A well-written and compelling SF novel, with an older, wiser, battle-hardened hero.
Earth maintains an uneasy peace pact with an alien race in Olson’s SF novel.
Mikail Benson remembers the war with the AranthChi well; it still haunts his sleep (“In his worst dreams, the dead floated in the void with him, close enough to touch, too late to help”). The long conflict saw much suffering and many lives lost…and its end was just as much of a surprise as its beginning. After years of bloodshed, the alien race suddenly wanted to talk of peace, and of working together to share information and technology. Mikail found himself no longer a soldier—now he runs the Office of Alien Technologies, reviewing the questions and answers that go from humans to AranthChi and back. Despite what so many others seem to think, Mikail is not convinced peace will last, even 36 years later. It turns out he’s right: Marsh(ee), the alpha male of Least Clan of the AranthChi, uses the fact that he is far enough out in Aranth-run space (and all but forgotten) to wage a “faux war with humanity.” Just as Mikail uncovers evidence of the AranthChi treachery and begins to formulate a plan, the aliens’ High Council of Great Clans learns of Marsh(ee)’s planned revolt and alerts their ships to plan to attack the humans in retaliation for aiding a traitor. Mikail might be too late to save humanity—if they couldn’t defeat a small fraction of the AranthChi forces years ago, what hope do they have against the whole fleet? In this riveting SF yarn, readers are treated to diabolical political plots and a thrilling race to save the world as we know it. Even with the human characters evolved to enjoy longer lifespans, it’s enjoyable to see an older hero in an adventure story (Mikail is 70). His experience in the war still affects him emotionally, giving his character a level of depth that feels utterly genuine and admirable.
A well-written and compelling SF novel, with an older, wiser, battle-hardened hero.Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2022
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 308
Publisher: Belle Isle Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2023
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 fine novel for those who like to immerse themselves in alternative worlds.
Set in the future and reminiscent of The Hunger Games and Game of Thrones, this novel dramatizes a story of vengeance, warfare and the quest for power.
In the beginning, Darrow, the narrator, works in the mines on Mars, a life of drudgery and subservience. He’s a member of the Reds, an “inferior” class, though he’s happily married to Eo, an incipient rebel who wants to overthrow the existing social order, especially the Golds, who treat the lower-ranking orders cruelly. When Eo leads him to a mildly rebellious act, she’s caught and executed, and Darrow decides to exact vengeance on the perpetrators of this outrage. He’s recruited by a rebel cell and “becomes” a Gold by having painful surgery—he has golden wings grafted on his back—and taking an exam to launch himself into the academy that educates the ruling elite. Although he successfully infiltrates the Golds, he finds the social order is a cruel and confusing mash-up of deception and intrigue. Eventually, he leads one of the “houses” in war games that are all too real and becomes a guerrilla warrior leading a ragtag band of rebelliously minded men and women. Although it takes a while, the reader eventually gets used to the specialized vocabulary of this world, where warriors shoot “pulseFists” and are protected by “recoilArmor.” As with many similar worlds, the warrior culture depicted here has a primitive, even classical, feel to it, especially since the warriors sport names such as Augustus, Cassius, Apollo and Mercury.
A fine novel for those who like to immerse themselves in alternative worlds.Pub Date: Jan. 28, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-345-53978-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2013
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