An increasingly madcap conclusion to an eco-themed SF saga of a weary Earth chafing under its alien tenants.
In Raham’s SF novel, long after an asteroid apocalypse has erased human civilization from Earth, various alien interlopers compel the planet’s guardian spirit to take drastic measures.
The author continues his tongue-in-cheek Dead Genius SF series, launched with A Singular Prophecy (2011). Earth has, for eons, been either settled or seeded by space-traveling civilizations that largely rise and fall haphazardly while myopically failing to note the others’ existence or respect other forms of intelligence. Following an asteroid strike that ended the present human era, Earth was colonized by the Jadderbadians, insect-folk who spend most of their long lives in worm/maggot stages. Their religion blinds many of them to the truth that the scruffy Earth “primates” who serve as their pets (or irritate them as pests) are actually remnants of advanced Homo sapiens. Among the other exotic races and entities in the mix is Gaidra, a planetary consciousness annoyed by the eco-injuries inflicted by all the egocentric life forms fixated on their own greed, grandeur, and procreation. Only a few comprehend the Big Picture, including the digitized personality of Rudy Goldstein, a tech genius who was (unwillingly) turned into sentient code after his biological death, and Mnemosyne, Rudy’s AI caretaker, who presents herself to the degraded remaining humans as the Spider Woman, a tribal goddess (“They say she lives in a metal mountain and speaks to them in times of great danger”). An imminent seismic disaster means they all must unite to survive. Raham uses the book’s complicated setup for clever excursions into exobiology, interspecies culture-clash farce, evolutionary eccentricity, catastrophism comedy, and SF in-jokes (oh, was that a Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy reference that just went by?). The finale is more like a series cast-reunion frolic, and the weird science becomes quite a potluck party, though the ultimate message is clear: Even the most bizarrely divergent beasties should cooperate for the common good. New readers to the series will particularly appreciate the author’s drawings, charts, and timelines, which should offset some confusion.
An increasingly madcap conclusion to an eco-themed SF saga of a weary Earth chafing under its alien tenants.Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2023
ISBN: 9780962630132
Page Count: 218
Publisher: Biostration
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2023
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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