Adrian Collins's Blog, page 177

REVIEW: One Day All This Will Be Yours by Adrian Tchaikovsky

One Day All This Will Be Yours, Adrian Tchaikovsky’s newest novella releasing in early 2021, is a brilliant and witty time-channel take on what happens when you are the only one left, and you damn well want to keep it that way.

Our titular narrator wakes up from his calm and untroubled clumber. He peers out onto his estate; there isn’t a cloud in the sky. And, even if there was one, a little rain is good. Bring on the rain for us farmer types, he thinks. It is a beautiful day because everything and all days are gorgeous, forever and ever amen. This beauty was hard fought for in a winner take all fight over the future, past, and every branch of possibility spread out forever—the casualty war. A war waged by many who could not remember why they were fighting. The past had been expunged, and the future was a fractured mess.

The narrator, the last soldier of the causality war, and his cohorts fractured, and dismantled time itself. If you don’t like the current path this government is on? Go back and sew discord 200 years ago so that that government won’t come into existence. Don’t like that Einstein helped develop the Manhattan project, go back in time and scare him so badly about what his ideas wrought that he destroys everything around his energy formula. It takes the philosophical question of, “would you go back in time to kill Hitler as a baby” to a whole new level. The list goes on and on. So much so that there isn’t much left after time has been tinkered with so much. Just pockets of reality that disintegrate in the blink of an eye when they reach a critical moment. It is as if many malicious time lords from “Doctor Who” were warring with each other and had no scruples.

How do we get to the point of a bright sunny day on a perfect farm? Well, if I told you that it would spoil the fun, and in the words of River Song from “Doctor Who,” “Spoilers!” However, know that it involves an Allosaur named Miffly, poison (occasionally), a couple of statues, and a sarcastic bastard of a soldier, or he just might be lonely. It’s hard to tell.

This soldier narrator has an excellent reason to act the way he acts and do the things he does without compunction. In his saving the future and living it up as best as possible, he faces something that challenges everything. That is the exciting part.

One Day All This Will Be Yours is another brilliant science fiction novella in the sea of Tchaikovsky’s deep and brilliant catalog. Tchaikovsky has proven in the last decade or so that he is a man who can write anything. Such as science fiction, as seen in his Children of Time series, where he eventually became known as the “spider guy.” Walking in Aldebaran, where he smashes horror and science fiction, creating an existential take on madness. Or his huge epic Shadows of Apt series. A sprawling and immense epic story involving beings known as Kinden. You would be hard-pressed to find a story by Tchaikovsky that is not a great read. One Day This Will Be Yours, which takes the time-travel-gone-crazy trope and turns it on its ear, is another excellent read to add to his catalog.

Pacing and world-building wise, Tchaikovsky understands the fundamentals needed for a tight and gripping novella. Unlike regular novel lengthed stories, novellas have a stricter economy of words. You only get so many words to work with to create world-building, dialog, and character arc. It is the same constraint that short story writers deal with but to a more extreme extent. Some writers are good at this “dialed in” type of writing style, while other writers are very good at it. I would put Tchaikovsky in the latter group. I have read three of his novellas/short novels recently, and not in a single place did I ache for some part of story creation that was lacking. Readers loathe to branch out into novella/short novels and short story length stories because some writers struggle to pare their ideas down to the minimum word count with the maximum effect.

This problem isn’t the case in One Day All This Will Be Yours.

The humor is wry and witty; the narrator’s situations are hilarious and wild but do not stray into the ridiculous or uncomfortable. The pacing is quick, a must for a novella. And, the story overall is sweet in its own twisted and brutal way.

I loved this book, in case you can’t tell. It will find a place of honor on my bookshelf and as a delightful reread in my future.

Read One Day All This Will Be Yours by Adrian Tchaikovsky

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REVIEW: The Piledriver of Fate by Samuel Gately

The Piledriver of Fate by Samuel Gately takes us back to the pro-wrestling-inspired fantasy world of the Titan Wars. Following reluctant titan Van’s tournament victory in The Headlock of Destiny, book two picks up immediately afterward. As the Overlord (an undead titan and possible homage to WWE’s Undertaker) builds a supernatural army, the beer-loving Van finds himself on the frontlines of a brewing conflict. Pursuing his enemy and missing love interest, the Valkyrie Kyle, the story begins with our protagonist journeying to the hellish underworld of the Nether and facing foes new and old.

Going in, the biggest question I had was how well this story would handle significantly raised stakes and a central conflict on a much larger scale than its predecessor. And while it is a big leap from the giant-kin wrestling championship of book one to the more epic threat of the Overlord leading his armies from the nightmare realms of the Nether and starting a second Titan War, I think the author handled this transition really well for the most part. This larger conflict is supported by the scaffolding of some A+ character development for both Van and the Overlord, awesome worldbuilding and lore about the titans’ heritage and the giants whose blood they share, and a genuinely unique setting that believably incorporates pro-wrestling into a high fantasy world.

With Van stepping out of the ring and onto the battlefield, grimdark readers will appreciate the notably higher body count and kill-or-be-killed stakes this book features as compared to its predecessor. And while the world of the Titan Wars certainly errs on the side of high fantasy, this novel does have what I thought was a very real and gritty underpinning of the way mankind deals with those it considers ‘other.’ Van and the Overlord’s memories of the all-too-often cruel ways humanity treats titans pose a pleasantly stark question in the narrative: Is mankind really worth defending?

If there was one section of the novel that didn’t work quite as well for me, it was the latter part of Van’s wandering through the Nether. The twisted and desolate land of storms and nightmares is a really cool underworld for Gately’s setting, but it begins to feel too empty and too dreamlike toward the middle of the book’s page count. Some compelling flashbacks to Van’s early life and interactions with the Overlord help, but I felt like this part of the setting didn’t work as well for me as the bustling Empire City. I also had a small issue with a few titan side characters blending together in the background. While many titans like the villainous monarch King Thad and the massive, furious Landshaker remained distinct, others’ shared love of beer, brute force, and bulging muscles made me need to occasionally flip back and forth to keep them sorted.

That said, for all the hulking titan biceps on display, this novel’s biggest muscle is its heart. Gately has a way of nailing all of the important emotional beats from start to finish. Van’s struggles and triumphs—both against the Overlord and frenemy fellow titans—genuinely do carry a feeling of inspiration and victory to the reader. This narrative strength was especially present in an ending that tied off Van’s character arc perfectly and brought a genuine smile to my face.

All in all, I think this novel evolved well from its predecessor while keeping true to its pro-wrestling roots. Good action, creative worldbuilding, and all the fun of a titan-sized smackdown make for a great read, and I think this novel acts as a fitting conclusion to Van’s story (though more Titan Wars books are forthcoming). I would give The Piledriver of Fate ⅘ stars, and I’ll be the first in line to buy ringside tickets to the next entry in the series.

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REVIEW: The Children God Forgot by Graham Masterton

The Children God Forgot by Graham Masterton is a terrifying story that pulls many of the different horror levers. 

The story starts with pain, visceral stabbing pain in a woman’s belly. The woman in question wakes up in the hospital, completely confused. She finds out she is pregnant, which is impossible. There is no way that she could be pregnant; she had an abortion three months ago. The doctors perform an emergency c-section and deliver a horrifically malformed fetus. One that could not possibly be alive, but it is. Major Cthulu vibes here. Then a rash of strange births and pregnancy sweep through London. 

“How much worse could her life become, if she wasn’t even allowed to die?”

Simultaneously, sewage engineer Gemma, owner of the sewage company, and cameraman make a routine check in a section of London’s sewers. As they travel through the engulfing claustrophobic darkness of a sewer pipe, they discover a fatberg, a stony mound of toilet paper, and grease clogging the sewer flow. They also find a severed women’s hand floating in the refuse. Immediately, chaos happens, lights flash, electricity arcs, and the three workers are thrown into utter and complete darkness while trudging through human waste. To say that the moment is something of nightmares would be an understatement. 

Up ahead around the pipe bend, the three workers can see child-like figures glowing amongst the waste. Child-like figures made of claws, horribly and inhumanly disfigured, that move with lightning speed. They make a run for it, and all make it out except for Gemma’s boss, who disappears only to be found later with his legs amputated and his eyes ripped from the sockets. 

DC Jerry Pardoe and DS Jamila Patel of the supernatural squad team up once again to delve into what is lurking in London’s sewers and if it is going to stop with one dismembered body or if there will be more. 

Spoiler alert, there will be more. Because, of course, there will be. Masterton will be Masterton, and it won’t be just one type of horror. He is going to poke and prod every kind of horror with a stick. He makes you squirm and scream and feel sick. I think that you could have a solid horror story of just the sewer part of the story because, especially for someone with claustrophobia…holy shit. But, there is a robust supernatural angle to this story. What are these things that look like malformed children, and who is the woman with the knives that keeps appearing? 

Unfortunately, I will have to stop the description there because it will give it away if I say anymore. Imagine something like The Strain, but with occult vibes taking place in a sewer. Now top it all off with a police procedural, and you won’t be far off. Because at the story’s heart is a case that needs to get solved. 

The supernatural squad is a competent duo. There is no flash with them, aside from wanting to get to the heart of the case. They had appeared together in the novel Ghost Virus; if you have read that, you would be familiar with the pair. However, reading the previous installment in no way affects your enjoyment of this one. 

The Children God Forgot will not be for everyone because this is some deep body horror. It is terrifying. I’d put some trigger warnings, flaying, abortion, claustrophobic spaces; there is a lot. If you can’t make it through the first three chapters of this book, you will not like what is in store. It will only get scarier and darker with a lot more gore. I love horror, and even I had to put the e-reader down now and then. Because, wow, some of these scenes are dark as hell. One particular one included one of these monstrous fetus-creatures eating a cat and tearing it apart with a cracking sound of a broken rib cage—bits of fur flying everywhere. You get the point. 

If you love horror of all sorts and want to be scared, The Children God Forgot is for you. Masterton is, well, a master of writing horror. If you are new to his books. Congratulations, you are in for a hell of a ride! I know that some of these scenes will be burned on your brain like Masterton used an actual branding iron; I promise you will recover from the cat scene and a few others soon.  

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REVIEW: The Last Kingdom Season 4

The Last Kingdom S4 continues the tale based on Bernard Cornwell’s The Saxon Stories. If you have read my review of the previous season then you will be aware that it was an absolute corker. Whilst not quite hitting the dizzy heights of S3, The Last Kingdom S4 marches forward in a new age for the show as Uhtred’s life continues without his frenemy King Alfred. This means that after three seasons, Uhtred is finally on his way back to Bebbanburg! What could go wrong?

The Last Kingdom S4 finds Uhtred free from the endless pull between Dane and Saxon. He is heading off to Bebbanburg to reclaim his home although King Edward does not support him with soldiers. To the surprise of no one, things don’t go so well for our weary protagonist. With Alfred’s death in season 3, there was an air of closure and the wrapping up of many threads. The Last Kingdom S4 feels like a new beginning with Edward stepping into his father’s shoes and playing the role of sometimes ally/sometimes pompous, petulant prick to Uhtred. A familiar but trusted recipe for the show follows.

The Last Kingdom S4 pushes forward with the brilliant, bloody battles and strong character development that made season 3 such a joy to behold. Sadly, the one flaw with this season is that it never seems certain of who the main antagonist is. Sigtrygger, an intelligent Dane, is convinced to take Winchester by the increasingly manipulative Brida but the Dane is too charming to come off as someone we want to see dead at the hands of our hero. Other antagonists aren’t given enough time to fully develop throughout the season. In fact, only the brilliant Haesten is a consistent villain throughout the season. I must admit to grinning from ear to ear every time the double-crossing Dane showed up – his wit and self-awareness allow him to steal every scene he is in. Like Aethelwold in prior seasons, Haesten has the audience begging for his death but secretly dreading the moment such a wonderful character is gone.

Family and legacy are the themes that binds the ten episodes of The Last Kingdom S4 together. Uhtred’s children are the personification of his split spirit: his son taking the path of a Christian monk and his daughter wishing to live with the freedom and values of the Danes. Some of the strongest scenes in the whole show are with Uhtred struggling to play the good father as his children do what all children do and fight against the smothering bonds he attempts to create. The relationships he has with them are given time to grow over the season and show just how far Uhtred has come since his early days as a rampaging warrior with a lust for battle. He sees King Edward struggling to see the light whilst standing in the colossal shadow of his deceased father and is smart enough to know that capturing Cnut’s children will lead the fiery warrior down a path of his choosing. Even the charming Dane, Sigtryggr, utters to Edward, “I have no children. Nor a wife. This is why I am stronger than you.” The show looks at the relationships of parents and their children and how they can be both a strength and a weakness and it handles such powerful moments with ease and guile.

A slight mis-step with the lack of a clear villain but The Last Kingdom S4 marches forward on the solid foundation of the previous season. The Last Kingdom S4 is packed with interesting characters and brutal battles that we have come to expect from the excellent show. Now to wait for Season 5. I will use the time to read Cornwell’s The Empty Throne which according to Ed is superior to this season’s show. I can’t wait to find out! Destiny is all!

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REVIEW: Legacy of the Brightwash by Krystle Matar

Legacy of the Brightwash is the debut novel by Krystle Matar, and it’s an excellent start to a richly detailed world.

Legacy of the Brightwash follows Tashué Blackwood, a former war hero, now an officer of the Authority. It is his duty to make sure the Tainted—people with powers beyond those of regular humans—are monitored. Those who register can live semi-normal lives, but even then many of their decisions will always be out of their control. They need to work in approved ways for the Dominion, stay under the supervision of Tashué and his colleagues, and may only marry and have children with approved people.

Yes, eugenics. It starts subtly enough, but it’s clear that that’s one of the Dominion’s main strategies for maintaining dominance. Find powerful Tainted, have them breed. If they’re registered, make sure they wed other powerful Tainted. If they’re not registered, or if they’re criminals, put them in the Breeding Program.

Tashué finds a mutilated corpse in the Brightwash, a major river in the city of Yaelsmuir. Her limbs are dismembered, she has tattoos, and no one knew who she was. That plot is the inciting incident of the book, but for much of the book it’s background noise.

Instead, Legacy of the Brightwash shows us the world. It’s a foul case, to be certain, but Tashué has other concerns as well. As a war hero and now an officer, there are discussions of him running for mayor for the city of Yaelsmuir. There’s his neighbour and one of the charges under his supervision, a Tainted whisperer (she takes other people’s pain) he’s falling for despite their power imbalance.

Legacy of the Brightwash starts with a thoughtful and grounded reason the lovers cannot be together. There’s no melodrama to the reason, no ‘star-crossed lovers’ vibe; it’s just a very realistic reason that two people who might have feelings shouldn’t be together. There really is a power imbalance between the two, which is a very valid reason, even if both are interested. Moreover, making the central romance one between two older people who are already single parents worked very well.

The other most important relationship in the book is between Tashué and his son. His son is in a special prison for Tainted who won’t register. For his son, it’s a matter of principle. He doesn’t feel tainted by his powers, and he won’t submit to the Authority, even as his father begs him.

Tashué knows what is best for his son, Jason—give up your principles so you can live. He knows that, and he can’t get through to Jason. Jason, meanwhile, respects his father less than anyone else, and not in an adolescent way. The scenes with Jason, two men on opposite sides of a prison, an officer and a criminal, a father and a son, a collaborator and a resistor, were the beating heart of the novel.

The characters are the highlight of Legacy of the Brightwash. The people in the story are almost all Tashué’s coworkers, or veterans from his war campaign, his family, or the tainted he’s supposed to supervise. They all have long, intricate, but very real relationships with one another.

When the plot does kick into gear, the tension comes not from battle sequences, but from those very human vulnerabilities being played against each other, and those human connections being used for support. The ending felt as if it was the only way this story could have ended.

Overall, Legacy of the Brightwash is a grounded, realistic, and surprisingly dark book, but it’s a book with a fundamentally moral lead that keeps the darkness from feeling gratuitous. I’d recommend it for fans of character-driven, low magic fantasy.

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REVIEW: The Cold Commands by Richard K. Morgan

In The Cold Commands, the second book in the A Land Fit for Heroes trilogy, we rejoin the tale of “hero, dragonslayer, and faggot” Ringil Eskiath. He’s now 31-years-old and there is a price on his head throughout Trelayne following on from his deeds that concluded the events of The Steel Remains. He’s changed dramatically because of his time in the Grey Places, his relationship with the Dwenda Seethlaw, and how their relationship came to its complicated conclusion.

In addition to Ringil, the other two main point of view characters return from The Steel Remains with the Majek warrior and dragonslayer Egar, and Archeth Indamaninarmal, part-human and part-Kiriath political diplomat. In a similar fashion to the previous novel, I enjoyed reading all the different perspectives of the main trio; but my favourite by far is Ringil’s. In my opinion, I’d say he’s one of the greatest grimdark protagonists I’ve read about yet.

‘And how exactly did you come by that murderous little item?’
Ringil reached up and touched the pommel of the Ravensfriend, where it rose at his shoulder. ‘It was forged for me at An-Monal by Grashgal the Wanderer.’
‘Yes – actually, I was talking to the sword.’

I thought that there was occasionally something odd and slightly disorientating about the story’s presentation from the different points of view. For example, one chapter would be following Ringil, then all of a sudden, it would be presenting someone else’s viewpoints on events which seemed to disrupt the flow. I’m not an expert at these devices, so I don’t know if this was intentional by Morgan, but it seemed that there are peculiar switches about ten times or so in the book. It didn’t really affect my enjoyment, yet I did raise my eyebrows and smile wryly here and there due to this.

One element I have really enjoyed in these novels is when both main and supporting characters reflect on their time in, and the current influence of, the previous war with the Scaled Folk. The history is deep and layered and almost feels like Morgan should have another fantasy series out that covers the wartime occasions that are mentioned in these novels. This adds considerable weight to the already complex characters.

‘I like you, Ringil Eskiath, Prophet take me up the arse if I don’t. You’re an arrogant little northern thug, you’re trading on not much more than old war stories, a belly for violence and a few family connections.’ Thin, grim slice of a smile on his lips now. ‘And from what I hear, your bedroom practices wouldn’t bear much scrutiny either. But there it is – I like you. What am I to do?’

Another aspect I like is the presentation and otherworldly feel of the Grey Places. I don’t always comprehend what’s happening or follow this realm’s rules but it is extremely intriguing and full of secrets I’m yet to acknowledge and understand. It’s also interesting to see when revealed, the influence this place is having over Ringil’s character progression. The mystery surrounding the Grey Places, I thought, was a bit like Other’s Island from Robin Hobb’s The Realm of the Elderlings and created similar imagery in my mind.

I’ll keep my review here pretty short as The Cold Commands is similar in style and design to The Steel Remains, therefore, a lot of what I stated in that review is relevant here also. Morgan’s fantasy world is riveting, the cast of characters is great and I adore the sardonic wit and humour. However, some parts dragged in the middle, there aren’t that many great set-pieces (excluding the finale), and I had no idea where the different storylines were going until about the 80% mark, when, once again, it all seemed to make perfect sense leading up to a belter of a finish.

I’d summarise The Cold Commands as being a steady 3-star read that I’ve upgraded the rating of due to its 5-star lead character and the 5-star ending. I found the finale so gripping and exciting that I will be returning to the A Land Fit for Heroes series with The Dark Defiles shortly.

Images from cover and interior art for The Cold Commands (2012, Subterranean Press).

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MOVIE REVIEW: Johnny Mnemonic (1995)

I can’t help but think about all the wonderful cyberpunk movies I’ve watched over the years: Robocop, Strange Days, Cyborg 2 (okay, that’s more of a guilty pleasure but so is this). The hands down most cyberpunk of all cyberpunk movies, though, has got to be Johnny Mnemonic. It not only was written by William Gibson but was screwed with by a bunch of soulless corporate suits so it has the cyberpunk pedigree from both sides!

It’s a gonzo sort of movie with laser garrotes, talking dolphins, couriers with flash-drives built into their heads, the Free State of Newark, and cyborgs everywhere. Hell, one of those cyborgs is a transhumanist preacher with a night job as an assassin. This is easily one of the cyberpunk things anyone has ever created and a codifier for many of the concepts to be found inside it. That’s not what I love about the movie, though. No, what I love about the movie is the protagonist: Johnny as played by Keanu Reeves. Why? He is a complete jackass

How else do you describe this speech being spoken with COMPLETE SINCERITY? “Listen. You listen to me. You see that city over there? THAT’S where I’m supposed to be. Not down here with the dogs, and the garbage, and last month’s newspapers blowing *back* and *forth*. I’ve had it with them, I’ve had it with you, I’ve had it with ALL THIS – *I want ROOM SERVICE*! I want the club sandwich, I want the cold Mexican beer, I want a $10,000-a-night hooker! I want my shirts laundered… like they do… at the Imperial Hotel… in Tokyo. ”

Too many movies feel the need to dumb down their content or provide something like, oh, a softening of a character so we root for him. A softening like, say, a conscience or likability or a tragic backstory. No, Johnny is a selfish high-end criminal who is, at one point, perfectly willing to abandon the woman who saved his life in the garbage as she’s dying from a neurological disorder. Johnny is motivated by money and saving his own ass all the way to the end where he’s only willing to do the right thing because it’s probably literally the last thing he’ll ever do on the planet so why not?

The premise is Johnny is a courier who transports data in a cybernetic implant in his head in order to avoid all the viruses and spyware (though that term hadn’t been invented yet) on the net. Johnny had to remove his childhood in order to get this device installed and is eager to get it back. However, he needs to do the proverbial one last job in order to get the money to do it. This leads him to Hong Kong where a group of scientists install a whopping 300+ gigabytes inside his head, which is more than twice his available capacity. Amusingly, that’s a fairly decent-sized chunk for a digital flash drive and we almost are to the movie’s then-far distant future of 2020.

It’s not a spoiler to reveal Johnny is carrying the cure for a neurological disease which is ravaging the world. PharmaCon, who made the cure, has decided they’d rather treat the disease than cure it. Which would be a sound business strategy if not for the fact numerous executives in their service have family members dying from it and it’s probably going to kill off most of the world. I dare say, under those circumstances, the Umbrella Corporation is a model of forward thinking. PharmaCon, unlike the Umbrella Corporation, doesn’t have it’s own military and instead has to employ the Yakuza to be their goon squad.

Johnny is accompanied on his quest by Jane (Dina Meyer), who is supposed to be a badass augmented cyborg but manages to spend much of the movie helpless due to being infected with NAS (the aforementioned neurological disease). I am stupidly in love with Dina Meyer and love the character of Molly Millions (who Jane is supposed to be). However, her portrayal in this movie is average at best. The movie makes Johnny a lot tougher than his literary counterpart and lessens the need for Molly/Jane save as a love interest. Which is a shame because she seems like a cool character, albeit one with terrible taste in men.

The movie has plot holes you can drive a truck through like the random appearance of an artificial intelligence who may or may not be Johnny’s mom as well as the fact there’s always a bunch of high tech tribals there to rescue Johnny’s ass. Why does PharmaCon want the research for the cure back if they don’t intend to ever use it? Why don’t the bad guys ever just offer to pay Johnny? Why don’t the scientists just broadcast the cure for NAS from the beginning? These are questions you will ask, right up until you just accept the movie for the illogical set piece for what it is: a sci-fi B-movie guilty pleasure.

The special effects are charming at best, laughable at worse, with the action being less than inspiring. However, the sheer weirdness of this movie is what saves it. Johnny may be an asshole but he’s an understandable one since we all wish we were an ultra-rich douchebag who cares only about himself (or is that just me?). Dina Meyer is sincere with her character and I liked Jane despite her flaws. The other characters are all memorable and there’s not a single one which I didn’t come to like before the end–even the despicable ones. This is cyberpunk at its most shameless and that goes a long way with me.

The vision of the world is an enormous trash heap which isn’t so much a post-apocalypse vision of the future as a past-its-expiration-date. The United States has fallen, Japan has taken over the world, and everyone has failed to notice because they’re too busy wrapped up in their own greed. It’s a delightfully Dark Age vision of a technological dystopia and probably this movie’s strongest suit. Well, that and a man actually wields a laser garrote in his thumb that he also uses as a whip.

I recommend for those who want to see a film where Keanu Reeves gives his best but cheesiest performance. So, ready your VCRs to record sensitive data, folks, and enjoy an utterly crazy film. Available on Amazon Prime and recently released on a no-frills Blue Ray.

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REVIEW: The Black Coast by Mike Brooks

Large in size, and ambitious in scope, The Black Coast (book one in the God-King Chronicles) perfectly lives up to the saying, “Slow and steady wins the race”. While it did not contain as much action as I was expecting, it was still a fascinating read.

The main storyline of this book features two separate cultures trying to coexist peacefully. A clan of the Tjakorsha people have just shown up at the Black Keep. Normally, that is cause for huge concern, as the Tjakorsha are raiders. However, in this instance, something has changed: the Black Eagle Clan is hoping to settle alongside the people of the Black Keep and live peaceably. Daimon of the Black Keep goes against the wishes of his law-father to allow this, adding an extra level to this already-unique plotline. This meshing of two very separate cultures makes for an engrossing story. There is no lack of danger or action, but the main risk is with two very different cultures attempting to mesh and live side-by-side.

There is much more to The Black Coast than just a joining of two cultures, and this is where things got a little muddy for me. I wanted so much to like the other storylines, especially that of Tila, a political mastermind with a double life (which I will not spoil by discussing). Unfortunately, they failed to suck me in. While the world is huge, with unique cultures, traditions, and speech patterns, I was left feeling a little overwhelmed by it all. It was a bit much for me to keep track of, and I’m sure I missed something important. It didn’t matter in the long run, though, because the Black Keep storyline was so interesting.

The Black Coast seems to be a book that is entirely set up for the rest of the series. I was left intrigued but feeling like I was still waiting for things to start. Another book that I had a similar reaction to was The Dragonbone Chair, the first book in the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn series by Tad Williams. As with that book, I have a feeling that The Black Coast is ramping up to what will be an amazing series, one that rewards patience. Go into this book expecting a slow buildup, epic worldbuilding, and a lot to mull over.

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REVIEW: Remote Control by Nnedi Okorafor

In Remote Control by Nedi Okorafar, Sankofa, the one who sleeps at deaths door, the remote control, arrives at a remote town in Ghana. The people are terrified of this 14 year old girl who only looks 10 and can make herself glow deadly green. They feed her. They clothe her. They wish her gone and hope is not then she is here to kill.

Sankofa walks through town after town, followed by her fox Movenpick, who is unaffected by her ability to snuff out life within a heartbeat. The story is one of wandering. Sankofa has somewhat accepted a life of loneliness, of no technology, and of sleeping under the stars as she searches for the seed, the original source of her power and her curse. All along she is predominantly feared and loathed and misunderstood, but she finds good people along the way.

The way the American family is written juxtaposed against the African town and people at the start is really interesting and brilliantly done. It helps a simple Sydneysider like me who knows admittedly little about the history and culture and people of Africa, quickly acclimatise myself with the setting and the people.

in Remote Control, Okorafar shows you this amazingly detailed world so well through the eyes of a child. Whether Sankofa is six or 14, the POV feels real and well realised. And it grows. I feel many authors who try to write children really struggle to land the POV and and the protagonist’s understanding of the world properly and consistently. Little errors slip in revealing the adult behind the words. Okorafar does not suffer this problem. The point of view delivery of the story is utterly seamless.

The ending is like a warm, loving, grimdark slap in the face. It comes out of nowhere and it works brilliantly and everything leads to it and I loved it. It’s a brilliant twist where all the learning, the lack of control over her life and her power, all comes full circle in just a few brilliant paragraphs that had my jaw flopping on the floor. I can’t wait till somebody else I know reads this because I need to have a discussion about that ending.

Remote Control is another excellent novella release from Tor.com, and my introduction to this brilliant author. It’s full of heart, heartbreaking, revealing, and has one of the most enjoyable and brutal last page twists I’ve read in a long time.

Read Remote Control by Nnedi Okorafor

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REVIEW: A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine is an expertly crafted science fiction fantasy novel that incorporates real-world cultures into the intricate Aztec Empire influenced mythos. It is shining, and immersive and should be read, and read often. 

“This book is dedicated to anyone who has ever fallen in love with a culture that was devouring their own.”

Right from the first pages of the story, you know that you are reading something different, and doing a little research into author Arkady Martine I instantly knew why. Martine is by profession a historian and city planner. The city planning part thrilled me to no end as I once upon a time was also a city planner. She has many prestigious degrees, one of which is a Ph.D. in medieval Byzantine, global, and comparative history at Rutgers University. When you read this book you will notice the incredible care and detailing that went into the language and worldbuilding of the Teixcalaani Empire with obvious influences from the pre-colonial/conquest Aztec Empire as well as influences from the Nahuatl languages. The Nahuatl language group is currently spoken by close to two million people in central Mexico and was spoken by the Aztecs. 

“Released, I am a spear in the hands of the sun.”

Often you read science fiction and fantasy novels that are based on or influenced by a particular culture. They usually only “pay lip service” to that culture. Authors delve deep enough historically and sociologically to have a general understanding of that culture enough to be as respectful and authentic as they can in the depiction with varying degrees of success. I think that what is so exceptional about A Memory Called Empire, and why it won the Hugo award for best novel and a finalist for the Nebula for the same category is that instead of superficially glancing at the culture, it is intensely immersive. The world-building in this story flows like rain flowing to the ocean. Every detail was imagined and it coalesced into a much greater picture of the history, city planning, and generally the Teixcalaani. There were no moments in which the detailing was off that it threw me out of the story. 

“A MIND is a sort of star-chart in reverse: an assembly of memory, conditioned response, and past action held together in a network of electricity and endocrine signaling, rendered down to a single moving point of consciousness”

The story follows the protagonist Mahit Dzmare. She arrives as an ambassador to the imperial city of Teixclaan as a representative of the space station Lsel. She is to advocate on behalf of her fiercely independent homeland of Lsel Station and investigate the death of the previous ambassador. The Teixcalaani is a glorious golden empire that swallows and changes everything it touches. It is beautiful to behold, but so much so that places like Lsel Station will get swallowed by its magnitude. Mahit is new to her ambassadorial duties, although she has studied the Teixclaan culture, language, and history for most of her life. But studying something, and living it are two very different things. She must figure out a way to protect the independence of her small homeworld in the face of everything.

Martine does an excellent job in representing the feelings of Mahit being a stranger in a strange land. Everything is foreign to Mahit right down to customs of facial expressions and food. She desperately needs to belong, and assimilate into this foreign culture but she can’t because she is missing a very important piece of information. One of the important pieces of hardware that the people of Lsel station use is a device called an imago. The device is the memory and personality of people who have come before her, saved as data to be re-downloaded. It is used so that none of the experiences and aptitude of the Lsel citizens is lost at the death of the person. The experience is then added to the new wearer and the personalities are blended. 

Nothing is lost. But, for Mahit her imago is malfunctioning. The previous ambassador’s memory and experiences are gone. She is a fish out of water. Without the experiences and knowledge of her predecessor, how is she supposed to do this? 

As befits her station, Mahit is assigned a cultural liaison named Three Seagrass. The naming conventions in this story are spectacular. Three Seagrass, while not the main protagonist of the story, is hugely important to the narrative and often steals the scenes with her wit, and systematic efficiency. She is brutally efficient. As Mahit surfs the political intrigue of the city Teixclaan and its people, she must not be pulled under. 

“I could have told her the truth,” Mahit said. “Here I am, new to the City, being led astray by my own cultural liaison and a stray courtier.” Twelve Azalea folded his hands together in front of his chest. “We could have told her the truth,” he said. “Her friend, the dead Ambassador, has mysterious and probably illegal neurological implants.” “How nice for us, that everyone lies,” Three Seagrass said cheerfully.”

There is a lot going on in this book. Right from the get-go, Mahit is thrown into a world of political intrigue. This book is called a space opera, but the genre title is misleading, as it often is. I think A Memory Called Empire is more than a genre label just as Dune is more than a genre label. A Memory Called Empire is visually lush and politically compelling. Martine builds a world through history, language, culture, and great characters. 

A Memory Called Empire is a deep science fiction story that asks questions on what is the nature of memory. What is memory? Can it be taken away? Is memory the collective history of a full culture like that of the Teixcalaani people or a moment of a single individual? It can be so many things. At the same time, while A Memory Called Empire delves into what memory is it also has a complicated mystery plot of “who done it” laced with wordplay, culture, and political intrigue. There are even cyberpunk elements laced into the story which is hard to believe, but they work with the narrative perfectly. 

The plotting of the story is swift. It moves from scene to scene with no lag and propels the narrative forward. Honestly, the story just got better and better as it continued.

“Nothing touched by Empire stays clean.” 

A Memory Called Empire had me stopping and evaluating my thoughts on what memory actually is many times. It is a story that can be taken in sips or devoured for hours at a time. It is glorious and shining like the golden city of Teixcalaani. It has made me remember why I love science fiction as much as I do. 

For all those readers who love deep, well-written, and intelligent science fiction and fantasy, A Memory Called Empire should leapfrog all other books on your to-be-read list for your immediate attention.

Read A Memory Called Empire by Arkady Martine

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