by R. Scott Bakker ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 1, 2011
It’s the usual fantasy stuff, in other words, derivative of but much inferior to the Tolkien/Lewis/Peake schools of yore....
By Crom and Ishtar, Batman: There’s a minor epidemic of sword-and-sorcery epics out there, and now one of them is long-practicing fantasist Bakker’s sequel to The Judging Eye (2009).
As readers familiar with that book know—and if you haven’t read the first volume, you’ll need to—Anasûrimbor Kellhus is “the Aspect-Emperor of the Three Seas.” His job description requires him to fight the forces of the Apocalypse here, the weirdlings of the frozen Ancient North there—in short, there’s not much time for golf or a Hawaiian vacation in a place where the gods and one’s kinfolk alike have it in for you. That world is a diverse if violent place: Think of it as Canada and Brazil with magic wands and battleaxes, with the North always coming in ahead, since “commerce with the Nonmen had allowed them to outstrip their more swarthy cousins to the South.” More swarthy? Nonmen? Gulp. The shades of D.W. Griffith are fainter than those of J.R.R. Tolkien, of course, with whom comparisons are naturally to be drawn. And in that Bakker is found wanting, for though this volume is dauntingly big, not much happens in it—there’s a lot of back story and a lot of talk, but not much of it adds up. Oh, there are grandmasters of the “Gnostic School of Sohonc,” of course, and Anagogic Schools, and practitioners of Inrithism and victims of “the Inrithi persecution of sorcery”; there are brave warriors of something called the Great Ordeal, which is more descriptive than the author might have intended; there’s a character who can “scry our scrying;" and there are witches and wizards but, at least, seedy brothels in the place of groaning-board inns. Not many of the venues are attractive; “the omnipresent smell of rot seemed to take on a sinister tang,” says our narrator, which unfortunately speaks volumes.
It’s the usual fantasy stuff, in other words, derivative of but much inferior to the Tolkien/Lewis/Peake schools of yore. Take it as good news or bad, but another volume in the series awaits.Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-59020-464-1
Page Count: 608
Publisher: Overlook
Review Posted Online: April 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2011
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BOOK REVIEW
by Max Brooks ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 16, 2020
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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New York Times Bestseller
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
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by Max Brooks
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BOOK TO SCREEN
by TJ Klune ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 17, 2020
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.
A tightly wound caseworker is pushed out of his comfort zone when he’s sent to observe a remote orphanage for magical children.
Linus Baker loves rules, which makes him perfectly suited for his job as a midlevel bureaucrat working for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, where he investigates orphanages for children who can do things like make objects float, who have tails or feathers, and even those who are young witches. Linus clings to the notion that his job is about saving children from cruel or dangerous homes, but really he’s a cog in a government machine that treats magical children as second-class citizens. When Extremely Upper Management sends for Linus, he learns that his next assignment is a mission to an island orphanage for especially dangerous kids. He is to stay on the island for a month and write reports for Extremely Upper Management, which warns him to be especially meticulous in his observations. When he reaches the island, he meets extraordinary kids like Talia the gnome, Theodore the wyvern, and Chauncey, an amorphous blob whose parentage is unknown. The proprietor of the orphanage is a strange but charming man named Arthur, who makes it clear to Linus that he will do anything in his power to give his charges a loving home on the island. As Linus spends more time with Arthur and the kids, he starts to question a world that would shun them for being different, and he even develops romantic feelings for Arthur. Lambda Literary Award–winning author Klune (The Art of Breathing, 2019, etc.) has a knack for creating endearing characters, and readers will grow to love Arthur and the orphans alongside Linus. Linus himself is a lovable protagonist despite his prickliness, and Klune aptly handles his evolving feelings and morals. The prose is a touch wooden in places, but fans of quirky fantasy will eat it up.
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21728-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
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