Notwithstanding the absurd backdrop, a warmly involving, action-packed yarn whose heroine is engagingly tough, vulnerable,...
Adams' (the joint pseudonym for C.T. Adams and Cathy Clamp) third outing for fearless, supernaturally powered professional bodyguard Celia Graves (Siren Song, 2010, etc.).
In the book's Los Angeles, ordinary folk must coexist with magic, supernatural beings (sirens, vampires, werewolves, you name it), psychic powers, ghosts, warrior priests and modern technology—a preposterously unstable concoction for which Adams compensates, or distracts from, with a richly involving back story. Celia, having discovered in a previous episode that she's part siren, also acquired a progressive vampirism that urges her to chomp necks. This she resists. However, because of a childhood curse, she tends to involve her friends in her adventures, which means they often get psychically or physically damaged. Thanks to her siren heritage, she's a man-magnet, what with sometime boyfriend and mage Bruno DeLuca and new love interest John Creede, another mage. She tends to attract demons. And in an unresolved case, murder victim Vicki Cooper, now a helpful ghost, bequeathed her millions, though even Vicki doesn't know why. Then trouble breaks out at the California State Paranormal Treatment Facility, where mad or bad supernaturals are confined. This eruption of demons, barely contained by Celia, John, Bruno and their allies, is but a harbinger of much worse to come. A rift between the demonic dimension and our own—both opened and then sealed by Celia's royal siren ancestors—is reopening, and its hellraiser-in-chief seems personally to have it in for Celia.
Notwithstanding the absurd backdrop, a warmly involving, action-packed yarn whose heroine is engagingly tough, vulnerable, principled and passionate in equal measure.Pub Date: March 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-7653-2496-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The open-ended nature of the ending suggests that the clan war is not yet over; it’ll be interesting to see what course Lee...
Two clans fueled by the magical power of jade battle for control of an analog of mid-20th-century Hong Kong.
Clan soldiers have a specific genetic affinity for jade not shared by most outsiders, which grants them strength and shielding, among other magical powers. Kaul Sen, the former Pillar (head) of the No Peak clan, has retired, and the new Pillar, Kaul Lan, doesn’t quite inspire the fear and loyalty garnered by his legendary grandfather or his late war hero father. His younger brother, Kaul Hilo, is an effective Horn (chief enforcer), but he’s also rash and impulsive. Sensing weakness in her rival, Ayt Madashi, the ruthless Pillar of the Mountain clan, begins a campaign to destroy No Peak and take total control of the island nation of Kekon. The setting suggests that this crime-thriller/fantasy might find inspiration in history and fiction about the triads, and perhaps it does, but it also clearly leans heavily on elements drawn from The Godfather. Some examples (beyond the general plot of crime families battling for supremacy): an adoptive member of the Kaul family is kidnapped by the Mountain to serve as intermediary; the Mountain wants to sell drugs and initially seeks No Peak’s help with the business; the character of Hilo bears some similarity to Sonny Corleone, while the third Kaul grandchild, Shae, traces part of the path of Michael Corleone (she’s spent years outside the clan pursuing her own interests but her loyalties drag her back when tragedy strikes). Despite those beats, Lee's (Exo, 2017, etc.) novel has its own story to tell; an intriguing confluence of history, culture, and biology shapes both the characters and their fates.
The open-ended nature of the ending suggests that the clan war is not yet over; it’ll be interesting to see what course Lee charts next.Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-316-44086-8
Page Count: 600
Publisher: Orbit
Review Posted Online: Oct. 10, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2017
The narrator is researching for his book, The Day the World Ended, when he comes up against his karass, as he later understands it through Bokononism. It leads him to investigate Dr. Hoenniker, "Father of the A-Bomb," whom his son Little Newt says was playing cat's cradle when the bomb dropped (people weren't his specialty). The good doctor left his children an even greater weapon of devastation in ice-nine, an inheritance which won his ugly daughter a handsome husband; little Newt, a Russian midget just his size for an affair that ended when she absconded with a sliver of ice-nine; and made unlikely Franklin the right hand man of Papa Monzano of San Lorenzo, a make-believe Caribbean republic. On the trail of ice-nine, the narrator comes in for Papa's death and is tapped for the Presidency of San Lorenzo. Lured by sex symbol Mona, he accepts, but before he can take office, ice-nine breaks loose, freezing land and sea. Bokonon, the aged existentialist residing in the jungle as counter to the strong man, formulates a religion that makes up for life altogether: since the natives are miserable and there is little hope for changing their lot, he takes advantage of the release of ice-nine to bring them a happy death. The narrator's karass is at last made clear by Bokonon himself, leaving him to commit a final blasphemy against whoever is up there. A riddle on the meaning of meaninglessness or vice versa in a devastation-oriented era, with science-fiction figures on the prowl and political-ologies lanced. Spottily effective.
Pub Date: March 18, 1963
ISBN: 038533348X
Page Count: 308
Publisher: Holt Rinehart & Winston
Review Posted Online: Oct. 6, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1963
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