A smartly executed jumping-off point for new readers in a complex SF saga.
Political and interdimensional challenges confront the Taran Empire in a new series that continues DuBoff’s Cadicle Universe SF saga.
Jason is a scion of the Sietinen Dynasty, which rules the galaxy-spanning Taran Empire. Blessed with telepathic and telekinetic abilities, he works in the Taran Selective Service, headquartered within Earth’s moon. One day he learns that a salvage ship, the Andvari, has been attacked by what appears to be a “transdimensional space kraken.” Worse, the attack happened near the Rift—a “spatial tear” left over from the end of the Bakzen War, 30 years before. Jason’s father, TSS High Commander Wil Sietinen, reveals that the Tarans have been accused of violating an ancient treaty with two alien races—one being the Gatekeepers, the other an unknown quantity. The Tarans don’t know how they violated it, but the Gatekeepers warn that the unknown beings are seeking retribution. Did the malicious, now-deposed Priesthood leave behind clues on Morningstar Isle, their former home, which can help alleviate the crisis? Meanwhile, on the Outer Colony of Duronis, the Sovereign People’s Alliance plans to sow chaos for the ruling family, and Lexi Karis has infiltrated the group to learn the fate of her missing friend, Melisa. DuBoff successfully accomplishes the tricky balancing act of acknowledging the massive Cadicle Universe narrative while also pushing forward into new territory. New readers will definitely feel like they’ve missed a few happenings that comprise the series’ fabric, such as the battle against the Priesthood. Fortunately, for much of the novel’s first half, the most compelling drama remains personal, such as Jason’s breakup with his lover, Tiff. When tragedy eventually strikes, the consequences are immense, as they provide an answer to the adventure’s biggest mystery and bring Earth into the Taran fold. Meanwhile, Raena, Jason’s twin sister who rules Morningstar Isle, weighs in on cultural politics: “There’s such a focus on uniqueness and differences that it’s divided people more than bringing them together.” By the end, a rattled status quo hints at an intriguing sequel.
A smartly executed jumping-off point for new readers in a complex SF saga.Pub Date: March 19, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-95-434420-4
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Dawnrunner Press
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
One small step, no giant leaps.
Weir (The Martian, 2014) returns with another off-world tale, this time set on a lunar colony several decades in the future.
Jasmine “Jazz” Bashara is a 20-something deliveryperson, or “porter,” whose welder father brought her up on Artemis, a small multidomed city on Earth’s moon. She has dreams of becoming a member of the Extravehicular Activity Guild so she’ll be able to get better work, such as leading tours on the moon’s surface, and pay off a substantial personal debt. For now, though, she has a thriving side business procuring low-end black-market items to people in the colony. One of her best customers is Trond Landvik, a wealthy businessman who, one day, offers her a lucrative deal to sabotage some of Sanchez Aluminum’s automated lunar-mining equipment. Jazz agrees and comes up with a complicated scheme that involves an extended outing on the lunar surface. Things don’t go as planned, though, and afterward, she finds Landvik murdered. Soon, Jazz is in the middle of a conspiracy involving a Brazilian crime syndicate and revolutionary technology. Only by teaming up with friends and family, including electronics scientist Martin Svoboda, EVA expert Dale Shapiro, and her father, will she be able to finish the job she started. Readers expecting The Martian’s smart math-and-science problem-solving will only find a smattering here, as when Jazz figures out how to ignite an acetylene torch during a moonwalk. Strip away the sci-fi trappings, though, and this is a by-the-numbers caper novel with predictable beats and little suspense. The worldbuilding is mostly bland and unimaginative (Artemis apartments are cramped; everyone uses smartphonelike “Gizmos”), although intriguing elements—such as the fact that space travel is controlled by Kenya instead of the United States or Russia—do show up occasionally. In the acknowledgements, Weir thanks six women, including his publisher and U.K. editor, “for helping me tackle the challenge of writing a female narrator”—as if women were an alien species. Even so, Jazz is given such forced lines as “I giggled like a little girl. Hey, I’m a girl, so I’m allowed.”
One small step, no giant leaps.Pub Date: Nov. 14, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-553-44812-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2017
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
