A sometimes-diverting dystopian fantasy with an unconvincing romance and inconsistent politics.
A bisexual, teenage slave squares off against the combined might of church and state with the help of his rich husband in this sci-fi thriller.
This second installment of Coulter’s (Chronicles of Spartak: Rising Son, 2016) series finds 17-year-old Spartak Jones, an Olympic gold medalist gymnast with divine pectorals and long blond tresses, on a honeymoon in orbit around Earth with his 19-year-old quadrillionaire husband, Zinc McClain, leader of the Twelve Families plutocracy. Zinc is technically Spartak’s owner, per a U.S. Supreme Court decision reinstituting slavery, but their relationship is portrayed as loving and egalitarian. In 2116’s neo-feudal America, where “barronials” lord over oppressed “downers” and democracy has been debased by the philosophies of Ayn Rand and Donald Trump, Spartak is a symbol of liberation to the oppressed masses. In many passages, characters praise him as “the most famous and lethal warrior on the planet” with an “endless supply of energy and goodness”; they toast his common touch, ponder his pronouncements on religious liberty, and applaud his “wondrous” interpretations of Frédéric Chopin’s and Franz Liszt’s works. Alas, there are distractions from Spartak-olatry: a military coup takes over the U.S. government; Dominionist theocrats attack barronials and kidnap Spartak’s siblings; and, most entertainingly, Spartak’s in-laws even sell him to a Marrakesh house of ill repute. Spartak fights back, assisted by Zinc’s limitless wealth, enormous private army, and invisible weapons. Throughout the book, Spartak often comes off as an overhyped, idealized character. However, when the book stops worshipping him long enough to throw in some conflict, Coulter pens some lively action scenes. Vigorous supporting characters also add some spice to the story. But the two romantic leads are a boring couple, and readers may find that their callow canoodling is far less arousing than their prurient weaponry: “I extracted the floppy plasteel sword from its hiding place in my belt….the sword lengthened, thickened, erect, hard, glowing and lethal.” Readers also may not buy that a master-slave marriage could possibly be as rapturous and non-exploitative as Spartak’s allegedly is—and may also feel that it undermines the novel’s soapboxing about equality and democracy.
A sometimes-diverting dystopian fantasy with an unconvincing romance and inconsistent politics.Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9966473-3-5
Page Count: 286
Publisher: Jubilation Media
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
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
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