An offbeat and enchanting space adventure.
A princess and her long-suffering assistant explore the galaxy in this SF novel.
Elaine Durowich is a handmaiden to Princess Anastasia, the pampered, only daughter of the Greater Galactic Emperor and Empress. When Anastasia gets her heart set on seeing what’s outside the palace, Elaine has little choice but to tag along with her. The timing is hardly ideal, as the newly divorced Emperor and Empress are waging war against each other, and antiroyalist rumblings among the populace are getting louder every day. Nevertheless, after Anastasia falsely claims that her dad approved of the trip, she and Elaine set off on a journey to alien planets, including glitzy Paartay, which is effectively one giant rave, and Dump, a colony of rebellious teens who stage ridiculous, gladiator-style fights. The royals’ unpopularity puts a target on Anastasia’s back, so she and Elaine try to keep low profiles via aliases and disguises with varying success. After meeting a dashing revolutionary, Anastasia and Elaine stow away with a crew of geeky space pirates and even meet an intergalactic mob boss on planet Vegas. Things get more complicated when the Emperor and Empress disappear, leading the Empire’s top general to label the princess’s trip a kidnapping. By now, Elaine and Anastasia are also being tracked by alien assassin Mirret and her bloodthirsty “teddy bear”accomplice. Gimba, the author of Not So Heartwarming Stories(2019),has written a refreshingly zany work that has the potential to become a cult classic. The witty, third-person narration takes aim at everything from fandom culture to materialism and inequality, but it never takes a tone that feels preachy. Instead, Gimba delivers refreshingly funny dialogue and fresh worldbuilding. The leads are genuinely likable and don’t feel focus-grouped: Princess Anastasia is hilariously flighty and spoiled but ultimately kindhearted, and Elaine, the older and more levelheaded of the two, is as blunt as her bob haircut, but softhearted enough to pursue a possible love interest.
An offbeat and enchanting space adventure.Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-79424-159-6
Page Count: 392
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Oct. 22, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
An epic space adventure.
A thief and a teleporter team up to save their former crew in the finale of Mihalik's Starlight's Shadow trilogy.
Lexi Bowen is one of the most accomplished recovery specialists—code for thief—in the galaxy. She's nervous about taking a contract that requires her to return to Valovia, home planet of the ruthless enemies she once fought as a soldier, but the payout is too enticing to decline. Once she arrives on Valovia, she is almost immediately cornered by the Empress Nepru’s private guards. Teleporter Nilo Shoren appears in the middle of the altercation and teleports her to safety. Lexi’s history with Nilo is complicated. They were both crew members on Starlight’s Shadow, but Lexi has never forgiven Nilo for luring her to what she thought was a date only for him to steal a job right out from under her. She can’t understand why Nilo would save her now, and she’s determined to escape Valovia on her own. Nilo convinces her to accept his help escaping the empress, but their plans change when they discover Starlight’s Shadow and its crew are missing. Lexi and Nilo suspect that their friends were heading for the planet Rodeni, trying to capture a fugitive, and they set a course to mount a rescue mission. Lexi is a likable, tough-as-nails character determined to make it on her own. The truth is that she suffers flashbacks and panic attacks from the war, and she is afraid to show her vulnerabilities to Nilo. Although she tries to convince herself that her attraction to Nilo isn’t serious, she finds it impossible to resist him. In order to be together, they must learn to trust and openly communicate with each other, whether on the battlefield or in the bedroom.
An epic space adventure.Pub Date: June 20, 2023
ISBN: 9780063051102
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Review Posted Online: March 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2023
Punchy, plausible, and bittersweet; studded with zingers until the very last line.
The desperate logistics of planning for the apocalypse reach their climax in the conclusion to a space opera trilogy that began with The Collapsing Empire (2017) and The Consuming Fire (2018).
Time is running out for Cardenia Wu-Patrick, aka Grayland II, emperox of the planet-spanning Interdependency. As she struggles to come up with a plan to save the billions who will suffer and starve in the wake of the collapse of the Flow, the extradimensional network connecting the planets of her far-flung empire, her nemesis, Lady Nadashe Nohamapetan, continues to scheme against her. With the support of many of the noble houses—who plan to abandon their subjects while preserving themselves and their wealth in a flight to End, the only self-sufficient planet in the Interdependency—Nadashe now seeks the throne for herself. Meanwhile, Cardenia’s lover, the Flow physicist Lord Marce Claremont, attempts to devise a scientific solution to the Flow collapse, unaware that Cardenia is hiding vital data from him. And the clever but hot-tempered Lady Kiva Lagos attempts to spy on Nadashe in hopes of defusing the coup, but she may have gotten herself in too deep this time. Scalzi treads a delicate line here: He set out to chart an apocalypse, and a deus ex machina would be cheating. The book also serves as an acknowledgment that intelligence and good intentions are not an impregnable armor against venality and the pitiless laws of physics. (In addition to slowing down Scalzi's writing—something he acknowledges in an afterword—the current sociopolitical situation in the U.S. has clearly flavored the story.) Given those parameters, Scalzi plays fair while still offering his readers some hope. And even when depicting the direst situations, Scalzi’s work retains its snarky cheer.
Punchy, plausible, and bittersweet; studded with zingers until the very last line.Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-7653-8916-9
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
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