SF/F: And Another Thing by Eoin Colfer

I first discovered Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy when I was studying librarianship, many years ago. We used to throw quotes at each other over coffee, between classes. “Forty-two!” we would cry. “The answer to the ultimate question of life, the universe and everything!” We needed the humor; librarianship was a heavy, exhausting course which gave us very little time to ourselves.

At home, my brother was taping the radio series. We listened to it and developed a passion for that. The story was over-the-top hilarious. It became a television series and a movie and recordings.

I loved the first two books. The third was not quite as good, though it was still very funny. Since then, I have listened to Douglas Adams reading the talking book and decided I liked it better than the first time around. The fourth book came along and it was not as good as the third. It still had some fun, but it was almost serious. In it, Arthur Dent got a girlfriend, Fenchurch, but she suddenly disappeared from his side and never returned. The fifth book, Mostly Harmless, was such a disappointment to me that I gave away my copy and never read it again. My re-reading rarely goes beyond the second book and never past the fourth

I mention all this so it will be understood that I am a major fan of this universe, but I acknowledge that even Douglas Adams, who created it, had lost the plot, so to speak, by the end. So when I heard that Eoin Colfer, author of the wonderful Artemis Fowl novels, had been commissioned to write a sixth book in the series, I was in two minds about it. If Douglas Adams couldn’t keep it up, how could anyone else, even Eoin Colfer? But the author’s widow had approved him and of course, I was curious to see how he would get Arthur, Ford and Trillian out of the impossible situation in which they had been left at the end of Mostly Harmless.

And Another Thing has been written to celebrate the 30th anniversary of The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy. It starts with a summary of the story so far, written in an Adams-esque style. It may have been to refresh the reader’s memory, and in any case, Douglas Adams did it himself. It may have been for any potential new readers, but my advice to these readers is not to read it till they have read the original. There’s no point. And Another Thing... was clearly written for people familiar with the universe.

I must admit, Colfer does a good job of getting Ford, Arthur, Trillian and their daughter, Random Dent, out of the fix they were in at the end of Mostly Harmless. I couldn’t imagine how it could be done, but he did it.

He makes a fairly good fist of Adams’s style, except for an irritating tendency to stop for asides. Douglas Adams did it, but nowhere near as often.

The story brings back a lot of characters from the third book, Life The Universe And Everything, including Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged. He was the green-skinned immortal who was trying to liven up his eternal existence by insulting everyone in the universe in alphabetical order. Now, he has returned and he wants to get rid of the immortality; we learn that his insults are aimed at getting someone to kill him.

The original character was there as a single joke. He was funny. Now he has become, of all things, a romantic interest for Trillian. He isn’t funny anymore.

Zaphod Beeblebrox is back too, with one head; the other one has replaced Eddie as the ship’s computer on the Heart of Gold. He has a quest of his own: helping Wowbagger get killed. This involves searching for the Norse god Thor, original owner of Wowbagger’s ship.

Also in the novel are the Vogons, who are still trying to wipe out the last humans to tie up loose ends -- not only Arthur and Trillian, but a colony of middleclass Earthlings who have bought the Magrathean-built planet Nano. The Vogon captain, Prostetnic Jeltz, who destroyed Earth in the first novel, is back, with a son who may not agree with him.

The story bounces around from one storyline to another, but all the ends are tied, although the very end suggests there may be more to come.

I got the occasional chuckle out of this book, but no more. It starts well enough, but just isn’t funny. A friend of mine suggested that Tom Holt might have been a better choice, but personally, I don’t think anyone could handle it.

Eoin Colfer is a brave man to have had a go at something like this, which has a passionate fandom. I commend him for it. I don’t believe anyone could have done it, but he has done as well as anyone could and at least he seems to be a fan.

If you are completist, buy it by all means -- hey, if you’re reading the book at all, you almost certainly are a completist. At least this story extracts our heroes from an impossible situation.

Fiction: Ray of the Star by Laird Hunt

2009 has been an incredible year -- a breakthrough year, perhaps -- for fiction that pushes the boundaries of storytelling and, certainly, of genre. Perhaps the most visible of these was China Miéville’s incredible The City and the City. If you liked that one and have been hungering for something that approaches the tone and originality of Miéville’s most recent creation, it seems quite possible to me that you’ll also like Laird Hunt’s fourth novel.

In most regards, the two books are almost nothing alike, but for a few important things. In both novels, dynamic young authors have reached beyond what is usual and what has been done to tell their imaginative – and entirely different -- stories in new and compelling ways. In both of these examples, they are mostly -- though not always -- successful.

Like The City and the City, Ray of the Star (Coffee House Press) is set in an imaginary European city. In Hunt’s book, however, the city we think of most is Barcelona. The stories are as reflective of the cities they’re not set in, as well. Where The City and the City is skillfully cold and distant, the world Hunt creates here seems to vibrate with warmth and light.

New Today: Heart’s Blood by Juliet Marillier

Young scribe Caitrin, fleeing an unwanted marriage with a violent cousin, finds herself on Whistling Tor, whose chieftain, Anluan, needs a scribe to do a summer’s work, translating Latin documents. Anluan’s family has been cursed for a century, since an ancestor conjured up a ghostly horde from the Otherworld and then couldn’t either control them or send them back. Anluan can handle them as long as he stays on the Tor, but if he leaves, the spirits could go on the rampage. They want to go back too, and something -- or someone -- is driving them insane, unable to control themselves. There may be a counter-spell in the Latin documents that will help. Everyone is relying on Caitrin to find it.

Despite the curse and the fact that Anluan can’t be the chieftain his people need, Caitrin finds friends on the Tor, some of them supernatural, and also finds love.

Heart’s Blood is a Gothic-style romance that has moved the story of “Beauty and the Beast” to mediaeval Connacht, a part of Ireland facing imminent invasion by Normans from England. Anluan is not a fairytale Beast, but crippled by a childhood illness. The “heart’s blood” of the title is a plant used to make very expensive ink, but also has a much more important use, as Caitrin finds.

It’s an interesting setting for the story, and it works. Western Australian-based novelist Juliet Marillier’s other Celtic fantasies are set in Ireland and she knows her period well. She reminds her readers that Irish law was fairer to women than the laws in other places at the time. Women had positions of responsibility and they had more property and inheritance rights.

The story is very readable; it was my first time reading one of this writer’s books and it won’t be my last. It is, admittedly, something of a Mary Sue. But I have been known to enjoy Mary Sue when well-written and at least this one is lacking long-lost princes, quests, elves and high priestesses. The only evil sorcerer is the hero’s ancestor, who was unpleasant and stupid, but hardly Sauron. And I must admit that “Beauty and the Beast” is a fairytale I like, and the author has done a good job of putting it into an historical context.

If you haven’t read Juliet Marillier’s other books, this one might be a good place to start, as it is a stand-alone and not part of a trilogy.

New This Month: The Midnight Guardian by Sarah Jane Stratford

On the off-chance that you’re not yet totally sick of vampires, debut novelist Sarah Jane Stratford serves up an interesting new take on the blood-sucking mythos. A sort of alternate history, with vampires, The Midnight Guardian (St. Martin’s Press) opens on Hitler’s Germany, right at the bloody center of the Second World War. By 1940, Hitler has managed to kill all the vampires in Europe and Britain’s vampires are outraged and incensed and determine to disrupt the Nazis from their course of destruction.

Stratford’s fiction clearly owes a debt to the most senior of vampire lore weavers: both Bram Stoker and Anne Rice though, certainly, her creations show little resemblance to the Twighlightish teens of recent efforts by others. This may be in part due her education: Stratford holds a Masters degree in medieval history from the University of York and the depth and clarity with which she approaches these aspects of her material really come through. You get the feeling that, in building her particular lore, Stratford is on very solid ground.

Stratford’s story is tight and she can certainly write but one just wonders if -- really? -- the world is ready for still more vampires after we’ve seen so very many. Still The Midnight Guardian is a worthwhile and in some ways thought-provoking book.

New Last Week: John Dies at the End by David Wong

At a time when many writers are pushing at the edges of the novel, trying to redefine what the word means and what it is, David Wong sort of does. This comes in part from the publication history of his first novel, John Dies at the End (St. Martin’s Press/Thomas Dunne), one of those weird Internet success stories you hear about. In fact, this might be one of the best yet.

John Dies at the End started out as a Web serial in 2004. The story appeared in book form for the first time in 2007, as a paperback from “Horror and Apocalyptic Book Publisher” Permuted Press, an independent publisher whose area of specialization you can pretty well guess at. John Dies at the End would have fit right in with their line.

The action in John Dies at the End all centers around soy sauce, a mysterious and fairly unstable drug that alters not only the mind, it seems to have an effect on time and eventually opens a portal to a pretty hell-like place. After you take it, Wong tells us, “You might be able to read minds, make time stop, cook pasta that’s exactly right every time. And you can see the shadowy things that share this world, the ones who are always present and always hidden.”

The story is a first person narrative from the viewpoint of the author who actually isn’t David Wong, but says he is throughout the novel. In real life (and it’s not even a secret) he is National Lampoon contributor and Cracked.com editor-in chief Jason Pargin. That CV might make you think that John Dies at the End is hilariously funny. And sometimes it is. But sometimes it’s deeply disturbing and even horrifying. And then it’s funny again. In between there are some starkly -- and even surprisingly -- human moments. And all of that sounds like too much for one little debut novel to hold up under, but wait: this is a book that reportedly had over 70,000 downloads when it was free on the Internet. Since it was free, you might think “big deal,” but think again: try to give away 70,000 of anything on the Internet. I promise: it won’t be as easy as it sounds.

And so, is John Dies at the End high art? Not exactly. Or maybe, not even. But it’s interesting, compelling, engaging, arresting and -- yes -- sometimes even horrifying. And when it’s not being any of those things, it’s funny. Very, very funny. Next stop for David Wong (or maybe he’ll be back to being Jason Pargin by then), who knows? But, whatever it is, I feel very confident that a lot of people are already waiting to see what he dreams up next.

Children’s Books: Time of Trial: Volume 4, The Laws of Magic by Michael Pryor

Time of Trial (Random House Australia) is the fourth of Michael Pryor’s delightful Laws of Magic series, set in an alternative Edwardian England.

Once again, Aubrey Fitzwilliam and his friends George and Caroline are needed to save the world, as one of the characters observes wryly in the novel. This time, after the usual opening scene of magical mayhem -- in this case, cloud ships attacking a university cricket game in which George and Aubrey are playing. It’s during a trip to Holmland (Germany in our universe) where Lady Rose, Aubrey’s mother, is speaking at a symposium.

But this is where the evil Dr Tremaine, Aubrey’s nemesis, is living. He has influence in high places. Very high places. And then there are the golems, which are far from the lumpy clay things of folklore; you can make them very lifelike, so that it’s impossible to tell them from real people till they’re deactivated. Who can be trusted? Certainly not characters who can get sucked into telephones, as in one memorable scene.

Then there’s the pearl Aubrey took from Tremaine in the last novel -- what mystery does it hide? Our heroes are about to find out -- and they won’t like it.

It’s not all bad, though. Aubrey now has a Beccaria Cage, which reunites the body and soul he tore apart in a stupid experiment before the start of the first volume. If only it hasn’t been sabotaged...

As always, the adventure tears along at a breakneck pace, and is very funny. It doesn’t let you go easily; there’s a twist near the end, just when you think the main story is over.

I found myself falling comfortably back into this universe, enjoying it as much as ever. It’s rarely that a series can continue for this many volumes without losing something, but though it will need to finish some time, at least for this story arc, The Laws Of Magic is one series that doesn’t go downhill.

I think the series will become a fantasy classic. Bring on Volume 5!

Review: Galileo’s Dream by Kim Stanley Robinson

Today in January Magazine’s SF/F section, contributing editor Iain Emsley reviews Galileo’s Dream by Kim Stanley Robinson. Says Emsley:

Kim Stanley Robinson's Galileo's Dream is a wonderful beast, managing to come of rather more as a book than an elephant of facts woven together. Though I love Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle, losing myself in its intricacies, it came across as alternate history rivet counting -- perhaps weft counting is more appropriate -- to paraphrase the phrase for Hard SF. It was indeed hard, though meticulous, but at times the detail overwhelmed. Galileo's Dream spelunks in a slightly earlier period, covering Galileo's discoveries and subsequent trial, but it deals with much the same area: the entrance of the scientific age.

The full review is here.

New This Month: A Princess of Landover by Terry Brooks

A Chicago lawyer, brokenhearted after the loss of his family, buys a magical kingdom for a million dollars in an attempt to escape his wretched reality. Then -- wonder of wonders! -- the magic is real and the dreams begin to come true.

All of that is the central premise behind Terry Brooks’ Landover series, less well known than his epic Shannara series and, in many ways, so much more fun! In fact, it almost seems as though fun is one of the points of the whole Landover creation. Don’t get me wrong: this series is every bit as well conceived and written as anything we’ve seen from this bestselling author. But Landover is special. It’s lighter than the world of Shannara and, all-in-all, it’s an incredibly pleasant place to pass time. With that in mind, it’s impossible for me to tell you why Brooks has waited 14 years to give us a new installment in what I understand was a bestselling series when initially released. However, that is the case: the series’ first volume -- Magic Kingdom For Sale -- SOLD! – was published in 1986. Books two through five were published in a fairly regularly pattern between 1988 and 1995. And then nothing. Until now.

The new book is sufficiently sweet, charming and skillful to fit nicely into the Landover world. In A Princess of Landover (DelRey) our businessman’s headstrong half sylph daughter (the princess of the title, of course) must be taught a lesson. Magical highjinks ensue.

A Princess of Landover is an enjoyable journey; a helluva ride.

New this Month: Hitler’s War by Harry Turtledove

There is something vaguely comforting about a Harry Turtledove alternative history. Turtledove has written many, many books and a lot of those books have been set in familiar times, but where some -- or even several -- of the elements have changed. To Turtledove, it seems, the world is a constant Sliding Doors of possibility.

Change one thing.

Turtledove’s books are deeply inventive and well thought out but, on a certain level, they are not deeply different from each other. Therein lies the comfort. One can rely on Turtledove. He writes well and with confidence. He develops strong plots. Delivers well considered storylines.

Take the most recent entry, Hitler’s War (DelRey). The novel is predicated on a single question: what would have happened if Britain’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain had refused to allow Hitler to annex the Sudetenland? Again, change one thing and, like a kaleidoscope, everything looks different. One piece falls another way and all things are altered.

I enjoyed Hitler’s War. It is solid writing and classic Turtledove. The book didn’t move me greatly, but I didn’t expect it to. I’ve seldom been moved by this writer’s work. But Hitler’s War did make me think and I enjoyed all of the time I invested into this large book.

Turtledove hits it once more.

Review: Tuck by Stephen R. Lawhead

Today in January Magazine’s SF/F section, Iain Emsley reviews Tuck by Stephen R. Lawhead.

Setting the native British mythology against the conquering Norman stories, Lawhead echoes Philip Reeve’s Here Lies Arthur in trying to recover the real person behind the legend. Says Emsley:

Stephen Lawhead's Tuck is the final installment of the King Raven trilogy. A retelling of the Robin Hood stories, Lawhead moves away from the Middle Eastern settings in his previous novels to the Marches, the borderlands between England and Wales, after the Norman conquest.

The full review is here.

New This Week: Warbreaker by Brandon Sanderson

If you love SF/F and have not yet encountered Brandon Sanderson, you can forgive yourself: the whole thing has happened pretty quickly. That said, don’t stick your head in the sand on this one. He may be relatively new, but expect him to be around for a while.

Sanderson is a writer with talent, vision and chutzpah, a combination that put him into awards line-ups and bestseller lists almost from before the first moment. This because Sanderson was hand-picked to write the conclusion to Robert Jordan’s epic Wheel of Time series after Jordan’s death in 2007. Being heir apparent to one of the genre’s most legendary writers did nothing to detract from Sanderson’s reputation, but when you read his work, it’s hard to imagine he wouldn’t have gotten there on his own. He is a writer that not only can write, but does. He’s so good, he makes it look effortless, to the point where Warbreaker (Tor) was more or less written online. Sanderson explains on his Web site:

And so, I did something crazy. I went to Tor and asked if they'd be okay with me posting the entire version of Warbreaker AS I WROTE IT. Meaning, rough drafts. The early, early stuff which is filled with problems and errors. They thought I was crazy too (my agent STILL thinks this project is a bad move) but the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to do something that would involve and reward my readers. For those who are aspiring novelists, I wanted to show an early version of my work so they could follow its editing and progress. For those who are looking to try out my novels, I wanted to offer a free download.

And that’s just what he did. The book published this month is much more than an intact testament to Sanderson’s great online experiment, it is a book that grows out of this author’s involvement with his community. Not a bad starting point at all.

The book itself is... well, it’s wonderful. Sanderson is one of those world-building authors who replies heavily on strong characterization to convince readers of the viability of the environments he creates. This is not a technique that can work for writers who are short on either skill or imagination and Sanderson has lots of both.

New this Week: The City & the City by China Miéville

Having waited quite a while for the latest effort by China Miéville, the author of Perdido Street Station and Un Lun Dun, I’m disappointed in myself to have been disappointed by The City & the City (Del Rey), a book that I know is better than I think it is.

Let me explain.

Since he arrived on the scene under the splendid weight of King Rat in 1998, Miéville has been the one to watch. Just 25 at the time, King Rat announced this arrival with a force and passion that was undeniable.

After a book like that debut, there’s always the fear: will he be able to follow it up? And Miéville did, in wonderful style, with a book that is -- arguably -- already a classic: 2000’s majestic steampunk Perdido Street Station.

Other books followed, with Miéville seemingly pushing the boundaries of whatever form he opted to follow. Mark my words: he is a very real talent. And the joy of it: seven splendid books in, Miéville is still only 36 years old. He has time to push at every edge of form that he wishes.

He’s done that again in The City & the City, pushing at the boundaries of both speculative fiction and classic 20th-century noir. Set in a somewhat recognizable world with a starkly Eastern European feel, the two cities referred to are Beszel and Ul Qoma, two cities that happen to be in the same place at one time. Citizens of both places are forbidden to see each other or acknowledge each other’s presence, even though there are circumstances where denizens of both places can be seen. At those times, it is both law and etiquette to unsee the other party and never to say you’ve seen anything at all.

Now clearly, a murder investigation under such circumstances is going to be a challenge. For one thing, there’s a whole city of potential suspects right over there and you may not ask them where they were or what they’ve seen.

While the premise is deeply fascinating, it never quite works for me. The writing, once again, is fantastic. Miéville writes beautifully. Few can come close to his way with both meter and metaphor. He seems to hit the dark and gritty noir tone effortlessly and -- aside from the weird circumstances of the city -- his characters are believable and even pleasantly flawed. I felt distanced from the story in a way that I could not bridge but, as I suggested when I began, the writing is so good, the premise so well thought out, I can’t see how the fault could be Miéville’s and, certainly, other reviewers have liked it much better than I did.

I plan to read The City & the City again in a few years. I’m hoping it will all gel for me then because, as I said, I suspect this book is better than I thought it was. I can’t, after all, see any reason for the book to be less than the sum of its parts.

New This Month: Red Wolf Conspiracy by Robert V.S. Redick

Though he’s been compared to George R.R. Martin and Philip Pullman, I don’t really see it. Other than the obvious, of course: fantasy writers who sell a lot of books. But certainly in Red Wolf Conspiracy (Ballantine) I’m most put in mind of Robin Hobb and her excellent Liveship series.

Whether or not this first book in a projected trilogy is destined to become one of the “classics of epic fantasy” as promised by Redick’s publicists I really couldn’t say. Classics have a way of keeping their own council until the deed is done. But, certainly, Red Wolf Conspiracy is a meaty and enjoyable read. An ancient vessel with a precious cargo: a royal bride who will connect two uneasy monarchies. But there is a conspiracy planned for this voyage and all sorts of trouble set to brew before the 600-year-old Imperial Merchant Ship Chathrand successfully completes her journey.

This is a substantial book and, at times, it is somewhat too dense. Redick’s touch is thorough, but it is not light. Even so, those who enjoy classic fantasy will like this ride and will hope that the next book in this series is not too far behind.

Religion Building 101

Though portions of SF Signal’s panel of experts ends up in the realm of the ethereal in no time flat, that journey is not inappropriate to this week’s question:

Where would Fantasy be without gods to bicker, argue, and meddle with the fate of mortals? In a created fantasy world, gods can proliferate by the hundreds. When building religious systems for fantasies, what are the advantages/disadvantages of inventing pantheons vs. single gods, or having no religious component at all?

Marie Brennan, Michael Swanwick, David Anthony Durham, Elizabeth Bear, Gregory Frost, Kate Elliot, Gail Z. Martin, L. E. Modesitt, Jr., John C. Wright and David Langford all weigh in and -- almost predictably -- our minds? They reel! The fantastic discussion is here.

JG Ballard Dead at 78

JG Ballard, author of over a dozen novels including Crash, Empire of the Sun and Super-Cannes died Sunday morning after a long illness, according to BBC News:

His agent Margaret Hanbury said the author had been ill “for several years” and had died on Sunday morning.

Despite being referred to as a science fiction writer, Ballard said his books were instead “picturing the psychology of the future.”

His most acclaimed novel was Empire of the Sun, based on his childhood in a Japanese prison camp in China.

The author of 15 novels and scores of short stories, Ballard grew up amongst the ex-patriot community in Shanghai.

During World War II, at the age of 12, he was interned for three years in a camp run by the Japanese.

He later moved to Britain and in the early 1960s became a full-time writer.

According to Wikipedia, it was while the young Ballard was stationed in Canada for RAF flight training that he discovered the genre in which much of his work would be enfolded:

In 1953 Ballard joined the RAF and was sent to the RCAF flight-training base in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, Canada. There he discovered science fiction in American magazines. While in the RAF, he also wrote his first science fiction story, “Passport to Eternity,” as a pastiche and summary of the American science fiction he had read.

Wikipedia also reports that Ballard’s work had a “notable influence on popular music”:

...where his work has been used as a basis for lyrical imagery, particularly amongst British post-punk groups. Examples include albums such as Metamatic by John Foxx, various songs by Joy Division (most famously “The Atrocity Exhibition” from Closer), the song “Down in the Park” by Gary Numan and “Warm Leatherette” by The Normal. Songwriters Trevor Horn and Bruce Woolley credit Ballard’s story, “The Sound-Sweep,” with inspiring The Buggles' hit, “Video Killed the Radio Star,” and Buggles’ second album included a song entitled “Vermillion Sands.” The 1978 post-punk band Comsat Angels took their name from one of Ballard’s short stories.

SFF: The Temporal Void by Peter F. Hamilton

Looking back on it, much of the time I spent reading Peter F. Hamilton’s The Temporal Void (Del Rey), I was in a daze. And the book is 700 pages, so it was a significant amount of time. What dazzles me is the breadth and depth of Hamilton’s imagination. The world he has created for his Commonwealth Saga is... well... dazzling. I found it eye-popping when I first encountered this world in 2008’s The Dreaming Void. If anything, I am even more blown away this time. The Temporal Void is a significant accomplishment that bristles with the author’s shining ideas.

The dreams implied by the titles were created long ago by a human astrophysicist named Inigo. Inigo’s dreams were inspirational and were shared by hundreds of millions of people, resulting in a religion: Living Dream. Now, however, the dream has grown darker and time is running out. The fate of humanity rests in the hands of half a dozen people that we come to know in The Temporal Void. This is a fantastic, alien, complex series. Hamilton can’t write them quickly enough to suit me.

SF/F: The Stranger by Max Frei

Before I say anything else I have to tell you that I’ve never looked forward to the publication of a book more than I did Max Frei’s The Stranger (Overlook). It’s been such a long time coming. I’ve been hearing about it for years but, in retrospect, it felt like whispers of things. Rumors from other lands. Something well imagined that could not possibly be true. Because both The Stranger and its almost iconic author, Max Frei, have taken on mythic proportions. All right, I’ll cop: in some circles, not so mythic. But in those circles, The Stranger -- and the books that come after -- had become almost the Holy Grail of books. If only, we said, Frei’s work could be translated into English, nothing would ever be the same as it had been.

And then, of course, it was. And nothing ever will be the same, but not in the way we anticipated. See: it’s simply not possible to come to a book with the expectations I owned and not be disappointed on some level. And, in certain ways, I was. I am. But I do understand that you simply can’t run out and translate a Russian novel and expect it to play perfectly in English. And I’m talking any novel here. But with something as chewy and nuanced as The Stranger, you can amp all of that up considerably. This isn’t just a book, it’s an event. Clearly, that’s a little tough to live up to.

The Stranger is epic fantasy on a quirky philosophical level. But if those words bring Terry Pratchett to mind, just clear your head: Frei’s work is nothing like that. In The Stranger, even the author is a fictional character. It has come to light that the actual author of Max Frei’s books is a woman named Svetlana Martynchik. Max Frei, the quasi author, is also at the center of his tales, which begin in The Stranger with Book One of the Labyrinths of Echo.

It took my tightly honed North American sensibilities quite a while to pick up the rhythm of Freis’ writing: the alternate universe of dreams, the fact that he is a sort of magical secret agent who must stop a murderer from our world from getting his way in the new one.

North American readers will find themselves slogging through at first: this is not your grandmother’s fantasy. But stick with it: all becomes clear after a while, as well as the density of wit we’re unused to reading English language authors.

The Stranger is a fantastic book and the first of many to be published in English. If I don’t miss my guess, reading it now will put you in the vanguard.

New This Month: The Warded Man by Peter V. Brett

One of the things you hear from new writers is how they’d have X number of novels inside them, if only they could find the time. But time is one of those funny things. Sometimes, the more you squeeze it, the more seems to pop out. At least, so it seems, because there are an awful lot of extraordinary time-squeezing stories in the publishing world.

The latest of these belongs to Peter V. Brett, long-time rider of the F train from Brooklyn to Times Square. It was on this daily commute that Brett wrote 90 per cent of The Warded Man (Del Rey), the first novel in a series so vast, so sweeping, it’s difficult to comprehend that it was composed mostly on the subway, a realm as far from that as inhabited by the legendary demon-fighter, the Warded Man, as can be imagined. Oh: and I did not mention, Brett accomplished this amazing feat while thumb-typing. That’s right: The Warded Man was composed on a Blackberry. The mind reels.

These are the things you think about as you begin The Warded Man. You don’t stay there long, though. While the Publishers Weekly review was a little simplistic, it did point at one of the things I really like about The Warded Man. While it’s not strictly true that “Brett’s gritty tale will appeal to those who tire of sympathetic villains and long for old-school orc massacres” it’s true enough to get to the heart of the matter. This is old-school storytelling, plain and simple. Brett’s characters grapple with issues of morality, with black and white, right and wrong. In the process, a lot of evil stuff gets dispatched. Quite often, there is blood involved.

This is hearty, muscular fare. There is no formula here and little to remind you of other writers. Brett has found his own way to his own world, on the F train. We’re glad to be along for the ride.

SF/F: Dragon in Chains by Daniel Fox

The story goes that Daniel Fox traveled to Taiwan and became obsessed, to the point of learning the language and writing about it every chance he got. He was, in essence, filled with the place.

When he was sufficiently filled, what ultimately flowed back out was Dragon in Chains (DelRey) a compelling and epic tale set in some alternate mediaeval China where the youthful emperor must flee to an island -- a lightly disguised Taiwan -- where, with his richly varied court, he repairs to get ready for his own destiny.

Fox recently described what was in his heart when he wrote Dragon in Chains:

Partly it was that classic image of the tiny island bristling at the vast mainland, bristling with weapons; partly it was the experience of the native Taiwanese, invaded by a vast northern army and living under military dictatorship. Marry those two together, and there’s a novel. But I’m a fantasist, I have small interest in mimetic fiction. I wanted to recast the story into feudal China first - an emperor in flight, the dynasty at hazard -- and then into imagination, put magic in jade and a dragon in the strait.

Dragon in Chains is the first in what is meant to be an epic saga. If another book were never to follow in this series, this one would be enough. As much as I want to discover what comes next in Fox’s carefully created world, Dragon in Chains stands alone. Fox is not only a wonderful storyteller, he has a poet’s heart and ear. Dragon in Chains is a beautiful book.

Philip Jose Farmer Dies at 91

Science fiction great Philip Jose Farmer died yesterday morning “peacefully in his sleep,” according to his official Web site, just weeks after his 91st birthday. From CNN:

Farmer was known for his science-fiction and fantasy novels and short stories. He was 91.

The Peoria, Indiana, native’s most popular work was his "Riverworld" series, written in the 1970s.

Joe Lansdale, a critic, writer and friend of Farmer’s, credited Farmer with changing the face of science fiction.

“I just can’t begin to tell you how important he is to the field as well as other fields,” Lansdale said.

Critics said Farmer was the first author to address adult sexual themes in science-fiction novels.

Jonathan Strahan, an editor and critic for Locus magazine, said Farmer treated sex seriously, not in a juvenile manner or for cheap thrills.

“It wasn’t pornography and it wasn’t just about the sex of it,” Strahan said. “It was about the sexuality of people in an interesting and intelligent way.”

Graham Sleight, who wrote eloquently about Farmer’s work for his “Yesterday’s Tomorrows” column early in 2008, had this to say on the Locus blog:

All the weird stuff he loved to pack into his stories -- Tarzan, Richard Burton, sex, Joyce, loopy epistemology, historical trivia, flat earths -- made it a brew like nothing else.

From Farmer’s Web site:

He will be missed greatly by his wife Bette, his children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, friends and countless fans around the world.

January 26, 1918 - February 25, 2009. R.I.P.

SFF: The Steel Remains by Richard K. Morgan

Back in 2002 when Richard K. Morgan’s first book, Altered Carbon, hit the shelves, both readers and reviewers went nuts. In January Magazine’s Best of 2002, gabe chouinard made the book one of his picks for best of the year. “If Raymond Chandler had ever spent any amount of time wallowing in the cyberpunk movement of the 1980s,” wrote chouinard, “I’m pretty sure he could have written Altered Carbon, an absolutely stellar first novel from Richard Morgan.”

It was a feeling that was echoed throughout reviewerdom and has been echoed since in subsequent books and which, in fact, is bound to be echoed for The Steel Remains (DelRey), another stellar novel, and one that takes Morgan into a new-for-him world: epic fantasy which, in his hands, is darkly gritty, violent and entirely gripping. And from the book’s opening paragraph, we know we’re back into territory that chouinard described so well: Chandler on hard drugs. Or maybe, Chandler on synth drugs, rather than the hard booze he was known for.

When a man you know to be of sound mind tells you his recently deceased moth has just tried to climb in his bedroom window and eat him, you only have two basic options. You can smell his breath, take his pulse, and check his pupils to see if he’s ingested anything nasty, or you can believe him.

If you have thus far missed out on Morgan’s work, do yourself a favor and try whichever one of his six books strikes your fancy. It might be good to know that a couple of Morgan’s books -- Altered Carbon and Market Forces -- have been optioned for film. Also homophobes might want to brace themselves for The Steel Remains, intended to be the first book in a new trilogy. Whatever you’ve heard about him, you’ll be hearing more soon.

New This Month: The Judging Eye by R. Scott Bakker

In a very short time, author R. Scott Bakker has proven that he is well on his way to building a universe that is arguably comparable with those created by the likes of Frank Herbert (Dune) and Isaac Asimov (Foundation). What Bakker does that -- again, arguably -- his contemporaries do not and that those SFF luminaries did was completely imagine -- from the ground up -- a universe so satisfyingly detailed you felt as though you could slip inside. The politics, the religion, the very ground beneath your feet. Many have tried but do not have that gift. But Bakker? Bakker has it, is doing it, will do it, or so I predict.

Barely into his forties, Bakker now backs up the first part of his story -- the three books of The Prince of Nothing series -- with a new series, The Aspect Emperor. The first book in this new series, The Judging Eye (Overlook) will be released later this month. It takes place roughly two decades after the events in 2006’s The Thousandfold Thought, where we find the Prince of Nothing himself now made Aspect-Emperor of a huge holding and claiming that he holds the key to a Second Apocalypse which is right around the corner.

The Judging Eye is released just two months before Bakker’s first thriller, Neuropath (Tor Books) will be released in the United States. (It was published by Penguin Canada around the middle of last year, but they seem to have been somewhat secretive about it.) In an admiring review, SFF World called it a “CSI-style thriller with a science fiction edge.” I can hardly wait!

I, Birthday

Today is the birthday of the Russian-born American biochemist who is also one of the most prolific writers of all time.

Mensa card carrying member Isaac Asimov -- who died in 1992 -- would have turned 89 today.

Though he is perhaps best remembered for his Robot series -- which was truly seminal -- I will always remember the feeling of astonishment that carried me through his Foundation series. It is one thing -- perhaps a noble thing -- to be able to imagine the worlds that carry readers away. But in Foundation, Asimov’s worlds were so distant and different and complete it was as though he had reinvented everything about everything... over a period that covered some 20,000 years. I’m still astonished just thinking about it.

In 2002 Janet Jeppson Asimov, the late author’s wife, edited a final biography entitled It’s Been A Good Life (Prometheus Books). “Generously exposing both Asimov’s immense talents as a science fiction author and his ruefully amusing self-deprecating punctures of his own early inflated self-image,” wrote Publishers Weekly at the time, “this readable and idiosyncratic self-portrait should attract a whole new generation of readers to Asimov's fine creative works.”

Morgan on the Failure of Capitalism

I’m a big follower of the work of Gumshoe nominated Richard Morgan, having known him since he debuted with Altered Carbon. Morgan was recently interviewed at the SF Web site IO9 and his insight is always of interest, especially in these economic meltdown days.

I was intrigued at Morgan’s response to Alex Carnevale’s question relating to Morgan’s take on the economic situation and what he had written in an earlier novel:

Market Forces was a screenplay and you picked it apart for a novel. It's eerily prescient -- what does it have to say about what's happened with the economy?

I'm kinda torn because on the one hand it's always nice to be right. On the other hand, I own a house like everybody else. And I don't want to see its value drop by a third. I am constantly perplexed by the reaction to Market Forces, especially the reaction in America. I didn't really think I was saying anything startlingly off the wall. To me it seemed like I was extrapolating a fairly obvious line. Anyone who knows anyone who works in high-risk financial institutions. Anybody who has friends who are merchant bankers, or stockbrokers or commodity dealers or has anything to do with that world will tell you, and I had a number of e-mails of people saying this, this is how these people operate. It's a high-testosterone environment. These people thrive on risk and massive fast success. It's a self-reinforcing loop. The more successful you are, the more testosterone you build, and the bigger risks you're prepared to take. Inevitably you're heading for a crash with that, it's impossible to sustain.

The book was really written as a critique not so much of the systems but of the mindset of this kind of boorish American business model asshole machismo. I didn't really think I was saying anything spectacularly unusual. I thought anybody who looked at would say, "Oh. Yeah, that's right." I ran into an awful lot of people for whom market forces are a kind of religious faith. I hate to caricature, but I do think American culture has a faith problem in the sense that there's much more of a willingness on that side of the Atlantic to take things on faith, and just accept stuff and believe in something wholeheartedly.

In Europe people just seem to be a lot more cynical about these things, whatever it may be, if it's religion or politics or whatever. And yet it would appear there are a lot of people for whom free markets are tantamount to a kind of religious faith. And by writing the book I'd stomped on that as if I had written a viciously anti-Christian satire. That may be it, I don't know. It may be that it was a book in which it's hard to sympathize with everybody because the characters are all fairly unpleasant.

As for what's happened now, I can just say, "Yep, see." It's not a very emotional "Yep, see," because to me it doesn't take a whole lot of smarts to predict something like this.

Read the full IO9 interview here and there’s more from Alex Carnevale here in “Novelists Write Our Way Out of The Financial Crisis” or stick around IO9 with Meredith Woerner and get really depressed when you discover “Why the Economy is to Blame for More Night Rider.”

Photo of Richard Morgan (left) and Ali Karim taken around the time Altered Carbon was first released. Photo courtesy Ali Karim.

Review: Stalking the Vampire by Mike Resnick

Today in January Magazine’s SF/F section, Andi Shechter reviews Stalking the Vampire by Mike Resnick. Says Shechter:

One of the moments I dread at parties is when I’m trapped with a bunch of people and someone says something punny. In my crowd, this means that for the next 15 minutes, everyone will try and one up the punster, and there will be no getting out alive. I head for the exit as soon as it starts. I mean, I’ve got amazingly clever and intelligent friends, but this form of humor bores me after about, well, two minutes. Or less.

Mike Resnick’s Stalking the Vampire is like that. A sequel to Stalking the Unicorn, a book published close to 20 years ago and reissued here in trade paperback by Pyr along with this new book. Resnick’s book is funny for a while and then you get it. And you get it and you get it.

The full review is here.

San Diego Readies Itself for Hyper Reality

The big story around Comic-Con this year is not the hordes of fans expected to fill the San Diego Convention Center for the next four days, but rather the fact that, with theaters filled with super heroes this summer, a 120,000-strong geekfest might be just the place to corral and sell audiences for future projects. From the LA Times:

The biggest challenge for Hollywood used to be making the audience believe a man can fly. Now it's getting noticed in a crowded skyline. This summer, theaters have been visited by heroes such as Indiana Jones, Batman, Hulk, Hancock, Hellboy and Iron Man, and there are dozens more in the pipeline for upcoming seasons. On Tuesday, Favreau said Marvel Studios was considering opening its own studio lot because of the boom in business.

This year every major studio is at Comic-Con, and the movies they are bringing -- such as "Hamlet 2," a loopy, R-rated comedy -- go well beyond the men-in-tights fare. There will be film presentations all four days this year and international press coverage. Comic-Con is the Super Bowl of popcorn cinema. And that's not even mentioning the TV networks looking to introduce audiences to their upcoming programs.

In 2008, Comic-Con is expecting some 120,000 attendees. The 38th Comic-Con begins this evening with a preview, though the convention officially opens tomorrow and runs through Sunday at the San Diego Convention Center. But if you’re in the area: don’t bother rushing down there: the Comic-Con Web site tells us that registration is closed, closed, closed!

Goodbye Mr. Disch and Mr. Budrys

Two recent losses have saddened fans of science fiction and beyond. Both Thomas M. Disch and Algis Budrys were major fixtures in the genre. Their influence has been lasting.

Cult science fiction writer Thomas M. Disch passed away on July 4th. I read most of Disch’s output, but perhaps my fondest memory is reading his novella The Brave Little Toaster to my eldest daughter when she was an infant. I will miss the work of this strange writer/poet who pushed the genre into the literary with masterworks such as 334 and Camp Concentration. Although an American, Disch was associated with the British new-wave of SF/F in the 1970s when he resided in the UK. The Telegraph reports on his passing away in a lengthy obituary:

Though an American, Disch was often associated with the New Wave of science fiction in Britain -- where he lived during the late 1970s – which was centred on writers such as Michael Moorcock and M John Harrison, rather than with figures such as Philip K. Dick and Ursula Le Guin in the United States, who were also engaged in broadening the field from its pulp origins.

Disch's work was self-consciously literary and ambitious -- and became more so as time went on -- and was notable from the first for its sardonic wit, chilly anger, cynicism and reliance on irony and allegory. In his later novels and poems, it often seemed that satire had given way to bitterness.

The critic John Clute judged him “perhaps the most respected, least trusted, most envied and least read of all modern first-rank SF writers.” He was well-regarded for his poetry (which he wrote as Tom Disch) by many who had no idea that he wrote genre fiction.

The Telegraph’s obituary is here.

Disch’s last interview was with Bat Segundo and is available as a podcast downloadable here. In a surreal twist, Disch is asked about Algis Budrys who passed away in June. Disch appeared to predict Budrys’ passing:

Correspondent: I wanted to also ask you about A.J. Budrys, who I know you -- I saw your LiveJournal where there were many caustic remarks directed his way. But I should point out that when I received this galley well before June 9th, when he died, you referred to him as “the late Algis Budrys.”

Disch: (laughs) Yes!

Correspondent: I’m wondering if you had some inside dope or if this is another example of your divine powers.

Disch: I guess so. I mean, I never know what my divine powers are going to do often, until they’ve done it. And this is certainly a case where I had picked the right horse without even knowing.

Influential and award winning writer Algis Budrys passed away on June 9th. The Chicago Tribune took a fond look back:

Known to friends as “A.J.,” Mr. Budrys' books, particularly 1960’s Rogue Moon and 1977's Michaelmas are highly regarded by critics and students of the genre. His work explored “the way a person feels or develops, more than with wild space adventures,” said his wife, Edna.“A lot of his books are about identity, who we are and why do we do what we do,” said Charles Brown, editor of the science fiction magazine Locus. The plot of Michaelmas touched on computer hacking and domination of human behavior by machines, “which pretty much predicted a lot of what’s going on today,” Brown said. “He was well ahead of his time.”

The full piece is here.

In a recent interview, Budrys’ was asked what the future held for him and replied somewhat poignantly considering his passing

I'll probably be found draped over my computer keyboard at some point. I’m 70 years old. I don’t know how much longer I can go, but I plan to keep going until I stop. I don’t have anything else I’d rather do, and since there’s no retirement income here (although I've been drawing Social Security for some time), I’ll just keep going.

The Times reported:

Algis Budrys was one of the writers who made his name alongside such luminaries as Arthur C. Clarke and Philip K. Dick in the early-1950s boom in science-fiction magazines.

Budrys’s first two published stories, in 1952, were The High Purpose (in Astounding Science Fiction) and Walk to the World (Space Science Fiction). He went on to write more than 100 stories in the next decade. In Silent Brother (Astounding, February 1956), the hero finds an alien intelligence living in his mind, with mutually beneficial results for both of them and the entire human race.

Other exceptional stories from this period are The End of Summer (1954), Nobody Bothers Gus (1955), The Man Who Tasted Ashes (1959), The Distant Sound of Engines (1959) and Wall of Crystal, Eye of Night (1961). The Edge of the Sea (1958), a seminal first-contact story, narrowly missed out on winning a Hugo award.

The Independent reported that Budrys’ later career was not without controversy –

In the early 1980s, a new professional role began to occupy Budrys's time, and changed his life. His involvement in L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future brought him far too close, in the eyes of many, to Scientology, both as a controversial religion and as the corporate backer of the series of anthologies Budrys edited – 18 of them in all between 1985 and 2007. This programme was of immense use to many young writers, which goes some way to justifying Budrys's sometimes strenuous defence of his advocacy, in word and deed, of Hubbard himself.

It was also in the 1980s that Budrys decided to come to England for the first time, to attend the 1987 World Science Fiction Convention being held that year in Brighton. To do so he had to modify his technical statelessness, and gained an American Green Card to make the trip (in the 1990s he took out American citizenship). Unfortunately the Brighton experience was shadowed by a perception on the part of British science-fiction professionals that the Church of Scientology, which maintained a highly visible sponsoring presence at the convention, was attempting to take over the event.

Meanwhile, Locus Magazine published this excellent essay on Budrys’ work shortly after his passing.

Children’s Books: The Equen Queen by Alyssa Brugman

With The Equen Queen, the second in the Quentaris spinoff series, Alyssa Brugman, best known for mainstream teen fiction, enters the children’s fantasy genre.

The city of Quentaris has been in flight for a while now, since being ripped from its home planet and sent spinning into the vortex. It’s in orbit around a new world and it’s not alone. In fact, sky cities are not especially unusual -- there is even an etiquette about greeting them.

Tab Vidler, heroine of the new series, has found her powers of mental communication disappearing, although they return during the course of the novel. But for the time being, she has no way of guessing what are the intentions of the other sky city. The people seem to be friendly enough, and willing to trade useful stuff in return for being taught children’s games. They also throw in thousands of “mood stones” they claim to have traded from another sky city, which they haven’t found much use, but which are pretty. Obviously, these are going to become significant. They also hand over a couple of “equen,” creatures from the planet below which look more or less like horses, but might have healing abilities.

Tab and her friends have adventures, find out the true intentions of the other city, try to handle a newly-hatched dragon which is very hungry, have trouble with those mood stones and find out the truth about the equen before the end of the book. It’s amazing how much happens in the course of a short 163 pages!

Jeremy Maitlnd-Smith’s lush cover and insert and Louise Prout’s delicate illustrations add considerably to the novel, though I can’t agree with her portrayal of Storm, head of the City Watch. Storm is supposed to be a policewoman and fighter, but is drawn with a Greek-style gown and high-piled hair. I always imagined her more as Xena, which the original description of her suggested. Oh, well. The rest of the illustrations are great, especially the dragon.

The original Quentaris novels were centred around a sort of junior Ankh-Morpork, with new characters in each book. For the new series, think Space: 1999 or Star Trek: Voyager. The city is going to arrive at a new world each time. There may be new characters, but since the city is flying through space, there won’t be too much room for anyone not already there, so the focus has been narrowed.

It will be interesting to see how the series proceeds.

Meanwhile, it’s well worth adding this new series to the old.

New This Month: Cosmos Incorporated by Maurice G. Dantec

Sometimes while reading Cosmos Incorporated (Del Rey) I would stop and emotionally sit back on my haunches and think: this is where the future of SF/F is going. This in my hands, right here, right now. If it never got any better than this, it would be all right.

Based in Montreal, Canada, former punk rock songwriter and ad man Dantec is an extremely popular writer in France. Like his Babylon Babies, Cosmos Incorporated is an English translation of a French novel. One part cyperpunk, one park Orwelian ironic dystopia, one part Houellebecqian sharp lyricism and wide-stanced theology. In scope and content and style, Cosmos Incorporated is breathtaking.

The population of the world has been devastated by disease, misuse and war. What little has been left of earthly society is monitored by the Uniworld, a huge computer network -- think Internet on futuristic crack -- that has information on every individual left on earth. We see much of what’s left close to Sergei Diego Plotkin, a man with a deadly mission who will soon find himself with more -- and somehow less -- than he anticipated.

Expect a lot of interest in Cosmos Incorporated. Babylon Babies -- which was the first Dantec novel to be translated into English -- will be released as Babylon A.D. in feature film form at the end of August and starring Vin Diesel. About a month before that, Del Rey will release a mass market version of Babylon Babies. All of that should conspire to make readers take note of Dantec’s most recent work. And that’s a good thing, because this is a writer worthy of the attention and many fans who have already read the book in French claim this is the writer’s best work to date.

To be clear, Cosmos Incorporated will not be for everyone. Not by a longshot. But if you like your SF/F with a heavy dose of discordance and the roving threat of electricity, this one may well be for you.

New Today: Tigerheart by Peter David

The thing that touches you first is the tone. You expect one thing and get quite another. But with Tigerheart (Ballentine/DelRey), Peter David has decided to give us a delicious treat: the voice here is one of wonder and discovery, as though written for a child, but it doesn’t take long to realize that it was not.

Though elements of Tigerheart put one instantly in mind of Peter Pan, this is not a retelling of J.M. Barrie’s classic story. Or, if anything, it is more.

Author Peter David (Sir Apropos of Nothing, Wode to Wuin) says that, when Peter Pan fell into the public domain, he began working on the story.

“But as it developed, I started to realize that it was really Paul Dear’s story, not Peter Pan’s. And since Peter Pan’s monumental ego would certainly not allow a story to feature him as a supporting character, he slowly began to back away from it with a mild sneer and a mocking sweep of his nonexistent hat.” This allowed, David reports, “a sort of respectful distance” from Barrie’s creations.

And so, in a way, Peter Pan is reimagined as Paul Dear and Neverland becomes Anyplace. And everything is familiar, but cast with Peter David’s own strong magic.

New in Paperback: Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman

Around this time last year, January Magazine contributing editor Andi Shechter reviewed Austin Grossman’s Soon I Will Be Invincible. Though she certainly wasn’t alone in liking the book, she liked it a whole lot:

I hope that Austin Grossman had as much fun writing this book as I had reading it. I’m delighted by the knowledge that this dead-on “superhero” v. “evil genius” story comes from someone whose expertise is in romance and Victorian literature. What a hoot! You have to wonder if Austin Grossman wrote Soon I Will Be Invincible to shake off the traces of literature that clung to him as a PhD candidate or if there’s some heretofore unrealized connection between high camp and high literature. No matter. It’s a hugely enjoyable book.

When Vintage releases the paperback on June 10th, there will be a beach read-sized version to love.

Here is Shechter’s 2007 review.

Lavinia by Ursula K. Le Guin

We tend to think of the writing gift as something that can wear out. Even if we’re not conscious of thinking about it, it seems that one of the things we value most highly in an author is youth, and then we lower our expectations as authors age, force deadlines, disappoint us.

I wasn’t even really aware of any of these feelings until I was reading Lavinia (Harcourt), and was transported by the vibrance of the story as well as that of the voice that tells it. Le Guin, bless her, has been around a long, long time. And, for perspective, she was born in 1929 and thus is even older than John McCain. For some reason -- perhaps nothing more than Le Guin’s name -- Lavinia keeps getting shelved (and sometimes dismissed) as SF/F. It’s not. In certain significant ways, this is a historical novel of the highest order or, as Le Guin herself puts it in an afterword, Lavinia is “a meditative interpretation suggested by a minor character in [Vergil’s] story -- the unfolding of a hint.”

Essentially, Le Guin lends her voice to the character Lavinia, Vergil’s creation from Aeneid. Lavinia is a dreamy, contemplative work. I am tempted to call it Le Guin’s best, but considering the consistently remarkable qualities of Le Guin’s writing, that might be an overstatement. After all, over the years Le Guin has been awarded the Hugo and the Nebula Awards -- actually, five of each. She’s been given the Kafka Award, a Pushcart Prize, the Howard Vursell Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. And the National Book Award. That’s a lot of celebration for a single career. But Lavinia is wonderful. I’m betting that the next award lands not far from this remarkable book.

Children’s Books: The World of Grrym: Allira’s Gift by Paul Collins and Danny Willis

When their grandfather, Fergus, disappears, Allira Hart and her brother Steven are taken to his Victorian country home by their father. Gerald Hart hasn’t seen much of his father for years and is angry with the old man for having wasted the family fortune on his crazy ideas. Like the castle. Niangula isn’t just a folly -- it’s a full-scale fortress which can be defended from the ravening hordes and it’s right in the middle of the Australian bush!

Of course, it turns out that there’s a good reason for having a fortress in the middle of the bush. Niangula is the gateway between two worlds and there are beings in the other world who would like to use it to invade.

Allira has strange powers. She has always known when something awful was going to happen -- and she has been hearing her grandfather’s voice in her head. He was, in fact, kidnapped by a bunch of troll mercenaries, who somehow managed to get past the defenses into our world and take him back into the world of Grrym, where he is the king. They did it on the orders of goblin Queen Morgassa, who had been overthrown by her subjects, with Fergus’ help, because of her tyranny.

The goblins loyal to Fergus want his granddaughter to take over and save them, since she is the only one in the family, after Fergus, to have the Sight. She is their Princess, as far as they are concerned, and has her own elite guard, even if they are so short that she has to sit down on the ground to talk to them properly. Of course, she protests that she wants to be an ordinary kid and anyway, she has to go to school, but comes good when needed.

The second half of the novel features a lot of fighting and sieges by the enemy armies as the action moves to Grrym, while at Niangula Steven is trying to find out what’s going on, family retainer Gardunk is having a hard time keeping control of Allira’s “g’loom,” a temporary illusion conjured up to replace her if Gerald returns from town, where he’s making arrangements for the children to go to school locally.

Who wouldn’t dream about being a Prince/Princess/Chosen One in another world, even if your subjects are a bunch of short, colorful pointy-eared beings? Children do. It has formed the basis of a lot of popular fiction and movies, from Star Wars to Harry Potter. As in the other stories of this genre, of course, the heroine protests that she doesn’t want to be royalty, she just wants to be an ordinary kid, but comes through when needed.

There’s enough action and humor in The World of Grrym (Five Mile Press) to keep young readers highly entertained, though the sequel had better come out quickly as the novel ends on a cliffhanger! The book is beautifully illustrated by co-author Danny Willis, whose pencil-drawn critters are reminiscent of Brian Froud in style. Despite all the goblins, trolls and giants taking part in the battles, the authors don’t forget that the story is centered around Australia. The scent of eucalyptus trees is strong, Australian animals wander about, the displaced Aboriginal spirit makes an appearance (hopefully to play a larger role in the next novel) and the bunyip plays his part in defending his home from otherworldly invaders.

This book should appeal to mid to late-primary school and early secondary students.

M Is for Magic by Neil Gaiman

Even if you’ve never read any of Neil Gaiman’s delightful fiction, you might have seen the film adaptation of Stardust, which did justice to the novel and has been compared to The Princess Bride.

M Is for Magic (HarperCollins) is a collection of mostly previously published short stories aimed at younger readers -- teenagers, really, rather than children, as the style of most of them is closer to adult than child. Four of the stories were published in the anthology Smoke and Mirrors. Others were also previously published. One of them is a chapter from a forthcoming novel.

In an introduction, the author explains the title as having been inspired by Ray Bradbury’s younger-reader anthologies, which had such names as R Is For Rocket and S Is For Space. This is appropriate because a number of the stories have a definite flavour of Bradbury. One of them, “October in the Chair,” is actually dedicated to Bradbury, but “The Witch’s Headstone,” which is the chapter from Gaiman’s forthcoming novel, The Graveyard Book, has the feel of Bradbury’s stories about the Family. In it, a young boy has been brought up and taught in a graveyard by ghosts and even a vampire. The stories range from the scary, such as “The Price,” in which the family cat has been fighting the Devil to protect his owners, to the deliciously silly, such as “How to Talk to Girls at Parties,” in which two inexperienced teenage boys turn up at the wrong party only to find out that all the girls there actually do come from another planet. There’s “Chivalry,” from Smoke and Mirrors, in which an old lady finds the Holy Grail in a second-hand shop. A young knight comes to ask for its return, but it looks so nice on the mantelpiece…

If you want an introduction to the short fiction of Neil Gaiman, this is a good place to start, and teens or children who are good readers should find it enjoyable.

Review: Dark Wraith of Shannara by Terry Brooks

Today in January Magazine’s SF/F section, contributing editor Lincoln Cho reviews Dark Wraith of Shannara by Terry Brooks. Says Cho:

Terry Brooks, the “godfather of American fantasy” has referred to Dark Wraith of Shannara as “the grand experiment.” It’s not difficult to see why. It’s a brand new story set in the distant future world of Shannara that tells the multi-generational story of the Ohmsford family. Though Brooks has set work outside of Shannara, it is these for which he is best known, as well as being what famed publisher Lester del Rey scooped out of the slush pile in the form of The Sword of Shannara, published in 1977. That was about 21 million copies of American-published Terry Brooks novels ago.

Thirty years later, it’s exciting to see this grand master of the genre trying his hand at something that is, for him, entirely new with a graphic novel.

The full review is here.

New Last Week: Secrets of the Wee Free Men and Discworld by Carrie Pyykkonen and Linda Washington

People who have read more than a single Terry Pratchett novel are not just readers; they are fans. That’s just how it works with this author. And Pratchett fans are more than just fans. They’re passionate fans, prepared to discuss the minutiae of the “Multiverse” Pratchett created with barely any provocation.

A Pratchett quote on the very first page of Secrets of the Wee-Free Men and Discworld: The Myths and Legends of Terry Pratchett’s Multiverse (St. Martin’s Griffin), explains part of the fascination. “You’d have to be a very strange person to get all of the jokes. But I hope you’ll get between 80 and 90 percent, and the ones you don’t get, you won’t actually notice are there!” These joke-getting readers, then, are the ones that will not only want this unauthorized companion, they probably won’t rest until it’s in their hands.

Meanwhile Pratchett, who was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s earlier this year, recently announced he was donating half a million pounds -- about one million dollars -- to be used for Alzheimer’s research. A grassroots fund raising program has been surging through the author’s fanbase. You can read more about that here.

Over the years, January has interviewed the Discworld creator on a couple of occasions. You can see those interviews here and here.

New Last Week: Succubus in the City by Nina Harper

“When you’re a single, hard-working woman in New York City, it’s hard enough to find a good man,” this from the PR material. “When you’re a succubus, you’ve got a completely different problem altogether!” We can only imagine.

Succubus in the City (Del Rey) by Nina Harper, a third generation Manhattanite, is meant to be the first book in a new series. The premise is silly, but the writing is sharp, and the story is engaging even if it is absurd. Think Carrie Bradshaw (without some of the intellectualizing) meets Elvira (with lower still morality) and you’re kinda close.

Unlike a lot of what protagonist Lily consumes, Succubus in the City is empty calories, meant to amuse rather than enlighten. Sometimes that’s enough.

New Today: Tales Before Narnia edited by Douglas A. Anderson

In many respects, this seems like the collection that real SF/F aficionados -- and those who love the history of the twinned genres -- have been waiting for. Editor Douglas A. Anderson -- a recognized expert on all things Hobbity -- here takes on the very history and roots of the form. Tales Before Narnia: The Roots of Modern Fantasy and Science Fiction (Del Rey) explores the stories that fired C.S. Lewis, author of The Chronicles of Narnia, Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra and others. In total, 14 novels and several short stories.

“Many of Lewis’s inspirations can be traced to his wide reading,” writes editor Douglas A. Anderson. In Surprised by Joy (1956) an autobiography of his early life, Lewis noted that one of the experiences forming his pleasure in literature occurred when as a youth he read the poem ‘Tegnér’s Drapa’ by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.”

It’s great to read about that in Anderson’s introduction, but it’s also great to then be able to look not far ahead and find “Tegnér’s Drapa” and sample the poem for yourself. (“I saw the pallid corpse of the dead sun borne through the Northern sky.”) In all, 21 works Anderson considers important to Lewis’ development as an author, including writing by Hans Christian Andersen, Sir Walter Scott, Charles Dickens, J.R.R. Tolkien and others.

The publication of the book is meant to tie in with the second Chronicles of Narnia film, Prince Caspian, starring Tilda Swinton, Liam Neeson, Eddie Izzard and others and due to be released by Disney Pictures May 16th.

A Warming Frost

To my way of thinking Gregory Frost’s Shadowbridge (Del Rey) is the kind of book that can start genre arguments, and on so many levels!

In the first place, the writing here is beautiful. Beyond beautiful. It’s sublime. And when critics think of fantasy novels, the first thing that jumps into mind is not prose that uplifts. And yet:

The first time Ledora spoke to a god, she had climbed to the top of the bridge tower and she was masked….

The towers – there were three supporting Vijnagar – were like great flat-topped and frieze-covered behemoths looming above the buildings and creatures on the surface that threaded the distance between them.

Frost writes, as I’ve said, beautifully. Lyrically, even. He writes as though he’s going to a place there is no coming back from. It seems to me to be the only place from which fantasy should be approached.

On his Web site, Frost describes the fictional place we encounter in Shadowbridge as “a world of linked spiraling spans of bridges on which all impossibilities can happen. Ghosts parade, inscrutable gods cast riddles, and dangerous magic is unleashed.” And… “Monstrous creatures drain the lives of children and for a price, you can sample their fleeting quintessence -- provided the creatures don’t sample you instead.” And, truly, aside from the whole fleeting quintessence thing, that works for me, as well.

Frost, who is also the author of the virtuous and awarded collection Attack of the Jazz Giants, has been a finalist for pretty much every award offered in his field of interest. In Shadowbridge, he proves himself to be a powerful writer here at the top of his game. If you love the sort of vibrant fantasy that relies as much on the skill of its creator as the complexity of his imagination, you will love Shadowbridge.

If you read and like Frost’s latest, there’s good news: while Shadowbridge: Book One was published just last month, you don’t have long to wait for the second book in the “duology.” It will be in stores this coming June.

Legacy Series Lacks Magic

I’ve been reading the Pern series since childhood. My introduction to the series came when I found two battered paperbacks in a used bookstore and, entranced by the covers, bought them. These two were the first in the Dragonriders of Pern series: Dragonflight and Dragonquest, first published in 1968 and 1970 respectively. Not only did I love both books, it’s probably safe to say that this early encounter with the work of Anne McCaffrey quite possibly altered the course of my reading forever. And since I was introduced to them many years after they were first published, I had great pools of this wonderful author’s work in which to swim before I had gotten all the way through her backlist.

Almost anyone who has given McCaffrey a serious read understands her magic. The connections she weaves between her human and dragon -- as well as other animal -- characters moves far beyond charm into some primal place where we all understand what might be possible if all the circumstances were correct.

The Pern series has, quite understandably, fostered more than its share of fanfic. So when it was announced that Anne McCaffrey’s son, Todd, would co-write a Pern book with his mother, there was much anticipation, but not a whole lot of surprise. That first book, 2003’s Dragon’s Kin was successful enough that the younger McCaffrey tried again -- on his own this time -- with 2005’s Dragonsblood. Another collaboration with Anne in 2006, Dragon’s Fire, leads us right here to Dragon Harper (Del Rey, 300 pages). Well, not exactly leads us: Dragonsblood actually takes place chronologically after Dragon Harper and the other collaborative McCaffrey books. But that’s another -- ahem -- thread.

The thing is, the younger McCaffrey is a competent enough writer. Heck: he might even be a very good one. Trouble is, I loved Anne McCaffrey’s books so well and believed in her magic so thoroughly, it’s tough to look at the collaborative efforts and judge them on their own merits, without having those judgments colored by the earlier, solo, books.

Do you understand what I’m saying? Dragon Harper is fine. It might even be good. It is not, however, magic. It does not transport and it will probably not alter your life. It did not alter mine. Will I read future efforts from the younger McCaffrey? You bet.

Review: The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror edited by Ellen Datlow, Kelly Link and Gavin J Grant

Today, in January Magazine’s SF/F section, contributing editor Andi Shechter reviews The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror edited by Ellen Datlow, Kelly Link and Gavin J Grant. Says Shechter:

There’s creepy horror and quiet horror, silly fantasy and dark fantasy. There’s poetry -- most of which didn’t do it for me but no harm. Paul di Filippo’s “Femaville 29” uses the aftermath of fictional tsunami that leaves hundreds of thousands of people homeless and helpless to create a wonderful tale of children coping in ways far different than usual. There are ghosts and sometimes maybe there are ghosts. There are stories that are clear fantasy, clear horror and some that are a combination of both.

Of course there are familiar names like Gene Wolfe and Joyce Carol Oates, Delia Sherman and M. Rickert, but there are many new names too -- new at least to me. The editors worked hard to create a very representative volume of the field as it exists. Writers from several countries are represented, all points of view, lots of information about where to find these and more are offered. They’ve done a really great job with this anthology.

Shechter also has a single story that is far and away her favorite of the collection, but we’ll leave that for the full review.

Review: From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain by Minister Faust

Today, in January Magazine’s SF/F section, contributing editor Andi Shechter reviews From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain by Minister Faust. Says Shechter:

There’s no way around it though. From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain is a romp. It’s hilarious, it’s edgy, it’s smart and it’s a hoot. The premise is silly enough -- group therapy for some of the world’s superheroes. Minister Faust not only knows psychobabble and uses it well, but he gets into the personalities of the various heroes and villains with exceptional wit and talent.

The full review is here.

Review: The Dark River by John Twelve Hawks

Today, in January Magazine’s SF/F section, Patrick A. Smith reviews The Dark River by John Twelve Hawks. Says Smith:

Twelve Hawks owes much to George Orwell’s bleak vision, the cyberpunk martial arts wizardry of The Matrix, the intricate travelogue quality of The Da Vinci Code, Michael Crichton’s cutting-edge tech novels. The Dark River is all of those things.

But much of it is derivative, not subversive, a mishmash of competing ideas and philosophies. The book wants too much, like Gabriel and Maya, to be a part of two worlds: one that mawkishly celebrates the virtues of anonymous living; the other that, despite its strong instincts to the contrary, craves the spotlight.

The full review is here.

Review: Rollback by Robert J. Sawyer

Today, in January Magazine’s SF/F section, Andi Shechter reviews Rollback by Robert J. Sawyer. Says Shechter:

Rollback is a dynamite science fiction novel that examines some major themes -- great and small .... I’ve read some trilogies, of course, and I’m a big fan of series books in the mystery genre. But sometimes, I just want to read a book that tells a story; a single story that ends when it should end. Don’t you?

In Rollback we get the big story -- communications with aliens -- and a smaller one -- life extension. Neither is a simple idea; yet the more complicated one is that of life extension. Both are told cleanly, intelligently and woven together well.

The full review is here.

Review: Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman

Today, in January Magazine’s Science Fiction/Fantasy section, contributing editor Andi Shechter reviews Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman. Shechter calls it a “hugely enjoyable book”:

Soon I Will Be Invincible tells the story of Dr. Impossible (not exactly the best supervillain name, ya think?) and the array of good guys determined to keep him from taking over the world. The timeline at the back of the book tells part of the story. I mean, how good can a bad guy be at being bad when he’s created five -- count ‘em five -- Doomsday machines? Usually, you stop at one because you’ve destroyed the Earth or the universe and can now take over whatever is left. But Dr. Impossible seems to have a little trouble in that regard. He keeps getting caught, locked up, then he escapes, tries again, you know the story, right?

The full review is here.

Review: Hal Spacejock #3: Just Desserts by Simon Haynes

Today, in January Magazine’s science fiction and fantasy section, contributing editor Sue Bursztynski looks at the third novel in the Hal Spacejock series. Says Bursztynski:

This is the third in what is likely to be a long-lasting series. At least, at the front of Just Desserts, author Simon Haynes says there will be about 15 volumes in the saga, or until someone takes away his keyboard. As this keyboard theft seems unlikely to happen in the near future, fans of the series should have plenty more Hal adventures to anticipate.

The full review is here.

Review: We, Robots by Sue Lange

Today, in January Magazine’s science fiction/fantasy section, contributing editor Andi Shechter reviews We, Robots by Sue Lange. Says Shechter:

In We, Robots, Lange takes on a heavy science fiction theme, examining once again, what it is to be human. At the same time, it’s deftly lightweight. The story doesn't try to redefine the genre (a little too much of that going on lately, I say) but it looks at the membrane that separates human and machine, which seems to be getting increasingly thinner. It’s a topic that has fascinated writers and readers for a long time, and I like Lange’s take on it.

Shechter’s review is here.