A bold attempt at classic fantasy that fails at its heroic quest.
In the second volume of a three-part series, Joe weaves an epic tale of vengeance, great battles, guardian giants, a prince of darkness and a brave knight from the underworld.
When Rhymes Ramose’s sister is killed, he vows to avenge her death by doing no less than wiping out the human race. Steeped in the storytelling tradition of ancient lore, the novel is told through layers: Capt. John Coiners tells Keith Black the story, which was told to Coiners by Treeon Littlewood, an immortal being. As it turns out, Keith Black, the pilot of the spaceship the Red Dragon, went in search of a replacement golden eagle—“an eagle with a head like a crow and…gold in colour”—after his son burned the first and was imprisoned for the crime. But the main thread of the novel follows the Black Knight, who was the former ruler of the underworld, though he’s just a highwayman now, and Thousand Boils, the Prince of Darkness, on their quest to Mount Kina in order to find the Fiddle of Doom, which has the power to capture an immortal’s soul—essential to defeating evil, murderous Rhymes Ramose. The plot, which relies too much on dialogue that’s often relayed without attribution, can be difficult to understand. On the ambitious, heroic journey, the strengths of the narrative can also be weaknesses: While Joe invents a large cast of interesting, unusual characters, they often appear with little context or explanation as to who or what they are. Likewise, Joe creates a dense mythology, little of which is explained. Set in a sketchy, confusing Earth-like world, the novel has real places next to mythical locales, spaceships mixing with ancient objects, and pop culture references mingling with Greek myths. Joe superbly creates a tense showdown of two powerful armies and harks back to medieval modes of storytelling, creating various songs and poems for characters to deliver in the prose. Yet, confined to genre conventions, the epic journey achieves only limited success.
A bold attempt at classic fantasy that fails at its heroic quest.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1453589465
Page Count: 222
Publisher: Xlibris
Review Posted Online: July 12, 2013
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
An existential crisis that steps on its own final moments.
With only a month left until the world ends due to a swiftly approaching black hole, Don and Rodney, a retired gay couple, road-trip from Maine to Washington to spend their final days with their son.
After reports that a planet-swallowing black hole is making its way toward Earth, Rodney and Don—who have been together for 40 years and survived everything from homophobia to the HIV crisis—decide to pack their belongings into an RV, say goodbye to their neighbors, and travel from Camden, Maine, to Washington to uphold a promise to spend their final days with their son. They can’t wait any longer, since there’s already chaos around the country: “Military vehicles in the streets of most cities and towns. Looting, rioting, the burning of cars and buildings and people, all of it had already happened.” As they make their way west across the country, they encounter fellow travelers ranging from close-knit families to free-spirited hippies, some of whom have come to terms with the impending end of the world and others who haven’t. While the story seems to be asking readers what they would do if they had 30 days left to live, and reflects on what different kinds of acceptance might look like in the face of unavoidable tragedy, it loses some of its poignancy in a series of thinly padded monologues about the meaning of life. Clearly intended to pack an emotional punch, it’s failed by an abrupt ending, and the way the journey’s mystery—which will be obvious to many readers—is revealed by an info dump in the last chapter.
An existential crisis that steps on its own final moments.Pub Date: April 28, 2026
ISBN: 9781250881236
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
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