is going to be able to pull this off regularly, but getting to do it in the second novel, solidifying the series’ identity as being able to work in both eras. I thought that was a great move that welcomes in fans of both eras of British Spy Fiction.

So, what did I think about Dead Lions?

So, back in 2019 when I read Slow Horses, I liked it and was impressed by it, but I only gave it 3 Stars. When I listened to the audiobook last year, I think I “got” what Herron was doing a little more. But I still wasn’t as impressed with this as everyone I knew seemed to be. I’m fine with that, but I wondered a bit if I was missing something.

I think I found whatever it was in the pages of Dead Lions. Because…wow. Herron does it all here—there’s some satire, there’s commentary on human existence, on the politics (and espionage) of the Cold War, on the politics (and espionage) of the 2000s, a real and slowly-building tension, there’s subtle wit, less-than-subtle wit, a plot that is impossible to predict, characters that are the most human you’ll find in spy fiction, dialogue and narration that are impossible not to endlessly quote…and fart jokes.

One lesson that readers of the first book should’ve picked up is that they shouldn’t get attached to anyone—look at the number of people assigned to Slough House at the beginning of the book and then at the end. Percentage-wise, it’s safer to be a George R.R. Martin character. Herron ensures that no reader of Dead Lions thinks that’s a fluke. Right now (and I’m ready to be disproven), I figure the only safe characters are Jackson Lamb and (sadly) James Webb—he seems to have the survival capabilities of a hardy cockroach.

Herron surprised me on multiple occasions—I think at this point, I’m going to just permanently suspend my reflex to predict what’s coming when I spend time with him. They weren’t just surprises—they were the kind that I absolutely didn’t even think of expecting—and then in retrospect, I don’t know how I could’ve imagined anything else happening at all.

From time to time, TV Critic Alan Sepinwall will recap an episode saying things like “if we only got X, that would be enough. If we only got Y, that would be enough,” and so on. I felt like that while thinking about this book. If we only got Lamb tracking the final movements of Dickie Bow, that would’ve been enough. If we only got the Louisa Guy/Min Harper storyline, that would’ve been enough. If we only got the Diana Tavener/Jason Webb scene, that would’ve been enough. If we only got River Cartwright going undercover, and everything he goes through…you see where I’m going. Any one of those would’ve been enough for me to realize I need to take this series seriously and get on with reading them all. You combine these points with all those that I decided not to list for space/spoiler reasons? I’m on the verge of being rabid.

Everything I thought was a bug about Slow Horses was a feature, and I see that now. Everything I thought was a fluke about Slow Horses wasn’t. Everything I thought was good about Slow Horses was at least a little bit great. How do I know that? I see all of those elements here and have a much better appreciation for them in Dead Lions so I can better understand its predecessor.

I had other things in my notes that I really wanted to cover. But…I’ve said the essentials, and am at the point where I’m trying to gild an already gilded lily. So, I’m going to leave all that unsaid. Yes, I may have overhyped this and doomed you to not appreciate it. I get that and apologize in advance. Just chalk this up to a new and rabid fanboy—go into this series expecting something good. And then when you’re ready to join the rabid throng, I’ll be waiting for you.

And now, I’ve got to start waiting for messages from Paul.

5 Stars
This post contains an affiliate link. If you purchase from it, I will get a small commission at no additional cost to you. As always, the opinions expressed are my own.