by A.W. Daniels ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 24, 2012
After an unhurried start, this debut switches gears into an inventive, intriguing novel.
Daniels’ blend of sci-fi and religious allegory explores the development of an entirely new, undoubtedly superior species of human.
Mary and Joe Christianson believe Dr. Benjamin Gabriel has finally answered their prayers for a baby. Dr. Gabriel, a friend and fertility specialist in Bethlehem, Pa., is supremely confident about his new procedure. He even asks the Christiansons to list their preferred physical traits for a child. Although they know that the doctor’s treatments are considered classified by the government, Mary and Joe are thrilled when the procedure helps them finally have a healthy baby boy, whom they name Justice. When Justice begins speaking and walking at only 5 months old, they enroll him in the school affiliated with Dr. Gabriel’s clinic to determine whether he’s gifted. He is, but so are the majority of his schoolmates. Mary and Joe eventually start asking questions and learn that Dr. Gabriel’s procedures are not merely successful—he’s actually created an improved species of human called Homo selectus. As the result of a genetically enhanced embryo, Justice is a member of the new species. The “children” of Dr. Gabriel’s program, who develop at an alarming rate, are fully mature by age 10. They are assigned work in highly specialized jobs at top companies and the government. Looming over them, however, is the threat that nefarious parties will exploit their abilities. Daniels skillfully develops the sense of threat from both outside groups and the top officials within Dr. Gabriel’s program. The pace, which tends to languish when discussing Mary and Joe, accelerates when following the children’s physical development, personal relationships and outsized intelligence. The novel focuses on a child named Jackson, who becomes a secret agent in Syria. Although his adventures seem divergent at first, they quickly cultivate suspense. Daniels’ prose can be awkward or too elaborate. For example, in describing Mary’s eyes Daniels writes, “those who were captured by those mesmerizing, cobalt spheres often lost track of time itself, having to be shaken to consciousness by Mary’s next unintended victim.” But these bumps will likely be overlooked in favor of the animated plot and thoughtful questions posed about genetic manipulation.
After an unhurried start, this debut switches gears into an inventive, intriguing novel.Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2012
ISBN: 978-1475942088
Page Count: 214
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Rebecca Yarros ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 2, 2023
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
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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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