City of Endless Night - Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child

   2018; 374 pages.  Book 17 (out of 21) in the “Agent Pendergast” series.  New Author? : No, and No.  Genres : Suspense; Thriller.   Overall Rating: 8½/10.

 

    The body of a young women has been found in an abandoned garage in New York City, under a pile of leaves.  Well, that’s not so unusual, there are some rough neighborhoods there, and Lieutenant Vincent D’Agosta knows this is one of them.

 

    Unfortunately, the young lady has been identified, and she’s a well-known, rich, young, spoiled socialite.  Great news fodder for the local tabloids.  That’s going to put a lot of pressure on the NYPD to solve this quickly, and in particularly on D’Agosta, who’s in charge of the investigation and has just arrived at the crime scene.

 

    He’s not particularly surprised when his friend, Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast also shows up.  Pendergast has some amazing deductive talents, and D’Agosta welcomes any help he can get.  Maybe it was a mob hit.  Maybe drugs were involved.

 

    Let’s just hope it’s not the work of a serial killer.  Because whoever did this also decapitated the corpse.  And took the severed head away for some unfathomable reason.

 

What’s To Like...

    If you like the idea of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child returning to the tried-and-true formula of FBI agent Aloysius Pendergast teaming up with Lieutenant Vinnie D’Agosta to solve a series of brutal murders, you’ll love City of Endless Night.  Connie Swanson is a no-show, and Constance Greene and Laura Hayward only make cameo appearances.

 

    It’s not a spoiler to reveal that a string of murders-by-decapitation follow the initial one described above.  Pendergast’s normally reliable Holmesian deductions are stymied by a seemingly lack of killing pattern, which opens the door to possible multiple and/or copycat murderers, or even random slayings just to blur the killer's motives.

 

    There are several secondary plotlines that bolster our protagonists’ sleuthing.  Tabloid reporter Bryce Harriman decries the lack of progress in the investigation, and comes up with a whodunit theory of his own, which even Pendergast has to admit has merit.  Harriman also coins the titular phrase “City of Endless Night” to describe a city terrified by a plethora of killings that the police seem to be unable to solve.  Meanwhile, an ex-Jesuit priest stirs the passions of the populace by reinventing the historical “Bonfire of the Vanities”.  I found it fascinating how Preston & Child smoothly blended both of those plot threads into the main storyline.

 

    As with any Pendergast thriller, the pacing is quick, plot twists abound, and our protagonists teeter on becoming the next victims.  At least one recurring character in the series fails to make it to the end of the book.  I liked that the perpetrator(s) are just as cunning and resourceful as our heroes.

    The chapters are short: 66 of them plus an epilogue to cover 374 pages.  The ending is 100 pages of excitement and thrills.  Pendergast finds himself being forced to play and badly outwitted in a deadly game where only an adjustment in his usual thought processes will keep him alive.  All of the plot threads are nicely tied up.  City of Endless Night is both a standalone novel and a part of a great series.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.5*/5, based on 12,771 ratings and 1,287 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.07*/5, based on 18,763 ratings and 1,718 reviews

 

Excerpts...

    “Our private investigators have submitted a preliminary report on Harriman.”

    “Give me the short version.”

    “All reporters are of questionable character, so I’ll leave out the minor sins and peccadillos.  Aside from being a muckraking, ambulance-chasing, rumormongering, backstabbing journalist, the man is a straight arrow.  A preparatory school product who comes from old, old money—money that is petering out with his generation.  The bottom line is that he’s clean.  No prior convictions.  No drugs.”  (pg. 135)

 

    “We must understand the anomalies before we can understand the patterns in what followed.  Why, for example, did somebody take the head twenty-four hours after the girl was murdered?  Nobody seems troubled by this anymore, except for me.”

    “You really think it’s important?”

    “I think it’s vital.”  (pg. 237)

 

“It’s only hubris if I fail.” (Julius Caesar)  (pg. 258)

    The quibbles in City of Endless Night are minor.

 

    There’s a fair amount of cussing: 29 instances in the first 10% of the book.  I noted eight different cusswords utilized, including a couple of f-bombs and a sexual allusion.  Preston and Child will never be accused of penning a cozy murder-mystery novel.

 

    The character-building of Bryce Harriman is stereotypical, as shown in the first excerpt above.  Just once I’d like to see a tabloid reporter that turns out to be a valuable ally of a crime investigator.  Also, if you like the “is it natural or supernatural?” spin that Pendergast novels occasionally have, that’s totally absent here.  Lastly, dogs die.

 

    But I pick at nits.  City of Endless Night is a strong entry in the Agent Pendergast series, a real page-turner and a welcome rebound after what I considered a subpar previous offering, The Obsidian Chamber, and which is reviewed here.  But that was a rare exception to the fine books Preston & Child turn out.  I’ve been hooked on this series for several decades, and am still a half-dozen books away from being caught up.

 

    8½ Stars.  For those who think that the “Bonfire of the Vanities” scene is too outrageous to be believable, I once attended a “book/music/movie burning” here in the greater Phoenix area.  LPs, VHS tapes, and paperbacks were heaped into pile, battered by zealot wielding a sledgehammer, then put to the torch via a liberal helping of lighter fluid.  All in the name of the Jesus.  That was 30 years ago or so.  Today it's 2023, and we’re seeing an upsurge in book-banning.  A present-day “Bonfire of the Vanities” event seems to get more plausible each passing day.

A Count of Five - Erin L. Snyder

   2015; 259 pages.  Book 1 (out of 9) in the series “The Citadel of the Last Gathering”.  New Author? : Yes.  Genres: Time Travel; Fantasy; Alternate Timelines.  Overall Rating: 5½*/10.

 

    Alaji has learned a new spell!

 

    Actually, that’s not such a big deal, since magic, at least on a limited basis, is a common ability among her people.  Men learn spells to help them in combat.  Women, including Alaji, are taught household magic, such as self-weaving thread and fire-starting spells to instantly light torches.

 

    However, Alaji has figured out how to do a decidedly more powerful spell, one that allows her to travel through time.  So far, all she can do is skip back a couple seconds at a time, not a very useful talent unless, say, someone is trying to punch you.  There must be some way to make bigger time-jumps, transport others through time with her, and jump forward in time.  Alaji plans to keep experimenting with the spell until she discovers how to do these things.

 

    There is a catch in all of this.  Time-travel is considered to be “a spell of the gods”, reserved solely for deities, and forbidden to humans.  If any of Alaji’s fellow tribesmen find out she’s learned how to cast this spell, they will kill her without any hesitation.  The gods demand it.

 

What’s To Like...

    A Count of Five is the first book in Erin L. Snyder’s sword-&-sorcery/time-travel series “The Citadel of the Last Gathering”.  The book’s title references the Alaji's people’s counting system, based on 5 digits, instead of our 10-digit system.  Surprisingly, that allows them to quickly do complex additions via their fingers, and presumably their toes if whatever they’re counting are numerous enough.

 

    I liked the character-building of our protagonist, Alaji.  Yes, she has the usual heroic qualities, but she is also capable of cold-blooded murder if need be.  Her on-again/off-again sidekick Yemerik is equally “gray”; he will quickly switch allegiances if the situation calls for it, and his past is shrouded in mystery, both as to where he comes from, and when.

 

    For now, the fantasy angle takes a back seat to the time-travel element.  The only otherworldly creatures I noted were goblins and dragons.  Both species can be a threat if you’re wandering around in the wilds, but they don’t have a major impact on the plotline here.  However this is only Book One.

 

    There’s much greater emphasis on the time-traveling.  It has a huge impact on the main storylines: Alaji wants to get back home and “revive” her dead brother by altering the timeline; Yemerik wants to get to the titular Citadel of the Last Gathering and (from his viewpoint) restore the timeline to its original and proper sequence of events.  Along the way, they will make use of a huge Time Portal door, which, if you have trouble envisaging it, is depicted on the book’s cover.

 

    The ending is more of a stopping point than the culmination of a tale.  Alaji is still honing her chrono-hopping skills, her traveling companions change frequently, and both Yemerik’s and her quests are a long way from being completed.  The book closes with some helpful background information about time-magic and what I presume is a teaser for the next book.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.0/5 based on 26 ratings and 12 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.14/5 based on 22 ratings and 7 reviews

 

Excerpts...

    “The words may be different or have altered meanings.  Even the syntax could have changed.  I have a pendant that will equalize my speech, but it might take time to adjust.  Until it does, I’ll have to make do with body language and tone.  It will be awkward until then.  Even after that, you won’t understand much of what we’re saying, if you understand any of it.”

    “And if they attack us?”

    “Then forget everything I just said and kill as many as you can, starting with the leaders.”  (loc. 1546)

 

    “Well.  I think that should do it, more or less.  I hope.  We’ve got several thousand years leeway, so there’s reason to be optimistic, anyway.”

    “The gate is . . . open?”

    “No.  It’s primed to be opened.”

    “Then . . . what?  It opens when we go through?”

    “Yes,” Yemerik replied, somewhat surprised she’d figured that out.  “When we go through with the fragments, the gate will open.”  He cleared his throat then corrected himself.  “Should open.  I’m still working more from theory than experience.”  (loc. 1951)

 

Kindle Details…

    A Count of Five is presently priced at $2.99 at Amazon, as are the other eight books in this series.  Erin L. Snyder also offers three standalone novels for your Kindle; they too cost $2.99.  The most recent e-book by this author, the closing volume in this series, was published in 2020.

 

“I’m a constructive historian, not a thaumaturgist.”  (loc. 1515)

    There are some things to quibble about.  First the good news: there’s amazingly little cussing in the book.  I noted just five instances in the first 40%, one excretory mention and four references to cosmic condemnation.  I’m always impressed when an author doesn’t rely on an overuse of cusswords to set the tone in a book.  That's what adjectives and a thesaurus are for.

 

    I found the pacing of the story to be slow and, for most of the book, not a lot of action to keep the reader turning the pages.  To be fair though, the ending does include an exciting and unanticipated calamity.  Still, I expected more thrills-and-spills given the presence of dragons, goblin, magic, and time-traveling.

 

    A map would have come in handy, although admittedly that would be a challenge since landmarks change over the course of centuries when centuries of time leaps occur. There are no page numbers in the Kindle format, but to be fair, the reader can use the "percentage read" figure to estimate how much more he has to go.

 

    Last, and nit-pickiest, syncing the “time remaining” estimates to the 70 “Sections” instead of just the five “Parts” would have been far more useful.

 

    Overall, I greatly enjoyed the time-traveling aspects in A Count of Five.  Erin L. Snyder is not afraid delve into the realms of Time Paradoxes and Timeline Manipulating, and I was impressed with that.  A few readers found that confusing, but I like it when a storyteller isn't afraid to tackle thins like "what happens if I go back in time and meet myself?"

 

    For me, the main issues were the shortage of action and lack of any of the plot threads being tied up in the ending.  This is a nine-volume saga, and I have to wonder if other books in the series have the same drawbacks.  Luckily, Book Two, A Tide of Ice, is on my Kindle, and perhaps reading it will give me a better idea of where this series is heading.

 

    5½ Stars.  Yemerik is an enigmatic character.  He is aware of things like tuning forks, coins and other historical anachronisms.  I found myself wondering if he’s actually from our present time and world, and can't wait to learn more of his backstory.

A People's History of the United States - Howard Zinn

   1980; 246 pages (first ten chapters only.)  New Author? : No.  Genres : U.S. History, Social Justice, Non-Fiction.  Overall Rating : 9½*/10.

 

    I remember it well: it was the first time I questioned what they were teaching us in American History class.

 

    We had facts to memorize about the Civil War.  It started in 1861 at Fort Sumter.  It ended in 1865 at Appomattox.  It was fought to free the slaves, which Abraham Lincoln did on January 1, 1863 when he issued the Emancipation Proclamation.

 

    And my junior high school brain wondered:  why was there a two-year gap between the start of the war and when the slaves were freed?  What were we fighting for in 1861-62?  Why isn't the teacher telling us about that time gap?

 

    Later on, in high school or college, I learned that technically, the Emancipation Proclamation only freed the slaves in states that had seceded from the Union.  It did not apply to the slaveholding “border states” of Maryland, Kentucky, Missouri, and Delaware.

 

    That made me wonder if there was a lot more of what we were being taught as "United States history" also omitted key information.  And why.

 

What’s To Like...

    Note: The full version of Howard Zinn’s 1980 book, A People’s History of the United States, has 21 chapters, and covers topics from Columbus to Watergate.  Later, an “updated” issue was published comprising Chapters 11 onward, with a couple of added chapters that addressed more-recent events.  That book is titled The Twentieth Century – A People’s History; I’ve read it; it’s fantastic, and it is reviewed here.   This present review is for the first ten chapters of the original book, which are:

 

01.  Columbus, the Indians, and Human Progress (the Discovery of the New World)

02. Drawing the Color Line (the Birth of Slavery)

03. Persons of Mean and Vile Condition (First Rebellions)

04. Tyranny is Tyranny (All Men are Created Equal, except...)

05. A Kind of Revolution (The War of Independence, the Constitution)

06. The Intimately Oppressed (Women’s Suffrage)

07. As Long as Grass Grows or Water Runs (Indian Removal from the Eastern US)

08. We Take Nothing by Conquest, Thank God (the Mexican-American War)

09. Slavery without Submission, Emancipation without Freedom (the Civil War)

10. The Other Civil War (Labor Unrest in the 1800s)

 

    Howard Zinn was politically an unabashed Socialist, and a prodigious author.  He wrote a series of “People’s History” books, starting with this one, which inspired other authors to take up the cause of writing history from the common man’s point of view.  (See the first excerpt, below.)

 

    That shift of focus makes this book a reading treasure for any American history enthusiast.  It was enlightening to learn about the brilliant Seminole chief, Osceola, and meet the feisty women’s suffragette champion, Sojourner Truth.  Andrew Jackson is aptly described as “the most aggressive enemy of Indians in US history”, and the eloquence of the writings Frederick Douglass was awe-inspiring.

 

    Neither George Washington nor Abraham Lincoln rate very high in Howard Zinn’s opinion.  The former was one of the richest persons in colonial America, and was more interested in preserving the "favored" status of the upper class to which he belonged.  Lincoln was a shrewd politician who knew when to give pro-abolition speeches, and when to give pro-slavery ones.

 

    I learned a lot about workers’ strikes and labor protests, starting as early as the 1600s.  These were never mentioned in my high school history classes: Shays’ Rebellion, Bacon’s rebellion, the Anti-Renter Movement, the Flour Riot of 1837, and many more.  I chuckled to see my boyhood city of Reading, Pennsylvania mentioned.  There, during a strike against the railroad for withholding wages: “two thousand people gathered, while men who had blackened their faces with coal dust set about methodically tearing up tracks, jamming switches, derailing cars, setting fire to cabooses and also to a railroad bridge.” (pg. 243)

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.7/5 based on 14,543 ratings and 3,302 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.07/5 based on 232,910 ratings and 6,782 reviews

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Cliometricians (n., plural) : statistical historians.

 

Excerpts...

    In that inevitable taking of sides which comes from selection and emphasis in history, I prefer to try to tell the story of the discovery of America from the viewpoint of the Arawaks, of the Constitution from the standpoint of the slaves, of Andrew Jackson as seen by the Cherokee, of the Civil War as seen by the New York Irish, of the Mexican war as seen by the deserting soldiers of Scott’s army, of the rise of industrialization as seen by the young women in the Lowell textile mills…   (pg. 10)

 

    They organized.  Women struck by themselves for the first time in 1825.  They were the United Tailoresses of New York, demanding higher wages.  In 1828, the first strike of mill women on their own took place in Dover, New Hampshire, when several hundred women paraded with banners and flags.  They shot off gunpowder, in protest against new factory rules, which charged fines for coming late, forbade talking on the job, and required church attendance.  They were forced to return to the mill, their demands unmet, and their leaders were fired and blacklisted.  (pg. 223)

 

“The cry of the poor is not always just, but if you don’t listen to it, you will never know what justice is.”  (pg. 10)

    There’s not much to quibble about in A People’s History of the United States.  In the entire 246 pages of those first 10 chapters, there was only one cussword, a damn, and that was because it was in a direct quote.

 

    Speaking of direct quotes, Howard Zinn knew that there’d be pushback to his “People’s History” tome.  He therefore included a slew of direct quotes in the text, and is to be commended for that.  But be aware that vocabulary, spelling, and capitalization rules in English have changed considerably since the 16^th-19^th centuries.  Reading this book can sometimes be slow and laborious.. But that’s in no way a criticism, and kudos to Zinn for adhering to word-for-word quotations of historical speeches and writings.

 

    We live in a world where books are banned and schoolteachers are muzzled so that only the “my country is always right” side of our nation’s past is presented.  Today, it’s more important than ever to make sure that the complete history of the United States is available for all those who want to learn about it.   Many thanks to Howard Zinn and others for penning this “People’s History” series.

 

    9½ Stars.    And for the record, yes, I did finally learn why the Emancipation Proclamation came out two years after the Civil War started and why it only applied to slaves in the states that had seceded from the US.

Murder in the Queen's Armes - Aaron Elkins

   1985; 260 pages.  Book 3 (out of 18) in the “Gideon Oliver Mysteries” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : International Mystery & Crime; England; Whodunit; Forensic Anthropology.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

 

    Hooray!  Gideon and Julie are newlyweds!  It’s time for their honeymoon!

 

    And a mighty fine honeymoon it’s going to be for the American couple.  They’re heading for a beautiful part of Great Britain called Dorset.  Right on the scenic coast of the English Channel.  How delightfully romantic!

 

    There will be two little side-trips for Gideon.   First, a trip to the Greater Dorchester Museum of History to see a skull fragment affectionately called “Pummy”.  Then to a nearby archaeological site, where a former classmate of Gideon’s, Dr. Nate Marcus, is supervising an excavation.  Both visits will be short; neither one is anything major.

 

    Well actually, Nate claims he is onto something major.  He says he’s uncovered proof that the ancient Mycenaeans visited early Britain and ushered the locals into the Bronze Age!

 

    Ho hum.  I guess you’d have to be a fellow archaeologist to get excited about that, and Gideon’s an anthropologist.  I certainly can't see that any of this is worth killing somebody over, right?

 

What’s To Like...

    Murder in the Queen’s Armes is the third book in this 18-volume series, and the second one I’ve read and which is reviewed here.  The title references the inn where Gideon and Julie are staying.  As expected, complications quickly arise that intrude into the couple’s honeymoon, including several mysteries that have need of Gideon’s technical expertise as the renowned “skeleton detective”.

 

    I thought the mysteries in the storyline were well-crafted.  To give details would entail spoilers, but let’s just say that neither Gideon nor the reader should discard any discovery, no matter how minor it may seem at the time.

 

    I loved the setting: a picturesque area along the southern coast of England.  I have a Facebook friend who lives nearby, and she’s posted pictures of Dorset in bloom.  I want to go there!

 

    The technical aspect of the story also fascinated me.  Gideon is called upon twice to do a skeletal analysis, and I was amazed at how much can be deduced from an ancient bone, no matter whether “ancient” means a couple millennia or a couple million years.  I was delighted that my favorite indigenous paleo-British group, the “Beaker People”, figure into the plotline, and enjoyed learning a number of Yiddish phrases, since one of the main characters was Jewish, such as doppes, nu, ungepotchket, farpotchket, and tzimiss.

 

    The ending is good, although the key break in the investigation doesn't happen until late in the story.  So even though this is a whodunit, and even though there are clues aplenty along the way, don’t be upset if you can’t solve the crime before Gideon does.  The fun comes with “connecting the dots” from a series of clues.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Oleaginously (adv.) : obsequiously; in an exaggerated and distastefully complimentary manner.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.4*/5, based on 1,134 ratings and 102 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.98*/5, based on 1,842 ratings and 112 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    “I can’t say I find the Bronze Age all that fascinating myself.  Too recent.”

    “Seventeen hundred b.c. is recent?”

    “Sure, to an anthropologist.  Didn’t you ever hear what Agatha Christie said about being married to one?”

    “I didn’t know she was.”

    “Yes, a famous one: Max Mallowan.  She said it was wonderful—the older she got, the more interesting he found her.”  (loc. 272)

 

    “He was pretty well soused when I left him an hour ago.”

    “Nate?”

    “Yes, indeed.  He’s sleeping it off, I think.”

    Abe made a decisive little nod.  “When we’re finished here, I’ll go down and fix him up.  I’ll make him take a guggle-muggle.”

    “Come again?”

    “An old remedy.  You mix whiskey, hot tea, molasses, and raw eggs, and swallow it in one gulp.”

    Gideon made a face.  “It sounds terrible.”

    “That’s why you got to drink it one gulp.  You call it a guggle-muggle because that’s what it sounds like when it goes down: Guggle, muggle.  Believe me, by seven o’clock he’ll be fine.”  (loc. 2760)

 

Kindle Details…

    Murder in the Queen’s Armes sells for $7.99 right now at Amazon.  The other books in the series cost anywhere from $1.99 to $8.99.  There are also two "bundles", both priced at $16.99, one with Books 1-4, the other with Books 5-7.

 

“He’s glick and he’s slib, that’s all he is.”  (loc. 2576)

    There’s not much in Murder in the Queen’s Armes to whine about.  The cussing is moderate, 17 instances in the first 20%, but I didn’t feel that it was overused, and I don’t recall any f-bombs.  There is some romantic banter between our newlyweds, but nothing salacious.

 

    There were a couple of typos: be/he, chinthursting/chinthrusting, farfetched/far-fetched, and one (out of six) “house-keeping” variant of the correct “housekeeping”, but overall the editing was pretty clean.  There were also several instances unintended breaks in paragraphs, but I blame the Amazon conversion program for that, since I’ve seen that in other e-books.   More annoying were a couple of scene switches without any signal, although this too could be the Amazon program’s fault.

 

    Overall, I enjoyed Murder in the Queen’s Armes.  It was a fast-paced, quick, easy read.  I loved the setting, and all the genre components—mystery, archaeology, anthropology, intrigue, and even romance—were nicely blended.  I’ve got a couple more e-books from this series sitting on my Kindle, and I have a feeling I’m going to enjoy getting better acquainted with Gideon Oliver.

 

    8 Stars.  One last “Kewlest New Word” for your vocabulary enhancement: the aforementioned hangover cure called guggle-muggle.  I’d never heard of it, and thought at first it was something Aaron Elkins made up.  But Wikipedia has a post about a milder variation of it, a dessert, and with several variant spellings including gogle-mogle, gogol-mogol, and kogel mogel.  Wiki it.  It is not likely to be added to my dessert list anytime soon.

Dust - Hugh Howey

   2013; 459 pages.  Full Title: Dust: Every Beginning Has an End.  Book 3 (out of 3) in the “Silo” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres: Post-Apocalyptic Sci-Fi; Dystopian Fiction.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

 

    In a post-apocalyptic world, the remnants of humanity are confined to underground silos, hundreds of stories deep.  The outside air has been shown to be toxic, so leaving the silo is a death sentence.  Interaction between silos is limited to radio conversations since the deadly outside environment precludes all aboveground transportation.

 

    Existence is a tenuous affair.  Some levels of each silo are devoted to farming, and the total population of each one is strictly controlled.  Yet still, catastrophes occasionally occur, and several silos have just suddenly “gone dark”, presumably with all their citizens perishing.

 

    But changes are looming, thanks to those pesky rascals in Silo 18.  Their mayor, Juliette Nichols, has initiated an underground tunneling expedition, which is working its way over to Silo 17.  Silo 17 has mixed feelings about this: it would be astounding to meet humans from another silo, but on the other hand, that’s also lots more mouths to feed.

 

    Let’s just hope that the powers that be over in Silo 1, those who monitor all the other silos, who dictate how many new babies can be born and how many old geezers need to be euthanized, don’t catch wind of Juliette’s project.  They might terminate everyone in both Silos 17 and 18.

 

What’s To Like...

    Dust is the third and concluding book in Hugh Howey’s fantastic “Silo” series.  It is divided into four parts, all of similar length, and with the appropriate titles: “The Dig”, “Outside”, “Home”, and “Dust”.

 

    There are 63 chapters, plus a Prologue and an Epilogue, which cover 459 pages in the Kindle version.  Almost all of the action is confined to three of the silos: Silos 1, 17, and 18, and the Table of Contents helpfully lets you in which of those each chapter is occurring.  The introduction above gives a brief backstory of Books 1 and 2, Wool and Shift, which I’ve read and are reviewed here and here.

 

    The main characters to keep track of are Donald and Charlotte from Silo 1, Juliette and Lukas from Silo 18, and Jimmy (aka Solo) and Elise from Silo 17.  I thought the character development of each of these was done well.  They all live under the threat of being terminated at any given moment, and it’s not a spoiler to say that not all of them will make it to the end of the book.

 

    The first part of Dust focuses mostly Silo 18’s efforts to tunnel across to Silo 17.  From there on in, we get plenty of intrigue as some of Silo-dwellers work on figuring out how to escape the silos without perishing, others work on acquiescing to the powers that be in hopes of not being exterminated, and the shadowy powerbrokers who have the ability to delete anyone and everyone they choose.

 

    The tension builds to a logical and hopeful climax, although it’s not particularly twisty or exciting.  I’d call it a THX-1138-ish ending, if you’ve ever watched that movie.  That’s not a criticism though, it’s hard to imagine any other way for this sort of post-apocalyptic storyline to end.  And don’t skip the epilogue at the end of the book; it'll leave a lump in your throat.

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.6/5 based on 17,573 ratings and 4,142 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.25/5 based on 76,902 ratings and 4,525 reviews

 

Excerpts...

    She fought to hold it together, to not let the tears creep into her voice.  “I’m being hunted right now.  They will put me back to sleep or they will kill me, and I don’t know that there’s a difference.  They keep us frozen for years and years while the men work in shifts.  There are computers out there that play games and will one day decide which of your silos is allowed to go free.  The rest will die.  All of the silos but one will die.  And there’s nothing we can do to stop it.”  (loc. 3629)

 

    “I know your brother, you know,” Darcy said as he held the door for her.  “He never seemed like the sort.  Neither do you.”

    Charlotte shook her head.  “I never wanted to hurt anyone.  We were only after the truth.”  She passed through the armory and toward the lift.

    “That’s the problem with the truth,” Darcy said.  “Liars and honest men both claim to have it.  It puts people in my position in something of a predicament.”  (loc. 4130)

 

Kindle Details…

    Dust currently sells for $15.99 at Amazon.  The other two books in the series will run you $9.99 (Wool) and $14.49 (Shift).  Hugh Howey has dozens of other e-books for your reading pleasure, some fiction and some non-fiction; some full-length novels, some in series, and a bunch of short stories.  The full-length books vary in price from $2.99 to $15.99.  The short stories are usually $0.99.

 

“Heroes didn’t win.  The heroes were whoever *happened* to win.  History told their story — the dead didn’t say a word.”  (loc. 2490)

    The quibbles are minor.  There’s a moderate amount of cussing—in this case 18 instances in the first 20% of the book, which was about the same as what I found for Drift, the previous book in the series.  Also, since these books are deeply interconnected, reading them in order borders on being a must-do.

 

    Although there’s only one or two main characters for each Silo, there are a fair amount of secondary characters at each site.  It would’ve been nice to have a Cast of Characters section, showing who’s in which silo to make keeping track of things easier.

 

    Lastly, this is the only book I can recall where a “Note to Reader” section comes before the Epilogue.  I don’t know whether this was accidental or not, but IMO it works rather well.

 

    All in all, I enjoyed this series.  Hugh Howey’s writing skills are good enough to where I didn’t get bored with the storyline even though, in books 1 and 3 at least, the settings are by necessity rather limited.  If there ever is a nuclear war, and the current Russia-Ukraine fighting demonstrates just how easily that could occur, underground silos may be the only way for humanity to continue its existence.

 

    Hugh Howey has devoted considerable time and effort to pondering such a situation.  It behooves us all to read what he has to say about it.

 

    8½ Stars. The door is left open at the end of Dust for a sequel but so far I haven't seen one.   Wikipedia reports that in August 2021, Hugh Howey announced he had started writing the next book in the series, taking place in Silo 40, but I've yet to see its release date.

 

    Until it does come out, there are several short story anthologies co-edited by Hugh Howey and John Joseph Adams, for your reading pleasure, as well the first book, Wool in graphic novel format.  There is also a 4-book fan fiction series, titled Silo 49 and written by Ann Christy, available for your Kindle.

A Second Chance at Eden - Peter F. Hamilton

     1998; 420 pages.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Science Fiction; Genetic Engineering; Space Opera; Anthology.  Overall Rating : 7*/10.

 

    Here’s a bit of recommended reading for those who are into epic space-opera: Peter F. Hamilton’s The Night’s Dawn Trilogy.  I read it back in 2011, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

 

    There are some caveats.  My science fiction tastes may not be the same as yours, thus you might not be as enamored by Peter F. Hamilton’s writing as I was.  There’s also the small matter of that trilogy being 3,563 pages long (1094, 1137, 1332 pages per tome).  The books are not standalones; you’re committing to all three when you begin the series.

 

    Ah, if only there was some way to get a smaller taste of this trilogy and the author’s writing style.  Or, if you’ve already read this series, perhaps a brief aftertaste of the fascinating 27^th-century universe Hamilton creates in this series.

 

    Well, that’s where A Second Chance at Eden enters in.  Seven short stories set at various stages between now and the 27^th century, and a total of only 420 pages.  That's more than a big enough sample to see if Peter F. Hamilton’s novels are your kind of sci-fi before committing several months of reading time to it.

 

What’s To Like...

   The seven tales in A Second Chance at Eden are:

01) Sonnie’s Edge (Earth-2070, 24 pages, dueling bots)

02) A Second Chance at Eden (Jupiter-2090, 175 pages, whodunit)

03) New Days Old Times (Nyvan-2345, 25 pages, killing for God)

04) Candy Buds (Tropicana-2393, 42 pages, virtual reality in 400 years)

05) Deathday (Jubarra-2405, 20 pages, sauropod shapeshifters)

06) The Lives and Loves of Tiarella Rosa (Tropicana-2447, 62 pages, fun with parthenogenesis)

07) Escape Route (Sonora Asteroid-2556, 69 pages, the worth of gold vs. salvage)

 

    A couple of the stories are written in the first-person POV, but most are in third-person.  Between each tale, Peter F. Hamilton lists a short timeline to let you know what technological and exploratory advancements have been made.  The book is written in “English”, not “American”, so distances are in kilometres, words like speciality and aluminium have an extra “i” in them, and I had to suss out what narked meant.

 

    My favorite tale was the eponymous A Second Chance at Eden, which had a clever murder-mystery plotline that kept me turning the pages and guessing (incorrectly) who the perp was.  It is also by far the longest tale, comprising more than 40% of the text.  It should be noted that in almost all cases when I’m reading an anthology, my favorite happens to be the longest entry.

 

    I enjoyed reading the backstory to the vital ability of “affinity” in The Night’s Dawn universe.  This is a psychic bond between people, or with animals (think: “spirit animal”), or even between a human and a spaceship or orbiting space colony, which is what the titular “Eden” is this book.  It’s a great way to carry on secret conversations, and here we learn about the person who first developed it.  I can’t wait for it to be invented in our present time.

 

    Interspersed among all the excitement are some keen insights into more serious topics.  Is there some way to still exist after we die?  Can different religions, particularly the three main Western ones, learn to coexist?  Can tarot cards give us insight into what lies ahead for us?  But rest assured, such musings never overshadow the main storylines in these stories.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Narked (v.) : annoyed, exasperated.  (Britishism).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.3/5 based on 469 ratings and 78 reviews.

    Goodreads: 4.04/5 based on 4,889 ratings and 107 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    “I think the personality memory of her death is perfectly accurate.  She walked out to the lake, and the chimp shot her.”

    “Thanks.  Now what can you tell me about Penny Maowkavitz herself?  So far all I’ve heard is that she could be a prickly character.”

    Corrine’s face puckered up.  “True enough; basically, Penny was a complete pain.  Back at the university hospital where I trained we always used to say doctors make the worst patients.  Wrong.  Geneticists make the worst patients.”

    “You didn’t like her?”

    “I didn’t say that.  And you should be nicer to someone who’s scheduled to cut your skull open in an hour.”  (pg. 53)

 

    Guy climbed up the low wall and sat on top, his skinny legs dangling over the other side.  “I didn’t like today,” he said solemnly.

    She leant forward against the wall, and put her arm round his shoulder.  “Me neither.”

    “Was the fat woman really a police officer?”

    “Yes, I’m afraid so.”

    “She didn’t like anybody.  Are all police officers like that?”

    “No.  You don’t have to be a police officer to hate other kinds of people.  Everybody on Nyvan does it.”  (pg. 220)

 

I tried to tell myself the day couldn’t get any worse.  But I lacked faith. (pg. 42)

    There are a couple of quibbles.  There’s a moderate amount of cussing: 16 instances in the first 10% (42 pages) of the book.  There are at least three rolls-in-the-hay and, more disturbing, one clear allusion to intimate relations with a minor.

 

   None of the characters carry over from one tale to the next, so you have a whole new slate of people to keep track of every time a new story begins.  This of course, is inherent with reading any anthology, and that's why I don’t read them very often.

 

    My least-favorite stories are #1 and #3, which are among the shorter entries, and which is also the norm for me.  They just didn’t fit well into the Night’s Dawn timeline.  But to be fair, Peter F. Hamilton addresses this in the Introduction section: “As to the stories themselves, some are new, some have appeared in magazines before, in which case I’ve altered them slightly so they fit into the Confederation timeline.”

 

    7 Stars.  I found the seven stories in A Second Chance at Eden to be a mixed-bag in quality.  The majority were good-to-fantastic, but a couple were so-so.  But that’s the usual spread for anthologies.  If you’re wavering as to whether to plunge into The Night’s Dawn trilogy, this book will be a great help in making your decision.  And personally, my recommendation is to dive into it.