Book Review: Spear of Light by Brenda Cooper
Transhumanity, ecological engineering, cultural clashes and strong characterization mark Spear of Light, the second novel in The Glittering Edge sequence from from Brenda Cooper, sequel to Edge of Night (previously reviewed here at S&F). Shaun and I also talked to Brenda on episode 262 of the podcast. If the first novel in the Glittering Edge sequence was fish-out-of-water stories, as humans learn to deal with transhumanity, and environments alien to them, the second novel is a story of full-on cultural collision. In the wake of the events of the first novel, the transhuman colony of Nexity on the planet Lym, an uncomfortable but necessary compromise created at the end of the first novel, is a source of constant tension. Under that tension between humanity and transhumanity, on Lym, is the dramatic engine that drives Spear of Light. Transhumans, humans and an ecologically fragile planet make for a potent environment for that dramatic engine to flourish and run in. And that doesn’t even mention the offworld events. While the first novel was relatively balanced between offworld and onworld events, and this novel is much more Lym focused, the events in space are crucial to the unfolding of the plot.
Book Review: Poisoned Blade by Kate Elliott
Second in the Court of Fives series, following Court of Fives, Poisoned Blade by Kate Elliott continues the epic YA fantasy story of Jessamy, as she struggles to preserve herself and her family. Her expertise and skill at the Fives has put her into the intrigue and machinations of Garon Palace, as factions within the court struggle to influence, if not outright control, the throne. But what can the daughter of a General, struggling to keep herself and her family above water, do against that? She has a game to master, and in the mastery of that game, and protecting her family, young Jessamy is going to be catapulted out of the capital, and into the countryside. There, away from all she has known, treachery, betrayal, loyalty and the struggle for the future of her country irrevocably change her own quest.
Book Review: Too Like the Lightning by Ada Palmer
It’s the 25th century, but William Buck Rogers is not emerging from several hundred years of sleep. Earth, however, is very different than the 21st century we know. Political changes, several rounds, have radically altered the geopolitics. People are affiliated with global political entities, physical borders being a thing of the past. So, too, technological abundance has not made a utopia, but definitely a society whose problems and issues and weaknesses are extremely different than our own. And people’s values, taboos and concerns have changed, to make a fascinating landscape alien to our own. And a young boy may bring it all down because he can do the literally impossible. Bridger, a young boy secreted away in the House of one of the crucial clans of this 25th-century world, is kept hidden for very good reason. His wishes, you see, come true. He can animate things, and perhaps do more, things nigh inexplicable even by the science of the day.
Book Review: The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
“Let’s start with the end of the world, why don’t we? Get it over with and move on to more interesting things.” Beginning the book with an apocalypse as a cold open is just the first audacious and bold maneuver that writer N.K. Jemisin pulls off in The Fifth Season, the first of the Broken Earth series. The Fifth Season continues Jemisin’s technique of crafting interesting, diverse and unique fantasy worlds to explore ideas, concepts and characters in her burgeoning signature style. I listened to this in audiobook form, an excellent narration by Robin Miles. After that cold open, and a very brief immersion into the world, less than a page, the novel launches us into the stories of the characters. The novel focuses on three characters, and given that apocalypse, one quickly realizes that two of the characters’ stories predate that critical cold open event, and one, the character we meet first, is a survivor of the aftermath. The characters are all women, all in different stages of life.
Book Review: The Race by Nina Allan
Ecological collapse, genetically modified dogs that bond with their human trainers and owners, the darker side of decaying worlds and the people trapped within them, and metatextual games. The Race by Nina Allan is a SF novel that is much more on the literary end of science fiction, much more Rachel Swirsky than Linda Nagata. The Race is composed of several interlinked and interlaced stories, and finding and discovering the connections, even below the immediately obvious, is part of the joy of the novel. In part one, Jenna’s story is of a hardscrabble existence in a town devoted to genetically uplifted dogs, and the desperate life people on the margins sometimes live. It encapsulates the domino problem and the fragility of people on the edge: just one domino falling can bring down an entire chain of lives. In terms of more straightforward science fictional elements and their use, this was by far the strongest section of the novels.
Book Review: The Jewel and Her Lapidary by Fran Wilde
Fran Wilde’s debut novel Updraft was a New Weird Secondary World story about growing up, finding one’s place in the world, and soaring on the winds around towers of bone. Her newest effort, The Jewel and Her Lapidary, shows how broad her talents are with a story about the end of empire, and how the last member of a dynasty comes to terms with her world’s destruction and transformation, and what she can find deep inside to survive. The world of The Jewel and Her Lapidary is of a remote valley kingdom where members of the royal family, together with their lapidary courtiers who complete the design needed to be able to make use of the magical jewels, have long stood in safe isolation. When greed and betrayal shatter that protection, and the valley is overrun, the jewels that hid the valley, and the palace, and could move mountain and river are no longer defenders and tools, but prizes to be won.
