Category: Fiction Page 190 of 348

A Few (more) Quick Questions With…Devri Walls

On June 3, 2019

In A Few Quick Questions With..., Fantasy, Fiction, Venators, YA/MG/Children's Books

Ages ago (it seems), Devri Walls stopped by to talk about her stand-alone The Wizard’s Heir, and gave us a little taste of her upcoming series, Venators (including a cover that I don’t think I ever saw again). Since then, I’ve actually spoken to her at book store events and a comic convention (sat in on a couple of her panels, too). At the book launch for her most recent book, Venators: Promises Forged, (see my earlier post) she did a Q&A that got a couple of questions percolating in the back of my mind. Before I knew it, I had enough for one of these posts and Devri was able to find a time to answer them.

Before I get to the Q&A, a word about that book launch — Devri seems to have a good number of solid fans, it’s encouraging to see — from a wide age-range, too. She had more people in the front row of her reading than were in the audience of the last reading I’d been to at Rediscovered Books (and that author had one of the major publishing houses behind him) — and she had some Facebook live viewers, too. It’s good to see an indie author getting that kind of support.

As is usual when I get a second shot with someone, we got a little more into details of the particular book/series in question—but I don’t think you have to be a Venators-reader to appreciate these answers. Check them out and then go grab her books.

You’ve talked about how everyone’s favorite character is Beltran (I demur), given his appeal/popularity—how hard is it to keep him from taking over the series? How are you going about that?

This book is different in that there really are a lot of main players. This is going to allow Beltran to have a large role, and you’re going to see him really stepping into that in book three. But yes, he cannot take over. I think the key when working with strong supporting characters is that although they can have a heavy-handed part in the story, at the end of the day, they can’t be the hero. They can assist the hero, they can motivate the hero, they can set up a hero, but they can’t actually “pull the trigger”, so to speak. Given who Beltran is this will be tricky, but it has to be done in order for the climax to feel satisfactory to the readers.

Let’s talk about names for a minute: there’s a lot of creativity and strangeness in names (up to Rune from Earth), but then you give us Tate. An oddly Earthy name. Is that just to mess with people? I’ve always wondered, but never asked anyone—how do you come up with character names? Is the process different per series/world/book?

This made me laugh! No, I was not trying to just mess with you. Although I will admit to giving the giant race ridiculously human names because it amused me. However I promise to keep it consistent. With Tate on the other hand, he is part Venator, which means he’s part human. It made sense to me that given the backstory of this world and its connection to earth that there would be human names floating around both in the human villages as well as the Venators.

When it comes to choosing names there is there rare occasion that I will just completely make a name up, but for the most part I lean heavily on baby name websites. People are ever disappointed when I give this answer because they think that we authors pull all of these things out of our heads. The thing I looove about the baby name websites is that I can sort the results. For example, I can choose to look at old Scottish names specifically or only Norse names. This allows me to keep a consistent feel through an entire story, or in a book like Venators, a consistent feel within different species.

Normally before I even start a book I will visit baby name websites. Trying to choose names is both a time suck and a momentum killer for me. If I have a list of names both male and female that I have decided I like ready to go, then I have a very short list to reference when I add a new character.

Talk to me a little more about Arwin the wizard. First, how am I not supposed to think about Liv Tyler/the Lady of Rivendell? Secondly, the brilliant character who probably knows more about what’s going on than anyone, but plays the doddering, clumsy fool is a mainstay. How hard is it to pull that character off convincingly? And why have you gone that route with him—is it just because that’s more interesting than the super-powerful, all-wise type?

I think anytime you’re working with a genre like fantasy there’s always going to be things that remind you of other stories. It’s, dare I say, almost unavoidable. But instead of fighting this, I did lean into the tropes on purpose. I wanted to play on the idea that all the stories and legends we tell today originated in Eon. In order to do that some of the threads needed to feel very familiar, while others I purposely twisted. Just like in the game telephone the end result will have some aspects of truth and some other things that have drifted far from the truth. That’s the basis that I was working from when deciding lore and chapter traits to keep or leave.

As far as Arwin’s character is concerned, I did choose to portray him as doddering very specifically. I needed to balance the story. When you look at the council you have a werewolf, vampire, incubus, succubus, elf, fae and wizard. From that list, three characters are very intense and serious. One of the characters is cruel and although she think she has a sense of humor, it’s dark and malevolent. Two of the characters have the ability to break tension in a scene but the sexual themes that run through that tension break is only sustainable for so long. And although all of these characters are much, much deeper than their facades, it’s the facades that they must present at the council house in order to keep themselves and their own people safe. Which means that by default every council scene will become unavoidably stifling. I needed someone to diffuse the situation and add a lightness to the writing. Thus, Arwin’s portrayal was born. Now, we are too early in the edits so I can’t guarantee that this scene will stay, but in book three we get a delightful taste of Arwin dropping that part of himself and showing the reader exactly what he is capable in a Council meeting by breaking up a argument between Dimitri and Silen. I think both you and the readers will be very happy with the result.

Now that you’ve told me about it, the scene has to stay. At the very least it needs to be included as a cut scene in an appendix. Or there will be rioting in the streets! (assuming I can figure out how to instigate one)

Can you tell me about the timeline for this series? A lot has happened in less than 2 weeks in Eon (assuming my memory/math is right), your poor characters have barely been able to catch their breath—are you planning on some kind of time jump? Is it going to keep going at this pace?

I’m a big believer in whatever timeline is natural and working for the story is the timeline that I’m going to use. Most of my work has always been a continual line without a lot of time jumping. For the first few books in the series I expect that will continue with small time jumps added to account for travel days. When we get past book five, I suspect we may need a time jump and some summarization of their day to day life when their world is not completely falling apart. But yes, overall I take it as it comes and I like a very logical and linear progression.

At the book launch, you talked a lot about what you’ve got worked out for the future in terms of plot and character—but I want to look at the world. How much of Eon have you mapped out (mentally or literally), do you know this world’s geography or is it more of a case of “I need an area like X, I’ll put it overrrrrr…here!”

Oh geography, I hate geography. Maps really do hurt my head. By happy accident I made a new writer friend who looooves making maps. So much so that she actually sat down with me and offered to map out the first general idea of Eon. It was very basic. However, as I’ve been writing book three and thinking through the plot points for the next couple of books, I realized that in order to set things up properly the geography absolutely had to be handled. Almost all of the council members areas have now been mapped out with the exception of Tashara and Shax for reasons I will explain in another book. But yes, there is actually a solid map on my wall now and despite the process causing me an aneurysm, I do really like the end result. Having something solid to refer to has been great. I definitely see the advantage to mapping things out at the start of the story and will probably move more toward doing that earlier in future projects.

I’m glad you were able to find some time in your hectic schedule for these answers and hope Promises Forged is a big success (and that you survive the editing process for #3!)

Venators: Promises Forged by Devri Walls: Out of the Frying Pan and into the . . . Clutches of a Life Siphoning Fae?

By HCNewton

On June 3, 2019

In Fantasy, Fiction, Venators, YA/MG/Children's Books

Venators: Promises Forged

by Devri Walls
Series: Venators, #2

Paperback, 428 pg.
Brown Books Publishing Group, 2019

Read: May 3 – 7, 2019

I’m about a month late with this one — every time I sat down to write it, I decided I wanted to chew on things a bit more (and then I arranged to do a Q&A with the author in conjunction with the post and so I bought myself some time to let things stew while she found time to get the answers done). Now that I have her answers in my inbox, I have no excuse to put this off. So, despite some of my thoughts still being half-baked, here we go…

And yes, that was one very convoluted series of food metaphors. That really doesn’t inspire a lot of confidence in this post, does it?

So the ending of the previous book (Venators: Magic Unleashed) focused on a dragon being unleashed by the series’ (apparent) Big Bad, the sorceress Zio. Not surprisingly, the series central characters survived the encounter. This book starts with a quick recap of that survival from the point of view of Zio — which is a great way to get the reader back into the moment and build on their understanding of what happened and Zio.

We quickly return to our Earthlings, Grey and Rune and the aftermath of their unauthorized excursion to rescue humans from a werewolf pack, which culminated in the aforementioned dragon attack. Rune’s proving to be a quick study of Council politics and was able to turn things to their advantage and buy them some leniency from the Council. The ways the two humans respond to and interact with Council members is pretty interesting and I suspect will be one of the more interesting developments from this point forward in the series. I suspect the Venator abilities that make these two the warriors they are in this world are in play with Rune’s politicking — no one mentions mental acuity when talking about Venator abilities, but maybe they should. Watching Rune play the games (both successfully and less-so) that the various Council members throw her way is probably my favorite part of the character.

And she has to do a lot of politicking and game playing here, because her co-Venator and friend Grey has found himself in quite the pickle. After their ordeal with the werewolves, the two Earthlings’ need for training was even more apparent. They get just a little of it (a good, promising start) before getting momentarily side-tracked. Before they get a chance to build on that, Grey is lured into the one place the two have been told they absolutely cannot go. Because forbidding people from going somewhere always works out (how many Hogwarts students stayed out of the forest? How long did Belle stay out of the West Wing? Even the Federation had to know that forbidding landing on Talos IV wouldn’t work for long).

Grey has found himself in the clutches of a powerful Fae, Feena. Feena will spend days/weeks/years sucking the life out of her prisoners to feed her own magics. Given that Grey is more powerful than your typical Eonian, you know she’ll drag it out as long as possible. It’s a torturous experience for Grey, but he does what he can to resist and fight back. On the one hand, watching him stupidly and blindly put himself in this situation was maddening. But after that, watching Grey endure what he has to and struggle in response is pretty cool. As much as I appreciate Rune’s playing politics, I enjoy watching Grey in action.

So the book boils down to this — can Rune get permission to run a rescue mission — or at the very least, find a window in which she can pull off another unauthorized mission? Can Grey survive long enough for the cavalry to arrive? Assuming they do, how can Grey be rescued and the Venators get back to their training without causing a diplomatic incident that will shake up everything?

The actions of the Venators’ guides, teachers, allies confuse me. They’ve got these two kids in a world they clearly don’t understand, with abilities they don’t understand and then expect them to react appropriately in new situations. Even worse, all of them are keeping things from Grey and Rune — telling them half-truths, deflecting legitimate questions and delaying explanations. It’s maddening. It’s bad enough that the Council, who are clearly only using these two for their own ends do that, but the people who supposedly are looking to them to change the world? A little honesty, being a little forthcoming, helping them to avoid the minefields they keep running into rather than saying “oh, you shouldn’t have done that” — it would make it a lot easier for this reader to stomach them.

The Council? I need to see more of them. I have little patience for them as individuals or as an entity at the moment, but as individuals and as an entity there’s great potential for something interesting to happen. Feena’s a good villain — she’s not worth several books, but for one novel? She’s a good opponent. The Fae? It’s simple — any universe, any world, any author — when it comes to Fae politics, Fae dealings with other Fae, Fae dealings with non-Fae? It’s complicated, tricky and messy. It’s good to know you can count on something.

So much is happening in a very short period of time, it’s hard to know what kind of impact the events are having on anyone — it’s been less than two weeks since these two jumped into this world, leaving St. Louis behind. It’s hard for them — or a reader — to really take it all in. We do know that already both Venators are changing because of their abilities (as well as the experiences in this new world) — both are self-aware enough to see how it’s happening (at least in part) and are both resisting and embracing the changes. Both are, naturally, deluded about how easy it will be to resist this kind of thing — denial’s not just a river on Earth.

I’m enjoying these books — I do hope that under the new publisher, they’re able to come out pretty regularly, it’ll help sustain my interest (and, I’m guessing, the reading public’s). I know that Walls has several more books planned, so it makes it okay that I’m still on the fence about the series as a whole — there’s a lot of potential to the series and these characters and she has time to help them reach their potential. There are aspects of the books (the prospective — and lingering — romantic entanglements, for example) that I’m withholding an opinion on until more happens. And I’m not sure if I should appreciate how little we’re getting with Zio and Rune’s brother, or if it should annoy me. Is Walls building suspense, or is she simply being obfuscatory? I’m hoping that after Book 3, I’ll be more settled with my expectations about these books — I know I’m enjoying them, I’m just not sure if I should wait on them getting better.

An interesting world, great characters (even if they frustrate me), good action — and a fast moving plot. This YA fantasy is a crowd pleaser, I’m sure of that — you should join the crowd.

—–

3.5 Stars

Don’t Panic by Neil Gaiman, David K. Dickson and MJ Simpson: An Indispensable Guide to Douglas Adams and his Work

By HCNewton

On May 31, 2019

In (Auto)Biography, A-B, Authors, Douglas Adams, Fiction, Neil Gaiman, Science Fiction, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

I’d intended to get this up and ready for Towel Day last week — but, obviously, I failed. Schemes once again, Gang aft a-gley. It’s pretty fitting, really that this is late.
—

Don’t Panic: Douglas Adams & The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Third Edition)

by Neil Gaiman; Additional Material by David K. Dickson & MJ Simpson
Series: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy (related)

Hardcover, 207 pg.
Titan Books, 2003
Read: May 22 – 23, 2019

The idea in question bubbled into Douglas Adams’s mind quite spontaneously, in a field in Innsbruck. He later denied any personal memory of it having happened. But it’s the story he told, and, if there can be such a thing, it’s the beginning. If you have to take a flag reading THE STORY STARTS HERE and stick it into the story, then there is no other place to put it.

It was 1971, and the eighteen year-old Douglas Adams was hitch-hiking his way across Europe with a copy of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to Europethat he had stolen (he hadn’t bothered ‘borrowing’ a copy of Europe on $5 a Day, he didn’t have that kind of money).

He was drunk. He was poverty-stricken. He was too poor to afford a room at a youth hostel (the entire story is told at length in his introduction to The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: A Trilogy in Four Parts in England, and The Hitchhiker’s Trilogy in the US) and he wound up, at the end of a harrowing day, flat on his back in a field in Innsbruck, staring up at the stars. “Somebody,” he thought, “somebody really ought to write a Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.”

He forgot about the idea shortly thereafter.

Five years later, while he was struggling to think of a legitimate reason for an alien to visit Earth, the phrase returned to him. The rest is history, and will be told in this book.

I distinctly remember purchasing the first edition of Don’t Panic from BookPeople of Moscow in the fall of 1991 — I remember being blown away by the idea that someone would write a book about Douglas Adams’ work. I had no idea who this Neil Gaiman fellow was, but I enjoyed his writing and loved the book he wrote — and read it several times. It was a long time (over 2 decades) before I thought of him as anything but “that guy who wrote the Hitchhiker’s book.” The Hitchhiker’s Trilogy had been a favorite of mine for years by that point, and getting to look behind the scenes of it was like catnip.

This is the third edition, and as is noted by Gaiman in the Forward, it “has been updated and expanded twice.” The completist in me would like to find a second edition to read the original 3 chapters added by David K. Dickson in 1993, but the important change was in 2002, when “MJ Simpson wrote chapters 27-30, and overhauled the entire text.” If you ask me, Gaiman’s name should be in the smaller print and Simpson’s should be the tall letters on the cover — but no publisher is that stupid, if you get the chance to claim that Neil Gaiman wrote a book, you run with it. Overhauled is a kind way of putting it — there’s little of the original book that I recognize (I’m going by memory only, not a side by side comparison). This is not a complaint, because Simpson’s version of the book is just as good as the original, it’s just not the original.

This is a little more than the story of The Hitchhiker’s Trilogy, but it’s certainly not a biography of Adams — maybe you could call it a professional biography. Or a biography of Adams the creator, which only touches upon the rest of his life as needed. Yes there are brief looks at his childhood, schooling, etc. But it primarily focuses on his writing, acting, producing and whatnot as the things that led to that revolutionary BBC Radio series and what happened afterward. Maybe you could think of it as the story of a man’s lifelong battle to meet a deadline and the lengths those around him would go to help him not miss it too much.

Once we get to the Radio series, it follows the The Hitchhiker’s Trilogy through each incarnation and expansion — talking about the problems getting it produced (in whatever medium we’re talking about — books, TV show, movie, stage show) and the content. Then the book discusses other Adams projects — Dirk Gently books, The Last Chance to See, his computer work, and other things like that.

It’s told with a lot of cheek, humor, and snark — some of the best footnotes and appendices ever. It’s not the work of a slavish fanboy (or team of them) — there are critical moments talking about problems with some of the books (some of the critiques are valid, others might be valid, but I demur). But it’s never not told with affection for the man or his work.

Don’t Panic is a must for die-hard fans — and can be read for a lot of pleasure by casual fans of the author or his work. I can almost promise that whatever your level of devotion to or appreciation of Adams/his work, it’ll increase after reading this. Any edition of this book should do — but this third edition is an achievement all to itself. Imagine someone being able to say, “I improved on Gaiman’s final draft.”

I loved it, I will return to this to read as well as to consult for future things I write about Adams, and recommend it without hesitation.

—–

5 Stars

The Flintstones, Vol. 1. by Mark Russell, Steve Pugh: A Yabba-Dabba-Doo time awaits the reader.

By HCNewton

On May 30, 2019

In Comics, Fiction

The Flintstones, Vol. 1.

by Mark Russell (Writer), Steve Pugh (Art)
Series: The Flintstones, #1

Paperback, 170 pg.
DC Comics, 2016

Read: May 27, 2019

Credit where credit’s due: If not for Paul’s Picks blog, I wouldn’t have even been aware this existed. I’m glad he blogged about it — I’d have missed out on something pretty unusual if he hadn’t.

This is a wildly inventive telling of The Flintstones for a contemporary age. Like the original Hanna-Barbera show, it’s written with an adult audience in mind — unlike the original show, it is not written with kids in mind. That was a strength of the original, and a weakness of the comic. Fred and Barney are war vets, dealing with the atrocities they witnessed (as are some others, but not as well). Mr. Slate’s an greedy, untrustworthy sort (he was probably that way in the cartoon, but he was at least funny). Pebbles and Bam-Bam are teens, but pretty much what you remember. Wilma’s a frustrated artist, Betty’s . . . well, Betty. Same for Dino.

Really, all the markers of the show are present — punny business/location names, animals-as-appliances that talk to each other, the ridiculous clothing choices for Fred and Barney. Russell uses our Modern Stone Age Family to make all sorts of social commentary (again, like the original) while telling pretty episodic stories about religion, marriage, war, consumerism, elitism, and aliens. Russell draws on the source material, but changes it as he sees fit, without mocking much about it — and while I have giant issues with his social commentary, I think it was the right way to go with this. But man . . . he started with a fairly joy-less perspective (but there was some sense of fun, some sense of play) and he got more series as the collection went on.

I mean . . . how do you not have fun with those folks from the town of Bedrock?

The real saving grace of this collection, the highlight is Pugh’s art. I simply love it — covers, panels, everything. I couldn’t get enough of it. I don’t know if there was a drawing anywhere in it that I didn’t think was in the neighborhood of perfect. And I don’t know how much credit Russell gets for background elements (store names, etc.), but since I don’t know, I’m going to give it all to Pugh. There sense of play, the sense of fun is present in his drawings (while not betraying the feel of the script). His character design was fantastic, the art was dynamic and he simply captivated me. But man, give Bam-Bam a haircut.

I appreciated the effort — and figure many people will appreciate it more than me — and I’m glad I read it. But I can’t help but feel that Russell squandered a bit of the opportunity. Still, a Yabba-Dabba-Doo time awaits the reader.

—–

3 Stars

Instant Karma by Todd Morr: Nasty, brutish, and short (I mean that as a compliment)

By HCNewton

On May 30, 2019

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

Instant Karma

by Todd Morr

Kindle Edition, 120 pg.
Fahrenheit 13, 2019

Read: May 24, 2019

Teller was the next to clue in, he sprung from his chair drawing his service revolver while Doyle started crawling for the back exit. The shooter was tall, wearing wraparound shades, a black baseball cap turned so it was shading the back of his neck, and a long leather trench coat. He had a gun in each fist, big semi-automatics with extended magazines. Teller was thinking this guy was an idiot, the kind of dumbass who thinks John Woo movies are documentaries, until he took two in the chest.

The gunman alternated firing each gun. Teller fell to floor and bounced the back of his head off the hard tile, putting him to sleep. Jones had just cleared his pistol when a bullet caught him in the shoulder, spinning him around. The next two bullets hit him in the back and sent him sprawling face first to the floor.

Nah, I didn’t give anything way (really). That’s at the 3% mark. The real action comes later. But that’s a good taste.

I hate being trite. I hate being cliche. I don’t want to say the same thing that everyone else in the world is saying. I don’t want to be the 3487^th person to say that Instant Karma is Tarantino-esque. But you read this book and not say something like that, I dare you (like Ralphie’s classmate, Schwartz, I’ll skip to the coup de grâce — I triple-dog-dare you to).

Let’s start with a underworld organization that may or may not exist — Instant Karma, Inc. (think of a West Coast Murder, Inc., with a smaller staff) and the intimidation (and worse) they inspire by maybe existing. Then you’ve got yourself an aging, but still vital, yakuzza Mr. Yasuda (called Mr. Burns by everyone not in his presence due to his age/resemblance to a certain Nuclear Plant owner) who disapproves of the man his daughter is sleeping with (and who expresses that disapproval in extreme fashion). That man is a disgraced ex-cop named Hondo, a security consultant for people like Mr. Yasuda/Burns. His daughter is an ex-kindergarten teacher who decided she was devoting her prime years to a bunch of annoying kids and decided to toss that career to the side to have fun and make bad choices (see: Hondo). Throw in a couple of cops who are hewing a little too close to the line; some people in Yasuda’s organization who want to make a name for themselves; a recovered addict and her pastor; and a lot (I mean a lot) of bullets and blood. Throw all that into a blender and this book comes out.

I want to keep this post as snappy as the book, so I’m not going to get bogged down in plot details — just know that there’s a few people just trying to stay alive and get a little bit of happiness in their lives, and there’s a whole lot of other people who are willing to stop them (and anyone else who’s in the way).

There’s a lot of humor in this book, as well as the action — some nice character moments and a lot of heart (frequently coming from directions you don’t expect). It’s also one of the most violent books I’ve read this year (actually, probably the most violent book this year to date). It’s about vengeance, hope, justice, love and a hope for a little bit of peace — but little of that is as flashy as all the violence.

I’m glad this weighs in at a slim 120 pages — I’m not sure I could’ve take much more. This is like a good double-shot of espresso — why waste time sipping a cup or two to get your caffeine fix? Knock back the 60 ml and move on with your day. This quick read feels all the quicker because of the pacing of the narrative, the action of the scenes and the smoothness of the prose — the adrenaline rush doesn’t hurt either. I’m not sure I can say enough good about it, actually. I had a blast, and bet that you will, too.

Okay, I’ll stop now and get out of the way so that the the 3488^th Tarantino comparison can get underway.

—–

4 Stars

COVER REVEAL: Death Will Find Me by Vanessa Robertson

By HCNewton

On May 28, 2019

In Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, News/Misc.

Welcome to The Irresponsible Reader’s part in the Cover Reveal for Vanessa Robertson’s Death Will Find Me — although, guessing by the people taking part in this Reveal, geography/time zones, etc. at this point, it’s more of a Cover Confirmation. Still, welcome. Pretty pictures ahead.

But first, some words. In particular, words that you’d find on the . . .

Back of the Book

Scotland, 1920.
Meet Tessa Kilpatrick; heiress and war-time covert operations agent.

Finding her husband – the feckless James – with another woman at a 1920s country house party, she demands a divorce. But when his body is discovered in a lonely stone bothy the next morning, Inspector Hamish Rasmussen sees Tessa as his only suspect.

Back in Edinburgh, links to another murder convince Rasmussen of her innocence. He enlists her help and together they set off on a pursuit that will bring Tessa once again face to face with the brutality of war as well as revealing to her the lengths that desperate people will go to in order to protect those they love.

Will Tessa be able to prevent a final murder or will she become the killer’s latest victim?

This book will be perfect for anyone who’s enjoyed the work of Catriona McPherson, Sara Sheridan and Jessica Fellowes.

You’ve got to love a blurb that uses a word like “feckless,” don’t you? It’s such a fun word, it’s a shame you have to use it in a disparaging way. Also, I now know that “bothy” is a thing.

This book will weigh-in at 262 pages and will be available on Feb. 20 from Amazon UK and US (I’m not sure about other Amazons).

Without further ado…

The Cover

That’s pretty eye-catching, isn’t it?

I particularly like the “W” and the little dashes next to the “Me” — I’m not sure why those are the points that catch my eye, but they do. Also, Tess’ eyebrows (I’m assuming this woman is our heiress and war-time covert operations agent) look like the kind of eyebrows that should be arched when someone tells a lie or says something that the Tess objects to. Sorry, I’m blathering here, but I feel compelled to talk about the cover a little . . .

But wait, H.C., you say — I have an e-reader and a limited imagination. What will the cover look like for me? Well, I’m glad you asked. It’ll look like this:

And if you’re wondering what a few paperbacks would look like stacked up next to each other (you know, in case you wanted to set up a display in your bookstore, or, I don’t know, your living room or foyer), it’s look like this:

And if you had a couple of paperbacks and an e-reader on the back of a unicorn, it look like — nah. Just kidding… I don’t have the graphic for that.

Now, I’ve done my part — I’ve revealed and/or confirmed the cover. So it’s your turn, follow this link to sign up for Vanessa Robertson’s newsletter (you’ll also receive special offers, new release details, and a welcome gift delivered right to your inbox). Better yet, go pre-order the book at Amazon UK or Amazon US.

The Controller by Matt Brolly: The Good, The Bad and The Iffy

By HCNewton

On May 27, 2019

In Book Tour, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

I’m putting stars here because I feel I have to (this book is another one tipping me against the practice), but I reserve the right to revise these when book 2 is released — and because I know I’ll round up for Goodreads/Amazon. The words are the important bit here.
—

The Controller

by Matt Brolly

Series: Lynch and Rose, #1

eARC, 404 pg.
Oblong Books, 2019

Read: May 17 – 21, 2019

FBI Special Agent Sandra Rose is called out to the scene of a home invasion turned hostage situation. It feels routine, but serious — and when things go wrong in pretty unexpected ways, it goes really, really wrong — and lets you know right away that this is not a book for the faint of heart. As nasty as things start out, the tattoo on the perpetrator’s back points to things getting worse, “half tattoo, half scar tissue,” is how it’s initially described. Later we’re told a bit more:

It was a Railroad tattoo. Carved by machete onto the man’s back, coloured by blue tattoo ink. Two long parallel lines stretched the length of Razinski’s back interspersed with a number of horizontal lines joining the two lines together.

Yeah, “carved by a machete.” You read that right.

Two thoughts spring to mind. I’ll never complain again about the needles on a tattoo machine during shading again; and Brolly is really not messing around here.

This tattoo is the mark of an Urban Legend, an “X-file”, a Wild Goose, an FBI Snipe Hunt — one that unfortunately might not be a legend, a Snipe or anything but a reality that the Bureau should’ve taken seriously years ago rather than writing off as a myth. Immediately Rose arranges for the one man who believed in The Railroad’s existence, former Special Agent Samuel Agent to be brought in for a consultation.

Lynch not only believed in their existence, he’s a victim of The Railroad. Six years ago — when he started to make some progress against them (if you ask him), Samuel Lynch’s 7 year-old son, Daniel, went missing. Lynch has long believed — scratch that, known that The Railroad was responsible for that disappearance and that knowledge and drive to uncover the truth about Daniel’s disappearance and The Railroad’s existence is what led to his dismissal a few months later. Now he’s being told that Daniel hasn’t been killed by The Railroad, but that he’s alive, and still in their custody. There’s hope. A small bit of hope.

At this point, I don’t know how to talk much about the plot without spoiling things. So I’m going to get vague. Things go wrong in ways that boggle the mind and stretch credulity (not beyond the breaking point, however). Not only is The Railroad real, its influence and power is, too — its reach extends into the FBI and likely is the reason that Lynch found himself out of the Agency. Things start to happen very quickly once Lynch and Rose begin interrogating the hostage taker, and soon they’re working together against the clock for one last shot at The Railroad. Rose working within the system and Lynch once again very far away from it.

The pacing is great, the plot is riveting, the writing is compelling — and the reader will be with these two right up to the very explosive ending, holding your breath frequently enough that an asthma attack might be triggered. Beyond that, I’m going to do something here I don’t normally do (but may begin doing more often, I like it) for “the opinion” portion of this post. As I thought about The Controller in preparation for this post, I found my thoughts falling into three categories — let’s take a look at them in order: The Good, The Bad and The Iffy:

The Good:
I’ve already talked about the pacing, plot, etc. — all the mechanics are really well done and serve the mood and tenor well. So let’s focus on some of the character work here in this section.

While diving into this investigation with the drive and passion almost equal to Lynch, Rose does have an outside life. Her sister is on her case continually to see their mother, to look in on her — she’s suffering from some sort of dementia. It’s so hard on Rose to see her mother that way that she’s responded by virtually abandoning her, she’s had no contact with her for ages. It’s hard to sympathize with, to have empathy for Rose because of this attitude — but it’s as real and understandable as it is despicable. The way that this daughter avoids the mother who has forgotten her stands in stark contrast to the way that Lynch will stop at nothing to see and help his son (who has likely forgotten him after all this time). Brolly could’ve spent time beating the reader over the head with this, but he doesn’t. It’s just there for you to see and draw your own conclusions about.

Lynch isn’t a broken man — well, he is, but he’s not broken down and beaten by life (although you couldn’t blame him if he had been). Life, circumstance and some truly evil men broke him — he’s a shell of who he used to be (in probably every sense). But what’s left in the ruins is a hard, almost merciless, near obsessed man on a mission who will not deviate one iota from that mission once he has a glimmer of hope.

Rose, she’s flawed, but she’s the kind of law enforcement agent you want to believe the world is full of.

She was working on little more than a hunch, and hunches were something she couldn’t abide. Real police work was completed by hard work and diligence, by analysing facts and evidence. Hunches were for a bygone era, for rogue detectives, for fiction and television.

Not that I think many FBI Special Agents consider themselves “police,” but I like the sentiment anyway. And while she’s this kind of Agent — she’s got all that baggage. She is not a perfect character. She’s probably one of my favorite characters this year — her partner for this case (the official one, anyway), McBride is a fun character, too. We don’t get a lot of him, he essentially functions as Rose’s assistant, but he’s a lot of fun (in a book that doesn’t bring the fun very often), and I’m so glad he’s around.

The criminals are well conceived of and well executed. There are monsters walking around in human skins — and we get to see a few of them here. However, this leads us to…

The Bad:
I don’t understand The Railroad. I don’t get their purpose, their actions, how they accumulate power and how. I do get that they’re one of the most evil shadowy conspiracy organizations that I’ve read about. They don’t seem to want to take over the world, or bring down governments or anything — but they’re horribly evil. Monstrous doesn’t come close to capturing their brand of evil. My lack of knowledge stems from the fact that we don’t get a big motive-explaining, super-villain-gloating, exposition-heavy monologue or three from anyone from The Railroad. And I love that. I also am fine with not understanding the group in a certain way.

But if you’re going to give me some big conspiracy that wields influence in at least one national government, I need to believe they have a reason, something. As Walter Sobchak said, “I mean, say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.” The Railroad probably as an ethos, but no one tells us what it is, and I have a really hard time accepting it because of that.

Earlier, I referred to something stretching credulity — that particular event results in far too many dead bodies and far too little fuss surrounding that event. Given the nature of that event, there would be great internal FBI pressures — and likely Homeland Security reasons to keep it quiet. I’m fine with that, but that wouldn’t stop it from kicking off a major — probably multi-agency — investigation, preventing almost everything that happens in the FBI offices from happening for the rest of the book. I’m not saying Rose and McBride couldn’t have done what they do, and Lynch obviously could’ve pulled off a lot of what he did — but there needs to be more Federal Agents of various stripes on the ground making life hard for them to accomplish what they do. That should’ve been explained away/justified/something. It’s not The Railroad’s influence, unless their reach extends that far into the Government, and we’re not given that indication.

The Iffy:
Let’s start with the easy one, and one that bugged me from early on in the book: how has this obsessed and unemployed man paid rent, bought the copious amounts of alcohol he uses and funded his obsessed investigation? Lynch has no visible means of support and a decent amount of expenses. It wouldn’t take much to explain it away, but we’re not given it.

I get why this is set in the US — Texas in particular. The Railroad needs the space, the extensive rail system, etc. to exist. The plot demands decentralized law enforcement. But if something is set in the US, the characters shouldn’t all talk like people from the UK. The term “Jumper” connotes something very different in Texas than London. Nor should anyone be seeing a lorry on the Texas Interstate, use a Sat-Nav, call their mother “Mum” or “Mummy” and many other things. Brolly is not the only writer to do this kind of thing (many of my favorite novels over the last couple of years do this, too), he just seems to be one of the worst offenders I’ve run across. It takes me out of the moment, re-engages whatever disbelief I’ve suspended and draws attention to any other problems there might be.

Lastly, a couple of days after I finished this, I noticed that this is labeled as “Lynch and Rose #1,” and it made me re-evaluate a lot. I’m not sure how this works as a series. Maybe a duology — possibly a trilogy (I can’t see it as an ongoing series — Rose and McBride, on the other hand…). That would likely take care of a lot of my questions about The Railroad, so I’m happy about that. But knowing there’s a second book leaves me with a different idea about the end of the book — the last line particularly. But there’s nothing in the novel that makes you think there’s another book on the horizon. It’s not impossible, and I trust that Brolly has a strong idea about what’s next. But I didn’t, at any point, think “I can’t wait to see what Lynch and Rose do next.” I did think, “I wonder what Brolly has coming out next,” and am curious how something he writes set in his own country feels.

Now, I’m afraid that given the space I’ve given The Iffy and The Bad that The Good has been overshadowed — also I can’t talk about all of The Good without removing any reason you might have to read the thing — which is sort of the opposite of my point. This is an exciting read with some very interesting and flawed characters (flawed by design, not by Brolly messing up), and a kind of evil, conspiratorial organization that ticks every box on your wishlist for evil conspiratorial organizations. Yes, I have questions, and yes, I found the ending less than entirely satisfying. But all that came up when I started thinking about the book for the purposes of this post and in terms of a series. Were this a stand-alone that I just read and hadn’t written about? I honestly think I’d have just shrugged off the issues if they’d occurred to me. Also, I’m pretty confident from the way he put this together that Brolly knows precisely what he’s doing and that many of my misgivings will be addressed in Lynch and Rose #2 — and I will be pouncing on that as soon as I know it’s available.

It’s exciting, I like the characters, I was genuinely surprised and shocked a couple of times, horrified a couple of times and I want to know more about what happened — Brolly made me curious when he could’ve easily made me disinterested. I can’t list precisely just what it is about his story telling that did the trick, but it worked, and that’s what counts. It’s by no means a perfect novel, but it’s good.

—–

3.5 Stars

My thanks to damppebbles blog tours for the invitation to participate in this tour and the materials (including the novel) they provided.

BOOK SPOTLIGHT: The Controller by Matt Brolly

By HCNewton

On May 27, 2019

In Book Tour, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Today I welcome the Book Tour for the dark and gripping thriller The Controller by Matt Brolly. Along with this spotlight post, I’ll be giving my take on the novel here in a bit.

There are so many people on this tour, you may not be able to read all names on the graphic, click here for a larger image (for me, there’s no underline there, but it will take you to the image, I assure you). There’s a lot of good stuff out there about this book already and more to come — you should see it all (not sure why they’re bothering with a small time bloviator like me).

Book Details:

Book Title: The Controller by Matt Brolly
Publisher: Oblong Books
Release date: May 24, 2019
Format: Ebook
Length: 407 pages

Book Blurb:

From the bestselling author of the acclaimed DCI Lambert series comes The Controller, a gripping serial killer thriller introducing Sam Lynch and Special Agent Sandra Rose.

It is six years since special agent Samuel Lynch left the FBI following the disappearance of his son, Daniel. Lynch believes an underground organization known as The Railroad is responsible and has never stopped searching.

When Special Agent Sandra Rose investigates a house invasion gone wrong, she discovers the assailant has the legendary, and infamous, Railroad tattoo carved onto his back and he claims to know Daniel’s whereabouts.

Rose draws Lynch in to her case, and together they become embroiled in an unparalleled world of violence and evil.

It seems that to see his son again, Lynch will have to confront his greatest fear and face the ultimate test: an encounter with the Railroad’s enigmatic and deadly leader, The Controller.

About Matt Brolly:

Following his law degree where he developed an interest in criminal law, Matt Brolly completed his Masters in Creative Writing at Glasgow University.

He is the bestselling author of the DCI Lambert crime novels, Dead Eyed, Dead Lucky and Dead Embers. The fourth in the series, Dead Time, was released by Canelo in May 2018 and a prequel, Dead Water, will be published in September 2019. In 2020 the first of a new crime series set in the West Country of the UK will be released by Thomas and Mercer (Amazon Publishing).

The Controller, released in May 2019, is the first of a new thriller series set in Texas.

Matt also writes children’s books as M.J. Brolly. His first children’s book, The Sleeping Bug, was released by Oblong Books in December 2018.

Matt lives in London with his wife and their two young children. You can find out more about Matt at his website MattBrolly.co.uk or by following him on twitter: @MattBrollyUK

Matt Brolly’s Social Media:

Twitter ~ Facebook ~ Website

Purchase Links for I Want You Gone:

Amazon UK ~ Amazon US

My thanks to damppebbles blog tours for the invitation to participate in this tour and the materials they provided.

Towel Day ’19: Some of my favorite Adams lines . . .

By HCNewton

On May 25, 2019

In Books, News/Misc., Quotations, Science Fiction

(updated 5/25/19)
There’s a great temptation here for me to go crazy. I’ll refrain from that and just list some of his best lines . . .

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.”
This must be Thursday. . . I never could get the hang of Thursdays.”
“You’d better be prepared for the jump into hyperspace. It’s unpleasantly like being drunk.”
“What’s so unpleasant about being drunk?”
“You ask a glass of water.”
(I’m not sure why, but this has always made me chuckle, if not actually laugh out loud. It’s just never not funny)
He had found a Nutri-Matic machine which had provided him with a plastic cup filled with a liquid that was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.
In those days spirits were brave, the stakes were high, men were real men, women were real women and small furry creatures from Alpha Centauri were real small furry creatures from Alpha Centuari. And all dared to brave unknown terrors, to do mighty deeds, to boldly split infinitives that no man had split before . . .
“Look,” said Arthur, “would it save you a lot of time if I just gave up and went mad now?”
The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don’t.

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

It is a curious fact, and one to which no one knows quite how much importance to attach, that something like 85 percent of all known worlds in the Galaxy, be they primitive or highly advanced, have invented a drink called jynnan tonnyx, or gee-N-N-T’Nix, or jinond-o-nicks, or any one of a thousand or more variations on the same phonetic theme. The drinks themselves are not the same, and vary between the Sivolvian “chinanto/mnigs” which is ordinary water served at slightly above room temperature, and the Gagrakackan “tzjin-anthony-ks” which kills cows at a hundred paces; and in fact the one common factor between all of them, beyond the fact that the names sound the same, is that they were all invented and named before the worlds concerned made contact with any other worlds.

Life, the Universe, and Everything

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy has this to say on the subject of flying.There is an art, it says, or rather, a knack to flying.The knack lies in learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss.

(It goes on for quite a while after this — and I love every bit of it.)

“One of the interesting things about space,” Arthur heard Slartibartfast saying . . . “is how dull it is?””Dull?” . . .”Yes,” said Slartibartfast, “staggeringly dull. Bewilderingly so. You see, there’s so much of it and so little in it.”

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Of course, one never has the slightest notion what size or shape different species are going to turn out to be, but if you were to take the findings of the latest Mid-Galactic Census report as any kind of accurate guide to statistical averages you would probably guess that the craft would hold about six people, and you would be right.You’d probably guessed that anyway. The Census report, like most such surveys, had cost an awful lot of money and told nobody anything they didn’t already know — except that every single person in the Galaxy had 2.4 legs and owned a hyena. Since this was clearly not true the whole thing eventually had to be scrapped.
Here was something that Ford felt he could speak about with authority.”Life,” he said, “is like a grapefruit.””Er, how so?”
Well, it’s sort of orangy-yellow and dimpled on the outside, wet and squidgy the middle. It’s got pips inside, too. Oh, and some people have half a one for breakfast.”

“Is there anyone else out there I can talk to?”
Arthur had a swordfish steak and said it made him angry. He grabbed a passing waitress by the arm and berated her.”Why’s this fish so bloody good?” he demanded, angrily.”Please excuse my friend,” said Fenchurch to the startled waitress. “I think he’s having a nice day at last.”

Mostly Harmless

A common mistake that people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency

If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family anatidae on our hands.
Let’s think the unthinkable, let’s do the undoable. Let us prepare to grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after all.

(I’ve often been tempted to get a tattoo of this)

The Last Chance to See

“So what do we do if we get bitten by something deadly?” I asked.He looked at me as if I were stupid.”You die, of course. That’s what deadly means.”
I’ve never understood all this fuss people make about the dawn. I’ve seen a few and they’re never as good as the photographs, which have the additional advantage of being things you can look at when you’re in the right frame of mind, which is usually around lunchtime.
I have the instinctive reaction of a Western man when confronted with sublimely incomprehensible. I grab my camera and start to photograph it.
Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.

And a couple of lines I’ve seen in assorted places, articles, books and whatnot

I love deadlines. I love the whooshing noise they make as they go by.
A learning experience is one of those things that says, “You know that thing you just did? Don’t do that.”
The fact is, I don’t know where my ideas come from. Nor does any writer. The only real answer is to drink way too much coffee and buy yourself a desk that doesn’t collapse when you beat your head against it.

Towel Day ’19: Do You Know Where Your Towel Is?

By HCNewton

On May 25, 2019

In A-B, Authors, Calendar Items, Douglas Adams, Fiction, News/Misc., Science Fiction, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

(actually updated and slightly revised this 5/25/19!)

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy has a few things to say on the subject of towels.

A towel, it says, is about the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have. Partly it has great practical value. You can wrap it around you for warmth as you bound across the cold moons of Jaglan Beta; you can lie on it on the brilliant marble-sanded beaches of Santraginus V, inhaling the heady sea vapors; you can sleep under it beneath the stars which shine so redly on the desert world of Kakrafoon; use it to sail a miniraft down the slow heavy River Moth; wet it for use in hand-to-hand-combat; wrap it round your head to ward off noxious fumes or avoid the gaze of the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal (such a mind-bogglingly stupid animal, it assumes that if you can’t see it, it can’t see you); you can wave your towel in emergencies as a distress signal, and of course dry yourself off with it if it still seems to be clean enough.

More importantly, a towel has immense psychological value. For some reason, if a strag (strag: non-hitch hiker) discovers that a hitch hiker has his towel with him, he will automatically assume that he is also in possession of a toothbrush, face flannel, soap, tin of biscuits, flask, compass, map, ball of string, gnat spray, wet weather gear, space suit etc., etc. Furthermore, the strag will then happily lend the hitch hiker any of these or a dozen other items that the hitch hiker might accidentally have “lost”. What the strag will think is that any man who can hitch the length and breadth of the galaxy, rough it, slum it, struggle against terrible odds, win through, and still knows where his towel is is clearly a man to be reckoned with.

Hence a phrase that has passed into hitchhiking slang, as in “Hey, you sass that hoopy Ford Prefect? There’s a frood who really knows where his towel is.” (Sass: know, be aware of, meet, have sex with; hoopy: really together guy; frood: really amazingly together guy.)

One of my long-delayed goals is to write up a good all-purpose Tribute to Douglas Adams post, and another Towel Day has come without me doing so. Belgium.

Next year . . . or later. (he says for at least the 4th straight year, a work ethic I like to believe Adams would recognize)

Last year, I did a re-read of all of Adams’ (completed) fiction. For reasons beyond my ken (or recollection), I didn’t get around to blogging about the Dirk Gently books, but I did do the Hitchhiker’s Trilogy:

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

Life, The Universe and Everything

So Long, and Thanks For All The Fish

Mostly Harmless

Adams is one of those handful of authors that I can’t imagine I’d be the same without having encountered/read/re-read/re-re-re-re-read, and so I do my best to pay a little tribute to him each year, even if it’s just carrying around a towel. Although, I do have the planet logo from the series tattooed on my forearm — so I do carry around a tribute to him constantly. I’ve only been able to get one of my sons into Adams, he’s the taller, thinner one in the picture from a couple of years ago below.

TowelDay.org is the best collection of resources on the day, recently posted this pretty cool video, shot on the ISS by astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti.

Even better — Here’s an appearance by Douglas Adams himself from the old Letterman show — so glad someone preserved this:

Love the anecdote (Also, I want this tie.)