A sometimes-engaging fantasy that reads too much like a video game tribute.
In this sci-fi debut, rebels try to subvert the aims of a greedy energy corporation.
On the planet Pearl, in the city of Urba, Cirrus Stark is a homeless drunk—a former law enforcement officer who was cut from the ranks of the organization MERCENARY and now lives on society’s fringes. While sitting at a train station, he happens to see his childhood friend Sagacious Gard walking past. They haven’t seen each other since their village, Highwind, was destroyed years ago by a magic-wielding, rogue MERCENARY soldier named Aggeroth Wyvern. Sagacious and her companion, Dash Black, take Cirrus to Seventh Heaven, a tavern that she owns in the Division Seven slums. After sobering up, Cirrus learns that Sagacious’ group, WAVE, plans to bomb one of the city reactors that convert “vim,” an energy from deep within the planet, into a marketable, if toxic, power source; it’s sold by Megacorp, which doesn’t care that vim is comprised of the essence of dead people. All members of WAVE can perform basic “mystics” (spells) using an “essenia orb,” but a woman named Grace Stillwater, who can grow flowers in her garden despite the reactor pollution, may be the key to saving a world where people connect more with handheld devices than with one another. For his debut, Van Horne presents an often compelling vision of technology running amok in a once-placid magical realm. The narrative’s engaging central theme is summed up best by Sagacious when she says, “I don’t want my daughter to grow up in a world in which everyone and everything are beholden to an all-powerful corporation.” However, the novel seems to take too many specific cues, particularly in its plot structure, from the video game “Final Fantasy VII” for readers who know that game to enjoy this work. In one scene, for example, Sagacious’ young daughter, Darlene, even insists on calling the blonde, spiky-haired Cirrus “Cloud”—which also happens to be the name of the blonde, spiky-haired character from the game. The numerous conceptual swipes overshadow the more original ideas, which could have seeded a more genuine homage.
A sometimes-engaging fantasy that reads too much like a video game tribute.Pub Date: Dec. 14, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9996157-0-6
Page Count: 228
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 9, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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