by Ashlyn Chase ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 26, 2019
Likely to appeal only to staunch fans of previous books.
A recently retired surgeon travels to Puerto Rico and falls in love with Gaia.
Dr. Aaron Samuels was widowed 20 years ago and is expecting his first grandchild soon. One day during surgery, he notices a tremor in his hand and chooses to retire rather than endanger his patients. Aaron decides that since one of his daughters lives in Puerto Rico, home to the only rainforest in the United States, he should travel there and search for plants that could be turned into medicine. Meanwhile, Gaia is on a tear. She has decided to put a group of shifters on trial for revealing themselves to humans, therefore breaking the laws she's made as Mother Nature. Gaia’s behavior is so out of control that her sisters, Fate and Karma, try to set her up on a date. Maybe if Gaia falls in love, she’ll be more forgiving of human foibles. The romance between Aaron and Gaia is a small subplot in a novel overwhelmed by point-of-view characters from 12 previous books over multiple series. The novel moves along frenetically, bouncing from character to character without any kind of main narrative arc. Chase (Immortally Yours, 2019, etc.) incorporates characters and mythologies from other cultures in a way that feels scattershot, such as mixing Greek and Roman gods together. But the book also whitewashes non-European cultures. Karma, an idea borrowed from Hinduism, is envisioned here as a beautiful redhead. Although large portions of the book take place on Puerto Rico, there are hardly any Puerto Rican characters and no hint of the Spanish language or Puerto Rican culture. Gaia glibly and cruelly explains that Hurricane Maria happened because she was busy preventing an earthquake in California, but, she says: “As soon as I was free, I grabbed hold of the tail of that hurricane and unwound it. You and the rest of the western Caribbean are welcome.”
Likely to appeal only to staunch fans of previous books.Pub Date: Nov. 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4926-4558-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Sourcebooks Casablanca
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2019
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by Ashlyn Chase
by Max Brooks ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 16, 2020
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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New York Times Bestseller
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
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by Cixin Liu ; translated by Joel Martinsen ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 11, 2015
Once again, a highly impressive must-read.
Second part of an alien-contact trilogy (The Three-Body Problem, 2014) from China’s most celebrated science-fiction author.
In the previous book, the inhabitants of Trisolaris, a planet with three suns, discovered that their planet was doomed and that Earth offered a suitable refuge. So, determined to capture Earth and exterminate humanity, the Trisolarans embarked on a 400-year-long interstellar voyage and also sent sophons (enormously sophisticated computers constructed inside the curled-up dimensions of fundamental particles) to spy on humanity and impose an unbreakable block on scientific advance. On Earth, the Earth-Trisolaris Organization formed to help the invaders, despite knowing the inevitable outcome. Humanity’s lone advantage is that Trisolarans are incapable of lying or dissimulation and so cannot understand deceit or subterfuge. This time, with the Trisolarans a few years into their voyage, physicist Ye Wenjie (whose reminiscences drove much of the action in the last book) visits astronomer-turned-sociologist Luo Ji, urging him to develop her ideas on cosmic sociology. The Planetary Defense Council, meanwhile, in order to combat the powerful escapist movement (they want to build starships and flee so that at least some humans will survive), announces the Wallfacer Project. Four selected individuals will be accorded the power to command any resource in order to develop plans to defend Earth, while the details will remain hidden in the thoughts of each Wallfacer, where even the sophons can't reach. To combat this, the ETO creates Wallbreakers, dedicated to deducing and thwarting the plans of the Wallfacers. The chosen Wallfacers are soldier Frederick Tyler, diplomat Manuel Rey Diaz, neuroscientist Bill Hines, and—Luo Ji. Luo has no idea why he was chosen, but, nonetheless, the Trisolarans seem determined to kill him. The plot’s development centers on Liu’s dark and rather gloomy but highly persuasive philosophy, with dazzling ideas and an unsettling, nonlinear, almost nonnarrative structure that demands patience but offers huge rewards.
Once again, a highly impressive must-read.Pub Date: Aug. 11, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-7653-7708-1
Page Count: 480
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: June 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2015
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by Cixin Liu ; translated by Joel Martinsen
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by Cixin Liu ; translated by Joel Martinsen
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BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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