A tale of a once-and-futuristic king that combines juvenile adventure elements and more mature intrigue.
In Hickman’s latest SF series entry, an Earth teenager who’s also the king of the Milky Way galaxy prepares to defend his massive realm against an ancient enemy dragon.
“So many things have changed since I've left home, and it's only been about ten months,” understates young Richard Plantagenet in this continuation of a saga begun with Richard: Distant Son(2022). Until recently, he was Richard Drumm, a small-town Ohio teenager; then he found out that he’s the hereditary heir to the throne of a galactic kingdom. This spacefaring destiny has been brewing for 1,000 years, ever since his royal grandfather and immediate family members died due to a conspiracy by a jealous usurper. The revelation that a boy from Earth—a despised planet—carries the crucial Plantagenet DNA has led to much plotting and scheming; although many planets of the realm celebrate the return of the monarchy, the power-hungry Senator Spartacus and his conniving family want to take control themselves. In this installment, they launch a conspiracy to abduct and murder the teen, but are unaware that the boy’s steadfast guardian—an artificial alien lifeform, or AAL—has created an emergency duplicate of Richard, dubbed Henry, for just such occasions. Richard and Henry are switched, but the price of escape turns out to be a steep one. The Spartacus household sends an assassin among the foxlike citizens of the planet Beowulf to kill Richard’s pregnant queen, Amber. However, the essential function of the Plantagenet king is to enact a once-a-millennium defense of the galaxy, partnering with satyrs and flying horses against a banished species of long-lived, teleporting dragons. The barrier between the dragon’s prison dimension and the capital world of Krel is thinning, and Richard must do his duty.
Blending SF, mythic fantasy, not-very-hard science, and references to Hollywood SF properties (even the TV series Sliders gets a shoutout), the epic narrative offers readers a mixture of the sophisticated and the jejeune. The latter aspect is sometimes abetted by close encounters of the bathroom-humor kind; one such moment elicits this reaction: “Richard almost lost his breakfast. ‘You have got to be kidding me!’ ” There are still some unanswered questions, carried over from the series’ inception, about mighty beings who transcend time and space and oversee everything with godlike authority; they include AAL’s mentor, Olaf, an ordinary-looking old man in a battered hat who’s invisible to most. There are deeper themes at work amid the action and menagerie of unusual creatures: Human beings are portrayed as having run the Milky Way government for centuries, mainly for their own benefit, and marginalizing a vast number of other intelligent species along the way (including rabbit folk, multi-limbed extraterrestrials, merpeople, and centaurs, among others). Fair-minded Richard not only launches his progressive reign with inclusivity in government and society, but also mates with foxlike alien Amber, which many consider taboo. As such, readers should be prepared for references to interspecies sexual couplings and sperm-related procedures, as well as profanity.
A tale of a once-and-futuristic king that combines juvenile adventure elements and more mature intrigue.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2022
ISBN: 979-8985477788
Page Count: 378
Publisher: RedFoxOnHigh
Review Posted Online: Aug. 3, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A laugh-out-loud “why choose?” romance of intergalactic proportions.
What’s worse: to be killed by a lion or dropped on a strange planet and forced into an alien breeding program?
Dorothy Valentine had a happy career in wildlife biology, studying meerkats in their native environment and living on her own terms. That is, until a hungry lion decided to make her into lunchmeat. Abducted from Earth at the moment of her death—along with the lion who attacked her—Dory becomes Subject 4 in an alien research project. The goal: to extend the life of the Sankado species, whose females were left behind on their dying home planet. With "a few modifications," Dory is a prime candidate for Sankado breeding…except for the secret birth control implant in her arm. To make matters more complicated, she hooks up with two Sankado men, Sol and Lok, while under the influence of an alien love serum, becoming their Zhali—a mate for life. Luckily, they don’t mind sharing Dory or one another. Just when their three-way honeymoon is about to kick off, however, Lok’s old enemy rears his ugly head, putting all of their lives in peril. Lemming’s characterization really shines here. Sassy Dory, sensitive and whip-smart Sol, and the dominant, flirtatious Lok all feel fully realized, as do Toto and Intern—the lion who tried to eat Dory and the birdlike alien responsible for observing her. The sex scenes are spicy, if perhaps too few and far between, and the dialogue is snappy and realistic.
A laugh-out-loud “why choose?” romance of intergalactic proportions.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9780593818633
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Berkley
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An ambitious but plodding space odyssey.
Having survived a disastrous deep space mission in 2038, three asteroid miners plan a return to their abandoned ship to save two colleagues who were left behind.
Though bankrolled through a crooked money laundering scheme, their original project promised to put in place a program to reduce the CO2 levels on Earth, ease global warming, and pave the way for the future. The rescue mission, itself unsanctioned, doesn't have a much better chance of succeeding. All manner of technical mishaps, unplanned-for dangers, and cutthroat competition for the precious resources from the asteroid await the three miners. One of them has cancer. The international community opposes the mission, with China, Russia, and the United States sending questionable "observers" to the new space station that gets built north of the moon for the expedition. And then there is Space Titan Jack Macy, a rogue billionaire threatening to grab the riches. (As one character says, "It's a free universe.") Suarez's basic story is a good one, with tense moments, cool robot surrogates, and virtual reality visions. But too much of the novel consists of long, sometimes bloated stretches of technical description, discussions of newfangled financing for "off-world" projects, and at least one unneeded backstory. So little actually happens that fixing the station's faulty plumbing becomes a significant plot point. For those who want to know everything about "silicon photovoltaics" and "orthostatic intolerance," Suarez's latest SF saga will be right up their alley. But for those itching for less talk and more action, the book's many pages of setup become wearing.
An ambitious but plodding space odyssey.Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2023
ISBN: 978-0-593-18363-2
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2022
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