A fast-paced portal adventure with some well-integrated social commentary.
In this debut sci-fi novel, a man investigates the interdimensional secrets of the evil corporation that employs him.
Other than his micromanaging boss, Quentin James enjoys working in the IT department of IBZ Energy, one of the world’s largest oil companies. But when he is asked to open an encrypted file for one of the company’s top executives, he sees that it contains photographs of IBZ security contractors murdering oil pipeline protesters. Hoping to blow the whistle on the company’s crimes, he and his friend Eissa go in search of the DimGate, which Quentin believes to be some sort of secret hard drive. But they end up being trapped in a mysterious locked room in the COO’s office: “In the center of the room was a door. It was flanked by a large gray box on each side, which sat perpendicular to the door. It looked like someone had taken two industrial breaker boxes and used them to hold up the door like giant bookends.” The DimGate turns out to be a portal to other dimensions, and after Quentin and Eissa are forced to use it to escape detection, they find themselves in an alternate version of 2015 where electricity hasn’t been discovered and the United States is at war with the Native American tribes that rule the territory west of the Mississippi. There, Quentin learns that IBZ is a subsidiary of the interdimensional DimCorp—and it’s been up to a lot worse than just “killing a few protesters.” In this series opener, Long describes the mechanics of the world with clarity and humor. His prose captures the wonder, fear, and excitement of his nerdy protagonist: “What a noble cause, and what an adventure it must have been,” thinks Quentin after learning about a small interdimensional resistance to DimCorp. “The last clear thought he had before drifting off to sleep, was that he, too, was on an adventure, and it was fantastic.” The portal-based world-hopping should appeal to the general sci-fi crowd, and the book’s themes—which take a critical view of the greed and power of international corporations—lend a deep relevance to Quentin’s quest.
A fast-paced portal adventure with some well-integrated social commentary.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-948169-08-0
Page Count: 330
Publisher: Mad Goat Press
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Genetically engineered dinosaurs run amok in Crichton's new, vastly entertaining science thriller. From the introduction alone—a classically Crichton-clear discussion of the implications of biotechnological research—it's evident that the Harvard M.D. has bounced back from the science-fantasy silliness of Sphere (1987) for another taut reworking of the Frankenstein theme, as in The Andromeda Strain and The Terminal Man. Here, Dr. Frankenstein is aging billionaire John Hammond, whose monster is a manmade ecosystem based on a Costa Rican island. Designed as the world's ultimate theme park, the ecosystem boasts climate and flora of the Jurassic Age and—most spectacularly—15 varieties of dinosaurs, created by elaborate genetic engineering that Crichton explains in fascinating detail, rich with dino-lore and complete with graphics. Into the park, for a safety check before its opening, comes the novel's band of characters—who, though well drawn, double as symbolic types in this unsubtle morality play. Among them are hero Alan Grant, noble paleontologist; Hammond, venal and obsessed; amoral dino-designer Henry Wu; Hammond's two innocent grandchildren; and mathematician Ian Malcolm, who in long diatribes serves as Crichton's mouthpiece to lament the folly of science. Upon arrival, the visitors tour the park; meanwhile, an industrial spy steals some dino embryos by shutting down the island's power—and its security grid, allowing the beasts to run loose. The bulk of the remaining narrative consists of dinos—ferocious T. Rex's, voracious velociraptors, venom-spitting dilophosaurs—stalking, ripping, and eating the cast in fast, furious, and suspenseful set-pieces as the ecosystem spins apart. And can Grant prevent the dinos from escaping to the mainland to create unchecked havoc? Though intrusive, the moralizing rarely slows this tornado-paced tale, a slick package of info-thrills that's Crichton's most clever since Congo (1980)—and easily the most exciting dinosaur novel ever written. A sure-fire best-seller.
Pub Date: Nov. 7, 1990
ISBN: 0394588169
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 21, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1990
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