A brisk, engaging, but uneven time-travel tale.
A time-travel researcher seized by abductors from the future must be rescued in this SF sequel.
Los Alamos, New Mexico, is home to Project Enlightenment, a secret research facility devoted to time travel. In Going Back (2020), the first volume of Abel’s Defenders of Time Series, a project team led by Special Agent Lou Hessman, head of security, traveled back to 1919 to prevent a time displacement wave from changing history. The team returned with Claire Hill, a 24-year-old reporter who would have died of influenza in her own time. That was three months ago; now joining the team is Dr. Sam Weiss’ niece, Samantha Weiss. She has a doctorate in time-travel physics and, as the usually impassive Hessman can’t help noticing, is “a statuesque beauty.” But she’s barely arrived when Russian-speaking terrorists from the future kidnap her. A rescue mission that includes Hessman, Claire, and her fiance, professor Ben Stein, follows the time-displacement trail to London in 2120. Just as important as retrieving Samantha is understanding why she was nabbed—and why the terrorists allow her to return. The danger is far from over. In this ambitious installment, Abel provides a fast-paced adventure with entertaining action sequences. The plot ties in well to readers’ serious contemporary concerns with plastic waste, lightened by humor and romance. But the book isn’t very imaginative about the future, mainly just providing some technological window dressing for familiar contemporary elements, and is downright retro in some respects. Claire and Samantha, unlike the male characters, are described in terms of their attractiveness: “At five and a half feet tall and slender, with long black hair, a pearly white complexion, and blue eyes,” Claire “was a beauty in any century.” Samantha is Miss rather than Doctor, unlike her uncle. The uncredited monochrome illustrations depict dynamic cityscapes but human figures are amateurish.
A brisk, engaging, but uneven time-travel tale.Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-950906-92-5
Page Count: 198
Publisher: Indigo River Publishing
Review Posted Online: Sept. 28, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A run-of-the-mill quest fantasy, despite its uncommon setting.
In the sequel to Prophecy (2013), demon slayer Kira searches for a second ancient treasure to protect her cousin and her homeland.
Only days have passed since the Iron Army, led by Kira’s uncle, King Eojin, defeated the Yamato invaders and liberated Hansong. Unfortunately, their triumph is short-lived: Assassins murder Eojin at a royal banquet, fracturing the fragile alliance that had united the Seven Kingdoms under one leader. To defend her cousin, Prince Taejo, from those who contest his claim to the throne, Kira embarks on a quest with her most trusted companions to find a jeweled dagger, the second of three magical treasures mentioned in an ancient prophecy. Their action-packed journey provides ample opportunities for Kira to demonstrate her fighting prowess and explore her growing feelings for the handsome, haunted Jaewon. Unfortunately, the brisk pacing doesn’t entirely compensate for the stock characters and the weak worldbuilding. It’s difficult to understand Kira’s strong senses of duty and loyalty when her most important relationships feel perfunctory. Meanwhile, though Oh weaves many details from Korean history and folklore into her story, her inconsistent prose—which veers from contemporary snark to stilted formality—prevents her from establishing a convincing sense of time and place.
A run-of-the-mill quest fantasy, despite its uncommon setting. (glossary, map; not seen) (Fantasy. 13-16)Pub Date: Dec. 31, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-209112-3
Page Count: 336
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Oct. 8, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2013
At least there’s a lot going on
Gene escapes from certain death at bloodsucker hands—and from drowning and starvation on the river, freezing in the mountains, wickedness in the creepy murder village, a deadly plummet on a death train—until finally he’s right back in vampire central.
After their death-defying escape from the Mission in The Prey (2013), Gene, Sissy and the other humans (or hepers) find their escape vehicle takes them not to the promised land of safety, but to a cavern full of starving hepers beneath the Palace: the Ruler’s larder. Double agents promise to rescue Gene and Sissy, but the cost—the sacrifice of all the other humans in the cavern—is too high. Gene and Sis together make up the Origin; their blood combines to fuel weapons that can de-fang the vamps back into hepers. They’re the only source of the weaponized blood (for no good reason), so when their next frying-pan–to-fire maneuver sends them straight back to the metropolis filled with millions of starving man-eaters, the salvation of humanity is at risk. As if gore-drenched certain death weren’t enough cause for despair, Gene suspects his vanished father didn’t love him enough, and he has to choose between two different girls, one of whom is a vampire, which should make it easy.
At least there’s a lot going on . (Science fiction. 14-16)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-250-00512-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2013
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