Month End SF Book Group (Paramus, NJ) - 2011 Books Read Thread

[Phil]

This Thread is for Books Read by the Month End Book Group in 2011:


ERAGON.............................................Christopher Paolini....................11/30/11
CHINATOWN DEATH CLOUD................Paul Malmont...........................10/28/11
JULIAN COMSTOCK..............................Robert C Wilson........................09/30/11
MORLOCK NIGHT.................................K W Jeter..................................08/31/11
HUNDRED THOUSAND KINDOMS..........N K Jemisin...............................07/29/11
INFERNAL DEVICES..............................K W Jeter...................................06/30/11
DIVINE MISFORTUNE...........................A Lee Martinez...........................05/31/11
AGENT TO THE STARS...........................John Scalzi.................................04/29/11
NORSE CODE........................................Greg van Hout............................03/31/11
LOVE & ROCKETS..................................Hughes & Greenberg..................02/28/11
FRAGILE THINGS..................................Neil Gaiman................................01/31/11

[Phil]

The following accounts are reprinted with permission from THE STARSHIP EXPRESS Copyright 2011 Philip J De Parto.


ERAGON (Eragon 1)
ERAGON is the first book in The Inheritance series and is more noteworthy for how it became a bestseller than for its actual literary qualities. The work was originally written by the author when he was 15 and published by his parent's small press. It gained a certain following and Knopf decided to mainstream publish the work and heavily promote the author. The decision was a profitable one.

While the plot of the work is heavily indebted to STAR WARS, The Lord of the Rings, and other classics, the book was much better than I expected. The hero was the same age as the author at the time of the writing and the voice rings true. The opening scenes on the farm and the nearby small town are well handled. The transformation from farm boy to warrior is nicely done. The story covers about a year in the life of the hero. Most of the time is spent either running after or running away from the bad guys. As they are on the road, there is little for Eragon to do after hours than fence and learn magic from a pair of master swordsmen. I found it readable, although I'm not in any particular hurry to read the next book.

CHINATOWN DEATH CLOUD PERIL
PERIL was the first book by Mr Malmont and is a love letter to the age of the pulp magazine. The three main characters are Lester Dent, Walter Gibson and L Ron Hubbard, with Harry Blackstone, John Campbell, Robert Heinlein, H P Lovecraft and Orson Welles among those with lesser roles. All become involved in a complicated plot about a deadly new nerve gas developed in Chinatown. Recommended, especially for people interested in the pulp era and the early days of science fiction..

JULIAN COMSTOCK
The work is set in a 22nd Century America which has partially recovered from the collapse of our civilization due to war, plague, and energy and environmental crises. The nation has conquered much of Canada and is at war with Germany for the remainder.

The story is told through the eyes of Adam Hazzard, a small town writer who chronicles the rise of his friend, Julian, through the ranks of military service to the Presidency to his fall at the hands of forces loyal to the fundamentalist Dominion of Jesus Christ.

The book is part love story, part war tale, and part political struggle. Adam Hazzard's naivete makes him at times an unreliable narrator, and the book has the feel of a boy's adventure story from the 19th Century. Among the touches the group enjoyed were Adam's unique footnotes, the use of theater as propaganda, and the spread of vaccination scars as a fashion statement. This is a solid opus, if not as cosmic as some of Wilson's other works.

MORLOCK NIGHT
The tale begins shortly after the dinner party framing sequence of H G Wells THE TIME MACHINE. Edwin Hocker, the narrator of NIGHT, is joined by fellow dinner guest Dr Ambrose during his walk home. Ambrose cautions our narrator not to dismiss the tale out of hand. The fog rolls in after they part company and Hocker discovers himself in a London which has been conquered by a Morlock invasion. After some adventures with Tafe, a woman freedom fighter, he awakens and finds himself in the desolate future of a dying Earth. Dr Ambrose reveals himself as the reincarnation of Merlin. He needs the help of Hocker and Tafe to rescue the imprisioned reincarnated King Arthur who will defeat the Morlocks.

The group embarks on a series of adventures from the sewers of London where they encounter an Atlantean submarine to the far future citadel where the Morlocks have hidden Excaliber. Eventually Arthur carries the day.

Angry Robot did a nice job with the reissue of this 1979 novel. Their edition has an introduction by Tim Powers and an afterward by Adam Roberts which discuss the origins of the book and the creation of steampunk as a genre. My assessment is that while I am happy to see the book back in print, it is more important as a seminal work of steampunk than as a work of literature.

THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINDOMS (Inheritance 1)
Karen and Phil were the most active voices in the discussion, although Bruce had the best line of the evening: “I’m a computer necromancer; I bring dead machines back to life.”

KINGDOMS melds several different fantasy traditions. It is epic creation like Middle Earth (although one we do not see much of, at least in the first book). It is a story of the gods and mortals like classic Zelazny. Almost all the action is within one huge structure like Peake. The sex scenes between Yeine and Nahadath are right out of paranormal romance.

Karen felt the compared the book to baklava, with layers beneath layers. (Someone else referred to it as a spam cheesecake.) She said it reminded her of a melding of paintings by Dali, Picasso and Chagall. Phil stated it was a work which concerned itself with family, revenge, and slavery. Karen added caste and betrayal. We liked it.

INFERNAL DEVICES
This seminal work of steampunk has recently been reissued in mass market paperback by Angry Robot Books. The current edition features a forward by the author and an afterward by author/editor Jeff VanderMeer.

The hero of the book is George Dower, a stolid man of modest gifts whose father was an insanely brilliant inventor of all manner of wondrous devices. The action kicks off with the visit of the Brown Leather Man, who asks George to repair one of his father’s devices. Our hero is soon kidnaped and rescued on multiple occasions by a variety of secret societies working at cross purposes. Few heroes have saved the world in quite this manner or with as much reluctance.

DIVINE MISFORTUNE
The book is a comedy set in a world very much like ours, except that the gods take an active, if tightly regulated, role. If you want the hot cheerleader to fall for you, you make a sacrifice to Aphrodite and--assuming you follow the correct procedure, you get your wish.

The heroes are Phil and Teri, a nice married couple who don't want much out of life except a fair shake. But when the best of life's blessings keep going to other, less qualified people, they decide to get-with-the-program and select a god from pantheon.com. They wind up with Luka, a minor god of prosperity, who announces that he has decided to live in their spare bedroom. Hijinks soon ensue.

Karen found the novel hysterical. Phil also enjoyed it. Doot thought that the writing was flat. Pam found herself unable to get into the book. Phil interrupted the pro and con with a reading from Chapter 15 in which a pair of inept cultists attempt to win the favor of the dread god, Gorgoz, by shooting Phil, Teri, and their friend, Bonnie. Pretty much everyone was laughing at the scene. Pam admitted that the words which had just laid there on the paper came to life when read aloud. Karen plans to pick up more of the author's works.

AGENT TO THE STARS
The book has had an interesting publishing history. It was originally intended as a practice novel for the author to prove that he could write a novel from start to finish and produce something which was readable. After the publication of the author’s first “real” novel, Scalzi put Agent on his website with the suggestion that anyone who enjoyed it was welcome to contribute $ 1.00. Thousands of people did so. Next Nightshade Books issued the work as a limited edition hardcover. Then Tor Books published it first in trade paperback and then in mass market format.

The plot is simple. Hollywood agent Tom Stein is hired by ugly, smelly aliens to represent them so that they can go public without causing panic in the streets. Figuring out how to do that while dealing with the rest of his client list of divas, wannabes and bimbos drives the story

Scalzi is at his best when Tom is dealing with his maddening clients. He is not as sure footed with the aliens, but does a nice job depicting them as a highly moral race which has a different moral code than humanity. Taras felt that the manner in which the aliens made their presence known was implausible, but Phil said that it made perfect sense from the point of view of plotting. This is not a great book, but as a practice work which was never intended to see publication, it is perfectly serviceable.

NORSE CODE
the author's first novel, a new slant on Ragnarok, the end of the world according to Norse myth.

Taras felt that the characters were a bit sketchy and that it would make a good graphic novel or movie where the artist or actors could flesh things out a bit more. Phil liked Odin's ravens Munin and Hugin. Karen liked the scenes set in the land of the dead. Pam enjoyed the scenes with the Fenris pack. A bonus was the unexpected visit by Ray and Laura Viquiera who had been shopping in the mall.

LOVE & ROCKETS
Lois McMaster Bujold wrote a very insightful introduction to the work which was worth the price of the book by itself. My favorite story was “For Old Times Sake” by Tim Waggoner which opens with a woman asking her husband, “I want you to tell me how I died.” Other stories which grabbed me were “Second Shift” by Brenda Cooper, “In the Night” by Steven Silver, “The Business of Love” by Kelly Swails and “Music in Time” by Dean Wesley Smith. I tend to read a lot of fantasy, and it was a lot of fun to be back on classic science fiction turf with aliens, space stations and starships.

FRAGILE THINGS
Story highlights included the Hugo-Award winning Sherlock Holmes / H P Lovecraft “A Study in Emerald,” the gothic homage “Forbidden Brides of the Faceless Slaves in the Secret House of the Night of Dread Desire” and “The Monarch of the Glen,” an AMERICAN GODS tie-in. Barry and Phil respectively lauded the poems, “Instructions” and “The Day the Saucers Came.”

Note: There are short stories / vignettes plus 8 poems in the collection.