An enjoyable, post-apocalypse mind romp featuring technologically bred demigods, future Stone Age tribes, and supercilious...
Long after an asteroid nearly erases Earth’s civilization, an artificial intelligence guardian and the archived intellect of a genius must deal with the arrival of large, caterpillarlike alien colonists.
In this sci-fi novel, much-married Albert “Rudy” Rudyard Goldstein earns wealth and esteem for helping heal Earth’s abused environment. Near death, the brilliant but cantankerous fellow rejects having his neural matter uploaded and his mind rendered practically immortal. But after he dies, a doctor and his cousin, an AI expert, do it anyway. Rudy, mildly annoyed, finds himself a disembodied consciousness entrusted to a resourceful, self-sustaining AI computer presence called Mnemosyne (whom he nicknames Nessie). Rudy eventually has a diversion, as an asteroid collision mostly ends terrestrial civilization. A million years later, Rudy, Nessie, and their mound-shaped complex are Earth’s last remnants of advanced technology. The local, primitive tribes worship Nessie as a goddess. In these diminished circumstances, humanity finally has alien first contact with a race called the Jadderbadians. They are tall, segmented, caterpillarlike creatures, not really evil but disposed to regarding Homo sapiens as little more than pets and slaves (if the name Arrogant Worms didn’t already belong to a Canadian band, these beings would have it). When Nessie’s surveillance drones are discovered, the stage is set for a confrontation. Jadderbadian scientist Morticue Ambergrand—slightly more broad-minded than his cohorts—makes Rudy’s acquaintance in a startlingly close way. Raham (Confessions of a Time Traveler, 2015), prolific in generating science books for school-age readers, turns his considerable talent and vision to a grown-up, seriocomic sci-fi narrative. The arch tone should remind readers of Kurt Vonnegut, although Raham is better grounded in exobiology and science and displays a more upbeat outlook for the human (and nonhuman) condition in this engaging tale. That said, hard-sci-fi fans may cock an eyebrow over how the author introduces the planetwide conscious entities, Gaia (for Earth) and Hydra (the corresponding spirit of Jadderbad), who also take active roles. The result is a bit like Arthur C. Clarke’s big-think mind stretchers, laden with wisecracking insults and the occasional dirty joke.
An enjoyable, post-apocalypse mind romp featuring technologically bred demigods, future Stone Age tribes, and supercilious worms.Pub Date: March 11, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-9968819-4-4
Page Count: 248
Publisher: Penstemon Publications
Review Posted Online: May 18, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
