A mere introduction to a strange but undoubtedly enticing world, and one that readers should happily return to.
In this sci-fi outing, a 15-year-old boy may hold the key to an ancient prophecy foretelling the possible doom of planet Spearca.
It’s akin to the medieval period on Spearca, a world of kingdoms and castles. But there’s at least some advanced technology, including aircraft and telephonic communications. The Unified Kingship monitors people across the realm with the Great Eyes, perpetually hovering orbs always recording. This is to make certain kingdoms abide by the Treaty of Eximius, which limits enhanced weaponry. A king known as the Father initiates battles not for land, but for information. He targets the Keepers, who hold knowledge of the Numas, overseers of the realm who ensure a level “playing field.” The Father’s convinced the Numas have hidden technology that he wants, and he soon learns about young Petro, ward to King Amerstall of the kingdom Dugual. The boy may be part of a prophecy, a special being who will bring forth death and destruction as a blue fire covers Spearca. Petro, meanwhile, undergoes training as a Numa recruit. He doesn’t know whether the Numas are aware of his unique ability: he experiences random episodes of precognition. As the Father devises a plan of attack against Dugual, Petro sees what looks to be a harrowing future. The novel boasts action with shades of sci-fi and fantasy. Rigsby (The Broken Christmas Tree, 2014) aptly develops the setting, clearly detailing Spearca and its inhabitants without a surplus of exposition. And there’s a slow-building mystery: the Father, for example, suffers from an unknown disease, hoping the equally enigmatic Numa tech will help. On a grander scale, no one’s gone farther than the White Sea’s horizon, an apparent stopping point. This is unmistakably the start of something bigger, as the story ends with a cliffhanger in lieu of a climax. Notwithstanding, Rigsby delivers a smashing sword duel, and Petro and fellow recruits even embark on a potentially dangerous wild boar hunt. Technology, too, is incorporated intelligently; for readers it’s both old, like your basic landlines, and new—viddons manage video/audio links via surgical implants.
A mere introduction to a strange but undoubtedly enticing world, and one that readers should happily return to.Pub Date: Feb. 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5177-8894-0
Page Count: 251
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
A new edition of the by now classic collection of affiliated stories which has already established its deserved longevity.
Pub Date: Aug. 16, 1963
ISBN: 055338256X
Page Count: -
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1963
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