Texas On the Rocks

Ayes of Texas Trilogy #2

by Daniel da Cruz

Ripley Forte comes up with a daring plan to save the United States from a catastrophic drought and to teach the Russians a lesson in the art of the surprise attack

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction

293 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published March 12, 1986

About the author

US writer, formerly known for numerous men's action-adventure tales, who began publishing sf with The Grotto of the Formigans (1980), a novel about African grotto Monsters, and who came to more general notice with his Ayes of Texas sequence: The Ayes of Texas (1982), Texas on the Rocks (1986) and Texas Triumphant (1987). The political premises underlying the series – in the late 1990s the USSR, having hoodwinked the supinely liberal US media, has come to dominate the world – have dated, though the American assumption that its media are liberal is still conventional wisdom; the exuberance of the tales themselves remains winning. The protagonist, a triple-amputee World War Two veteran from the newly free Republic of Texas, arms an old battleship (itself called Texas), and sails off to fight the Russians. Much blood is spilt, and a good time is had by all; by the close of the third volume, however, a genuinely sophisticated dubiousness about the nature of the USSR/USA Cold War conflict complicates what might have seemed an unduly simplified picture: the sequence merits revisiting. F-Cubed (1989) is a less entrancing Technothriller; but Mixed Doubles (1989) enjoyably depicts the attempts of a contemporary failed composer who travels back in time to steal Music from those more talented than himself. [JC] - See more at: http://www.sf-encyclopedia.com/entry/...

Reviews

[Gina Rheault · Rating 4 out of 5]

How can you resist a story set in The Republic of Texas in the 2000's where the mission is to save the world from drought by hauling a massive Antarctic iceberg past Capetown, up the African coast, across the Atlantic, and into the Gulf of Mexico by picking up vast ocean currents, self-hauling with subterranean anchor pulls, using wind via airfoil sailing masts, and acres of solar panels, while fending off saboteurs, pirates, spies, politicos, and a sister-in-law out for your jugular?

Seriously. I picked up this book for its cover for 25 cents, and found a charmer that is fast moving "House of Cards" meets "Dr. Strangelove" meets "Tom Swift" meets "Indiana Jones". It is politically incorrect in ever so many ways, but not in a degrading #MeToo way, since there are exactly two women in the entire book and the secondary one lasts exactly one paragraph. The other woman , a strong calculating. bad-girl anti-hero butts heads with the hero and finally, predictably succumbs to the heros charms, at least momentarily, in the last dying moments of the story -- at least that is what the hero thinks. No, this is a world of big men living large, outdoing each other, scheming, conniving, crossing each other's paths in pursuit of glory, power, and conquest of nature, and a single stubborn woman.

Very fun book, given modern-day villainous Russians, and Capetown, South Africa on the verge of going dry. Expect 1980's science which can be quite up to date for some disciplines, and enjoy how differently the world developed from how it seemed to be going when this book was conceived. Excellent dialog and structure, well written, never a dull moment. Kudos Daniel da Cruz.

[Bryan457 · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. I enjoyed this more than the first one because of the out-of-the-mainstream science and technology and because of the catastrophic ecological disaster thread. It was also simply better written, without that not-quite-fleshed-out feel that "The Ayes of Texas" had.

The "near future" science fiction setting for "Texas on the Rocks" is 2004-2008.

I'm fascinated by "near future" science fiction books. It's kind of like pulling up old issues of "Popular Mechanics" from past decades to see what they predicted about future science and technologies. And, you get the added bonus of seeing what kind of political climate they predict.

The relationship between Ripley and Jennifer Red cloud is pretty twisted.

In the light of actual world politics, the "near future" political setting, with Texas as an independent republic, The Russian element, the Jewish twelve, and the lack of any Arab or Islamic element except for the Lebanese business financier Yussef Mansour, is more than a little surreal.

[Devlocke · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ridiculous premise, but wonderfully evocative of the thinking in the era in which it was written. It's so very 80s, from the evil scheming Russians to the weird Zionist conspiracy. Also very 80s in its blatant sexism. The book basically climaxes in a 'just' rape which the victim enjoys so much, she begs her rapist to stay with her always, because she loves him now that he's shown her what she wanted all along. If it wasn't so cliche, it would be horrifying.

Other than that, it was readable but kind of dumb. Chock full of cliches, just most of them aren't borderline offensive. The U.S. runs out of water and the protagonist has to best politicians, scheming womens, Russian intelligence analysts, and a secret group of Jewish plotters, in order to tow a giant iceberg to Texas so we can all take showers again. Yeah.

[Peregrine 12 · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fun read, and definitely one-of-a-kind (have YOU ever heard of Daniel DaCruz? Yeah, me neither...)

The main character is pig-headed and the story is overtly sexist. If you can get past that, then this is a damn good action(?) novel about a near-future North America running out of water and the race to bring ice from Antarctica. I guarantee you, there's nothing else out there even similar to this. Check it out!

[Randy Benson · Rating 4 out of 5]

in a world which is losing its sources of fresh water (soomething that's actually happening now), a maverick of the Texan Republic takes matters into his own hands. . .the second chapter of da Cruz' Texas Trilogy.

[Little Timmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is definitely a SiFi story about Texas and Texans, the adventure is big, the story is big and the characters are larger than life. A good read and interesting story. Nice 2nd book in the trilogy. Recommended

[Meg · Rating 4 out of 5]

What an absolute trip! Definitely written when it was written, but has such a goofy "Andy Weir" vibe. Will definitely be picking up other books by this author.