A mostly successful book that favors clever atmosphere over plot.
Crime novelist Gischler (Shotgun Opera, 2006, etc.) takes his first stab at science fiction with this goofy but engaging tale of life after the end of the world.
Nine years after the apocalypse, former insurance salesman Mortimer Tate emerges from his cabin in the Tennessee mountains to rejoin the world and finds it a chaotic, dangerous place. Decimated by plague, earthquakes and nuclear war (all of which Gischler dispatches in less than two pages), the United States has descended into feudalism and barbaric nastiness, as is often the case in post-apocalyptic novels. Gischler offers a sometimes awkward balance of disturbing looks into the dark recesses of human nature (rape, cannibalism and slavery all play prominent roles in this new world) and jaunty, lighthearted takes on surviving the collapse of civilization. Nothing quite lives up to the gonzo promise of the title, although a chain of strip clubs known as Joey Armageddon’s Sassy A-Go-Go is posited as the key element in the rebuilding of society. Like a sort of post-apocalyptic Candide, Mortimer bumbles through various self-contained cultures, including a surreal interlude at a mental hospital and a visit with some disturbingly banal flesh-eaters. Sometimes it’s a bit too over the top, but the pace remains brisk throughout, and everyman Mortimer is a likable protagonist, remaining steadfast even as it becomes more and more apparent that he would have been better off just staying hidden away in his secluded bunker. As the story builds to its climax, with Mortimer tracking down his ex-wife, Gischler focuses a little too much on action over character and the amusing plot details that make most of the book so much fun to read.
A mostly successful book that favors clever atmosphere over plot.Pub Date: July 8, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-4165-5225-3
Page Count: 336
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Satisfying on all levels of the reading experience: thrilling, emotionally resonant, and cerebral. Escape to Witch Mountain...
The product of a long-running alchemical experiment, twins Roger and Dodger struggle to understand their unique circumstances and gain control over them.
In the late 19th century, ambitious young alchemist Asphodel Baker tried to rewrite reality to create a better world. She set in motion a long-range plan to incarnate the alchemical Doctrine of Ethos, encoding her scheme in a series of children’s books destined to become classics. In the present day, the considerably more ruthless James Reed, who is her creation and her killer, breeds twins designed to each incarnate half of the Doctrine; once they have fully matured, united, and manifested as “the living force that holds the universe together,” he will seize their power to control everything. Failed experiments are terminated. Roger Middleton, brilliant with languages, develops a strange telepathic connection with Dodger Cheswich, a math genius living across the country from him. Despite all of Reed’s brutal and covert efforts to keep the pair apart so their abilities will flower fully, they cannot help re-encountering each other and then separating in the wake of tragedy. Their attempts to avoid becoming one of Reed’s failures force them to draw upon their more arcane powers: Roger can persuade people—and reality itself—to bend to his wishes, while Dodger can actually reverse time back to a certain fixed point. With the help of Erin, the living incarnation of Order, they must craft the timeline that allows them to survive long enough to realize their potential. Books that include magic range across a spectrum that puts rules-based, logical magic on one end and serendipitous magic with no obvious cause or structure on the other. This book falls intriguingly far on the logic end; with its experiments and protocols, it redefines what is typically meant by science fantasy. If there’s a flaw in McGuire's (That Ain’t Witchcraft, 2019, etc.) gripping story, it’s that it isn't clear how Reed could really gain complete control over the Doctrine long term, nor why Reed’s followers actually believe that he would cede any of the Doctrine’s power were he to gain it.
Satisfying on all levels of the reading experience: thrilling, emotionally resonant, and cerebral. Escape to Witch Mountain for grown-ups.Pub Date: May 7, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-19552-4
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Feb. 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
With its bug-eyed monsters, one might think Dune was written thirty years ago; it has a fantastically complex schemata and...
This future space fantasy might start an underground craze.
It feeds on the shades of Edgar Rice Burroughs (the Martian series), Aeschylus, Christ and J.R. Tolkien. The novel has a closed system of internal cross-references, and features a glossary, maps and appendices dealing with future religions and ecology. Dune itself is a desert planet where a certain spice liquor is mined in the sands; the spice is a supremely addictive narcotic and control of its distribution means control of the universe. This at a future time when the human race has reached a point of intellectual stagnation. What is needed is a Messiah. That's our hero, called variously Paul, then Muad'Dib (the One Who Points the Way), then Kwisatz Haderach (the space-time Messiah). Paul, who is a member of the House of Atreides (!), suddenly blooms in his middle teens with an ability to read the future and the reader too will be fascinated with the outcome of this projection.
With its bug-eyed monsters, one might think Dune was written thirty years ago; it has a fantastically complex schemata and it should interest advanced sci-fi devotees.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1965
ISBN: 0441013597
Page Count: 411
Publisher: Chilton
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1965
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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