A dense but often engrossing tale, grounded in a relatable love affair.
Buxton offers an SF story about interplanetary love triumphing, despite the odds.
Dina Bellaire is a beautiful Terran scientist residing on the planet Wakanreo, immersed in an alien civilization in which her own people occupy a complex and controversial role. In Wakanrean culture, romantic relationships are formed through shahgunrah—a once-in-a-lifetime experience in which two participants are unified in a physical and psychological connection; if Wakanreans can’t find such a connection, they become ill. Terrans are capable of eliciting a similar passion in Wakanreans, called glashunrah, without experiencing its throes themselves. Both cultures believe that humans and Wakanreans can’t experience the reciprocal union of shahgunrah. However, Dina and a Wakanrean named Kuaron Du instantly feel an unusually passionate connection when they first meet, and soon, Dina is pregnant with twins. The shahgunrah they share gives rise to fear and discrimination that puts Dina’s life in danger. When the Wakanreans develop a vaccine that will remove Terrans’ ability to inspire glashunrah in Wakanrean people, Dina is compelled by lawto accept the treatment, even if it jeopardizes her shahgunrahai with Kauron Du. Fans of SF romance are certain to appreciate Buxton’s vivid, imaginative landscape, which she populates with thoughtful cultural elements and extensively detailed history. That said, this complex story is replete with political machinations and legal proceedings, which may not be to all readers’ tastes, and casual readers may feel overwhelmed by the sheer volume of new terms and concepts, despite the included glossary. Still, readers will feel truly immersed in the religion, values, and technology of Wakanreo and appreciate the relevance of Buxton’s depiction of a couple fighting for their relationship in a climate of intolerance in this thought-provoking work.
A dense but often engrossing tale, grounded in a relatable love affair.Pub Date: Jan. 25, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9979898-2-3
Page Count: 387
Publisher: Cracked Mirror Press
Review Posted Online: March 17, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
This rip-roaring romp pivots between past and present and posits the future-altering power of love, hope, and forgiveness.
A time-toying spy romance that’s truly a thriller.
In the author’s note following the moving conclusion of her gripping, gleefully delicious debut novel, Bradley explains how she gathered historical facts about Lt. Graham Gore, a real-life Victorian naval officer and polar explorer, then “extrapolated a great deal” about him to come up with one of her main characters, a curly-haired, chain-smoking, devastatingly charming dreamboat who has been transported through time. Having also found inspiration in the sole extant daguerreotype of Gore, showing him to have been “a very attractive man,” Bradley wrote the earliest draft of the book for a cluster of friends who were similarly passionate about polar explorers. Her finished novel—taut, artfully unspooled, and vividly written—retains the kind of insouciant joy and intimacy you might expect from a book with those origins. It’s also breathtakingly sexy. The time-toggling plot focuses on the plight of a British civil servant who takes a high-paying job on a secret mission, working as a “bridge” to help time-traveling “expats” resettle in 21st-century London—and who falls hard for her charge, the aforementioned Commander Gore. Drama, intrigue, and romance ensue. And while this quasi-futuristic tale of time and tenderness never seems to take itself too seriously, it also offers a meaningful, nuanced perspective on the challenges we face, the choices we make, and the way we live and love today.
This rip-roaring romp pivots between past and present and posits the future-altering power of love, hope, and forgiveness.Pub Date: May 7, 2024
ISBN: 9781668045145
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Avid Reader Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 3, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
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