Another Homeric road trip for Turtletaub’s roguish heroes sends them to ancient Athens in search of fortune, fame, girls—and philosophy.
Menedemos and Sostratos (The Sacred Land, 2003, etc.), merchant cousins from Rhodes, have a frat-boy air but can be serious and sober when occasion demands. As front men for their wealthy fathers, they’re in charge of buying and selling whatever can be bought and sold and moving the loot in the good ship Aphrodite. In the past, this has put them in harm’s way more than once—from pirates, storms, wars, and sirens—but it has also given them a cosmopolitan outlook and a sharp nose for business. This time out, the boys are headed for Athens, once again saddled with a worthless cargo of olive oil taken on as a favor to their dimwitted brother-in-law, Damonax. The sale of the oil (in oil-rich Athens) will barely cover the cost of the voyage, but Menedemos and Sostratos manage to take on some rare rose perfume and fine wines as well—and are glad of any excuse to visit the big city. The scholarly Sostratos, who once studied philosophy in the Greek capital, arranges to linger a while in town during the drama festival known as the Greater Dionysia, where he takes in the latest works of Menadros and other celebrated dramatists. Sostratos is not a fan of the theater, but he’s relieved just to be away from home, where he’s had the misfortune to fall in love with his stepmother. In Athens, however, he forgets that pretty quickly once he’s seduced (and possibly impregnated) Xenokleia, lovely wife of his host, Protomakhos. It’s the usual Frick-and-Frack routine, worldly Menedemos or cerebral Sostratos alternately falling into some trap and having to be rescued by his cousin—who promptly falls into another mess himself.
Quick and fun for newcomers, though fans may wonder whether the series is running out of steam.Pub Date: Dec. 14, 2004
ISBN: 0-765-30038-9
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Forge
Review Posted Online: May 20, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2004
Categories: GENERAL SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY | FANTASY | EPIC FANTASY
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A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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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. 10, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
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An almost-but-not-quite-great slavery novel.
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The celebrated author of Between the World and Me (2015) and We Were Eight Years in Power (2017) merges magic, adventure, and antebellum intrigue in his first novel.
In pre–Civil War Virginia, people who are white, whatever their degree of refinement, are considered “the Quality” while those who are black, whatever their degree of dignity, are regarded as “the Tasked.” Whether such euphemisms for slavery actually existed in the 19th century, they are evocatively deployed in this account of the Underground Railroad and one of its conductors: Hiram Walker, one of the Tasked who’s barely out of his teens when he’s recruited to help guide escapees from bondage in the South to freedom in the North. “Conduction” has more than one meaning for Hiram. It's also the name for a mysterious force that transports certain gifted individuals from one place to another by way of a blue light that lifts and carries them along or across bodies of water. Hiram knows he has this gift after it saves him from drowning in a carriage mishap that kills his master’s oafish son (who’s Hiram’s biological brother). Whatever the source of this power, it galvanizes Hiram to leave behind not only his chains, but also the two Tasked people he loves most: Thena, a truculent older woman who practically raised him as a surrogate mother, and Sophia, a vivacious young friend from childhood whose attempt to accompany Hiram on his escape is thwarted practically at the start when they’re caught and jailed by slave catchers. Hiram directly confronts the most pernicious abuses of slavery before he is once again conducted away from danger and into sanctuary with the Underground, whose members convey him to the freer, if funkier environs of Philadelphia, where he continues to test his power and prepare to return to Virginia to emancipate the women he left behind—and to confront the mysteries of his past. Coates’ imaginative spin on the Underground Railroad’s history is as audacious as Colson Whitehead’s, if less intensely realized. Coates’ narrative flourishes and magic-powered protagonist are reminiscent of his work on Marvel’s Black Panther superhero comic book, but even his most melodramatic effects are deepened by historical facts and contemporary urgency.
An almost-but-not-quite-great slavery novel.Pub Date: Sept. 24, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-399-59059-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: One World/Random House
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
Categories: GENERAL SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY | HISTORICAL FICTION | FANTASY | HISTORICAL FANTASY
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