Tag: 4 Stars Page 28 of 83

The Salvage Crew (Audiobook) by Yudhanjaya Wijeratne, Nathan Fillion: A Unusual Tale of Artificial Intelligence, Cascading Failure, and Poetry

By

On January 27, 2021

In Audiobook, Fiction, Science Fiction

The Salvage Crew

The Salvage Crew

by Yudhanjaya Wijeratne, Nathan Fillion (Narrator)

Unabridged Audiobook, 8 hrs., 21 min.
Podium Audio, 2020

Read: January 20-22, 2020

Red Dwarf Remix?

I’m not suggesting for a second that Wijeratne’s mind worked this way (at least I don’t mean to), but this is the impression I got as this started.

The Red Dwarf TV Show/Novels had a couple of great ideas at the beginning—an AI that ran the ship, that had a strange personality, an odd sense of humor, and wasn’t entirely reliable. The second was that the ship generated a holographic officer based on the memories and personality of one of a dead member of the crew (whoever was highest ranking/most needed among the dead). A long time ago, it had been determined that AI with memories and real emotions actually perform better than those not based on actual humans.

Our main protagonist and narrator in this novel is an AI, made from the memories and personality of an engineer who served his whole professional life in space (after leaving his family’s farm). He’s now in charge of a small salvage crew for the company Planetary Crusade Service, sent to a tiny planet Urmahon Beta to recover as much as they can from an old colony ship that presumably crashed there.

His role is Overseer, and his crew nicknames him OC. This is OC’s first command, if it goes well—and a few others—he can move up to a larger, better body/command. In a few decades or so, he could work is his up to a large ship, overseeing a major operation. Again, that’s if everything goes well.

Everything Doesn’t Go Well

OC is promised an “A-Team” of a crew for his first command. He doesn’t get one. They’re not a B-Team either. There are not enough letters to describe how far this trio is from an A-Team. For that matter, I’m not sure OC is A-Team material either—they land far off-course (turbulence during descent, we’re told).

Almost instantly, the crew starts falling apart, ignoring orders and protocol. They begin to build a base to work from, but get distracted by things like indigenous flora and fauna, personality conflicts, and evidence that suggests they may not be the only salvage crew on the planet (there’s a rival company with bionic operators with aggressive tendencies).

From a rough start, it gets worse, and the next few weeks are a spiral of cascading failure, disease, injuries, strife, crop failure, questionable vodka distillation, bargain-basement tech, and…well, I can’t keep going. It gets messy, and what starts off as a quirky, comedic version of The Martian with a side of Red Dwarf turns into something tense, taut, dark, and suspense-filled. It doesn’t stay that way, depending on how you want to count things, ends up taking one or two other overall flavors, while never completing shedding the offbeat humor that characterized the book since the opening paragraph.

Poetry and Other Quirks

I’m going to focus on OC, rather than the rest of the crew (and they are all worth writing about) to keep this short (and because you really need to get into spoilers to do a proper job of talking about the humans). He is funny. There’s a snarky, offbeat humor to his narration and dialogue throughout.

He’s also a poet. I’m not saying he’s a good one, but he is one. Frequently in Fantasy novels (particularly older ones that wear their Tolkien-influence on their sleeves), you get a lot of poetry/songs/etc., but that’s rarely a feature of Science Fiction novels. The Salvage Crew is the exception to this rule. OC writes it, recites it to his crew to encourage them, he quotes and ruminates on other’s poetry…he’s the most poetic AI I think I’ve ever encountered in a novel. He’s also a Buddhist, and will often apply that to his situation.

He also has the best curses. He’s frequently letting off steam by cursing his crew, PCS executives, or local fauna to a horrible future reincarnation. I could have listened to some of those for a solid hour.

Fillion’s Narration

It’s tough to say for certain, but I think that Fillion raised this about a star in my book (maybe just a half). It’s his voice, his charm that hooks you in and gets you to like, believe in and root for OC. That said, at some point, I stopped thinking of this as Fillion, and just let OC tell me a good story.

It’s not the best narration I’ve ever heard, but it’s really good and it made me hope that Fillion does more audiobooks.

Co-written by AI?

So, there was apparently actual AI software involved in the writing of this. I learned about this when I started writing this post, and I’m not sure I understood everything I skimmed (I didn’t want to take the time to read carefully instead of just posting this). I’m intrigued by this notion, but am relieved to see that the software only “helped” with portions of the book and that Wijeratne was the final word.

So, what did I think about The Salvage Crew?

Roughly the first half of the book* is about what I expected—an amusing SF adventure—and was a lot of fun to listen to. The rest of the book isn’t what I expected from the premise in terms of story or tone. And I was riveted. There are portions of the book that get into more philosophical territories, and while I wasn’t as interested in them as I think the novel wanted me to be, they were really well constructed and told.

* This is an estimate, I didn’t jot down notes about when the tenor of the plot/novel changes)

I’m really glad I took a chance on this book, I’ll definitely listen to future audiobooks by Fillion (assuming any are produced) and am probably going to be trying some of Wijeratne’s other novels. I heartily recommend it to SF readers/listeners.

Disclaimer: I received this eARC from Podium Audio via NetGalley in exchange for this post—thanks to both for this.

4 Stars

2021 Audiobook Challenge

Pub Day Repost: We Could Be Heroes by Mike Chen: A Super-Powered Thief and Vigilante Together Could Be Extraordinary

By

On January 26, 2021

In Fiction, Mike Chen, Science Fiction

We Could Be Heroes

We Could Be Heroes

by Mike Chen

eARC, 336 pg.
Mira Books, 2021

Read: January 11-14, 2021
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!


At this point with Mike Chen, I don’t bother looking at the book blurb, I just read what he publishes. But so I could decide how much to say in this post, I had to go look at the blurb. Just between you and me, I think I wouldn’t have given as much away as it did, but now I feel a little freer about what to say.

Jamie Sorenson/The Mind Robber

Two years ago, Jamie Sorenson woke up in an apartment with no memory of who he was or how he got there (the name is something he picked). He’s a coffee snob, has taken in a stray cat that he’s named, “Normal.” He reads a lot of autobiographies and memoirs from the library, because he likes hearing life stories since he doesn’t have one.

Oh, and he has super-powers. He can read people’s memories, and erase a little bit of them. He uses these abilities to rob banks as “The Mind Robber.” He’s not living an extravagant lifestyle with these funds, in fact, he lives fairly frugally. His goal is to save up enough to finance his retirement on a tropical beach—just him, Normal, coffee, and books. If he can just pull off one or two more without getting caught, he should be able to do just that.

He was almost caught once, and he’s pretty sure he won’t be able to evade capture too easily next time. He was almost caught by:

Zoe Wong/The Throwing Star

She, too, woke up without memories in an apartment two years ago. She had a name tag, so at least she didn’t have to come up with a name. She spends her time watching horror movies on an app on her phone and drinking so much I think I might have liver damage from reading about it. She makes ends meet by working for a food delivery service.

She doesn’t drive for one, though, she has super-powers, too. Including speed—not Flash or Quicksilver fast, but she’s fast. So fast that she can deliver food fast enough to maintain a 5-Star rating, even though she’ll take quick detours to beat up criminals. She’s also super-strong (not quite Superman-level, but more than Captain America) and has a couple of other tricks up her sleeve.

She’s assembled enough of a uniform to stand up to the punishment her speed puts on normal clothing and to protect her identity, and was dubbed “The Throwing Star” by the press. Although, she’d prefer Shuriken, not that anyone asked. Besides, she’s pretty sure she’s of Chinese descent, not Japanese, so both names are problematic.

The Team Up

Jamie regularly attends a support group for people with Dementia or other memory problems. No one’s treating them there, it’s just a place for emotional support. One day, not long after he’s almost captured by The Throwing Star, Zoe walks in. Afterward, the two have a quick conversation by the coffee pot and (thanks to their abilities) recognize each other. For the sake of the group, they don’t start battling each other, instead, they talk.

A few things happen, and then Zoe decides to ask Jamie to help her with her memory—surely, he can use his powers for something other than crime, right? They strike a little quid pro quo deal and get to work.

From this point, two things happen, one harder to believe than the other. First, they start to uncover things about Zoe’s past (and Jamie’s, although he’s really not that interested at first) that lead them to a therapeutic organization that seems to have something else going on. And, the two begin to become friends.

It’s that “something else,” naturally, that gets their attention. It’s not long before they discover that not only does this organization (or maybe just what it’s a front for) hold the key to their pasts but has a secret plan to change to the world as we know it. To combat it, this thief and this vigilante might have to be something more, they might have to be heroes.

The Mad Scientist

A mad scientist at work is a mainstay of Super-Hero Fiction and Chen delivers that well. Not just a mad scientist, but one who doesn’t see herself in that way. Indeed, she’s going to save humanity from itself and the world from humanity while she’s at it. And sure, she’s doing this on her own, without consulting the countless lives that she’s going to radically alter, because when you’re a super-genius with a messianic-complex (among other psychiatric problems) playing with unimaginable technology, who cares what anyone else might think?

That sounds almost dismissive, and I don’t mean it to be. She’s a well-drawn character, absolutely convinced she’s doing the right thing, and is pretty convincing about it. Don’t get me wrong, I love a super-villain who’s just out to watch the world burn, or driven by pure avarice. I was raised on that stuff. But a super-villain convinced they’re the city’s/nation’s/world’s savior? There’s something more compelling about them, and that’s what we have here.

Extraordinaries

One challenge that non-Marvel/DC Super-Hero Fiction has it coming up with what they’re going to call their costumed, super-powered crime-fighters. Most of the time, I note the term and move on, while it’s usually a serviceable term, it’s a challenge to come up with something that really clicks on this front.

Chen’s world uses the term, “Extraordinaries.” That’s catchy, a little quirky, and it sticks with you. Sure, this is a minor point, but you add up enough of these minor points, and you elevate a good book into something more.

The Mike Chen Factor

The something more…does this have it? Readers of this blog know that I’m always game for a Super-Hero novel, and from early on, it was clear that this was a good one. And that’d be enough for me to recommend it, maybe even highly recommend it. But Here and Now and Then and A Beginning At The End have taught me that I should expect something more than just a good Time Travel/Dystopian/Super-Hero novel from him. The Mike Chen Factor.

And while I didn’t go looking for it—that would distract me from this entertaining story—I did keep wondering when it’d crop up (and if I’d recognize it right away). I think it popped up in a couple of different places and while I espied one instantly (or pretty quickly) the other slipped by me until it was in full bloom—making it my favorite.

The first thing that makes this more than a good Super-Hero novel is that it’s about the role our memories play in who we are—our identity, our personality, how we act. Two characters whose tabulas are about as rasa as you can get make excellent candidates to explore this. In the end, one character’s deliberate choices in spite of natural inclinations and what we learn about their past becomes something they didn’t expect. While the other character is driven by their past (especially the parts they can’t remember but shaped who they are) and ends up being a better (more complete) version of what they were all along.

So, you know, if you were looking for Chen to settle a debate, I think you can skip that.

The other expression of the Mike Chen Factor was the friendship that develops between Jamie and Zoe. This was something special. Too, too, too often when we look at relationships in fiction (in whatever medium) we focus on romantic relationships, familial bonds, or even that between enemies. We don’t see enough explorations of friendship. I wish we had more of them—Rick and Louis aren’t the only one’s with a beautiful friendship, a well-written one is a great thing.

And Jamie and Zoe’s friendship promises to be a beautiful friendship, it’s off to a great start, anyway. I think the reader sees it before either of them do, which is an added layer of fun. But before they realize it their mutual aid pact starts to carry shades of something else. They banter, they tease each other (including in that almost-cruel way that only good friends can), they look out for each other beyond what’s needed for their project and care about each other. Eventually, they’re inspiring each other to be more than they think they are.

So, what did I think about We Could Be Heroes?

This was great. It was a good Super-Hero Story that had a lot of other things going on. Like Chen’s other work, it could probably spawn a sequel or two—but probably won’t.

Can you enjoy this without spending time thinking about what he’s exploring in terms of identity, memory, and friendship? Sure—I don’t know why you’d want to, but if you’re just looking for a compelling story featuring people in outlandish dress flexing super-abilities, this would absolutely fill that need. On the flip side, if you prefer to focus on the other material? This would work, but you’d have to put up with the Super-Hero stuff, and that might be harder for you. If you’re a Greedy Gus like me and want it all? You’re definitely in for a treat.

There’s a little something for everyone here, get to it.

Disclaimer: I received this eARC from Harlequin Trade Publishing via NetGalley in exchange for this post—thanks to both for this.

4 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, opinions are my own.

We Could Be Heroes by Mike Chen: A Super-Powered Thief and Vigilante Together Could Be Extraordinary

By

On January 18, 2021

In Fiction, Mike Chen, Science Fiction

We Could Be Heroes

We Could Be Heroes

by Mike Chen

eARC, 336 pg.
Mira Books, 2021

Read: January 11-14, 2021
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!


At this point with Mike Chen, I don’t bother looking at the book blurb, I just read what he publishes. But so I could decide how much to say in this post, I had to go look at the blurb. Just between you and me, I think I wouldn’t have given as much away as it did, but now I feel a little freer about what to say.

Jamie Sorenson/The Mind Robber

Two years ago, Jamie Sorenson woke up in an apartment with no memory of who he was or how he got there (the name is something he picked). He’s a coffee snob, has taken in a stray cat that he’s named, “Normal.” He reads a lot of autobiographies and memoirs from the library, because he likes hearing life stories since he doesn’t have one.

Oh, and he has super-powers. He can read people’s memories, and erase a little bit of them. He uses these abilities to rob banks as “The Mind Robber.” He’s not living an extravagant lifestyle with these funds, in fact, he lives fairly frugally. His goal is to save up enough to finance his retirement on a tropical beach—just him, Normal, coffee, and books. If he can just pull off one or two more without getting caught, he should be able to do just that.

He was almost caught once, and he’s pretty sure he won’t be able to evade capture too easily next time. He was almost caught by:

Zoe Wong/The Throwing Star

She, too, woke up without memories in an apartment two years ago. She had a name tag, so at least she didn’t have to come up with a name. She spends her time watching horror movies on an app on her phone and drinking so much I think I might have liver damage from reading about it. She makes ends meet by working for a food delivery service.

She doesn’t drive for one, though, she has super-powers, too. Including speed—not Flash or Quicksilver fast, but she’s fast. So fast that she can deliver food fast enough to maintain a 5-Star rating, even though she’ll take quick detours to beat up criminals. She’s also super-strong (not quite Superman-level, but more than Captain America) and has a couple of other tricks up her sleeve.

She’s assembled enough of a uniform to stand up to the punishment her speed puts on normal clothing and to protect her identity, and was dubbed “The Throwing Star” by the press. Although, she’d prefer Shuriken, not that anyone asked. Besides, she’s pretty sure she’s of Chinese descent, not Japanese, so both names are problematic.

The Team Up

Jamie regularly attends a support group for people with Dementia or other memory problems. No one’s treating them there, it’s just a place for emotional support. One day, not long after he’s almost captured by The Throwing Star, Zoe walks in. Afterward, the two have a quick conversation by the coffee pot and (thanks to their abilities) recognize each other. For the sake of the group, they don’t start battling each other, instead, they talk.

A few things happen, and then Zoe decides to ask Jamie to help her with her memory—surely, he can use his powers for something other than crime, right? They strike a little quid pro quo deal and get to work.

From this point, two things happen, one harder to believe than the other. First, they start to uncover things about Zoe’s past (and Jamie’s, although he’s really not that interested at first) that lead them to a therapeutic organization that seems to have something else going on. And, the two begin to become friends.

It’s that “something else,” naturally, that gets their attention. It’s not long before they discover that not only does this organization (or maybe just what it’s a front for) hold the key to their pasts but has a secret plan to change to the world as we know it. To combat it, this thief and this vigilante might have to be something more, they might have to be heroes.

The Mad Scientist

A mad scientist at work is a mainstay of Super-Hero Fiction and Chen delivers that well. Not just a mad scientist, but one who doesn’t see herself in that way. Indeed, she’s going to save humanity from itself and the world from humanity while she’s at it. And sure, she’s doing this on her own, without consulting the countless lives that she’s going to radically alter, because when you’re a super-genius with a messianic-complex (among other psychiatric problems) playing with unimaginable technology, who cares what anyone else might think?

That sounds almost dismissive, and I don’t mean it to be. She’s a well-drawn character, absolutely convinced she’s doing the right thing, and is pretty convincing about it. Don’t get me wrong, I love a super-villain who’s just out to watch the world burn, or driven by pure avarice. I was raised on that stuff. But a super-villain convinced they’re the city’s/nation’s/world’s savior? There’s something more compelling about them, and that’s what we have here.

Extraordinaries

One challenge that non-Marvel/DC Super-Hero Fiction has it coming up with what they’re going to call their costumed, super-powered crime-fighters. Most of the time, I note the term and move on, while it’s usually a serviceable term, it’s a challenge to come up with something that really clicks on this front.

Chen’s world uses the term, “Extraordinaries.” That’s catchy, a little quirky, and it sticks with you. Sure, this is a minor point, but you add up enough of these minor points, and you elevate a good book into something more.

The Mike Chen Factor

The something more…does this have it? Readers of this blog know that I’m always game for a Super-Hero novel, and from early on, it was clear that this was a good one. And that’d be enough for me to recommend it, maybe even highly recommend it. But Here and Now and Then and A Beginning At The End have taught me that I should expect something more than just a good Time Travel/Dystopian/Super-Hero novel from him. The Mike Chen Factor.

And while I didn’t go looking for it—that would distract me from this entertaining story—I did keep wondering when it’d crop up (and if I’d recognize it right away). I think it popped up in a couple of different places and while I espied one instantly (or pretty quickly) the other slipped by me until it was in full bloom—making it my favorite.

The first thing that makes this more than a good Super-Hero novel is that it’s about the role our memories play in who we are—our identity, our personality, how we act. Two characters whose tabulas are about as rasa as you can get make excellent candidates to explore this. In the end, one character’s deliberate choices in spite of natural inclinations and what we learn about their past becomes something they didn’t expect. While the other character is driven by their past (especially the parts they can’t remember but shaped who they are) and ends up being a better (more complete) version of what they were all along.

So, you know, if you were looking for Chen to settle a debate, I think you can skip that.

The other expression of the Mike Chen Factor was the friendship that develops between Jamie and Zoe. This was something special. Too, too, too often when we look at relationships in fiction (in whatever medium) we focus on romantic relationships, familial bonds, or even that between enemies. We don’t see enough explorations of friendship. I wish we had more of them—Rick and Louis aren’t the only one’s with a beautiful friendship, a well-written one is a great thing.

And Jamie and Zoe’s friendship promises to be a beautiful friendship, it’s off to a great start, anyway. I think the reader sees it before either of them do, which is an added layer of fun. But before they realize it their mutual aid pact starts to carry shades of something else. They banter, they tease each other (including in that almost-cruel way that only good friends can), they look out for each other beyond what’s needed for their project and care about each other. Eventually, they’re inspiring each other to be more than they think they are.

So, what did I think about We Could Be Heroes?

This was great. It was a good Super-Hero Story that had a lot of other things going on. Like Chen’s other work, it could probably spawn a sequel or two—but probably won’t.

Can you enjoy this without spending time thinking about what he’s exploring in terms of identity, memory, and friendship? Sure—I don’t know why you’d want to, but if you’re just looking for a compelling story featuring people in outlandish dress flexing super-abilities, this would absolutely fill that need. On the flip side, if you prefer to focus on the other material? This would work, but you’d have to put up with the Super-Hero stuff, and that might be harder for you. If you’re a Greedy Gus like me and want it all? You’re definitely in for a treat.

There’s a little something for everyone here, get to it.

Disclaimer: I received this eARC from Harlequin Trade Publishing via NetGalley in exchange for this post—thanks to both for this.

4 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, opinions are my own.

Dead Perfect by Noelle Holten: A Desperate DC Races to Save Her Friend’s Life

By

On January 15, 2021

In DC Maggie Jamieson, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, Noelle Holten

This is one of those that I struggled for over a week to finish. I can only hope it’s coherent. The short version: Get this book. Read this book.

Dead Perfect

Dead Perfect

by Noelle Holten
Series: DC Maggie Jamieson, #3

Kindle Edition, 449 pg.
One More Chapter, 2020

Read: December 30, 2020-January 2, 2021

What’s Dead Perfect About?

So, Dead Wrong left us with:

‘Just had a call come in. Police are on the scene. Body of a female has been found. Initial description sounds just like your friend Dr Moloney. I’m so sorry, Maggie …’

Obviously the important thing there is “sounds just like,” because it isn’t Moloney* but the body looks so much like her, that no one can be blamed for assuming it was Moloney. It’s quickly determined that it’s not her, but Maggie and Kate Moloney’s colleagues are having difficulty finding her. Making sure that the tension is as high as it can get in a first chapter.

* That’s not a spoiler, it’s in the blurb, which I should’ve read before diving in.

But even before we get to that, there’s the Prologue. It seemed ominous but fairly typical. Then I looked up one word that I didn’t know, orbitoclast, “A surgical instrument for performing transorbital lobotomies, resembling an icepick.” Then I reread the Prologue and got seriously creeped out.

Kate’s located (and given a talking-to about keeping her phone with her), the body is identified, but that just clarifies the issues at the heart of the investigation. We knew Kate had a stalker, and it seemed like the stalker was getting more intense, more threatening. There’s almost certainly a connection between the murdered woman, the stalker, and Kate. But Maggie has to prove that before they can act on it.

So Maggie and her team dive into the murder investigation, but Maggie’s attention is divided between finding out what happened to this woman and preventing the same thing from happening to Kate. This is probably not the best way to tackle the problems, but it’s not like Maggie is going to let either objective out of her hands.

And then another body is found.

Maggie’s State of Mind

It’s been a while since things were stable for our series protagonist, she’s been caroming off emotionally and mentally challenging cases for so long that she’s got to be close to unraveling. She’s barely had her chance to catch her breath from the events of Dead Wrong before she’s plunged into this race to save her friend’s life.

Add in the pressure of the press, getting used to the shift in the dynamic between her and friend/new boss, and her personal life—she’s not in the best headspace for this (or any) investigation. I think it’s starting to show, she makes some errors in judgment, she’s not dealing well with people, and unless this series is about the downfall of DC Maggie Jamieson, something’s going to have to change.

Although I can totally see Holten pulling off Maggie hitting rock bottom and trying to recover from that, come to think of it. So maybe that’s what we’re starting to see.

Supporting characters

I’ll touch on this more later, but one of the best things about the series is this great world that Holten’s creating. And it’s filled with some great characters, I have a few thoughts about some of the more prominent from this book.

We’ll start with DS Nathan Wright, he’s trying to acclimate to his new position and the way that changes the way he relates to and interacts with his team and friends—and seems to be doing it as well as you can hope. But he’s not perfect, and the transition isn’t smooth. It’s a minor thing, and I don’t imagine many authors would spend the time to do it, but I think it says a lot about the world that Holten’s creating that we see this.

That said, his team needs some more blood. and there’s a newly minted DC he’s got his eye on to help. Everyone’s very excited when Kat Everett is seconded to the investigation, and then she largely disappears. She’s eager, she’s bright, and then it’s like she doesn’t exist until the end when she plays a decent-sized role. It felt a little strange, is all I’m saying. Also, I’m not sure anyone needs a series where a “Kat” and a “Kate” play a major role, I’m just thinking someone needs a new nickname.

A reporter that made few friends, and probably a couple of enemies in Dead Wrong resurfaces. Julie Noble is well on her way to being a regular feature of this series, but for the moment, I don’t know what to think of her. I expect books four and five will solidify my impressions. She promises to be interesting—but I’m not sure in what way yet.

Lastly, there’s poor PC Bethany Lambert. She’s the unit’s go-to worker. Miscellaneous errands, thankless tasks, things requiring technological expertise, and more fall to her. I lost track of how many things Maggie threw her way to do—on top of her own assignments. I have multiple notes about how they’re working this woman to death, and even tweeted Holten about it. I’ve been assured that Bethany likes to be overworked, and that it’ll be addressed soon. But I’m telling you now if she snaps and takes out a lot of pent-up aggression on Maggie, I’ll be cheering her on.

The Killer

I’ve spent more than a week trying to write this post and failing because of this section right here. I still don’t know how I’m going to write something that I like and that doesn’t give anything away.

Sure, I could not talk about The Living Doll Killer, but Holten does something here that I feel compelled to write about. So I’m stuck. You’ll have to read the book to get the unsettling reason for the name, but that won’t keep me from using it.

We get a lot of information at some point in the novel from LDK’s own mouth. Now, I’m not sure the reader or police are supposed to believe everything told to them by LDK, but for the moment, I’m going to pretend I do.

Holten comes as close as possible to giving us a serial killer that the reader can empathize with. Sure, that’s not that close at all, but that doesn’t disprove my point.

I can say that I picked out the LDK straight off, but that’s all I got right. The “how” of the killings is bad, the “what” (abducting and killing) is disturbing, but the “why” will cast everything in a different light and somehow make it all worse (and, at the same time, almost understandable).

I can’t think of a serial killer with this kind of backstory and motivation. And for a fictional serial killer, there’s a strong “Yeah, I can imagine reading about this in the paper” kind of vibe. When I talked about her debut, I said that “Holten writes humans, not caricatures or types.” That applies to LDK, too.

The World Around Maggie Jamieson

This is the Maggie Jamieson series, and she is the core of it. But Holten has put her in the middle of a complex world. We touch base in this book with characters from the first two books—particularly from the first book, and we see a lot of growth and development. These people have put in the time and effort to change their lives and move on from the nightmares we met them in.

The way Holten has set up the series guarantees it won’t just be DC Jamieson and her boss (and the rest of her team) bouncing from investigation to investigation, they’ll brush up against these people, focusing on them for significant periods.

I really appreciate this design and am eager to see how it’s developed.

So, what did I think about Dead Perfect?

I got sucked into this story fast, and if anything above sounds critical, it’s only because I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about them (and talking about three or four niggling points out of one hundred is more interesting to write about than fanboying over the other 96 or 97). I was quickly invested in what was going on—and was soon thankful that it wasn’t Kate’s body in the opening chapter.

And yes, I was convinced that Holten had killed her off at the end of Dead Wrong.

I had many, many opinions about how Maggie and Kate were behaving over the course of this investigation (positive and negative), and sincerely wished that DS Wright would have sat them down in his office and talked some sense into both of them. I’m not sure that I usually spend quite as much time talking back to books about what protagonists are doing/thinking as I did in these pages.

And then the reveals about LDK? Didn’t see any of them coming (other than the one I mentioned). I love it when an author does that.

And then, just like she did last time, Holten doesn’t let you fully absorb and reflect on the conclusion of the novel without hitting you with an image that makes you want the next book now, not in a few months.

So what did I think about it? It was great. I need Book Four next week, and probably Five a couple of weeks after that.

4 Stars

The Curious Dispatch of Daniel Costello by Chris McDonald: A Cozy Mystery for People who Don’t Read Cozies

By

On January 13, 2021

In Chris McDonald, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, The Stonebridge Mysteries

The Curious Dispatch of Daniel Costello

The Curious Dispatch of Daniel Costello

by Chris McDonald
Series: The Stonebridge Mysteries, #1

Kindle Edition, 94 pg.
Red Dog Press, 2021

Read: January 9, 2021
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

The Would-Be Sherlock

Adam Whyte is a late bloomer, or at least he expects to be.

He remembered reading that Susan Boyle had been 47 when she auditioned on whatever talent show she’d gone on, and the guy who founded McDonald’s didn’t do it until he was 59. Some people simply came into their own a little later in life – like a fine wine.

He’s still a couple of decades away from those ages, and if he can’t apply himself a bit better, he’s going to be living with his mother until then. Just like he has since he dropped out of college and began holding a series of dead-end jobs.

From a young age, he loved playing detective and even started university to study Psychology with an eye to joining the police. Now, he binges the Mark Gatiss/Steven Moffat Sherlock. When he discovers a dead body at the hotel he’s staying at for a wedding, he decides to take it upon himself to solve the crime he’s convinced was committed (even if no one else thinks there’d been any crime), dragging his friend Colin along.

His Watson

His friend Colin, on the other hand, has his life together. He works at an assisted care facility and likes it. He has an easier time talking to people—and getting them to talk to him.

Early on, Colin realizes that Adam’s cast him as a Watson-figure and wonders why he was the sidekick (he could handle the sight of blood, for starters, unlike his friend), but it takes almost no time for him to realize why he is. I appreciated both his ambition and quick understanding about his own nature.

Interestingly, for a Watson, Colin’s not the narrator, nor the exclusive point-of-view character. I’m sure I’ve seen this before, but since reading this book, I haven’t been able to think of another example.*

* Reader, you’re invited to make me feel foolish by listing a few examples in the comments.

Their First Case

After a night of heavy, heavy drinking, most of the wedding gifts are stumbling around and trying to recover. But the best man doesn’t make an appearance, and Adam is sent to get him. Sadly, Adam discovers his body and notifies the police. Once they arrive, Adam is dismayed at the small number who show up and even more dismayed at the cursory look they give the victim and his room. It’s a busy weekend, so it will be some time before paramedics are able to come and get the body.

Adam and Colin don’t believe the police’s conclusion—Danny had too much to drink and choked on his own vomit. They instinctively know that Danny didn’t die from overindulging—he’d drank them under the table without trying too often to believe that. With nothing else to do for the rest of the day, they decide to look into things themselves.

It ends up being good that the body hasn’t been removed yet, they’re able to sneak back into the room, and Colin’s able to give their friend’s body a closer look. Then they start asking a few of the guests and the groom some questions. People indulge them and answer—mostly for their own amusement it seems. The pair start to uncover some actual evidence, which leads them to more and quickly, a theory emerges for Adam.

Then he just has to come up with a way to prove his theory—hopefully in a way worthy of Cumberbatch.

So, what did I think about The Curious Dispatch of Daniel Costello?

This is a quick and enjoyable read. It’s a clever little mystery—most (maybe all) of the clues are there for the reader to pick up and put together with (or before) Adam. For me, at least, this is what I want in this kind of story—a little bit of fair play so that I can match wits with the sleuth (amateur or not).

The language is a little rougher than I’m used to seeing in this kind of story, and the protagonists aren’t the norm either. Honestly, they’d both be a better fit for a harder-boiled, more noir-ish fare. I’m not criticizing this, I’m trying to describe it.

Nor am I complaining—McDonald makes this work. Maybe it’s the contrast between what I’m used to seeing in “cozy” mystery and what he gives, maybe it’s just the strange charm that the boorish Adam displays that does it. I’m not sure I can describe why it works, I’m just enjoying the fact that it does. Also, the language and protagonists are what make this novella/series what I suggest in the headline—something for people who aren’t drawn to the aesthetic of a cozy, but like the way they work.

The one thing that I’d be tempted to grumble about is the length of the novella and the resulting lack of depth to the story. But both of those are by design, so I’ll hold my tongue. And really, if my gripe is that I didn’t get enough of something that I liked, it really just says that I’m a glutton.

I don’t know when the second Stonebridge Mystery will be available, but I’ll be waiting for it when it is. Spend a few minutes with this unlikely crime-fighting duo and you’ll likely be waiting with me.

4 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, opinions are my own.

Red Dog Press
My thanks to Red Dog Press for the invitation to participate in this tour and the materials (including a copy of the novella) provided.

Twisted Twenty-Six by Janet Evanovich: Stephanie’s Discontented but Provides Readers with the Best Book in Years

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On January 5, 2021

In Janet Evanovich, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller, Stephanie Plum

Twisted Twenty-Six

Twisted Twenty-Six

by Janet Evanovich
Series: Stephanie Plum, #26

Paperback, 305 pg.
G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 2019

Read: December 25, 2020
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

“You still want to chase after this guy?”

“You bet your ass. Just because he made fools out of us three times, don’t mean one of these times we won’t luck out. Notice he called us losers and not quitters. That’s on account of we never quit. In my mind, that’s the difference between being a loser-and a winner. A winner is willing to look like a idiot for as long as it takes to get the job done. I figure you stick with i it long enough ~ and you win. Unless you die or come down with some disease like shingles or cancer of the rectum. If I ever got cancer of the rectum, I’d go to the best rectumologist out there. Like I’d get a celebrity rectumologist. I wouldn’t mess around with some local yokel.”

“All good to know,” I said.

I don’t even need to provide dialogue tags to that, do I? If you’ve read a single Stephanie Plum novel, you know who’s saying what there.

What’s Twisted Twenty-Six About?

When we last left Stephanie*, her Grandma Mazur had left for a getaway with her new love, who just happens to be a semi-retired mobster. We pick up a week or so later, Grandma Mazur and Jimmy Rosolli had been married, and then forty-five minutes later, Rosolli died (of natural causes, I feel compelled to add). Still, even a 45-minute marriage makes Grandma a widow, but more importantly, a widow of some status in the neighborhood.

* Yeah, I know, right? I’ll talk about that in a minute.

We don’t know a lot about Jimmy’s criminal life, but among his group, he had a particular importance. He was “Keeper of the Keys.” Now, no one—not Grandma, not the cops, not almost anyone that Stephanie can talk to about Jimmy knows what that means. The few that do know, aren’t talking to anyone about them (also, they don’t believe Stephanie or Grandma when they say they don’t know where the keys are).

So Jimmy’s partners are looking for the keys, their rivals are looking for the keys. And everyone thinks Grandma Mazur either has them or can get them (she is the beneficiary of his will, after all). And none of these men are willing to take any means necessary to get her to talk. Stephanie, Ranger and Morelli team up to keep Grandma Mazur and the Plums safe.

All the while, Stephanie and Lulu are on the hunt for people who missed their court dates for the Bail Service, Stephanie is dealing with a destroyed car, Stephanie is fending off advances from Ranger—and not doing fending off much from Morelli, you know, typical stuff.

A moment of chronological accuracy

At one point, Stephanie is lamenting to Lulu about how her life isn’t working out the way she wants and states her age—a larger number than Lulu is ready for (okay, I wasn’t ready for that amount of candor, either—but the math works), and a sign that maybe Evanovich is going to start aging her in real time. It’s not long before Stephanie blows off that moment of honesty as a joke and we’re elft wit an indeterminate age again.

Still, for a couple of poages, it looked liek Evanovich might have been making a big step.

Old Dog, New Trick?

From the start of this series, there’s been a little carry-over from one book to the next—Stephanie’s sister’s marriage and kids, glacially slow advancement of her relationships with Ranger and Morelli, and so on. But largely, these are stand-alone books and can be read in any order.

Until now (obviously).

The end of Look Alive Twenty-Five leads into this book. The ending of this book propels the reader into Fortune and Glory (aka Tantalizing Twenty-Seven). This is new. This is a positive movement, there’s something to sink our teeth into. Not much, maybe, but it’s something.

I’m not sure why Evanovich has changed her approach. I’m not sure I care, either. I’m just happy to see that it has happened, and wonder where she’s going with all of this.

So, what did I think about Twisted Twenty-Six?

“I don’t want to do this job anymore. I’m not good at it. I don’t like it. I don’t like being in the bad neighborhoods looking for the bad people.”

“What would you rather do?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“Do you have a direction?”

“No.”

“Babe.”

“Yeah, I’m a mess.”

“You aren’t a mess,” he said. “You’re just a little burned out.”

“It’s more than that. I’m stagnant. There’s no growth in my life.”

“That’s okay as long as you like what you’re doing. Not everyone needs to keep moving up the ladder.”

I have to read a State of the Series in these words (see also: the quotation at the top). I doubt that Evanovich set out to do that, but “mess,” “stagnant,” and directionless are words I’d use to describe this series lately. But like Stephanie’s (no doubt) futile efforts at self-improvement, over the last couple of books I’m seeing signs that Evanovich might be trying to add some direction and clarity to the series

I do not think it’ll ever reach the comedic heights it once hit. Nor do I think that Evanovich is going to suddenly become the new Grafton (not that I’d complain), but it seems like she’s taking the storytelling component of this seriously again. I could be 2-3 books away from again wondering why I’m sticking with these series. But until I get to that point, I’m going to enjoy the ride.

As for this book? It was fun—I admit to laughing out loud on a few occasions. I liked the story (I’m not convinced the bad guy was set-up correctly before the reveal, but…I’m not going to argue about it). The action was decent. I didn’t roll my eyes at the destruction of the car, and best yet, I think this is one of the best uses of Stephanie’s parents in ages (if not ever).

This might actually be a decent jumping-on point (Look Alive Twenty-Five would be marginally better) for this long-running series. This is definitely one to use to come back to the series after a time away. Or if you’re just plugging away with a new annual entry, you’ll be satisfied. Give this series a shot, it’ll be worth it.

4 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, opinions are my own.

Persons of Interest (Audiobook) by Peter Grainger, Gildart Jackson: DC Smith’s Tie to a Murder Victim Leads to a different Twisty Case

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On January 4, 2021

In Audiobook, DC Smith & Kings Lake, Fiction, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Time’s gotten away from me on this one, been trying to get it done since August and keep getting distracted. But…I won’t let myself listen to the next one until I get this posted. So…

Persons of Interest

Persons of Interest

by Peter Grainger, Gildart Jackson (Narrator)
Series: A DC Smith Investigation, #4

Unabridged Audiobook, 10 hrsl, 30 min.
Tantor Audio, 2017

Read: August 14-18, 2020
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

Allen wrote a short email of his own to Detective Inspector Reeve. The first version included the phrase, “Tell Smith to carry on as normal.” Then he had second thoughts and deleted that, telling Smith to carry on as normal might not be wise, because “normal” for Smith was not the same as it was for other people. [guessing on punctuation, etc.]

What’s Persons of Interest About?

DC Smith is called to a nearby prison to answer some questions. It appears that a murdered prisoner had a connection to Smith. Smith has never had anything to do with this man. Oh? Then why does he have your phone number? This is technically true, but it hasn’t been Smith’s number since the first book in the series. DC’s written off pretty quickly as a suspect (thankfully! I’ve made it clear that I just don’t like those stories), but he is curious about the man having his number.

But he can’t focus on that—the case belongs to a different jurisdiction, in the first place. In the second place, there’s a major new drugs task force temporarily in Kings Lake and he needs to focus on the new initiative. DC is enough of a cynic to have little use for it, seeing it as a PR stunt more than anything else.

Sadly, because of this task force, Smith and his team realize that something has happened to the drug trade in Kings Lake recently, power has shifted and the old players aren’t in the game anymore, or are playing a diminished role. So who’s running the show now, and how did this happen without any of the police aware?

Oh, and there is that nagging curiosity in the back of his mind about the murdered prisoner.

The On-Going Arcs

I really appreciated the way that Smith is still dealing with the, er, shortcuts he took to make sure he passed his physical exam. It was semi-comedic in the previous book, but that’s over and now DC is paying for it.

The new team member is becoming part of the crew but there’s still some room to grow—which is how it should be. There are some other internal moves, and potential moves, even some cooperation where I wouldn’t have expected it. I’m looking forward to seeing how it all resolves. I’m being vague, but it’s hard not to be without spilling details.

The story involving DC’s True Crime Writer friend was really scaled back, and I kept wondering if it was going to come into play more in this book. It didn’t, which I assume means that it’ll play a big role in Book 5. Which works for me. It’s not my favorite part of any of these books, but I’m really curious about how it’s going to play out.

Jackson’s Narration

Everything I’ve said before still holds. The perfect combination of text and narrator, protagonist and portrayer.

That’s it, that’s all I can say.

So, what did I think about Persons of Interest?

The reason that it’s taken me months to post about this book is that I don’t know what else to say about this series. I think that there are a couple of more compelling police procedural series out there, but I can only handle so much of them at one time. It feels like I could listen to this series on a loop and be perfectly content for a few weeks.

I love the cast, I love the way Smith’s mind works, I love his quiet little humor (he reminds me of a more realistic Francis Xavier Flynn making jokes that only he will understand or appreciate), I really like the cases this team works, and Jackson’s narration puts it over the top.

I’m not 100% convinced that this case was as compelling as the previous three, but the way Grainger tells the story makes up for that. I can’t wait to get back to Kings Lake Central and see what they get up to next.

4 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, opinions are my own.

Cooking for Cannibals by Rich Leder: An Ex-Con turned Cook, Experimental Drugs, Reverse Aging and a Gerontologist make for a Very Strange Crime Novel

By

On December 23, 2020

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

Cooking for Cannibals

Cooking for Cannibals

by Rich Leder

eARC, 371 pg.
Laugh Riot Press, 2021

Read: December 15-17, 2020

Don’t Suspend Your Disbelief, Throw it into a Small, Locked Room Somewhere

The core premise of this book is hogwash. Scientifically impossible. Accept that and move on. Leder doesn’t try to dress it up in pseudo-scientific jargon or explanations, he just says this impossible-to-believe thing happened. The characters only believe it because of what’s in front of their eyes and make no attempt to explain it to each other, either. So pretend the universe works the way he needs it to for this story, and you can have a lot of fun.

If you can’t do that, don’t even bother picking it up. Sure, go ahead and buy it, Leder could use the sale, but don’t bother reading the book.

What’s Cooking for Cannibals About?

It’s about what happens when an ex-con gets his big break, a behavioral gerontologist who prefers rats to people takes a dramatic step, and a group of seniors embrace a second chance.

Carrie

Carrie is a behavioral gerontologist who’s working at a secret pharmaceutical laboratory coming up with a medication to combat the effects of aging. The results are phenomenal. Unbelievable—it actually appears to reverse the aging process to a degree. A significant degree.

On the weekends, Carrie works for the Copacabana, a “low rent rest home,” where her mother lives, and has grown close to a number of the residents. She can’t help but want to help them and steals the medication from the lab one night.

This sets almost everything else in motion.

Jimmy

Jimmy’s done time a couple of times—assault, burglary, that kind of thing. As a result of this, he can’t get a job unless he lies about his background. As soon as the truth comes out, he loses the job. While he’s trying to go straight, Jimmy can’t go for more than a few weeks without having to start over again, losing jobs and places he rents. He’s a “rockstar butcher” but wants to cook. He just can’t get the chance.

After his most recent dismissal/eviction, he’s given a tip about a job—there’s a retirement home in need of a cook, they provide room and board, in addition to a paycheck. This is everything he needs, if he can get the job. Which is where he meets Carrie, becomes smitten with her, and sees what happens to the residents there when they start using that medication.

Sadly, his new parole officer is determined to find him in violation of his parole for being fired/evicted and will send him back to prison. Unless, of course, Jimmy starts paying him a weekly bribe.

The Copa Crew

Carrie’s mother and her friends are the ones who make the decision to hire Jimmy after he wows them with his sample meals. And instantly, the reader enjoys them—there’s a great, familial interaction between them and it’s just charming. Once they start taking this medication? Well, they become even more entertaining.

The Fixer and the Cleaner

You can absolutely make the case that Carrie and Jimmy are their own antagonists (with some help from the Copa Crew), they’re just not cut out for this kind of thing. But formally, I guess we have to give that credit to the two bodies that funded the pharmaceutical experiments, as represented by the Fixer and the Cleaner, both in LA to make sure that no one finds out about the drug or that their employers had anything to do with any secret drug research.

The Fixer is a suave, calm, and collected Latino who enjoys creative ways of torture. The Cleaner is a Russian in love with Hollywood and all things American film (like poorly educated, heavily accented Chili Palmer), but he loves fire and burning things/people even more. Neither is the kind of guy you want to draw the attention of. Sadly, Carrie does (and because of that, so does Jimmy)

So these two come to LA to find the stolen pills, recover them, eliminate anyone who knows anything about the pills, and any other trace of them—records, people who’ve used or developed them, etc. (without realizing the other is doing the same). It’s their entrance into the story that gets everything really rolling. The question is simply, who will be alive after they’re done?

And sure, the California Legal System was also out there, looking into Jimmy and his activities. But comparatively speaking, that’s a pretty low worry.

Lecter-ish, but with a Sense of Humor

So, Cannibalism is in the title for a reason. Technically, yeah, there’s some cannibalism. But it’s not that anyone wants to eat humans, it’s just a side effect of the drug that the users become very hungry, and are not that selective where their meat comes from.

If it also turns out that eating human remains cleans up other problems by eradicating evidence? Well, that’s just a bonus.

It’s not grizzly, it’s not detailed—it’s also not justified. I think everyone involved is disgusted on some level. It’s simply they’re hungry and they have access to some well-cooked human remains.

The Two Styles of Rich Leder

This is the third novel I’ve posted about by Leder, and he seems to write two different types of books. There’s the McCall & Company series, which is a fairly straight-forward series about a would-be actress who takes over her father’s PI business after his death. It’s light fun in the vein of Stephanie Plum, but a little less wacky. I read the first book, and have intended to read the rest (my mother has read at least one, probably more, of the rest). Then there’s Let There Be Linda, a book I described as “strange, bloody, a little violent, and impossible to explain in a way that does it justice.” Which could really be said about this book, too.

It’s hard to see both of these coming from the same source. I don’t know if one’s necessarily superior to the other, but one’s a lot more marketable than the other, for sure. I’m not sure there’s a lot of overlap in the audiences for both, too. Linda and Cooking for Cannibals are marked by black comedy, one unbelievable occurrence being accepted as fact, and stories that are nigh-impossible to predict.

I do think this is largely more successful, and only slightly less imaginative, than Linda. Leder has a tighter focus on the narrative here, and it just makes the whole thing more compelling and interesting.

So, what did I think about Cooking for Cannibals?

Seriously, if you’re going to read one black comedy about anthropophagites this year, make it Cooking for Cannibals. As I wrote that, it occurred to me that late last year, I read another black comedy about anthropophagites. This is a pretty odd trend, but I can assure you that neither of them has had an impact on my diet.

There’s a lot of funny stuff in this novel. There are also few things with a pretty high “ick factor.” But what comes through most strongly? There’s a sweetness to the way that Jimmy, Carrie, and the Copa Crew interact. The relationship that springs up between Jimmy and Carrie is the focus, but there’s a nice connection between Jimmy and the people who give him his chance to cook (and they love his food), Carrie and her mother find another layer to their relationship in these pages, and so on. Sure the sweetness is buried underneath torture, killing, fire, rats, threats, and more—but it’s there.

The major note I had about the writing was that it felt like the concluding chapter ends 1-4 paragraphs too early. At least at the moment. But honestly, it’s the perfect conclusion to this story as it is. I just had to think about it for a couple of minutes first.

If you’re willing to give this kind of thing a shot, you’re going to have a pretty good time. Leder can pull off the outlandish ideas in a piece of Crime Fiction and it’s rewarding to see him do it.

If you read what I said, and you’re on the fence? You should probably avoid it.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this novel from the author in exchange for this post and my honest opinion. While I appreciate it, my opinions are my own.

4 Stars

Amari and the Night Brothers by B. B. Alston: Look Out World, There’s a New Magician on the Loose!

By

On December 11, 2020

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

Amari and the Night Brothers

Amari and the Night Brothers

by B. B. Alston
Series: Supernatural Investigations, Volume Number 1

eARC, 384 pg.
Egmont Books, 2021

Read: December 7-9, 2020
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

What’s Amari and the Night Brothers About?

Amari is a thirteen-year-old girl from Atlanta’s inner-city, attending a private school on scholarship, and is in trouble when we meet her. She’s been antagonized (probably bullied, honestly) by some rich girls from her school and struck back. She’s now facing discipline—up to and including loss of her scholarship. The principal ties this behavior to her brother’s recent disappearance/presumed death, she’s been “acting out” since then.

While reeling from this, Amari receives a delivery from her brother—cutting the details, it’s an invitation to the Bureau of Supernatural Affairs. The invitation opens her eyes (literally) to the hidden magickal world around her. She can join the Bureau via a summer program (as her brother, Quinton, did) and if she passes some tests, she can become a junior member. She sees this as her best/only chance to find out what happened to Quinton—and hopefully, find him alive.

But also, it’s magick. How could she not want to be part of it?

One of the first steps involves finding her secret talent—where she learns that she has rare and illegal abilities. Determined to stay in the Bureau to find Quinton—and to show that just because she’s born with abilities that remind everyone of the worst people in the supernatural world’s history, it doesn’t mean she’ll be as evil.

It’s hard to make friends—hard not to be ostracized by everyone—because of her abilities, and she faces outright prejudice. But she does make an ally or two among the other supernatural youths, and a few among the adults overseeing the program*. Not only does Amari work to pass her tests to remain in the Bureau, she and her allies look into Quinton’s disappearance.

* I really don’t have the time to get into it, but I really liked the adults in this book (with the exception of two that you’re clearly not supposed to like)

The Clincher

There are many reasons to read this, many reasons you’ll enjoy it. More than I have time to enumerate, more than you want to spend time reading. So I’ll just give you one word that should convince you: weredragon.

Were…@#$%&!…dragon.

I love this idea. I don’t know why we don’t have a half-dozen series about them in UF. Elsie, the weredragon in question, would be a character I love no matter her special ability/species/whatever. She’s a fun, vibrant, supportive, smart character, and combining those qualities with the idea of a human shifting into a dragon? You’ve got a fan in me.

The Inevitable Comparisons

It’s impossible to read this book and not think of a certain other MG series that rhymes with Larry Cotter. I think Amari and the Night Brothers comes off pretty well in such a comparison—I’m not saying it’s superior (or inferior), but it holds its own.

But honestly? I think this is closer to a Percy Jackson kind of thing (just without the mythological basis), and Alston’s style and voice are closer to Riordan’s.

I’d also throw in a comparison to Will Hill’s Department 19 books, but few of my readers will recognize it—and it’s for an older audience and is more bloody. But it’s one of those things that keeps coming to mind as I read Amari’s adventure.

I’m not suggesting that Alston’s just giving us an “inner city” version of Percy Jackson, etc. There are just things about Amari and the Night Brothers that remind me of the others, (the way that the Iron Druid Chronicles reminds readers of The Dresden Files, for example). The novel’s themes and particulars of the fantasy worlds will vary, but the overall feel and style of the novel will invite comparison to Barry Totter, Percy, and similar works.

The Real World

In the background of all the fantastic things going on in Amari’s life—all the unbelievable things she’s being introduced to, the incredible people and creatures she’s encountering—there’s the real world, and not an easy part of it. She lives in the inner city of Georgia with her mother working horrible shifts at a local hospital struggling to make ends meet. Her father has abandoned the family.

The police assume her brother’s disappearance has something to do with him being a criminal—he’s not missing, he’s off doing something he doesn’t want his mother to know about. Because that’s what young men in this neighborhood do. As infuriating as that prejudice expressed is, there’s someone in the neighborhood who is falling into that lifestyle. Quinton had been tutoring him, but now he has no one helping him—but Amari tries once she realizes what’s going on with Jayden. This is a storyline that we follow throughout the book, and it might be the most important and rewarding one.

Both in Amari’s school and even at the Bureau, she has to deal with privilege—people who were born into the right families, people who aren’t like her. Because of things she has no control over, no input into, simply accident of birth, there are those who don’t want her in the Bureau, don’t want her pursuing her goals—but she doesn’t back down. Never fear, the book doesn’t preach, it doesn’t moralize. It simply shows the challenges Amari has to deal with—and the challenges so many others don’t—and lets the reader draw their own conclusions.

Grit and Smarts

Amari is practically the embodiment of Angela Duckworth’s concept of grit. I made a few notes like that while reading, making Amari the kind of protagonist you can really get behind.

Duckworth’s website defines grit as:

Grit is passion and perseverance for long-term goals…
Grit isn’t talent. Grit isn’t luck. Grit isn’t how intensely, for the moment, you want something.
Instead, grit is about having what some researchers call an”ultimate concern”–a goal you care about so much that it organizes and gives meaning to almost everything you do. And grit is holding steadfast to that goal. Even when you fall down. Even when you screw up. Even when progress toward that goal is halting or slow.
Talent and luck matter to success. But talent and luck are no guarantee of grit. And in the very long run, I think grit may matter as least as much, if not more.

Replace the word “talent” above with “magick” and you’ve got Amari.

The book is also a celebration of thinking. Quinton, Elsie (the weredragon), and Amari are smart. They’re bookish. They’re problem solvers. Sure Amari has magical abilities, but before she uses magic, she thinks through a situation and addresses it with her mind. Amari and Elsie study, they plan. There’s one point where Amari remembers the book and page number where she learned a fact that proved vital to one challenge. Her remembering that page number just made me happy.

Elsie’s a tinkerer, even before she gets her magical enhancement, she’s inventing things, making things. Amari talks about how many things are in the library that she wants to read about, learn about that have nothing to do with her goals. Give me characters like this any day.

So, what did I think about Amari and the Night Brothers?

This was just so much fun. Even when things are looking dire for poor Amari (or anyone else), there is an ineffable sense of awe and hope to the book. That just magnified all the good from above (and helped me brush off the couple of minor reservations I had).

Is this one to give to the MG reader in your life? Yes. Is this one to read yourself if you like the occasional (or not-so-occasional) MG novel? Absolutely. I’m already planning on getting the sequels, and expect just about everyone who reads this novel will too.

4 Stars
My thanks to The Write Reads for the invitation to participate in this tour and the materials (including the novel from Egmont Publishing via Netgalley) they provided.

Last Stand in Lychford by Paul Cornell: A Tense, Taut Conclusion to this Series (that I really don’t want to see conclude)

By

On December 1, 2020

In Fiction, Paul Cornell, Urban Fantasy

Last Stand in Lychford

Last Stand in Lychford

by Paul Cornell
Series: Witches of Lychford, #5

Kindle Edition, 192 pg.
Tor, 2020

Read: November 24, 2020
Grab a copy from your local indie bookstore!

What’s Last Stand in Lychford About?

When I talked about the last book, The Lights Go Out in Lychford, I said:

The conclusion was simply fantastic and heart-wrenching—with a last line that will drive you to the online bookstore of your choice to try to order the conclusion immediately.

And it picks up right from that point—Lychford has seen plenty of trouble and conflict the last few years, but this time, it’s for all the marbles.

It’s not supposed to be a final showdown between other-worldly forces and the defenders of the town. It’s supposed to be some of the other-worldly forces just rolling into town, wiping out humanity in Lychford before moving out to the rest of the planet. But the crafty, wily, and stubborn trio that we’ve been following for the past few years have a thing or two to say about that. They may not be fully ready for what’s coming their way, but that’s not going to stop them—and as usual, we see that they’re pretty good at adapting to whatever circumstances they find themselves in.

The New Characters

What better time than the last volume of a series to introduce three major characters? (well, maybe 2 major and one minor—no pun intended). We meet both a new fairy and a new mortal (and her daughter) who both play significant roles in the final confrontation.

The fairy’s quite possibly the most helpful representative of the species we’ve encountered, as far as Autumn and Lizzie are concerned. He’s pretty entertaining as far as the reader is concerned. So that’s a win all around.

The human, Zoya, is a newish resident of Lychford—struggling to keep her and her young daughter afloat. She’s fully aware that strange things happened in town a few weeks before we meet her, but she doesn’t understand it—and is in no rush to understand. All she cares about is finding rent money so she and Jas aren’t evicted. I can’t get into her role in things but Zoya’s background, her personality, and circumstances make her a pleasant and important addition to this world and I’m glad we got to see her.

I don’t have much to say about Jas, but I enjoyed her. She was a fun burst of innocence in grim circumstances.

Autumn and Lizzie

Naturally, the most important characters to the book are our returning protagonists. Lizzie’s always been my favorite character, the one I could relate to most in this series. But…there’s a lot of what she does in this installment that just annoyed me, it didn’t feel like the same character to me (it’s likely just my mood at the time). At the same time, I connected more with Autumn here than I’m used to.

Overall, though, I appreciated their character arcs (contained in this book and over the series, both). These two women—rebuilding a friendship, learning about a whole new (to them) world of magic and strangeness and fantastical beings—are not really de rigueur in Urban Fantasy. I enjoyed them for their novelty, but more than that, I thought they were solid, well-rounded, believable characters that were just a lot of fun to spend time with.

You Might Want to Read this Next to an Open Window

There’s a claustrophobic feel to a lot of this book as Lychford is cut off from the rest of the world, and it gets worse as the book goes on. But there’s one scene in particular where Autumn is micrometers (maybe nanometers) away from probable doom. Cornell nailed that scene in a visceral way.

So, what did I think about Last Stand in Lychford?

This was exactly the conclusion this series needed. Cornell nailed the landing—teaching us a lot about the world (much of which we’d guessed, but now we know) and surprising readers the way things wrap up, while making it all feel inevitable and right. All along, this has felt like the most real, the most possible Urban Fantasy series—and even as cataclysmic events unfold, Cornell somehow makes it feel a whole lot more believable than any UF I can think of.*

* I think I said something similar about Amber Benson’s Witches Echo Park series—and the two series have a similar feel, but I think Cornell does a slightly better job of it.

This series about a tiny English town standing between two worlds, as humanity’s (unwitting) defense against beings from other worlds, other realities has really been a blast. I heartily encourage you to go back to Witches of Lychford and dive into this series.

4 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, opinions are my own.

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