Michael Patrick Hicks's Blog, page 33
December 19, 2016
Revolver Audible Audiobook Giveaway!
With the holidays upon us, and Donald Trump's confirmation as our next President of the United States happening during today's formal and final Electoral College votes, I figured it was a good time to do a little giveaway.
Not that Revolver is exactly a story of bright holiday cheer, and it certainly won't do much to help you escape our political dystopia currently in progress. Revolver is very much a political work of science fiction, and reviewers have called it "unflinching," "thoughtful," "gut wrenching and relevant (maybe too much so)," and "terrifyingly real."
Brian's Book Blog wrote, "Revolver is a perfect short story/novella to read right now. The political extremists are gaining more and more power and they aren’t easily ignored anymore. Revolver tells the story of what would happen if we let this extremism go too far. And wow was it good."
Some have even gone so far as to compare it works like 1984, V for Vendetta, and The Running Man. Much acclaim has, rightfully and deservedly so, gone to narrator Patricia Santomasso, as well. Her voicework on this audio edition is simply stunning, and listeners have called her a "revelation" whose performance is "simply brilliant."
About Revolver:
Cara Stone is a broken woman: penniless, homeless, and hopeless. When given the chance to appear on television, she jumps at the opportunity to win a minimum of $5,000 for her family.
The state-run, crowdfunded series, Revolver, has been established by the nation’s moneyed elite to combat the increasing plight of class warfare.
There’s never been a Revolver contestant quite like Cara before. The corporate states of America are hungry for blood, and she promises to deliver.
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December 18, 2016
Best Books of 2016
Children of the Dark by Jonathan Janz
Livia Lone by Barry Eisler
Dark Matter by Blake Crouch
Savages by Greg F. Gifune
Company Town by Madeline Ashby
Every Heart A Doorway By Seanan McGuire
The Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle
The Complex by Brian Keene
Lights Out by Nate Southard
Odd Man Out by James Newman
The end of 2016 is nearly upon us, which means it's time for yet another one of those annual 10 Best Books list.
It should go without saying that this list is purely subjective and based solely on my own opinions, but since I recently received an e-mail from some pinhead telling me I should be ashamed of myself for liking a book he did not and how dare I, I apparently need to preface this list with some kind of warning. Now that's done, on with the list!
Feel free to click the links below, or on the photo captions above, to see my original review. In those reviews, all you last minute holiday shoppers can even find an Amazon link directly to the title in question where you can gift away to your heart's content.
Children of the Dark by Jonathan JanzLivia Lone by Barry EislerDark Matter by Blake CrouchSavages by Greg F. GifuneCompany Town by Madeline AshbyThe Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValleThe Complex by Brian KeeneEvery Heart A Doorway by Seanan McGuireLights Out by Nate SouthardOdd Man Out by James NewmanDecember 17, 2016
Review: Odd Man Out by James Newman
Odd Man Out by James Newman
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
It begins with a simple vote inside a church to determine if a local Boy Scout troop, in the wake of the Boy Scouts of America's decision to no longer ban youths based on sexual orientation. When the church agrees to ban the Scouts from using their building in the name of good, old fashioned, religiously sanctioned discrimination, Dennis is reminded of a horrifying incident from his childhood in the summer of 1989. Then, at the Black Mountain Camp for Boys, Dennis and his friend Wesley were confronted with an all-too human evil and gut-wrenching violence.
Odd Man Out is a wickedly powerful novella, and author James Newman does a masterful job of slowly developing his story, building toward a deeply unsettling finale. Throughout, readers are asked to consider why we hate and to understand how pathetically easy it is for us to be manipulated and bullied into doing evil. Late in the story, Newman writes:
Hate doesn’t always start out as hate. It is often born of ignorance. We discriminate against those who are different from us, under the guise of upholding tradition or protecting one group while denying rights to others. We build walls to keep us separate, and when those walls eventually crumble and fall we blame the other for chipping away at the foundations. We point fingers right up until the moment we are crushed beneath the weight of our own intolerance. Everyone loses.
To say that this book is timely is probably the understatement of the century. As I was reading this book, our president-elect was busy insulting China on Twitter, apparently taking a break from stocking his cabinet with more anti-LGBTQ advocates and white supremacists, but I'll be damned if Newman's words didn't loudly echo the current state of affairs writ large all over the USA. To say that people are uneasy about what is ahead of us for the next four years is a gross understatement, and half the country is wondering how in the hell we got into the predicament now facing us. Odd Man Out is all the more powerful given our recent election, and the platform of unadulterated hate and nationalism our president-elect ran on, and the continual assault upon equal rights through BS double-speak legislation like the Religious Freedom bills seeking to make discrimination the law of the land.
You want to know how hate wins? Well, sometimes it begins with a simple vote. After that, all we can do is resist and fight to beat back the hate.
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December 16, 2016
Review: The Nightly Disease by Max Booth III
The Nightly Disease by Max Booth III
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Isaac is a night auditor for the Goddamn Hotel, who, when not reading, watching porn or Netflix, or masturbating off the roof and onto the cars parked in the lot below, is dealing with surly, ignorant guests, deadbeat travelers, grifters, and the occasional corpse. After stealing a guest's lost wallet, and shocked by the disturbing owl-related attack of a co-worker, Isaac is caught up in some dark situations well and truly over his head. He also has a crush on a homeless bulimic girl.
By turns funny and macabre, dark and sentimental, The Nightly Disease is a crime story with shades of horror, wrapped in the sensibility of retail hell. Originally published by DarkFuse Magazine as an online serial, the story has now been collected in a limited edition hardcover with a forthcoming ebook due out in 2017.
As somebody who spent too many years working in retail, and even longer working with the public (with no end in sight...), Isaac is a guy I could relate to a little too well. He gets inundated with idiotic requests, selfish demands, and entitled assholes who think the concept of the customer is always right actually means something. I definitely got where Isaac was coming from, even as he goes off the deep end, and Max Booth III's writing is clearly drawn from a deep pool of real-life experiences. Booth, himself a hotel night auditor, no doubt has many more such stories saved for other books. Isaac's relationships with Kia, the bulimic homeless girl, hits a particularly strong chord and their relationship is explored rather tenderly. This unlikely romance is a terrific mirror for Isaac as he weighs who he is versus who he wants to be.
The Night Disease is a successful fusion of multiple genres told right from the ground-level of the eternal war between the public and the workers that serve them while struggling to maintain not only their integrity and individual identity, but their sanity, as well. Note that this last item is especially important and a more difficult struggle than most civilians realize. Booth captures that particular essence here especially well.
There's also a good deal of owls, which is clearly always a bonus. If Booth intended to drive his readers into seeing owls everywhere, it worked. This book got a little too into my head, but that's OK because at least now Owlbert and Chowls can keep me company.
[Note: I received an advanced copy of this title via NetGalley as part of the DarkFuse Readers Group.]
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December 15, 2016
Review: The Fifty-Year Mission: The Next 25 Years: From The Next Generation to J. J. Abrams: The Complete, Uncensored, and Unauthorized Oral History of Star Trek [Audiobook]
The Fifty-Year Mission: The Next 25 Years: From The Next Generation to J. J. Abrams: The Complete, Uncensored, and Unauthorized Oral History of Star Trek by Mark A. Altman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
My original THE FIFTY-YEAR MISSION: THE NEXT 25 YEARS: FROM THE NEXT GENERATION TO J. J. ABRAMS: THE COMPLETE, UNCENSORED, AND UNAUTHORIZED ORAL HISTORY OF STAR TREK audiobook review and many others can be found at Audiobook Reviewer.
Picking up directly after the close of the previous volume, The Fifty-Year Mission: The First 25 Years, The Next 25 Years has an awful lot of ground to cover over the course of its nearly 35 hour run-time. If the previous era of Star Trek was defined by The Original Series’s cancellation and subsequent resurrection as a film franchise a decade later, and one in which studio support was generally a cold shoulder, then the next era is best characterized as a resurgent franchise, one where the very same studio, under new leadership, recognized the cash cow of the Trek brand, that eventually grew so over-saturated the death-knells of Star Trek began ringing loudly again.
This 25 year period saw the development and success, both creatively and financially, of Star Trek: The Next Generation, its leap to the silver screen following a seven-year television run, and subsequent spin-off TV series, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek: Voyager, and the prequel series, Enterprise (later re-branded as Star Trek: Enterprise) set a century before The Original Series, and the rebooted film franchise helmed by J.J. Abrams.
Given the amount of material covered here, 34 and a half hours almost seems too short. The prior volume had plenty of room to breath during its exploration of The Original Series three-year run and six films, and authors Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross were able to spend a lot of time on the intricacies of story development, the actors and their relationships, and the history of the series and its formation. Having to cover what amounts to a total of 25 television seasons, plus seven films between the TNG and reboot franchises, the oral history delivered here feels truncated even with the longer running-time.
This, however, is not to say that The Next 25 Years lacks depth or breadth, as there is still plenty of interesting material to cover, all of it told from first-hand accounts from the actors, directors, and writers involved. And, best of all, the stories being told don’t hold back, as the speakers approach their recollections with much-appreciated frankness. The writer’s let you know when they failed, the actors speak out about the material they liked and didn’t like. None of the behind-the-scenes drama is hidden away, and nearly everyone involved is very open about the missteps taken at various points along the way, or how harshly some actors treated their cast-mates. Several Voyager cast members speak out about the catty jealously between Kate Mulgrew and Jeri Ryan, who joined the show’s fourth season as Paramount Studios demanded the show get sexed up a bit, as a ex-Borg crewmen seeking to rediscover her humanity while wearing a skin-tight silver suit that left little to the imagination. Others speak about the difficulties in bringing the prequel series to life and being hampered by studio executive demands, only to be cancelled just as the show seemed to be finding its legs, and delivering an alienating series finale that upset fans and cast and crew alike by focusing on TNG characters in the 24th Century, rather than the 22nd Century regulars.
The ratings drop Voyager suffered over the course of its run, the premature cancellation of Enterprise, and the box office failure of the final TNG movie, Star Trek: Nemesis, gave the ready appearance the Star Trek franchise was finally finished. Once again, though, it was resurrected due to fan support – this time from within Hollywood, as those writers and directors who grew up on Trek found themselves in positions to take the reins and give the franchise new life, beginning with the 2009 movie, Star Trek, featuring a young James T. Kirk and Mr. Spock, both fresh to Starfleet.
Like the prior volume, The Next 25 Years is narrated by a full-cast. Unfortunately, none of them are the actors, writers, crew, and directors themselves. I will say, though, that one of the narrators does a stellar impression of Malcom McDowell when reading the actor’s lines during discussion of the TNG film debut, Star Trek: Generations. The production side of things leaves a little to be desired, though, as several of the narrators have trouble pronouncing the names of various characters. Deep Space Nine’s Gul Dukat and Voyager’s Chakotay proved to be particularly problematic for the readers, and these names get mauled in various ways nearly every time they come up. The audio, at least, is clear, although the reading of this oral history can be a bit dry at times.
Given the turbulence involved in keeping the starship Enterprise aloft, it’s seems somewhat surprising that the Star Trek franchise has survived fifty years. This is, if nothing else, a testament to the love and loyalty of those involved in the series production, as well as the support of the fans across generations. Whether or not it will survive another fifty years is questionable, but with the resurgent film series and the launch of a new streaming series, Star Trek: Discovery, on CBS All Access in spring/summer 2017, there is at least room for hope. And hope has been the central enduring characteristic of Star Trek itself for half a century.
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December 14, 2016
#GoreWars!
The big news this week is that I was invited to take part in DarkFuse Magazine's first-ever gross-out competition, GoreWars.
The rules are simple - participants have 50 words to gross out, shock, and/or disturb readers. There was a call-out competition on Twitter a short while back, which I took part in, but was still pretty surprised to make it this far. At the time of this writing, I've got a narrow lead over my competitor in our challenge bracket.
Which is where you come in! I know we all thought we were done voting for the year, and yet here I am, stumping for readers and voters. If you've got a strong stomach, head on over to the GoreWars page. Because of graphic content, the stories are accessible to subscribers. You can either purchase a paid account, or you can sign up for a 72-hour trial subscription and cast your vote.
Here's a look at my entry:
December 12, 2016
Review: Tijuana Donkey Showdown by Adam Howe
Tijuana Donkey Showdown by Adam Howe
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Tijuana Donkey Showdown wins, hands-down, for being the most off-the-wall, ridiculous, and endearingly fun read of 2016. Adam Howe is clearly a crazy person, and thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster he's writing down all the weird shit that happens inside his skull for us to consume. Seriously, we owe him a great big debt of gratitude. It's (probably?) not everyday you'll read about a donkey who is a celebrity in the adult entertainment industry, neo-Nazi's, and the redneck titty bar bouncer, Reggie Levine, moonlighting as a repo man for the world's sleaziest used car salesman who just so happens to be caught in the middle of it all when shit goes south at a gas station-slash-roadside zoo (yeah, that's right. A roadside zoo and gas station. Let that sink in.).
Reggie Levine is all recovered from his skunk ape hunt in Damn Dirty Ape, the escapades of which are told as one part of a three-novella collection Die Dog or Eat the Hatchet, in time to have another go-round with the worst the southern US has to offer. Howe states in the book's afterword that his dream casting, should Levine ever make it to the silver screen, is Danny McBride (despite the book's in-story worship of Nicolas Cage and his Con Air mullet), which is absolutely perfect for a character that reminds me of a white trash, low-budget Indiana Jones. After only two stories featuring Levine, I'm a full-fledged fan and hope we get to see plenty of more of him getting suckered into these weirdo hijinx.
Tijuana Donkey Showdown is a pitch-perfect action comedy, and it seems almost criminal that Howe, an England native, can capture hillbilly zaniness this ripely. I'm clearly not alone in thinking this, and I know Odd Man Out author James Newman has my back. If you're the type of reader who skips introductions, don't. Newman provides a lot of wit, and a fair share of a grudge, in his intro here, and it's a terrific tonal start to a book like this.
Levine's latest exploit is all kinds of ridiculous, raucous fun that explodes into a wild, wide-eyed pyrotechnic climax that burns with such ferociousness it's hot enough to keep you warm all winter-long. And that's even aside from a bevy of 80s movie references, crazy redneck side stories, and a guest appearance from a certain celebrity sporting a lovely, flowing mullet.
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December 8, 2016
Review: Loch Ness Revenge by Hunter Shea
Loch Ness Revenge by Hunter Shea
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Hunter Shea's latest cryptid horror-actioneer, Loch Ness Revenge takes us to the mythical creature's Scotland habitat as twins Natalie and Austin McQueen seek revenge on the creature responsible for the death of their parents.
The premise and set-up is short, sweet, and to the point. Shea wastes no time getting into the guts of his story and delivers an action-packed sea tale of man vs. beast. Loch Ness Revenge is a fast-moving novella, with plenty of hearty violence and a fair share of familial heart to go with. I was pleased to see these characters spend a lot of time in the loch, going mano-a-mano with ol' Nessie, and enjoyed spending a few hours with the McQueens and their German compadre, Henrik, who lost his own family to some very different cryptids (Shea sets the stage for a follow-up story with this trio, which we'll hopefully see soon).
While this book is certainly entertaining and fast-paced, I have but one complaint. The ending was a bit too abrupt and rushed for my tastes, and I wouldn't have minded a touch more decompression in the resolution presented. Things wrapped up too quickly, and I found myself having to part from this story sooner than I had wanted. Consider this a minor issue, though, as the other 95% of the book was simply flat-out fun.
Shea's written ghost stories, a supernatural western, and more, but cryptids are clearly the author's sweet spot. He knows the mythology of the various creatures he tackles quite well, as presented in efforts like The Dover Demon and this year's earlier (and quite excellent) release, The Jersey Devil, and always manages to add on a few extra surprises to give these legends a cool little spin.
Shea is quickly becoming a go-to author for me when I need a quick, bloody creature-feature fix, and I'm thankful I still have a few of his other cryptozoology horrors unread on my Kindle, because I'm certain I'll be jonesing for another before too long.
[Note: I received an advanced review copy of this title via Hook of a Book Media and Publicity.]
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December 7, 2016
Review: Die Dog or Eat the Hatchet by Adam Howe
Die Dog or Eat the Hatchet by Adam Howe
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Die Dog or Eat the Hatchet is a collection of three novellas from author Adam Howe, and it's one of the strongest I've read in terms of quality, tone, and uniqueness. Each of the three stories are different from one another and beautifully showcase the dynamic range Howe possesses as an author.
DAMN DIRTY APES (4 stars) kicks off this collection in rollicking fashion. Picture Roadhouse by way of one of those trashier cryptid-hunting SyFy shows, with the spirit of a dozen 80s flicks, and you'll be off to a good start. Reggie Levine is a washed-up boxer turned bouncer at The Henhouse, a honkytonk strip bar, who gets dragged into the search for a missing local, who was possibly abducted by the mythological skunk ape while filming a gonzo porn in the woods. Right about now, you should have a pretty good idea if this book is for you or not. For me, this is some damn fine absurdist pulp.
Adam Howe is clearly a talent - he did win Stephen King's On Writing contest, which goes a long way in cementing him as an author to watch in my book, and Die Dog or Eat the Hatchet is serving only to double-down on that estimation - and he writes comedy and action with (deceptively) equal ease. This story had me laughing rather frequently, and Howe can turn one hell of a phrase. He's also pretty damn good in delivering a loaded, pyrotechnic payoff. The finale gets mighty damn crazy, and is psychotic in all the best ways. This is seriously entertaining stuff!
DIE DOG OR EAT THE HATCHET (5 stars) takes a radical, bloody left turn from DAMN DIRTY APES and proves that Howe has a hell of a range. Where the previous story was light and funny, with small bits of gross-out descriptions, DIE DOG is bleak, dark, and unrelenting even before it swerves into some hardcore grotesqueness. And hot damn, did I ever love it.
Hingle, a psychotic murderer known as the Sorority Slayer, has escaped from a mental institution and abducted a waitress, Tilly, from a roadside dinner. Faster than you can say "road trip!" the you-know-what hits the fan, and the two run afoul of some good old Southern boys of the Deliverance variety.
Howe takes an already promising and dark premise and plunges it into some Stygian depths of true depravity. This shit is wicked, and the author revels in crafting some real squirm-worthy, hard-core horror scenarios. I enjoyed the every-man perspective given via Tilly, who goes from a sort-of waif to a bad-ass Final Girl after enduring so much and being in so far over her head. It was a pretty radical turn, and quite well executed.
I'm giving this one the full 5 stars for being ballsy, gruesome, and depraved, alongside some bloody, nasty descriptions and details. I dug it.
GATOR BAIT (4.5 stars) is sweet piece of swampland noir revolving around a piano player, on the run after running afoul of his lady's husband and losing two fingers in the process, taking refuge in Louisiana. At the Grinnin' Gator honkytonk strip-club, he finds employment as the bar's newest pianist, working for a rumrunner name Crocker, while shacking up with Crocker's wife, Grace. If this sounds like trouble, you would be correct.
GATOR BAIT brings with it a cool noir sensibility, along with a giant, man-eating alligator that is the main staple at Crocker's bar. Howe goes for the slow-burn in this one, letting us get inside Smitty's head as he gets to know his new patrons and adjust to life on the bayou, before letting everything go to hell. As the prior two stories demonstrated, Howe knows how to construct and deliver a beautiful action sequence ripe with chaotic, inevitable denouements, and GATOR BAIT is no different.
Each of the stories in Die Dog or Eat the Hatchet are worth the price of admission alone, but taken as a whole this collection is nearly perfect. Howe is clearly a well-versed, studied writer of multiple genres, and his voice is, at turns, authoritative and downright hilarious. If I have any complaint at all, it's that I didn't read this book sooner, but I can at least be thankful in knowing his next book, Tijuana Donkey Showdown, is due out in just a few days.
[Note: I received a copy of this title from the author.]
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December 3, 2016
Review: Convenant by Allan Leverone
Covenant by Allan Leverone
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Covenant is my first experience with Allan Leverone's writing, and while I mostly enjoyed this book I found it to be a bit too generic. This is a haunted house story and although the ghost of psychopathic Edward Collins is terrific, it does little to break new ground and I didn't find much in the way of surprises.
This is a shame because Collins is basically the ghost of a New England Jack the Ripper, and the opening chapters, told from the point of view of one of his victims circa 1800s, are very well executed. I could have easily read a book solely about Collins and likely have been very, very satisfied. Leverone then jumps forward to present day, where a young husband and wife have bought a fixer-upper house in Covenant, New Hampshire. In short order, Lindie Cooper is made a widow and brought under the scrutiny of Detective Nielson. From there, it's pretty standard, and mostly unexceptional, ghost fare until the final third when the action ramps up toward a predictable finale.
Leverone's writing, though, is smooth and the guy can certainly write a page-turner. Despite Covenant treading so much familiar ground, the prose kept me invested, alongside some great character work. I was fully invested in Lindie's plight and the growing stressors piled upon her. Here's a woman mourning the loss of her life's one true love, her life further upturned by a policeman who has drawn some very natural conclusions and just won't stop digging, compounded further by mysterious happenings inside her new home, which is fully stocked with her dead husband's belongings, and the site of his grisly, untimely death. I felt for Lindie, and she's truly a sympathetic character all the way through. There are a few other characters worth attention, as well, particularly Verna, a psychic medium well-versed on the history of Collins.
There's plenty of good stuff happening in Covenant, but most of it feels overly familiar and culled from a number of other haunted house stories. The arc of the characters, especially Det. Neilsen, are natural but mostly because they occur exactly as expected. There's plenty of built-in conflict and tension between the various roles within this story, but too few surprises. Despite some good character work and smooth writing, Covenant fails to break any new ground and is ultimately too formulaic to truly impress.
[Note: I received an advanced copy of this title from the publisher via NetGalley and am a member of the DarkFuse Readers Group.]
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