Ice

Ice by Anna Kavan, 193 pages

"In this haunting and surreal novel, the narrator and a man known as the warden search for an elusive girl in a frozen, seemingly post-nuclear, apocalyptic landscape. The country has been invaded and is being governed by a secret organization. There is destruction everywhere; great walls of ice overrun the world. Together with the narrator, the reader is swept into a hallucinatory quest for this strange and fragile creature with albino hair. Acclaimed upon its 1967 publication as the best science fiction book of the year, this extraordinary and innovative novel has subsequently been recognized as a major work of literature in its own right." Summary courtesy of Goodreads

There is a plot to the novel but it is loose. In fact, it can be hard to keep track of what is going on because of the hallucinations. But that seems to be the point. It is a psychological examination of destruction and control. It's about what might happen at the end of the world.

It is notable that no characters are named. The prose is beautiful. The forward and afterword help give background and context to the novel. I would recommend this to those like science fiction and those that like literary fiction.

Good Omens

Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman     412 pages

According to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch (the world's only completely accurate book of prophecies, written in 1655, before she exploded), the world will end on a Saturday. Next Saturday, in fact. Just before dinner.

So the armies of Good and Evil are amassing, Atlantis is rising, frogs are falling, tempers are flaring. Everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan. Except a somewhat fussy angel and a fast-living demon—both of whom have lived amongst Earth's mortals since The Beginning and have grown rather fond of the lifestyle—are not actually looking forward to the coming Rapture.

And someone seems to have misplaced the Antichrist . . . 

This was an interesting read - it took me a while to get into it and get used to the format of the book. If you're not a fan of constantly switching pov, then you might want to skip this, because there is a large cast of characters and many of them get at least a little portion of the text from their perspective. In this way, it was a bit tricky remembering people as you read the book, especially if they were just a minor character and they popped up early in the book and many not again until much later. In this way, I think the movie of this book might actually be a better format for this kind of story. It will be easier to remember characters, for one, but also the humor that Pratchett and Gaiman employ might come off better told from actual people than being read on a page. The humor was another thing that made it difficult for me to absolutely love this book. I guess since I'm not British, some of the humor just went over my head. Also, because I'm not as familiar with certain customs or companies that were either real and mentioned or parodied, it didn't come off as funny to me, per say. There were also lots of references and playing off of Biblical subject matter, and since I did not grow up learning Biblical subject matter, a lot more might have gone over my head. However, there were some pretty funny bits and I did enjoy a good portion of the book. All in all, it was fun read, but it didn't roll along easily for me. I definitely read it in chunks. I would recommend it, but only to people who I think this humor would go over well with.

Mortal Engines

Mortal Engines, Philip Reeve, 296 pages

London is hunting again, making its way across what was once Europe on a headlong dash to who-knows-where, hardly pausing to snap up smaller towns along the way, and 15-year-old Tom Natsworthy, Assistant Historian, Third Class, is delighted. Is it not natural that town should eat town, and Municipal Darwinism spread across the globe? But when he interrupts an assassination attempt on Head Historian Thaddeus Valentine and is cast out of London along with the would-be murderer, the horribly scarred Hester Shaw, he must question everything he thought he believed in.

The trailer for the upcoming movie adaptation came out a fewweeks ago, and I knew I had to re-read one of my favorite YA novels of all time. It’s a dark, but hopeful, satire of consumerism, patriotism, and warfare, set thousands of years after the old, mad American Empire bombed itself and much of the rest of the world into oblivion – the Sixty Minute War. The worldbuilding is perhaps my favorite part of the book, and it’s usually how I describe Mortal Engines when recommending it to friends: massive Traction Cities rumbling across the land, leaving churned mud in their wake; patched-together airships with crews of sky pirates trading relics of long-dead civilizations, such as idols of Mickey and Pluto, the animal-headed gods of old America; the Shield-Wall of Batmunkh Gompa sheltering the Anti-Traction League, or “Mossies” (as in, a rolling stone gathers no moss); the terrible spectre of Grike, the Resurrected Man, with his metallic screech of a voice, the last remnant of the Lazarus Brigade. Mortal Engines is a masterpiece. I highly recommend it, and I hope that the movie does it justice.

NB: Many reviews call Mortal Engines steampunk. It's not steampunk – there's no steam engines. Just like Mad Max, it's more appropriately called dieselpunk.

Our Dark Duet

Our Dark Duet, Victoria Schwab, 510 pages, audiobook length 10:32:00

After her father’s death and the fall of his regime, Kate has fled to Prosperity to hunt new kinds of monsters. August has been thrust into a leadership role in the Flynn Task Force and struggles to suppress his humanity as his brother’s voice whispers in his ear. Sloane, once thought dead, has survived and taken over half of Verity with the aid of Alice, a monster born of Kate’s act of violence. The war has come to a stalemate, until Kate stumbles across a brand-new monster that sows chaos wherever it goes.

As I read this book I kept repeating to myself: “Negative character development is still character development.” But no matter how much I reminded myself of that, there’s only so much bleakness I can handle, and this book really pushed the limits. I’m honestly having a hard time writing this review because I am so glad to finally be done. Kate spends most of the book fighting against a supernatural murderous rage that wells up inside her; August is a hollow shell, and the more he feeds, the hollower he becomes; Sloane of course is a blood-soaked nightmare; and I am so tired. Dear reader: call it quits after This Savage Song and pretend there’s a happy-ever-after in this world.

Shards and Ashes

Shards and Ashes, ed. Melissa Marr & Kelley Armstrong, 369 pages

This is a collection of short stories, all of a dystopian or post-apocalyptic bent. They are of varying quality, and some definitely felt like they were meant to tie in to larger works, which is in my opinion usually a mistake in a short story collection. Additionally, several of them felt like they hurried through their plot – “Pale Rider” by Nancy Holder in particular felt rather disjointed, which admittedly may have been deliberate given the nature of the story (time is falling apart due to a magical intrusion) but came across as just rushed and sloppy. However, some of them were quite good. I enjoyed “Hearken” by Veronica Roth tremendously, set in a world full of bioterrorist attacks, where Hearkeners can listen to the songs of people’s lives or deaths, though I found the pseudoscientific explanation for this ability somewhat lacking and wish Roth had just glossed over that aspect entirely.

This Savage Song

This Savage Song, Victoria Schwab, 427 pages, audiobook length 10:09:00


Verity is a city of monsters. Every act of violence casts a shadow, and these shadows stand up and walk. And kill. Kate Harker’s father rules one half of the city, where people pay for safety, and August Flynn’s parents rule the other half, where people fight for it. But August is a monster himself, the rarest kind, a soul-eater, who can pass for human, and he’s been tasked with spying on Kate at her new school. As the frail truce beween the Harkers and Flynns threatens to collapse, the two teenagers attempt to unravel the secrets that threaten not only their lives and their city, but their souls.

I enjoyed this book quite a lot. Schwab is skilled at taking simple concepts and building a compelling story out of them: though the plot was fairly straightforward and at times even predictable, that’s not necessarily a bad thing, especially when written with the skill that the author brings to the table. There were a few minor points that strained my suspension of disbelief, though. There is a scene where the school counselor gives Kate anxiety medicine with no prescription, just hands over a bottle of pills, which I found completely ridiculous, especially as it has no payoff with regards to either the plot or her character arc. However, generally I thought this book was well-written and enjoyable, and I look forward to reading the sequel.

A Meeting at Corvallis: Emberverse Book III

A Meeting at Corvallis, S.M. Stirling, 497 pages, audiobook length 23:07:05


On March 17, 1998, at 6:15 EST, all advanced technology in the world stopped working – nuclear power, gunpowder, electricity, internal combustion engines, steam engines, all mysteriously dead, causing mass chaos and death from starvation and disease. In Dies the Fire, the first book in the Emberverse series, the Pacific Northwest began to reform into several new nations – the Bearkillers, led by the Bearlord Mike Havel, the Clan Mackenzie, led by the Witch Queen Juniper Mackenzie, and the Portland Protective Association, led by the tyrannical Lord Protector Norman Arminger. Ten years later, things have stabilized – the cannibal Eaters have mostly been wiped out, and there are no more mass dyings, but the nations are at each other’s throats. Arminger threatens the uneasy peace, and only the capture of his daughter has kept him at bay – but for how long?

Stirling’s exploration of how ordinary people react to extraordinary times is both charming and chilling in turn – the Clan Mackenzie, for example, is a neopagan utopia, where the folk live in harmony with the land and each other, whereas the Protectorate is a feudal dictatorship characterized by mistreatment and exploitation of the serfs who farm the lands. It’s difficult to tell if Stirling sees feudalism as inevitable and advantageous or merely a simple way of decentralizing government in an era without high-speed travel or communication, and in the long run the series probably suffers for this confusion – there is a strong running theme of the importance of a powerful leader to the development and improvement of a society. The books make an effort at diversity (one major and several supporting characters are gay, and there are a couple people of color, as well as a good number of powerful women), and as such probably deserves the tag of "diverse reads", but they aren’t always written with the care and tact one would hope for, something that unfortunately gets much worse as the series progresses onwards from this point.

It’s difficult to know whether to recommend this book. The concept of ancient technologies re-engineered with modern sensibilities is certainly fascinating, especially to this blogger – Arminger especially is often hampered by his devotion to purely historical methods, ignoring advances in engineering and social structuring even when they would benefit him, and the Bearkillers blend old and new with startling effect – but the frequent graphic violence (and in Dies the Fire, sexual violence) and mishandling of diversity issues certainly bear considering before starting this series.

The Knowledge

The Knowledge by Lewis Dartnell, 340 pages

In The Knowledge, Lewis Dartnell attempts to write a basic, bare-bones instruction manual for how to rebuild civilization from the ground up, in the event of a world-ending catastrophe, starting with agriculture and working up to radios, advanced chemistry, and navigation.

Unlike many post-apocalyptic how-to guides, this book is not intended to be a survival manual per se – it lacks critical detail, serving more as a surface-level introduction to various concepts essential (or at the least useful) for the development of human civilization, jump-starting “the Reboot” and leapfrogging over centuries of slow progress. Dartnell spends less than one chapter on survival techniques for immediately after a collapse, but the book doesn’t suffer for it.

Where The Knowledge really shines is its exploration of simple chemistry using the most basic of technologies, then using that simple chemistry as a gateway to access more complicated and elaborate chemical and industrial processes. For example, wood ash can be easily processed into potassium carbonate, which be added to boiling fats to produce soap, to vinegar to help fix dye into cloth, or to fields to help fertilize them. With some more slightly more complicated chemistry, it even helps produce the materials for simple photography.

The main issue with The Knowledge is that it is too short by half. Dartnell obviously cannot give a summary of every piece of knowledge necessary for modern civilization, but he barely touches on some absolutely critical technologies (there is only a single mention of plumbing for sanitation, which omission completely boggles the mind), and completely ignores many simple intermediary technologies that would be easily achievable by a “rebooting” society (such as simple solar devices like the solar water heater, or many pedal-powered tools invented in the late 19^th and early 20^th century). Perhaps a sequel is in order.

Rules of the Game

Rules of the Game by James Frey and Nils Johnson-Shelton (3
 stars, hardback, 327 pages)

This book is the third and final chapter of the Endgame Trilogy.
 Over the course of this series, twelve teenage representatives of the bloodlines of ancient civilizations compete in a life or death struggle to find and unite three keys and win salvation for their line. As this book begins, seven players are still alive with one very close to winning. The rules have changed, though, and their purpose for playing is not the same as it was when they started.

I loved the rapid pace of the action, and the apocalypse theme.
 (I think “disaster science fiction” is closer to describing this book than the “dystopia” people like to bandy about.) I was very invested in the arc of the characters, which is why I just had to finish the series. Unfortunately, this book has significant
 weaknesses. These included the introduction of new characters to keep track of in a series driving towards a necessarily apocalyptic conclusion. Nori’s role was so small as to make me wonder why they even bothered introducing a character. Jenny’s role was so important that it should have been played by somebody with whom we were more familiar. Stella’s role in this book was as a mere plot device. The conclusion was weak, little more than a deus ex machina thinly disguised as a celebration of an ancient belief.

The biggest problem with the book is the why - what the Makers wanted to get from all of this. They conducted this genetic bloodlines thing that spanned all of human civilization, and planted these tools for the players to gather them at the right time and… do what with it? kepler 22b was obviously lying to the players and the lines about their survival, but I don’t think we ever learned what the aliens got out of the whole deal. Maybe their motive was discussed at some point in the second book that I’ve forgotten, but their stakes were not sufficiently clear to me. I’m not alone in this, as several other reviewers express the same reservation. I guess their motives were supposed to be arcane and unknowable, but it weakened the story dramatically. Perhaps Baitsakhan was right in the first book when he said “This is Endgame. There is no Why.” This is interesting/nihilistic as a philosophical idea, but pretty annoying if it’s the only motivation for an otherwise fascinating book series.

Rules of the Game is a mediocre conclusion to a series with a fascinating premise and a strong beginning, but I appreciated it anyway. I may have liked the third book more if the events of the second book were fresher in my memory.

We All Looked Up

We All Looked Up by Tommy Wallach, 370 pages

What would you do if there was a good chance that an asteroid was on target to hit the Earth, probably with devastating results for the population?  This book explores what a group of teens in Seattle do, based on the knowledge that they may only have a couple of months to live.  This story is told from the perspective of four teens, Peter, Eliza, Andy, and Anita.  Peter is the popular athlete, slated to go to Stamford on a scholarship.  Eliza is a loner whose mother left for Hawaii and father is dying of cancer.  Andy is a stoner wannabe rock star whose parents don’t seem to care what he does.  Anita is brilliant but ruled by her parents’ wishes that she go to Princeton and study something they see as lucrative, like medicine or business and have tried to stamp out her dream to study music.  These teens are completely different but end up coming together after the news of the asteroid is released.  I really liked this book although I was disappointed in the ending, but not surprised.  Teens who like realistic fiction or apocalyptic novels may like this.

Seveneves

Seveneves by Neal Stephenson, 867 pages

I’m betting that a lot of people will read this book and most will probably like it.  I found that some parts of it were a little slow but overall, it wasn’t bad.  The basic story is an end of the world scenario that comes from the moon breaking apart.  There are several parts to this story that focus on different people at different times but it’s basically about how the world can ensure that the human race will survive.  Some are sent into space, some go underground, and some go underwater.  The story is focused on the group in space but by the end, the other two groups also factor in.  It’s an interesting idea and a good story but I would have expected more action than I got.

Y the Last Man: Paper Dolls

Y the Last Man: Paper Dolls by Brian K Vaughn, 142 pages

Yorick Brown's kidnapped monkey Ampersand, is on his way to Japan. However  Yorick, Agent 355, and Alison Mann have arrived in Sydney, Australia, a fueling stop for the ship they've hitched a ride on. Yorick's maybe fiancee, Beth, is somewhere in the outback and he wants to get in touch. After convincing  355 to let him have shore leave under her chaperonage to things start happening. Meanwhile in the U.S. Yorick's gun-toting sister finds  a woman named Beth bearing what can only be Yorick's child.

This volume seemed like its main goal was to tie up loose ends, and start drawing the story towards the conclusion rather than actually progress the plot. The glimpses of back stories however were interesting, and the series continues to be worth reading. 

Y the Last Man: Girl on Girl

Y the Last Man: Girl on Girl by Brian K Vaughn, 125 pages

After two years spent crossing the U.S., Yorick and his escorts, have gone to sea. Dr. Mann has discovered the key to understanding what saved Yorick when all the other men died. The only problem though is that the key to Yorick's survival has been stolen by a Japanese mercenary.

I'm not really going to bother saying much for the review, because I feel like I'm just kind of repeating myself a bit for each of these. I will say that I'm glad they gave us a peek at how Yorick's girlfriend is faring in Australia. 

Y the Last Man: Ring of Truth

Y the Last Man: Ring of Truth by Brian K Vaughn, 188 pages

It has been more than two years since a flash plague killed all males. Yorick and his companions have finally made it to San Francisco where his unbalanced sister, Hero, finds him finally succumbing to the male-killing plague after he loses his engagement ring to agents of the Setauket Ring, a splinter group of the mysterious Culper ring. Meanwhile Dr. Mann continues running tests and believes she is closing in on the answer to Yorick's survival.

Though it begins with a relative lull this fifth book seems to accelerate the comic's pace bit, and continues to leave the reader asking questions. Meanwhile Guerra and Marzan's art continues to work well with the overall feel of this series making the extreme situations feel convincing.

Y The Last Man: Cycles, One Small Step, and Safeword

Y The Last Man: Cycles by Brian K Vaughn, 117 pages
Y The Last Man: One Small Step by Brian K Vaughn, 166 pages
Y The Last Man: Safeword by Brian K Vaughn, 141 pages

Yorick Brown, the last man on Earth, has begun making his way across the country to California where Dr. Mann hopes to figure out why he and Ampersand somehow survived the plague. However along their journey they have an unscheduled stop in the town of Marrisville, Ohio which harbors a big secret, discover that a Russian capsule from the International Space Station is coming down with possible male survivors, and Yorick gets to spend some time with the Agent 355's mysterious friend Agent 711. All the while avoiding Israeli special forces and crazed man hating cults, and keeping Yorick from exposing his identity.

So far this series continues to stay interesting, with well done excellent episodic writing, clever ideas, and characters that you actually start to care about. While the art isn't as remarkable as other graphic novels it does well in conveying the action and general tone of the series.

Y: The Last Man, Unmanned

Y: The Last Man, Unmanned by Brian K Vaughn, 126 pages

When a plague of unknown origin instantly kills every mammal with a Y chromosome it leaves only one survivor. Yorick Brown is an unemployed and unmotivated slacker is suddenly the only male left in a world inhabited entirely by women. Accompanied by his mischievous monkey Ampersand and the mysterious Agent 355, Yorick sets out on a journey across the world to find his girlfriend and discover why he is the last man on Earth. Slowing their progress though are gun-wielding wives of Republican representatives, tribes of latter-day Amazons claiming males were meant to die, and mysterious Israeli soldiers, who seem to want Yorick for their own.

Y: The Last Man, Unmanned is a great story well written with the occasional touch of humor, which does a good job of introducing the series. The artwork also seems to work pretty well with the overall story. This a good book for those who enjoy graphic novels.

Monument 14

Monument 14 by Emmy Laybourne, 294 pages

On the way to school the world seems to come to an end that morning.  Giant hail comes down and Dean’s bus driver loses control of the bus and crashes.  The bus carrying Dean’s younger brother is behind them but their driver manages to get under cover by driving the bus directly through the doors of the Greenway super store.  She then manages to help rescue the survivors of the bus crash.  So, six high school kids, two junior high kids and four elementary age kids are trapped in the store, with the Network down and no way to contact anyone.  Although it really isn’t safe, the bus driver, decides to leave the high school kids in charge and try to get to the hospital to get help, because some of the kids are injured.  Thus begins the kids’ ordeal.  They have food, but they must learn to work together in order to survive not only the storms and the release of chemicals from a nearby plant, but also the people who want to get in to the store for various reasons, mostly not good.  I really enjoyed this apocalyptic survival story and think that teens that enjoy this genre would too.

Good Omens

Good Omens : The Nice and Accurate  Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch by Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett, 412 pages

Several centuries ago, a witch by the name of Agnes Nutter predicted the future, with events culminating in an apocalypse. The time for said apocalypse has come. It will be heaven versus hell in one fantastic showdown. The Antichrist has been chosen and born. There are a few snags in the plan, though. The representatives for heaven and hell, Aziraphale and Crowley, respectively, who happen to be friends, aren't thrilled about the apocalypse and would like to figure out a way around it. The child they thought was the Antichrist was switched with a human child at birth. The four horsemen of the apocalypse have some groupies that can't decide what to call themselves.

In other words, an already crazy situation becomes even crazier. This book was very entertaining, a sort of scifi/fantasy blend, with lots of sharp wit and many actual laugh out loud portions. I'd not previously read anything by either of these authors, but I will definitely check out some more of their works.

P.S. Crowley, the representative for Hell, was definitely my favorite character in this book, driving around in his vintage Bentley, taking credit for heinous human acts that he actually had nothing to do with. :)