Rachel Caine: Working Stiff

The first book in a new fantasy series set in modern US. I enjoyed Caine’s Weather Warden series and so I was eager to try her new series even though I’m not a zombie fan.

Publication year: 2011
Format: Audio
Publisher: Penguin Audio
Narrator: Julia Whelan
Running Time: 11 hrs and 59 minutes

Bryn Davies is a former soldier and now she’s a mortician. She’s just been hired as a funeral director to Fairview Mortuary, which has a reputation for going through funeral directors quickly. Bryn soon finds out why. Even though her immediate boss, Mr. Fairview, is nice enough, Bryn realizes that he sells drugs. And not just ordinary ones, but the one drug which will restore life to a corpse. Soon after, the villainous Fairview kills her.

However, Bryn is revived with a shot of the drug, Returne. The two men who brought her back work for Pharmadene, the company which developed the drug and they want it back. They decide to use Bryn as a way to track down the black market seller. Because Bryn now need a shot of the drug every day, she has no choice but to agree.

Bryn is very different from Joanne, who is the lead in the Weather Warden series. Bryn is a serious woman and she’s also quiet and contemplative, unlike Joanne. Unfortunately, this makes her somewhat flat and the other characters aren’t remarkable, either. Her situation is also so grim that there’s not a lot of humor in book.

The leader of Pharmadene is a ruthless woman and she makes clear that as soon as Bryn isn’t useful to her, Bryn won’t get the drug anymore. Returne is based on nanotechnology. In addition to restoring a corpse to what it was during live (needing to eat, breath, having same emotions etc.) it also sets up a code word in Bryn’s system (and the systems of everyone else who has been injected with the drug) and when that word is said, Bryn has to obey.

The book has a very dark tone; Bryn is dead and nothing is going to make her alive again. She can’t have a normal life. Even her romantic interest McCallister is cold and aloof. I wasn’t interested in him at all and couldn’t see what Bryn sees in him, except that he’s the only eligible man around. I would have liked the book more without the mandatory romance.

The book doesn’t end in a cliffhanger but it does leave the future open for further adventures. At any case, Bryn has to have Returne or she will literally decompose.

It wasn’t bad but I don’t think I’ll continue with this series.

 

Lisa Shearin: Con & Conjure

Fifth book in the series.

Publication year: 2011
Format: print
Page count: 322
Publisher: Ace

Raine Benares is an elf seeker and a member of a very notorious criminal family. She got accidentally bonded to a very powerful magical rock, the Saghred, and since then pretty much everyone has wanted to use or manipulate her to their own ends. Now, she’s on the island of Mid for her own protection as well as others’ protection. The head of the Seat of Twelve, who rule Mid, wants to imprison Raine and use Saghred through her. But because the king of the goblins and a very powerful goblin sorcerer also want Raine, she’s marginally more safe on Mid.

Now, the goblin king’s exiled brother is coming to Mid and bringing his enemies with him. Unfortunately, those enemies don’t care how many other people their kill to get to Prince Chigaru. In addition to the goblin king’s assassins, someone has hired the best assassin in this world to kill the prince: Rache Kai, who just happens to be Raine’s former boyfriend. Raine fears that Rache will come after her or her current boyfriend.

However, Raine and her family are also trying to solve some of Raine’s problems. They know that the head of the Twelve, Carnades Silvanus, and his cronies are corrupt; they just don’t have any proof. So, Raine’s banker cousin is coming to cut off Silvanus’ and his cronies money supply. Raine has also a part to play because she’s very good at glamoring herself and so she can pretend to be another banker.

Unfortunately, things rarely go according to plan and soon Raine is again on the run, as an outlaw.

If you’ve read the previous books in the series, I think you will like this one, too. Raine is again dodging enemies left and right. The love triangle was solved in the previous book, just in time for Raine’s ex-fiancé to pop up and make Raine really uncomfortable.

The plot puts Raine’s glamoring ability to good use and that’s always fun: Raine disguises herself as a male banker and talks to one of Silvanus’ top cronies about their future plans. Unfortunately, Raine also makes a point to talk about how, er, badly endowed the poor banker is and that he might have turned to crime because of that.

Otherwise, I really enjoyed the book. The main plot is in full gear and going forward. The next book is the last in the series and so Con & Conjure ends with multiple cliffhangers.

As always I enjoyed the cast and the witty, if somewhat repetitive, writing style.

 

Kerry Greenwood: Murder in Montparnasse

The twelfth book in the historical mystery series.

Publication year: 2002
Format: Audio
Publisher: Belinda audio
Narrator: Stephanie Daniel
Running Time: 9 hrs and 38 minutes

This time the Honorable Phryne Fisher has two unrelated mysteries to deal with. Anatole Betrand is the owner and the chef in one of the best French restaurants in Melbourne. He’s around forty years old and has found an eighteen-year-old girl, Elizabeth, for himself. Unfortunately, Elizabeth has vanished and Anatole wants Phryne to find her. Elizabeth’s father is a “well-known racing identity” who is a terror to his servants and most likely a crimina. He sent the girl to a finishing school years ago. So, he doesn’t really know his daughter.

Phryne’s friends Cec and Bert tell her that two of their friends have died. Officially, their deaths are accidents but Cec and Bert are convinced that someone has murdered their friends. Cec, Bert, and the two victims are part of a group of seven soldiers who have kept in touch over the years. Since they haven’t done anything remarkable after the war, Phryne concludes that they must have seen something during their time in Paris, when they were together celebrating the end of the war. Cec and Bert reminisce about their time in Paris and Phryne also remembers her time just after the war. She was an ambulance driver during the war and after is she met some of the famous Parisian artist and modelled for a while in order to buy rent and food. She fell in love the first time, but unfortunately for a completely wrong man.

Also, Phryne’s Chinese lover Lin Chung announces that he’s been engaged to be married. His fiancée is a lovely, seventeen-year-old virgin from mainland China and she will arrive soon. Phryne has understood that this will happen and she would like to meet the girl and put her at ease. However, Phryne’s dependable servants, Mr. and Mrs. Butler, are resigning. Mr. Butler doesn’t want to live in a household where adultery is going on. Phryne is miffed and sets out to find a new butler.

It was great to see more of Phryne’s history and to glimpse into the bohemian side of Paris right after the war. As far as I can tell, Greenwood captures it wonderfully.

Even though Greewood writes with humor, she deals (again) with serious issues such as racism and attitudes towards immigrants.

The main cast are back and even Phryne’s adoptive daughters will have a larger role in the book than usual. Since meeting Lin Chung, we been told that his family will arranged a marriage for him so it wouldn’t be possible for Lin and Phryne to get married. I’ve been wondering about this; if Greenwood would make the prospective bride a criminal or otherwise unsuitable so that Phryne could marry her Chinese lover. Thankfully, this didn’t happen. In fact, it was dealt with tastefully, if perhaps a bit too easily. I was a bit sorry for the poor girl; she would be moving to another country getting married to a man she doesn’t know and the man is already in love with someone else and continuing the relationship. Hardly fair for her.

A great continuation to the series.

 

Patrick Weeks: The Palace Job

A stand-alone fantasy book.

Publication year: 2012
Format: ebook
Page count: 229 in .pdf
Publisher: Tyche Books Ltd.

Loch and Kail are soldiers of the Imperium but they’ve been caught and are in the Republic’s maximum security prison. The prisoners work on the underside of the floating city of Heaven’s Spire where they have to keep the magical lapiscaela in working order. The place is almost impossible to escape from except by falling into you death. However, Loch and Kail have a plan and Loch has to get away from the prison because she has bigger things to do. The pair escape but of course they become the most wanted villains in the Republic and the prison warden, Orris, becomes their implacable enemy. Justiciar Pyvic is sent after them, too.

While Loch has been in prison, a high-ranking Imperial officer has taken her family’s property and Loch wants them back. In order to do so, she has to break into the most heavily guarded areas of Heaven’s Spire. They are guarded by magic as well as people.

The Place Job is a heist story with an engaging cast. Loch herself is a very moral soldier; she repeats ”Fight the enemy, not their people” and expects others to follow that saying, too. She’s confident and very intelligent and at least one step ahead of her enemies. Oh, and she’s a black woman. Kail is her most trusted friend who will go through fire for her. He’s also more a rogue than a fighter and his favorite tactic is to insult the enemy’s mother until the enemy looses their cool and attacks him. Together Kail and Loch gather a group of people to help them. Loch knows some of them already.

Ululenia is a shapeshifting nature spirit. She’s in it for the money because with the money she can buy land away from greedy humans. She’s very attracted to virgins and her natural form is a unicorn. She’s not really a combatant and instead uses mind control.

Icy Fist is an acrobat and a martial arts expert. He’s sworn an oath not to hurt living beings. He’s an Imperial by birth and is very courteous towards the local, Republic’s, people. He usually works with Tern who is an expert lockpicker and tinker. She’s also an actor and skilled in con jobs.

Loch is looking for an old and reliable magic user she knows. Unfortunately, he has died so instead Loch has to settle for Hessler who has just been thrown out of the university. Then he was accused of cheating at cards and promptly thrown into jail. A young and naive man tried to defend Hessler and ended up in chains next to him. Hessler doesn’t want to leave the boy so Loch agrees to take in Dairy as well. That’s the boy’s nickname. Hessler’s expertise are illusions and magical objects.

Last but possible the most interesting person in the group is Desidora, a death priestess who has an interesting history. She’s working on magic defenses along with Hessler. She also has a talking, ancient warhammer Ghylspwr which can do a lot of damage. Ghylspwer talks in a made-up language.

On the other side of the legal fence is the hard-working ex-solder Pyvic who is doing is best to get the prisoners so that he can get on with the important work. However, politics gets into his way. The former warden Orris is assigned to Pyvic because Orris needs a chance to clear his name. Unfortunately for Pyvic, Orris doesn’t know anything at all about catching criminals. Of course, the story has also a mystery villain who is behind it all and has lots of political power.

All of these people have personalities and they all have their moment to shine, so the book doesn’t feel too crowded.

I was a bit surprised by how much I liked this book. I love Ocean’s eleven and the TV series Hustle but I haven’t read many heist stories so I was a bit skeptical about how well it could work. This one worked really well and I enjoyed it throughly. In fact, I wouldn’t mind reading more about Loch and her friends. (The other heist story I remember reading was Sanderson’s Mistborn which I also loved. Hmm. Any recommendations of other heist books?)

The world is a bit different from usual fantasy worlds. For one thing, the Republic is really a republic with people voted into office. It requires some way to tell people about what’s happening and here they use a puppet show! I loved that! The Republic has a two-party system, the Skilled and the Learned, who are constantly at odds with each other. The magic system isn’t really explained but I didn’t mind that. It felt more like technology than magic, to me.

The narration doesn’t tone down the danger but it’s not really gory or gritty (thankfully). In fact, the book has a lot of humor.

 

Kristine Kathryn Rusch: The White Mists of Power

A stand-alone fantasy book.

Publication year: 1991
Format: Audio
Publisher: Audible
Narrator: Gildart Jackson
Running Time: 9 hrs and 38 minutes

I’m a fan of Rusch’s SF books but this is the first fantasy I’ve read from her. It’s also her first published book.

Alaric is the King’s eldest son and heir. Even though he’s still very young, ten, he’s already trying to know how to do his future job properly. At the start of the book, he’s gone to see a mysterious Enos who can see his future. The Enos prophesies that Alaric will wise and feared but that he will be threatened with death.

Alaric is constantly asking his father about the ways to rule. However, his questions annoy the King and alarm the high nobles. Alaric wants to go the nearby big city Anda and Lord Boton promises to take him there. However, it’s Lord Ewehl who shows up to escort the young prince to the city. The Lord gives the boy some money and sends him off to explore Anda on his own. Unfortunately, Alaric is soon beaten and robbed. To his shock he finds out that Lord Ewehl hasn’t waited for him and nobody believes that he’s actually the prince.

Seymour is a son of a famous magician. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have his father’s talents and so he wasn’t properly trained. He lives on the lands of lord Dakin who has a dark reputation for hunting his enemies with dogs and Seymour is one of the few who has escaped such a hunt alive. When he hears that another man is being hunted, he helps the man. The man turns out to be Byron, a bard. Byron is rumored to have killed a lady and that’s why he’s in trouble. He’s, of course, innocent. He needs a powerful protector and to get that he heads to the King’s court. But getting to the King isn’t easy and lord Dakin is still after them.

The world has a few unique features even though the social system is a common feudal system. The Enos seem to be some sort of earth spirits but in physical bodies. They are attuned to the land and can sense if the land is in turmoil or “wants blood”. The Enos make prophesies and are forbidden to help humans.

Magic is real and magicians are accepted as another profession. Herbal healers help people and powerful wizards are in the Lords’ employ. Byron ends up leading a bardic troupe so we get to know more about them.

Alaric is an idealistic ten year old but he feels older to me. However, he has to quickly learn to live in his new life. Luckily, he makes friends who will prevent him from dying of hunger on the streets. He learns harsh lessons.

Seymour is in his mid-thirties and he’s lost his idealism long ago. He’s bitter at his father and unsure about his own abilities. He develops a quick attachment to Byron and the two travel together. Byron has ideas about how to get into the King’s palace and how to leave their pursuers behind.

The book has many other point-of-view character. Some of them are seen only briefly and some of them are the story’s bad guys. One of them is a starving street urchin.

I enjoyed the book but I don’t think it’s quite as good as Rusch’s later books. Still, it’s nice to read a stand-alone fantasy for a change.

 

Yvonne Carroll: Leprechaun Tales

Illustrated by Jacqueline East

A retelling of six Irish folktales about the Little People.

Publication year: 2011
Format: print
Page count: 64
Publisher: Gill & Macmillan

This is a charming little book for kids. Each page has illustrations which match the story on that page. The book has six stories where people encounter Leprechauns in various ways. In a couple of them, greedy humans are trying to get the Leprechaun’s gold but there are other classic tales, too. The stories are pretty short.

The stories: The Crock of Gold, Niamh, The Sidhe, The Fairy Lios, The Magic Cloak, and The New House.

To me the illustrations look similar to children’s book illustrations and they fit the stories well.

 

K.A. Stewart: A Shot in the Dark

The second book in an urban fantasy series where the main character is a modern day samurai.

Publication year: 2011
Format: print
Page count: 306
Publisher: Roc

Jesse Dawson is a champion. When someone has made a deal with a demon and contacts Jesse, he can make another deal, with his own soul as the collateral. The demons’ physical bodies don’t have vital points, like a human body, so Jesse needs a bladed weapon to fight them. However, Jesse’s not alone: he’s part of a network of Champions who share information when it’s needed. Old Ukrainian Champion Ivan Zelenko has brought the Champions together even though they work alone and in different parts of the world.

Jesse is happily married to Mira and they have a daughter which is quite a departure from other UF books and I liked that. Even though Jesse hates demons, he’s on speaking terms with one of them. Axel appears when he wants to and sometimes gives Jesse information. He has quite a big role in this book.

A Shot in the Dark is quite different in tone and structure than the first one, A Devil in the Details. While the first one was solidly an urban fantasy, this one has more horror elements.

The males of the Dawson family and their friends have a yearly retreat in a mountain cabin in Colorado. Jesse, his brother Cole, his best friend Will, his friend Marty, the cabin owner Oscar, and Oscar’s teenaged son are going to the cabin to get away from the world and to shoot paint balls at each other. But this time, they have an addition to the group. Jesse’s doctor and good friend has a new boyfriend Cameron and the good doctor pressures Jesse into taking Cameron to the retreat. They also have to take Marty’s mastiff Duke who turns out to be extremely useful.

However, once the group gets to the mountain, Axel warns Jesse to leave immediately. But Jesse can’t just leave his friends and soon they are all trapped into the cabin with bloodthirsty monsters all around.

The start of the book is quite slow with the Dawson family barbecue and then the long car trip to the mountains. The action doesn’t really start until about 100 pages in but then it’s very intense and the book’s mood changes abruptly from light-hearted to horror. Even though Jesse’s friends know intellectually that demons exist, they haven’t ever met one. Still, when they are threatened, they quickly accept that demons are real and concentrate on staying alive. There’s some tension between the characters, too, so it’s not all “us vs. them” mentality.

I really enjoyed the relationships between the characters and Duke was a real delight. We find out that there’s a far larger plot moving beneath.

 

Kerry Greenwood: Away with the Fairies

11th book in the series.

Publication year: 2001
Format: Audio
Publisher: Belinda Audio
Narrator: Stephanie Daniel
Running Time: 8 hrs and 5 minutes

The Honorable Phryne Fisher is a bit bored: life is good but her Chinese lover Lin Chung has been sent to China to buy silk. Then Detective Inspector Robinson asks Phryne to look into a suspicious death. Marcella Lavender has reported that someone is threating her and Robinson looked into the matter but didn’t find anything. However, now Lavender is dead and Robinson feels really guilty about it. Of course Phryne agrees to look into the matter.

Lavender wrote and illustrated children’s books, specifically fairy books. She also worked for the Women’s Choice magazine. She lived in a boarding house with a motley crew of other people and her house was decorated with fairies. She even inflicted garden gnomes on the hapless gardens. Phryne interviews her house mates without getting much clues. However, she’s invited to write for the Women’s Choice magazine and this gives her an excellent opportunity to investigate.

The book is pretty ordinary Phryne book until about the half-way point: funny and witty but showing also how people’s lives can be hard. However, about half-way through the book Phryne finds out that her lover has been kidnapped and the book’s tone for that plot becomes far more serious.

As usual, the book has a range of interesting characters. In addition to the usual cast, there are lot of new characters. It seems that miss Lavender wasn’t much liked. Her co-workers at the magazine aren’t grieving; they are focused on getting the next issue out. She wrote also the advice column for the magazine which widens the field of suspects.

I really enjoyed this one.

 

Steven Harper: The Doomsday Vault

The first book in the Clockwork Empire steampunk trilogy.

Publication year: 2011
Format: print
Page count: 391
Publisher: Roc

Miss Alice Michaels is 22 and still unmarried. Her fiancee, mother and brother have died of the clockwork plague and her father is severely ill. Because Alice’s father is a Baron, she can’t get a job and the only thing she’s good at is making and repairing mechanical automations, which (is another thing) women aren’t supposed to do. She has managed to get an invitation to Greenfellow’s ball which is her last chance of catching a wealthy husband and keeping up appearances. At first, she despairs when it’s clear that everyone shuns her. However, she befriends Louisa Creek, a woman who takes full advantage of her position as a heiress, and she meets Norbert Williamson, a wealthy industrialist who is very interested in her. On the way back from the ball, zombies attack her carriage and she’s saved by a group of people calling themselves the Third Ward. Even though the police has given up on fighting the zombies, because they don’t want to get infected, these people fight the zombies. Alice helps them and wishes briefly that she could join them. However, her father is ill and has a lot of debts, so her only choice, in the eyes of the society and herself, is to catch on wealthy husband.

Gavin Ennock is a cabin boy on the airship Juniper. He’s been a cabin boy for years and knows airships inside out, but he can’t become a full airman until on his 18th birthday, which is in just a few days. Unfortunately, the Juniper is attacked by air pirates. The crew is killed and the only thing that saves Gavin is his skill with the violin. He’s also an excellent singer and has perfect pitch. Eventually, he manages to escape but he’s lost his job and has to suddenly support himself in the streets of London. He’s from a poor family who lives in Boston.

Alice and Gavin are quite different. Not only are they of different status in the eyes of society but they’ve also been taught different things about themselves. Alice has known all her life that her only worth in through marriage and that she’s interested in the wrong things because of her gender. So, she has learned to lie and keep her real feelings a secret. Her duty is towards her father. Gavin has worked hard to achieve was he really wants and his duty is to the airship and the crew. He has no reason to lie. Their outlooks on life are quite different.

Because Alice has such a strong sense of duty towards her father and towards their place in society, she isn’t eager to head into adventure and an uncommon lifestyle. Because many of Britain’s men have died because of the plague, women have had to step up. Women who were married to members of the Parliament, who became ill, voted in place of their husbands. Women even got suffrage but still the society at large looks down on women who use their right to vote. They are called Ad Hoc women and Alice’s conservative father is strongly against them. So, for most of the novel, Alice waffles between her duty and her desire for a more exciting and meaningful life. Some readers most likely find that boring but I found it realistic.

The world is quite interesting. The whole world is suffering from the clockwork plague which makes people sick. The sick people are contagious so others avoid them. The sick people also seem to have a need to infect others, so they attack the healthy ones. They are sensitive to sunlight and are called zombies. However, some rare people don’t become zombies but clockworkers: they are geniuses in their own field but inevitably they will become mad and die in a few years.

The Third Ward is a shadowy organization whose purpose is to corral the clockworkers. The Ward gives the clockworkers a safe place to work in and also keep them from the general public, keep the other people safe. The Doomsday Vault is the place where they keep all of the inventions which are way too dangerous to ever use.

The clockworkers and the plague affect every country. In India, for example, the clockworkers are stoned alive which in China they are revered and given materials to work. That’s why China has advanced inventions which might make them the strongest country in the world some day.

The Doomsday Vault is an entertaining book. I even enoyed the inevitable romance.

 

Phil Foglio and Kaja Foglio: Agatha H. and the Airship City

A novelization of the first three graphic novels of the Girl Genius. The comic is available for free online: http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php

Publication year: 2011
Format: ebook, Kindle
Publisher: Night Shade Books

The novel is very loyal to the comic. Most of the time it follows the comic panel for panel. I’ve been a fan of the comic for a few years and love it. However, I’m not sure how accessible this novel is if you haven’t read the comic.

Agatha Clay is student at the Beetleburg University and an assistant to one of the professors. However, she’s also absent-minded and clumsy. She lives with her step parents who are constructs. One day, Baron Wulfenbach, who has ruthlessly conquered most of Europa, comes to town with his soldiers. Two of them rob Agatha of her necklace and strange things start to happen to her: her mind feels clearer but she also starts to sleep walk, in her nightclothes. The Baron kidnaps Agatha to his airship and she’s introduced to a wider world, while getting to know herself.

I adore the Girl Genius world. It’s a steampunk alternate world where some people have supernatural powers to construct mechanical things. Unfortunately, these people, called Sparks, tend to ran amok, building weapons and destroying people around them. So, Baron Wulfenbach has taken it upon himself to capture the Sparks, let them work, and, well, contain the destruction. However, the Baron is also interested in knowing just how and why Sparks are born, so he dissects them to learn more.

The Baron has very interesting people on his airship. There’s his son Gilgamesh who is a Spark and almost as ruthless as his father and various constructs, including the Jägermonsters who can be either funny or terrifying, depending on the scene. They talk in a horrible German accent which is pretty much the only thing I don’t care about in the comic. Sadly, it’s even more pronounced in the novel. Then there are the students who are either hostages or future Sparks or both.

On the background, and sometimes the foreground, there are stories of the Heterodyne boys who were the heroes of this world until they vanished. Some people are still waiting for them to return, while some think they’ve never existed at all.

I enjoy the characters as much as the world. Agatha herself is a pretty typical heroine: stubborn but loyal to her friends but she’s also a genius inventor who has a fascination with machines. The Baron turns out to have actual motivations and he’s very funny when he’s trying to do work and is constantly being interrupted by incompetent underlings and/or stuff blowing up. And of course Othar Tryggvassen! He’s the Gentleman Adventurer and he talks like a pulp fiction hero. The Baron has captured him and he’s trying to escape while trying forcibly to take Agatha has his plucky sidekick. On the other hand, Bangladesh DuPree is a through villain: enjoying torture and mayhem. And then there’s the talking cat…

The novel is entertaining, of course, but none of the gadgets are explained and most of the lingo is also unexplained. This works in the comic because you can see the gadgets and get other visual clues but perhaps not to well in the novel, especially if you haven’t read the comic. So, go and read it!