An uncompromising cautionary tale with bold notions about how the government of Earth ought to conduct itself.
Belligerent states on Earth get their just deserts from an intergalactic enforcer in Roberto’s sci-fi thriller.
Robert Benson—astrophysicist, quantum mechanics expert, professor, survivor, narrator—first experienced a visitation to Earth by an alien emissary from the Association of Planets in 1951, when he was nine years old. Though distant, the Association was troubled by Earth’s warring tendencies and sought to bring peace. But the American government was in no mood—politicians and their military-industrial cronies were getting rich off war. When the emissary leaves, the government viciously works to erase all memory of the visit. In particular, it persecutes Benson’s mother, who had become close of the emissary, Klaatu. Benson, now 70, is on hand to witness the consequences as the Association sends a destroyer to wipe out all nuclear capabilities of Earth, and a significant portion of its population. Roberto sets forth the proceedings with a good dash of retro color—a flying saucer and a monster robot complete with helmet-head and visor, “a horrible, but magnificent sight”—plenty of suspense, a disturbing canvas of the world’s nuclear landscape and a fondness for goosey modifiers (“ravening terror”), with the elements working together to develop the pleasing, melodramatic timbre of comic books. Along the way, Benson offers a handful of pointed opinions about lawyers (“the ruin of us all”), how to conduct war (Major Holloway: “[I]t should be waged as such until every last one of your enemy is destroyed…men, women, and children.” Benson: “Well said, Major Holloway.”) and the fathomless evil of politicians. This all makes him an intriguing, complicated figure, to say the least: a libertarian constitutionalist whose farewell speech—he’s off to Muurae, Klaatu’s home planet—could have been written by Orwell: “If the people of Earth fail to proceed along the path of peaceful existence, if you fail to follow the Association of Planets guidelines and regulations toward a new peaceful and prosperous Earth,” well, the peaceniks in the Association will blow you to smithereens.
An uncompromising cautionary tale with bold notions about how the government of Earth ought to conduct itself.Pub Date: March 27, 2010
ISBN: 978-1450063944
Page Count: 152
Publisher: Xlibris
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2010
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
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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