Adrian Collins's Blog, page 140

REVIEW: The Nothing Within by Andy Giesler

The Nothing Within is a book that utterly oozes voice. It’s the debut novel of Andy Giesler, and I was lucky to get a chance to read it as part of my role as a judge in the Self-Published Science Fiction Contest. The book did not make the semi-finals, but it was one of my personal top three picks from the contest.

The Nothing Within is a rural, pastoral post-apocalyptic story. Imagine Horizon Zero Dawn with Amish people and no giant robot animals and you’re halfway there.

It reads unlike any other story I’ve read before, with an excellent voice from the beginning to end that never wavers or feels fake. Giesler keeps up a folksy slang throughout. There are fables called Good-old Tales, and an old diary called Words from the Reckoning that takes place during the apocalypse, in addition to the main story, and all have their own idiosyncrasies and styles.

Many birds, but no idea how many

Lord protect us

Nearly two weeks since I wrote last. Will try to keep at it. Seems more important now.

A little warmer, though haze dims the sun.

Word is that everything modern stopped working, everywhere at the same time.

There’s been looting, burning and killing in Sugarcreek, Berlin, Millersburg, and New Philly. I’d visit the neighbours for news but Eli won’t hear of it. Said the children and I should stay put. He’s been visiting for us. Tells us what he hears. Parts of it anyhow.

Even though Elijah Lapp’s Amish, he had a naughtwork grown into him for work, so he could talk with the saws and drills and lathes. Had to, or he’d lose his job. Two weeks ago, same day as the wall of smoke, his naughts shut down. No warning. Left him feeling poorly a few hours. He says others from work were the same. Like the whole world went quiet at once.

The other sections are Old Root telling her story to an audience. This is the main storyline of the novel, but all of them tie together as the book goes on.

The premise of The Nothing Within is that technology ran amok and destroyed civilization, but the groups of people best able to survive and adapt from that are the groups that have resisted technology as much as possible—Mennonites, Hutterites, and Amish people. Their agrarian lifestyle is definitely altered and adjusted by the rest of the world collapsing, but their lack of dependency on technology has kept them able to keep going. Honestly, this premise is so simple it’s amazing that no one to my knowledge has done it before.

Many of the chapters in this book are extremely short, and the way the story switches between its Good Old Tales, its diary, and Old Root’s story can make it feel disjointed and fragmented. That makes sense, in that if we’re dealing with a post-apocalyptic setting, we’re dealing with the loss of knowledge, and piecing together fragments feels true to the setting in a way that a more traditional story arc would not.

The characters are all solid and well-developed, with a naturalistic sense to all of them and their relationships with one another. The tension and relief of community living is consistent throughout, as characters navigate their relationships, which are extremely important in such a tight-knit community.

The Nothing Within takes its time in getting you to the plot, but the mysteries of the setting and the fragmented narrative kept me interested throughout regardless. The voice is consistently compelling. If you’re looking for a unique post-apocalyptic tale, I definitely recommend this one.

Read The Nothing Within by Andy Giesler

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REVIEW: Bluebird by Ciel Pierlot

Bluebird by Ciel Pierlot is an incredibly fun queer science fiction adventure captivating readers from the first to the last page. How could it be any different with a tagline like “Lesbian Gunslingers in Space”? Evoking the phenomenal Gideon the Ninth, famously marketed as “Lesbian Necromancers in Space”, Bluebird might charm readers similarly. I don’t expect it to be quite the same breakout success but I can see this being a popular and beloved genre contribution. It is full of dry humour and the sort of sparse wit that made me chuckle throughout reading the book and felt absolutely natural for this set of characters.

The story follows Rig as she embarks on a journey across the galaxy to save her estranged sister from her former faction – who are trying to blackmail her into returning what she stole from them. But as is par for the course, she is not alone on this mission as she joins the crew of the Bluebird, a ship full of resistance fighters, and has the help of her badass librarian girlfriend June. Despite having noped out of the power struggles between the three factions vying for dominance in this world, Rig is drawn back into them as she and her friends fight their way through space.

Bluebird is fast-paced and compelling, the kind of book you’ll want to keep reading and reading because it absorbs you so much and you want to know how Rig’s story continues. I personally keep thinking I’m not a huge fan of science fiction, and then I pick up a book like this one, and I want to immediately read the whole genre because it’s exactly my cup of tea. Strong characters, a compelling story, high stakes and humour that just clicks for me. It is dark and gritty without being overly misantrophic, and never loses a hopeful spark to keep the characters motivated.

I think this is an outstanding science fiction title, and one I’d personally consider for awards. I look forward to reading more of Ciel Pierlot’s work – if her debut is this good, hopes are high for future books. And I definitely need to keep reading queer science fiction, because apparently I have been wrongly assuming that I’m not a science fiction person. I’d especially recommend Bluebird to readers of fellow Angry Robot title The Outside by Ada Hoffman or Charlie Jane Anders’ Victory Greater Than Death, or perhaps even Tade Thompson’s Far From the Light of Heaven.

Read Bluebird by Ciel Pierlot

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REVIEW: The Darkness That Comes Before by R. Scott Bakker

R. Scott Bakker’s The Darkness That Comes Before has a divisive effect: readers who love it, laud it with endless praise, but those who despise it, vocalize their criticisms ardently. I was keen to see what my own experience would bring.

[image error]The first book in The Prince of Nothing Trilogy, The Darkness That Comes Before, lays the groundwork for a world remade by an apocalyptic event. Bakker weaves together a mysterious history from two thousand years before with an uncertain present as thousands gather in pursuit of a holy war. At the story’s center lies an unknown traveler whose connections and influences shape the world and people around him. As the struggle for control over the crusade heightens, history reveals itself in the usual way: through its survivors.

The world of The Darkness That Comes Before is equally bleak for everyone: something Bakker makes abundantly clear throughout the narrative. The grim setting lends itself as more than just a backdrop. It impacts the way Bakker intwines significant themes with his character arcs, especially with regard to internal and external identity. In parallel with strong philosophical threads, each character experiences a certain moment that separates the person they were before the event from the person they are afterward. This internal collision of identities bleeds into an external struggle as they begin to question how their changed selves fit into their society. While you might not agree with their choices, the path these characters walk not only makes sense for their arcs, but also for the world in which they dwell.

Aside from these transformative moments, Bakker displays ones of autonomy, specifically for his female characters. Though they may be quieter or come about in more unexpected ways in comparison to those for their male counterparts, these instances naturally fit into the overarching story Bakker’s telling. These events act as evidence that these characters could have more agency as the series continues.

Though The Darkness That Comes Before is told from multiple points of view, Bakker is purposeful and clever in the way he makes introductions. Each main POV serves the plot, continuously pushing the narrative forward while slowly grounding the reader in their unique perspective and the world. He masterfully blends history, lore, philosophy, and religion into a disturbingly beautiful culmination unique to the fantasy genre.

Lodged under the grimdark label, The Darkness That Comes Before is not for the faint of heart. Bakker’s setup warns this is only the beginning of a full descent into darkness. His exploration of choice and the fallout from those decisions adds a relevant and meaningful layer into his intentions with the novel: “It’s the concert of knowledge and ignorance that underwrites our decisions” (73). I’m very much looking forward to what comes next.

Read The Darkness That Comes Before by R. Scott Bakker

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REVIEW: Blade Runner 2019 Volume 2

Blade Runner 2019 Volume 2 is the second graphic novel in the Blade Runner graphic novel series released by Titan books. These serve as a prequel series to Blade Runner 2049 and follow a story over roughly ten years of time. It’s a hefty time skip but quite effective in its handling of the subject matter. It is a dark, gritty, noir series that I think benefits from the extensive time skip.

The premise is that Aahna “Ash” Ashina was the best Blade Runner in Los Angeles when she was dragooned into working for an insane corporate executive, Selwyn, out to recover his missing daughter, Cleo. Realizing that he was no good for her and “rescuing” the girl from a bunch of Replicants trying to protect her, Ash has since taken the girl to the offworld colonies in order to protect her.

Unfortunately, life in the offworld colonies isn’t like it was described in the brochure. Ash can’t live among the super rich due to Selwyn’s goons still looking for her and couldn’t afford it even if she could. As such, she lives a life among the Replicants with her “son” Ian (who is the disguised Cleo). It is a miserable and demanding life but has hardened Cleo and also kept her safe from those who would experiment on her.

I was briefly curious whether Cleo was trans or identified with her adopted gender, but it appears that it was merely crossdressing as the opposite gender for safety. It’s a shame because the comic is quite good at touching on social issues while not distracting from its dark and gritty worldbuilding. We never got to see what life in the offworld colonies was like in Blade Runner, so this is genuinely building.

Life in the offworld colonies is hot and miserable for Replicants with many of them dying regular horrible deaths in attempting to terraform worlds for human habitation. It results in regular revolts by the Replicants up there and Blade Runners are employed as corporate assassins there. It is a lot of well-done new material that adds to, rather than detracts, from the setting. Still, I would have loved to have seen some of the luxurious super-rich lifestyle in action that is hinted at but never shown on-panel.

The story is full of lot of twists and turns with Replicant revolutionaries, a corporate sponsored Blade Runner every bit as good as Ash, and the seemingly resurrected Isobel Selwyn. I really liked the character of Hythe that proves to be able to match wits and gunplay with Ash. It’s a nice reminder of just how far she’s come from the Replicant hating bigot of the first volume while also having a few twists of their own.

The art is excellent, though I think it lacks something by being in space rather than in the huge cities of the first volume. It’s still a fantastic book and I am eager to find out what happens in the climax of the third volume. A ten-year time skip is a lot for a book like this but not something that I am against either. Too many comic books don’t have any real sense of progression and this is a nice aversion.

Read Blade Runner 2019 Volume 2

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Discussing 36 Streets, cyberpunk, and D&D with T.R. Napper

Many of our followers will know T.R. Napper from our publication of his brilliant short story collection, Neon Leviathan. On Jan 18 in Australia, and Feb 8 for the rest of the world, Titan Books will be publishing Tim’s debut novel set in the same world, 36 Streets. Having read an advanced reader copy of it—and having seen what Richard K. Morgan had to say about the book—I know you’re going to want to get in on this read.

Tim is an incredibly interesting author and human. His decade of aid work ranging from Mongolia to Vietnam has meant he has seen human poverty, darkness, struggle, and hope up front, in the flesh, in one of the poorest regions of the world. And his stories just consistently use that lived experience to reach into your chest and pluck your heartstrings while depicting a cyberpunk world you’re unlikely to have read the like of before, based in Vietnam and Australia.

Being in the same time zone as me (FOR ONCE) I was lucky enough to have a chat with Tim about the upcoming release of 36 Streets, his work and thoughts on short stories, working with autistic children to build social confidence through Dungeons and Dragons, and his lived experience.

[GdM] Welcome to the GdM blog, Tim! Thanks for joining us and the grimdark crowd.

[TRN] A pleasure. Ironically I think the so-called ‘Grimdark’ crowd are the most supportive, friendliest, and level-headed sub-culture of genre readers.

[GdM] in 36 Streets we see a near future Ha Noi, Vietnam through the lens of a gangster and sometime private investigator, Lin. One of the things I love most about your works is the setting—can you tell me how you take a city you lived in for three years and created the cyberpunk aspect and regional upheaval around it?

[TRN] With great difficulty. Novels are hard, man. I also did a PhD, I should add, that in part focussed on Vietnamese literature, and that one of my supervisors was an Australian who originally came here as a refugee from Vietnam. So I had a wealth of personal experience and external expertise to draw on.

In terms of the futuristic aspects—the cyberpunk tech and the geopolitical future—in general I follow the maxim of Ursula Le Guin: ‘science fiction is not predictive, it is descriptive’. I took a lot of trends I see today—in communication technology, artificial intelligence, and surveillance—and extrapolated. The idea, for example, that an advanced version of a smart phone will be in our skull as a neural implant, is not a huge imaginative leap. Even much of the technology of memory—erasing, manipulating, and creating false memories—in the world I’ve created, while certainly more of a leap that most of the other tech in the novel, is still an extrapolation of some preliminary experiments being conducted today in the field of neuroscience. I should add a disclaimer here: I’m not a hard science fiction writer, as such, but I do want to ensure the tech I use is plausible (though this is cyberpunk, so some tech simply has to be cool).

Geopolitically I imagined a future that many, if not all, of my Vietnamese friends feel is unfolding today—that China wants to dominate Vietnam. China has a history of treating Vietnam as a ‘little brother’, and one that ought to be more respectful. There was widespread public anger at China when I was living in Vietnam, for several reasons. China did not respect Vietnamese territorial waters for one, and was frequently harassing Vietnamese fishing vessels not far off the coast of Vietnam. Those unfamiliar with Vietnamese history should also be aware that China was the colonial power in Vietnam for a thousand years, until the Vietnamese rebelled and kicked them out.

Again, I don’t think this future is a huge imaginative leap. The idea that the US might collapse and China become the sole super-power: certainly plausible. There are, of course, some nuances in how the countries in the region might interact, but before I was a writer I was an aid worker in the region, and studied international relations at uni, so I have a decent geopolitical understanding of things.

[GdM] Drug addiction plays a big part of Lin’s character. How was the drug culture in the book influenced by what you witnessed during your time in South East Asia?

[TRN] It isn’t. I don’t see drug culture as worse in Southeast Asia. I’d say it is less bad than in places like the United States, which has been suffering through an opioid epidemic for twenty years now.

The drug addiction in the book is more about how Lin deals with alienation and trauma. It is something of a trope in noir literature, and cyberpunk is, in my view, a descendant of noir. The drug use reflects how flawed Lin is, how she is barely holding it all together, how she walks the finest of lines between her humanity and a descent into darkness. It’s Grimdark, baby.

[GdM] As an Australian, you smoothly work in themes and language that meshes two wildly different cultures—Australian and Vietnamese. You also write convincing characters from China and more Western countries. A lot of times this is done in other author’s works it often falls back on stereotypes, but yours feel engaging and real. How did you achieve this mish-mash cast of characters and how do the multiple nationalities work and impact your world?

[TRN] Well, thank you for saying so. It matters to me that I get this right.

What I find sometimes in the writing of other authors is that they they try to essentialise a character down to a cultural stereotype. Identity becomes one-dimensional. The reality is, unsurprisingly, that all of us are multi-dimensional—we have nationality, but also our gender, our class, our profession, our education level, our sexuality, our neurodiversity, and a million other characteristics.

Living overseas for so long strongly reinforced my view that we do have a common humanity and human experience. We are all, in short, explicable to each other. Which is not to say writing in other cultures isn’t hard. It’s incredibly fucking hard. Earlier in this interview, I touched on just how much research and on-the-ground knowledge went into this novel (and my writing more generally). This background was crucial. Basing a story in another cultures adds a greater degree of difficulty to the work, and a heavier ethical responsibility to ensure the world-building is plausible.

I should also add the for the protagonist, Lin, she is not Australian (even though she grew up there), and she is not Vietnamese (even though she was born there). At least in her own mind. She feels as if she is an outsider; not truly welcome in either culture. In this way I’m not trying to write a quintessential Vietnamese character (which I’m not convinced I could do well enough), but the quintessential outsider, which is very much at the core of the cyberpunk anti-hero. Some of us—the Grimdark crowd especially—are drawn to the outsider as protagonist, as many of us have had that experience of never quite belonging, of feeling out-of-joint in the world we’ve found ourselves travelling through.

[GdM] I know that Richard K. Morgan is one of your literary heroes. In what way did he influence 36 Streets, and if you could sit down for a pint with the man, what would you want to talk about?

[TRN] Richard actually asked me to sit down for a pint with him, if ever I’m in the UK, which I certainly will take him up on if the opportunity arises. How did he influence me? I don’t think directly, in terms of writing style or the setting of his novels. I don’t think Altered Carbon was a direct influence on 36 Streets, for example. However—and this is a big however—he showed me the way. When I read Altered Carbon 15 years ago, before I had started writing, I thought to myself: that’s the type of book I want to write. His work harks back to the hardboiled style, and yet it stays relevant by focussing on the the perennial issues of inequality, the corruption of the elite, and the exploitation of new technologies to cement the position of the ruling class.

What would we talk about? He’s already told me he wants to talk about some of the influences on 36 Streets, in particular the Vietnamese novel, The Sorrow of War. I would ask him: so how the fuck do I get a million dollar option? (which he received for Altered Carbon). Seriously though, I’d just talk to him about some of his influences, his thoughts on where cyberpunk is going; I’d ask him how he made the switch from science fiction to fantasy (a change I might consider, somewhere down the track). I’d drink too much and crap on, and I’d hope he join me.

[GdM] That’s brilliant. It’ll be a cyberpunk meeting for the ages. I know you’re also a whiskey man. But Morgan hails from the home of whiskey. Are you taking an Australian whiskey over with you?

[TRN] Geez mate, I’m not going anywhere at the moment, what with a pandemic and young children. But if I did? Sure. I’m a whisky man, but not an aficionado by any means.  However, I do know there’s a Western Australian distiller called Limeburners, which makes some excellent stuff. Probably take a bottle of that.

[GdM] Your book is a short, bullet-speed read. Was there a temptation to try to push for something a bit more chunky and slow it down a bit, as seems to be the done thing outside of the novella market at the moment, or are you saving some up for book 2?

[TRN] I feel like this is more your response to the novel, Adrian. From your review, it seemed to me that you were hooked, and this is what I want. I want the reader to be propelled through the book. I want it to be exciting, high-octane, and immersive. But it is over 400 pages long (Neuromancer was about 350 pages). So perhaps it was a short read for you, but I think that, to some extent, reflects your reaction to it.

One of the reasons I like the hardboiled writers is because they distil descriptions and events to the fewest words needed. Dashiell Hammett was the master of this. I really admire a writer who can evoke much with layered sentences; a simple sentence that can yet reveal character, and move the plot forward, and imprint an image in the mind’s eye. It reminds me of a saying sometimes attributed to Mark Twain: “I didn’t have time to write you a short letter, so I wrote you a long one.” It’s easier, in some ways, to write a novel with 50 or 100 or more unnecessary pages. Bloat is easy. Spare prose and elegance are fucking hard.

Let me give you an example, though in film rather than literature. Ghost in the Shell (1995) is an iconic anime cyberpunk. It has kick-arse action scenes, interspersed with profound ruminations on the human condition, and it is a work of art. Every frame a painting, in that movie. And it’s 82 minutes long. That is what I want to replicate in my work (even if I fall short): that hyperkinetic action, that elegance, that art.

The next novel (which we can discuss later), if anything, will be shorter than 36 Streets, I suspect.

[GdM] 400 pages!? I’ll be buggered. It was, too. What are some of the writerly tools you use to really hone those sentences back to distilled descriptions?

[TRN] Practice, I guess. Editing, revising, and editing again. My writer mind now always asks the question: does this sentence have any fat? And, Is anything redundant in this paragraph?

The master of this is Dashiell Hammett, as I mentioned above, and I have spent some time studying his novels in order to better understand how it is done (and subsequently failing to write to those standards, of course, but aspiring to improve by learning from the greats can never be a bad thing). I re-read one of his novel every year.

[GdM] You’re also really well known for your short stories, having been published multiple times across a range of the top flight magazines since winning the Writers of the Future best story award in 2015. What do you think are the value of short stories to authors, fans, and do you think the market for them is getting better or worse?

[TRN] Oh look, I can’t recommend short stories highly enough to new authors. When I started writing, maybe 9 years back, I thought, with great hubris: “I’m going to write a novel!” It took me a few chapters to realise I didn’t know what the fuck I was doing, on any level. Craft, world-building, anything. So I stopped the novel and started writing short stories. In the short stories I began building pieces of a future tech-noir world. This helped me accrete layer upon layer of detail, and give my stories the sense of being lived in (I hope). And also (I hope) making it seamless for the reader. No jarring infodumps explaining the setting, rather, ways of expressing and describing efficiently. As a short-cut to improving the writing craft, I think they are a must.

Are the markets getting better or worse? I really could not say. It seems to me that there are more venues than ever, and that they value a diverse range of authors and subject matter, and that can only be a good thing. Many markets mean many options for would-be writers (though, for all that, the field is probably more competitive than it ever was, through sheer volume of submissions), and for fans looking for a specific niche.

If there is one problem with the current short story landscape, I’d say that it is very US-centric. With the exception of Grimdark Magazine and a handful of others, you are almost always dealing with American magazines. The US world-view has such a strong centre of gravity in the genre of science fiction, it troubles me that non-US writers feel obliged to service it. By that I mean: make their stories accessible to Americans, include American settings or characters, or address political issues currently dominant in the States. I’ve certainly had non-US authors tell me that they do this.

Not all writers do, of course, and this issue is less pronounced in the short story markets (which still welcomes innovation and difference), than it is in traditional publishing.

[GdM] The short stories you’re published have all been collected into Neon Leviathan. How has that release gone from your perspective, and for future authors looking to release collections what are some of the pitfalls they need to watch out for—whether they go through a publisher or release the book themselves?

[TRN] We did fucking great, mate. Multiple awards nominations (and one win, for Best Science Fiction Novella at the Aurealis Awards), likely the best-selling SF collection in Australia for 2020. It was a success for Grimdark Magazine, and a success for me personally. While collections will always have a relatively small audience, it certainly grew the number of readers of my work.

Yeah, I absolutely recommend a newer writer putting a collection together. However, you have to be ready, and by that I mean you’ve got to wait until you have those 10 or 12 stories that really represent your best work. That will take a few solid writing years, at the least (It took me around 7).

Putting the collection together with you also helped me understand the process of editing, covers, marketing and publicity, distribution, and the singular discipline and commitment it takes to bring a quality product to fruition.

[GdM] Yeah, that release did go pretty well. If you could have your time over while retaining the knowledge of the release you and I managed, what would you do differently? Eg. what could authors with 10-12 amazing short stories learn from what we didn’t do so well?

[TRN] Overall I have few regrets. We got stuffed around by some people in the industry, but really the only way to discover that was through trial and error. You learn certain things about your limits as a writer—like how much you should push back against an editor, for example. I suppose I would have done more in the way of launches when I had the chance—there is a reasonable chance that over the next couple of years, we will be hit by further waves of Covid, so I think there’s an argument for really seizing the day. The next time there is a lull in cases, and people are feeling more positive about going out in public, I won’t hesitate to organise a live, in-person signing.

But overall Neon Leviathan has gone a lot more smoothly than my experience with 36 Streets. This isn’t a criticism of my publisher Titan Books, who are great, but rather a criticism of traditional publishing more broadly. Getting a book out this way can sometimes be a quite frustrating, where the reasoning behind certain conventions is opaque at best.

[GdM] One of the things in your life that I think is just the coolest thing is that, for a job, you run Dungeons & Dragons games. Can you tell us a bit about how you ended up in that line of work, and what you do?

[TRN] I run three separate Dungeons and Dragons campaigns for the Marymead Autism Centre. The program is funded through the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). D&D has been found—through peer-reviewed study—to have a beneficial impact on the lives of autistic people.

I was offered the opportunity to run one group at a local youth centre maybe 4 years ago. I put aside other job opportunities (a return to the public service, or work in the university sector) to try to advocate for and grow the D&D program. It’s been tough. Finding funding is difficult, as is securing institutional support. The program was cut by the youth centre during the start of the pandemic, and I ran it for free for a while until I could convince Marymead to take us on. They have been very supportive, and we have two dungeon masters, five groups, and a hundred people on the waiting list.

Once a social pariah (when I was in high school my D&D group kept our gaming a secret), Dungeons & Dragons is today a radically social game in an age of internet forums, online gaming communities, and rolling campaigns of outrage on twitter. It’s quaint, almost, to think of six or seven humans sitting down face-to-face for two hours, to problem solve, communicate and compromise, and jointly imagine a fantastical world together. D&D can help these young people form friendships, learn flexibility, and even empathy.

Many of my players have struggled with issues beyond autism, and it has been immensely rewarding to see their lives improve through the program. One player, for example, was house bound for 18 years. A shut in. A carer would go to his house and help him get through the day-to-day. Now he comes to D&D every week, sometimes early so he can discuss spells or strategies. He’s started going out into the world outside D&D, as well. It’s strange, but obviously also awesome, the way a pure nerd pastime of mine has become something that can change and improve the lives of people marginalised in the community.

[GdM] Once your launch is done, what is next for you?

[TRN] What’s next is what I’m working on now, a novel called The Escher Man. I wrote it before 36 Streets, actually, and while both novels are stand-alone, they are set in the same world, and have some characters cross over. I re-read The Escher Man a couple of weeks ago, and was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. I’m revising it at the moment—in a month or so I’ll send it to my agent and see if he thinks it is good enough.

I also have a completed draft of a third stand-alone novel set in the same universe, also with one or two minor characters crossing over from the other books, called Howling Metal. It’s a fucking mess, though, and I’m at the formal stage of “loathing” (all writers are required to hate their own novel at some point). I hope I can edit it into something decent. It could well be the ‘chunkier’ book you referenced earlier, as it is closer to military science fiction rather than cyberpunk (though still, most definitely, the latter).

I also have been thinking about doing a second short story collection. I don’t have enough stories I am sufficiently happy with as yet, though a year from now I will. If only I could find a dynamic small Australian publisher willing to take on the job…

This interview was originally published in Grimdark Magazine Issue #29.

Read 36 Streets by T.R. Napper

 

 

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REVIEW: Rise of the Mages by Scott Drakeford

Rise of the Mages by first-time author Scott Drakeford is an epic fantasy story in the tradition of The Belgariad that will directly appeal to those who love the classic fantasy of that era. It is a combination of political machinations coupled with a quest for vengeance with found family vibes. All of this is nestled comfortably in a fascinating magic system based on infusori. Infusori is the electromagnetic energy and soul of everything around us. Practitioners can tap into this power and harness it for anything from tinkering to crumbling walls and battle magic.

The story starts with two brothers, Emrael and Ban. Two young men who are nationless refugees of a now-defunct royal bloodline. Emrael is working to keep his brother in materials used for tinkering and to further his crafting skill with infusori. At the same time, Emrael is learning daily to become a master warrior and political commander at training school. This training will allow the brothers to make something of themselves, and they would no longer have to rely on their mother for Ban’s support. No matter the two brothers’ work, they are constantly regarded as lesser by their peers, save for Ban’s best friend, Elle.

Due to the political machinations of the existing nations and the church’s influence, Governor Corrande, the governor of the state that Emrael’s school is located in, brokers a deal with the church to enslave users of infusori to build machines that will give him an edge in an upcoming war for territory. Corrande is setting himself up to consolidate the existing domains under his authority. Emrael and Ban, due both to their ability to use infusori and their political connections, get stuck in the middle of this war.

The crux of the story happens when Emrael and Ban attempt to flee the Citadel, the school they train at, and Ban is captured. Elle, Ban’s teacher, and Emrael’s master and trainer Jaina barely escape with their lives. The extremely close brothers are separated by the direst of circumstances. This separation sets Emrael on a quest for revenge on those who captured and enslaved Ban, and Emrael will burn the world to ashes before abandoning his brother.

There is a strong power in this familial bond between the brothers, especially in Emrael and how he relates to Ban. Ban is the younger brother, and while competent and a man in his own right, Emrael takes care of him as an older brother should. This helps drive the narrative of why Emrael will stop at nothing to save his brother. I think had the reverse happened; Ban would do the same. Although due to the story’s structure, we learn and get to know Emrael a lot more than we do Ban. I am hoping in the second and third parts of this trilogy, we will get to know Ban a lot more and learn what drives him.

In Rise of the Mages, behind the story of Emrael and his quest to become a warrior or Ban’s quest to learn to tinker and create are strong female characters. In the periphery, but no less important is the boy’s mother, who is more than she claims. But at this junction, we only know fragments and pieces of her story.

Jaina, Emrael’s master, is a warrior and one of the best fighters that the world has ever seen. Instead of slipping into convention, Drakeford gives her added depth by making her devoutly religious to the Ordenan religion. It is a beautiful contrast that she is not all hard planes but a soul beyond fierce battle. And finally, we have Ban’s best friend Elle, who is powerful also but very different from the brothers. While the narrative is always about Emrael, I couldn’t help but wonder about Elle in the backdrop of his extraordinary quest. Elle is in the background experiencing moments that bifurcate her life into the before and after. She is not the same character at the end that started the story.

I am thoroughly impressed by this story. I know that this story took ten years to craft and was a labor of love for all involved. With its rounded characters and exciting action sequences, you can tell this will have gigantic appeal to lovers of classic fantasy stories. Author Scott Drakeford just stepped into the publishing world of SFF and slammed his ax down.

I am very much looking forward to the next book, so I may dive back into the world of Ire and watch the brothers come into their power.

Read Rise of the Mages by Scott Drakeford

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REVIEW: The Mad Trinkets by Cameron Scott Kirk

A war is coming and the ultimate weapon has been forged. Trinkets endowed with the strength and power to rival godhood has been discovered, but the battle over them will be deadly. Graphic and vile, The Mad Trinkets by Cameron Scott Kirk is bloated with violence.

The Mad Trinkets primarily follows the exploits of the trinket bearers. Tristan Drogos de Merlon is hellbent on ruling the land of White Cloud and beyond. Blinded by his need for revenge and the trinket’s power, Tristan seeks to destroy the lesser kings. Rebecca Occitane dons her father’s trinket and seeks retribution after her father’s brutal murder. Throughout the novel, we are given the perspective of more trinket bearers and their companions. Each of them fueled by a unique set of motivations and desires ranging from heroic, but mostly wretched.

The Mad Trinkets is hypermasculine and ultraviolent. This novel does not shy away from acts of war and the doings of depraved men. This is further amplified due to the trinket’s ability to further corrupt already deranged characters into something truly inhumane. The trinkets are fashioned into obvious shapes reflecting its power. The most notable and reoccurring trinket is the phallus. This novel is defiantly grim and unapologetic with its rampant amount of rape and murder.

Cameron Scott Kirk packs a lot in his deceptively average sized fantasy novel. With so many characters, Kirk is precise on what each chapter contains. A reader will not find excessive descriptions of cities or lengthy internal dialogue in his novel. Some important events are even left entirely to the readers imagination. I felt certain characters deserved more attention.

Despite having written more male characters for The Mad Trinkets, Kirk excelled most when writing from a female perspective. His women characters were more complex and balanced, though given less page time. I wanted more from Brynhild Grimsdotter and Amal Muna.

Kirk’s prose and method of storytelling is unique. In some chapters, it was difficult to immediately grasp the point of view. This was purposeful, a stylistic choice to amplify mystery and unpredictability. His sentence structure is not conventional. His use of commas creates a splicing effect. It could be a deterrent to some readers.

The Mad Trinkets is an epic fantasy not bogged down by in-depth world building. Instead, Cameron Scott Kirk relies on his many characters to capture the full feel of his gritty world. His novel challenges the notion of the slow burn epic fantasy. The Mad Trinkets is fast-paced and gut-churning.

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REVIEW: River of Thieves by Clayton Snyder

Time is running out for thieves, Cord and Nenn. With this duo, no robbery is accomplished without spilling blood and creating chaos. In one last ditch effort to retire alive, they decide to set their next target on robbing an entire kingdom. River of Thieves by Clayton Snyder is chock-full of grotesque fiends and smart quips.

“‘If you’re going to teach a rich and powerful dickhead a lesson, you stick to what you know. Because my dear, we’re not thieves. We’re exceptional thieves.’”

Cord and Nenn are not your run-of-the-mill burglars. Cord has been cursed with the inability to remain dead. This curse is seemingly not without limits. Each time Cord dies, his rate of resurrection slows. As readers we are plagued with the question, how many more deaths can Cord revive from? River of Thieves is told from Nenn’s perspective. Nenn has adept knife fighting skills and a cast iron stomach for carting Cord’s corpse around when necessary. Nenn is the finest accomplice Cord could hope for, but their final heist will require additional help with an unnatural range of skills.

River of Thieves has the best band of ragtags since Kings of the Wyld. Joining Cord and Nenn’s insane scheme are Rek and Lux. Rek with his enormous build and turkey-sized hands, is the tank of the group. Lux is undead. All four have strong personalities that often clash, but their bond with each other is evident. This band would feel genuinely incomplete if any one of them was missing. Together, their collective banter and sincere regard for each other forge a kinship that is addicting to read.

The lore woven into River of Thieves is also exceptional. Fables of the world’s seven gods and its history are strewn throughout the novel. These legends are mythological in nature and offer snippets of history and culture. They provide intricacy to an otherwise hellish world. Certain tales were so effective, it came close to outshining the overall plot.

I love grimdark for its brand of fanfaring the darkest magic and hellish monsters. Given the depth of worldbuilding in River of Thieves, this first installment reads as an introductory for all possible fantasy elements in the Thieves’ Lyric series. I want to know more about the Harrowers and creatures behind the veil.

For an author whose cornerstone is grim snark, Clayton Snyder also writes with such an aesthetically pleasing prose. Snyder’s books have performed notably well in the SPFBO competitions. His book Demons, Ink won semi-finalist in SPFBO 7. The SPFBO 7 finalists include Norylska Groans, Snyder’s collaborative work with Michael R Fletcher.

River of Thieves is wickedly clever and bizarre. Clayton Snyder’s satirical approach breathes freshness to the standard fantasy heist novel. I am excited for not only the rest of this series, but his future projects.

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REVIEW: Spirits of Vengeance by Rob J. Hayes

Spirits of Vengeance is the third standalone novel in the Mortal Techniques series by Rob Hayes, following the excellent Never Die and Pawn’s Gambit. Though independent of the first two, this one does build on the intriguing Japanese based mythology and worldbuilding that Hayes set up in those.

”’Sorry then, about stabbing you. But why can’t you die?’ She thought everyone could die given enough prodding with sharp things.”

Haruto is on a quest, a lifelong quest. No, make that a many-lifetime quest. He is an onmyoji, trained in the spiritual arts of tracking down yokai, which are spirits trapped in the world. He confronts them, and upon defeating them, sends them on to the other side, freeing their souls. He’s actually a character of legend, though he tries to keep a fairly low profile.

He’s assisted by Guang, a poet of (his own) renown who also has a checkered past but chooses to remain on the down low. Guang has sworn several oaths which prevent him from such things as taking up arms or saying bad words, but he does seem to be of use to Haruto as a grounding force.

Kira appears to be a young woman, though she’s what’s called an onryo, which seems to be a blending of a yokai with a human. She’s unusual though in that her human side is dominant and guides her actions, where other onryo they encounter are the other way around. She has a technique of her own which she’s learning as she goes, manipulating of glass for many uses.

Yanmei is Kira’s teacher and mentor, having worked for years to get out from under the shadow of her infamous father, Flaming Fist. He was a legendary bandit known for cruelty and his control of flames, which she’s had difficulty separating herself from as she inherited his ability. Still, she tries to guide Kira to be the best human she can be.

Shiki is a small spirit that possesses small creatures or objects temporarily, assisting Haruko on his journey.

This motley band moves through our story, helping out villages with spirit issues along the way. Their end goal is to find the group of onryo led by the villainous Herald of Bones which has wiped out a monastery and has much more sinister goals in mind.

”’I committed such atrocities that even the gods took notice of me.’”

Spirits of Vengeance is a much longer work than the first two books in the series and while his craft of language moves the story along nicely, it does get quite long. That’s not a slight, as it’s a book with a great epic feel, but after the quick reads in earlier books the reader might not be prepared. That said, it really isn’t much of a criticism.

What we have here is another great addition to the fantasy slate from Rob J. Hayes, who continues to impress with his versatility in the genre.

Review: Spirits of Vengeance by Rob J. Hayes

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REVIEW: The Rush by Simon Spurrier

It’s not that there’s any particular lack of dark fantasy fiction in the comicsphere, but there is a decided lack of quality dark fantasy. That made it a no brainer when I heard about Si Spurrier’s new project with the Vault, The Rush, or This Hungry Earth Reddens Under Snowclad Hills. If that feels like a mouthful, or possibly evocative of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, or, The Evening Redness in the West, don’t worry—both are entirely accurate. The Rush is a grim, bloody dark historical fantasy that takes place in the frozen northern reaches of the American Old West, a tale of a mother’s desperate search for her son who’s disappeared somewhere in the Yukon at the tail end of the 19th century. 

But The Rush is also a story of monsters and madness, of inhuman horrors lurking somewhere beyond the edges of perception and sanity. The art in The Rush brings the story to life, thanks to Nathan Gooden’s drawing and Addison Duke’s colors and textures. The art flows, the expressions are lively—especially when the characters are terrified—and it’s all done with a kind of antiqued overlay to the colors which bolsters the old timey feel of of The Rush, not to mention makes the sudden gushes of blood and viscera all the more striking as it seems to leap off the page.

The true horror of The Rush lies, like in all good cosmic horror, in the not knowing. While we do see some of the terrible monstrosities stalking the snow, we know nothing about them. The “why” and the “how” go unanswered. We are also faced with the all too human horrors of loss and madness in The Rush, as the protagonists confront one ordeal after another whether it be the harsh environment of the north and privation, the brutality of other humans, or a sinister and pervasive atmosphere of fear and paranoia. Speaking to the art again, the emotion is made viscerally real on the faces of the characters as they experience each moment, as Gooden finds that magical sweet spot between stylized illustration and painterly realism. In all, the entire creative team behind The Rush works exceptionally well together, with each member’s talents coming together to weave an immersive story that flows seamlessly from page to page.

In all, the first issue of This Hungry Earth Reddens Under Snowclad Hills does everything the opening chapter of a story needs to do. It establishes the tone, stakes, and premise while setting the hook and drawing the reader in. It gives you enough to chew on so that when the close of the issue does come, you’re chomping at the bit for more. More blood in the snow, more horror in the freezing cold, more of humanity on the brink of madness. Me personally, I can’t wait for issue two, with issue one of The Rush definitely earning itself a very strong four stars. There are good, awful things ahead for this series.

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