A hugely entertaining techno-magic adventure novel.
In Speegle’s (Pen and Platen, 2011) novel set in a fantastic future world, technologically enhanced craftsmen face a deadly new threat.
As the story opens, a young man named Gregor loses his home, his best friend and very nearly his life in the hinterlands at the fringe of the Tech Republic. He and his friend Anatoly are skilled “Artificers” who use small, handheld computers to tap into a “Feed” of neutral matter, which they electronically resequence to create things to suit their needs. But their skills don’t protect them when they’re attacked by Frontmen—soulless, interchangeable minions of an all-devouring malevolence called SILOS. Gregor’s life is only saved thanks to the appearance of a woman named Ros, who hails from another dystopian enclave: the musicians’ haven called State of Play. Ros uses technology and her considerable fighting skills to rescue Gregor and take him on her quest to fight SILOS by enlisting the aid of yet another enclave, the Writers’ Bloc. There, the people prize the written word above all else, and a text called the Book may hold the key to victory. Along the way, Gregor and Ros squabble (at one point, he sarcastically calls her “Ros the Unnecessarily Taciturn”), but she gradually fills him in on the perilous state of the world outside the Tech Republic, her own past and training in the State, and the rise of the evil quagmire of SILOS. The author conveys most of this information in prolonged flashback segments, which he handles with a great deal of skill. The technology in Speegle’s world has morphed and sharpened into something akin to magic, and the Tech Republic, in particular, is impeccably imagined. He also makes the various sects’ worldviews believably distinct. Overall, his crafting of his characters is sensitive and, at times, winningly funny.
A hugely entertaining techno-magic adventure novel.Pub Date: April 20, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-692-26050-0
Page Count: 478
Publisher: &yet
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
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