Sanders is at his best when he leaves humor behind to tell stories with big ideas; fortunately, over half the stories here...
A short story collection wrestling with modern isolation and dystopic futures, from an author also known for nonfiction essays about conservation and nature.
Sanders (Divine Animal, 2014, etc.) begins with “The Anatomy Lesson,” a horror story about transformation in a poorly defined academic setting. “The First Journey of Jason Moss” describes a nebbishy man's unlikely midlife blossoming into a world traveler and solver-of-everyone's-problems. “The Artist of Hunger” is about an artist's rebellion against (somewhat cartoonish) villainous corporate patrons and their manufactured culture of greed. “The Engineer of Beasts" is the first story explicitly set in Sanders' Enclosure universe, a dystopia of bubble cities sealed against Earth's pollution, more thoroughly explored in his 1985 novel Terrarium. Despite traces of a too-cute whimsy, Sanders hits his stride as he explores what happens when one of the Enclosure's "disneys" (an inspired coinage for artificial parks within the cities) goes haywire. Sanders invigorates the "domed cities" trope for the last 10 stories, which chronicle humanity's retreat into the Enclosure...and their subsequent need to escape their refuge and reconnect with their ruined natural world and with one another. In the far future of the setting, our species reaches other, less spoiled planets. The two best stories take place here: “The Audubon Effect,” in which a team of scientists puzzles through the impossible appearance of extinct avians; and the claustrophobic and creepy “The Land Where Songtrees Grow,” a rescue mission whose members are in risk of losing their own minds. “Travels in the Interior” is also strong, sharply examining both celebrity culture and colonization/exploitation through two brothers whose expeditions on alien planets are televised.
Sanders is at his best when he leaves humor behind to tell stories with big ideas; fortunately, over half the stories here do so, despite a shaky start.Pub Date: Aug. 15, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-253-02251-6
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Indiana Univ.
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Too much puzzle-solving, not enough suspense.
Video-game players embrace the quest of a lifetime in a virtual world; screenwriter Cline’s first novel is old wine in new bottles.
The real world, in 2045, is the usual dystopian horror story. So who can blame Wade, our narrator, if he spends most of his time in a virtual world? The 18-year-old, orphaned at 11, has no friends in his vertical trailer park in Oklahoma City, while the OASIS has captivating bells and whistles, and it’s free. Its creator, the legendary billionaire James Halliday, left a curious will. He had devised an elaborate online game, a hunt for a hidden Easter egg. The finder would inherit his estate. Old-fashioned riddles lead to three keys and three gates. Wade, or rather his avatar Parzival, is the first gunter (egg-hunter) to win the Copper Key, first of three. Halliday was obsessed with the pop culture of the 1980s, primarily the arcade games, so the novel is as much retro as futurist. Parzival’s great strength is that he has absorbed all Halliday’s obsessions; he knows by heart three essential movies, crossing the line from geek to freak. His most formidable competitors are the Sixers, contract gunters working for the evil conglomerate IOI, whose goal is to acquire the OASIS. Cline’s narrative is straightforward but loaded with exposition. It takes a while to reach a scene that crackles with excitement: the meeting between Parzival (now world famous as the lead contender) and Sorrento, the head of IOI. The latter tries to recruit Parzival; when he fails, he issues and executes a death threat. Wade’s trailer is demolished, his relatives killed; luckily Wade was not at home. Too bad this is the dramatic high point. Parzival threads his way between more ’80s games and movies to gain the other keys; it’s clever but not exciting. Even a romance with another avatar and the ultimate “epic throwdown” fail to stir the blood.
Too much puzzle-solving, not enough suspense.Pub Date: Aug. 16, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-307-88743-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: April 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
Suspenseful and snarky with surprising emotional depths.
This debut novel, the first of a projected trilogy, blends science fiction, fantasy, gothic chiller, and classic house-party mystery.
Gideon Nav, a foundling of mysterious antecedents, was not so much adopted as indentured by the Ninth House, a nearly extinct noble necromantic house. Trained to fight, she wants nothing more than to leave the place where everyone despises her and join the Cohort, the imperial military. But after her most recent escape attempt fails, she finally gets the opportunity to depart the planet. The heir and secret ruler of the Ninth House, the ruthless and prodigiously talented bone adept Harrowhark Nonagesimus, chooses Gideon to serve her as cavalier primary, a sworn bodyguard and aide de camp, when the undying Emperor summons Harrow to compete for a position as a Lyctor, an elite, near-immortal adviser. The decaying Canaan House on the planet of the absent Emperor holds dark secrets and deadly puzzles as well as a cheerfully enigmatic priest who provides only scant details about the nature of the competition...and at least one person dedicated to brutally slaughtering the competitors. Unsure of how to mix with the necromancers and cavaliers from the other Houses, Gideon must decide whom among them she can trust—and her doubts include her own necromancer, Harrow, whom she’s loathed since childhood. This intriguing genre stew works surprisingly well. The limited locations and narrow focus mean that the author doesn’t really have to explain how people not directly attached to a necromantic House or the military actually conduct daily life in the Empire; hopefully future installments will open up the author’s creative universe a bit more. The most interesting aspect of the novel turns out to be the prickly but intimate relationship between Gideon and Harrow, bound together by what appears at first to be simple hatred. But the challenges of Canaan House expose other layers, beginning with a peculiar but compelling mutual loyalty and continuing on to other, more complex feelings, ties, and shared fraught experiences.
Suspenseful and snarky with surprising emotional depths.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-31319-5
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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