A classic in the making, this collection of time-traveling sci-fi stories mixes gripping human narratives with provocative...
A dazzling collection of time-travel–themed sci-fi that stands with some of the classics of the genre.
In Whose Time, the novella that opens this collection, distills complex theoretical physics into an attention-grabbing yarn. According to the story, particular moments in history create focal points from which new universes in other dimensions branch outward. Ambassadors from two different futures created by one such focal point—the launch of a seemingly innocuous communications satellite—travel back in time to the Earth days before liftoff. If she can ensure that the satellite isn’t launched on schedule, Sha’raelon’s timeline begins; if it’s launched on time, the universe of Jarren Canto is ascendant. Each timeline has its attractions and perils, and it’s up to the people of the Earth to choose their future. Unfortunately, neither ambassador has been completely honest about what’s in store for humankind....There are big ideas in this story—grandfather paradoxes, temporal loops—yet the pacing never flags, and the plot’s contortions of time and space are original and thrilling. The title story is a gritty future noir about two cops on a mission to deliver a warrant in a lawless city. The twist at the end of this short, brutal tale—a nightmarish vision of penal system privatization—delivers the satisfying impact of a classic Twilight Zone episode. “Crossover,” the final story, has a similarly surprising conclusion. A husband grieving his wife’s death becomes intrigued with a scientist friend’s research: experiments involving separating the soul from the body by means of extreme physical experiences. The husband devises his own test to see if, once freed, a soul could re-enter its body at an earlier time and change the future. The results are literally as well as figuratively breathtaking. All three of these stories are brightly and engagingly written, with solid dialogue, compelling characters and scenarios that, no matter how elaborate, never undermine the momentum of the stories.
A classic in the making, this collection of time-traveling sci-fi stories mixes gripping human narratives with provocative scientific speculation.Pub Date: May 18, 2012
ISBN: 978-1475053890
Page Count: 272
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2012
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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