The Dark Deeps - Arthur Slade

   2018; 288 pages.  Book 2 (out of 4) in the “Mission Clockwork” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Steampunk; Young Adult & Teen; Action-Intrigue.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

 

    Matthew Wyle is a covert British intelligence agent based in New York City during the Victorian Era.  He’s been monitoring French agents there, and he’s just stumbled onto something strange.  Unfortunately, it’s in code.

 

VSVYWBT KEUW 6035236.  Grand Poisson 6035236.

 

    Hmm.  Those numbers and uppercase letters could mean anything, but “grand poisson” is French for “big fish”.  Something about a whale maybe?  But that seems a bit far-fetched.

 

    Well, he’d better let his London-based boss, Mr. Socrates, know of his discovery.  Maybe he can crack the code.

 

    Alas, two strong hands have just closed tightly around his throat and a voice out of nowhere says, “Ah, that is the information I’ve been trying to decode.  What do the numbers mean?  Tell me!”

 

    Those are the last words Matthew Wyle will hear in his life.

 

What’s To Like...

    The Dark Deeps is book 2 in Arthur Slade’s Mission Clockwork series.  I’ve read the first book, Mission Clockwork; it is reviewed here.  The hunchback Modo has now completed his training to be an agent for Mr. Socrates, even though he is still a teenager.  His shape-shifting skills will be put to the test on this current assignment, as he’ll be posing as part of a young married couple alongside his fellow teenaged agent, Octavia Milkweed.  At least they get to go on a cruise.

 

    I liked the inclusion of foreign language phrases in the text.  There were snippets of French, Latin, and what I presume was Catalan.  The mention of penny dreadfuls made me chuckle.  And being a chemist by trade, I loved the inclusion of the Oxygen-creating reaction involving Manganese Dioxide and Potassium Chlorate.  Does that sound nerdish?  Well, it enables humans to breathe underwater.

 

    The storyline has a very “Jules Verne” feel to it; the book’s title and cover image confirm this.  It is not a spoiler to say that both our protagonists will be spending a lot of time beneath the sea.  Add to our two protagonists a ship’s captain who’s both idealistic and fatalistic, a French spy who’s both shapely and pragmatic, and a dude named Griff who nobody is real sure about; and you end up with an extremely fascinating tale.

 

    The ending manages to be both death-defyingly exciting and predictably logical at the same time, which is not a criticism.  Both the good guys and the baddies get their just desserts, and since this is a teen-YA book, it’s mostly done without any gore.  All the plotlines are tied up, and although there’s room for a sequel (how can you be certain someone is truly dead if no bodies are recovered?), I’m predicting that Book 3 will be a completely new setting for Modo and Octavia.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Dummacker (n.) : a knowing or acute person. (British slang)

Others: Dulse (n.);

 

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.4*/5, based on 77 ratings and 29 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.84*/5, based on 1,111 ratings and 137 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

   “Now, where exactly are we supposed to go?”  She sat at the mahogany table, and looked down at the carved map.

    “Assuming this is accurately carved, it’s right here!”  He tapped on a point about an inch below Iceland.

    “Sounds dreary and cold; good thing we get paid such riches to do this job.”

    “You get paid?”

    “Mr. Socrates said he is setting aside a fund for my retirement.  I assume he has done the same for you.”

    “I didn’t know we could retire.”  (pg. 62)

 

    “Ah, Mademoiselle Brunet.” Captain Monturiol said.  “Good morning.”  She sounded pleasant enough, but Colette would not give her the benefit of a smile.  “Comrade Girona and I will help you into your aquasuit.” The two women removed a suit from hooks and shelves along the wall.  Then the captain stopped to study Colette’s face.  “You have a mind like an oyster, did you know that?”

    “What do you mean?” Colette replied.

    “It is closed.  But I know there are pearls inside.  I eagerly await the opening of your mind today.”  (pg. 120)

 

Kindle Details…

    The Dark Deeps sells for $2.99 right now at Amazon.  The other three books in the series cost either $2.99 or $3.99.  Arthur Slade has several other series for your Kindle.  The e-books in those are generally in the $0.99-$4.99 price range.

 

“I don’t cough,” she said.  “I expel air daintily.”  (pg. 57)

    Finding things to quibble about was difficult.  As was true for the first book, there is zero cussing in The Dark Deeps.  Ditto for adult situations, although I wouldn’t be surprised if some affection eventually develops between Modo and Octavia.

 

    The book is written in “Canadian”, which means us Yankee readers will occasionally run into some odd spellings, such as marvellous, tonnes, centred, and defence.  Interestingly, both centimetres and meters were encountered, which seemed inconsistent.  The editing is topnotch; I only spotted one typo—a capitalized “Stopped” that should have been the lowercase “stopped”.  I'll blame the printer for that.

 

    But enough of the quibbling.  The Dark Deeps was a page-turner for me, despite it being in labeled a “Teen and Young Adult” book.  Yes, it is clean enough for kids.  Yes, it’s fast-paced, and filled with lots of action-intrigue, a YA requirement.  But adults will enjoy it just as much, because skilled authors are capable of accomplishing that.

 

    8½ Stars.  One last thing.  The Latin phrase in The Dark Deeps was “Plus Intra Plus Extra”, which Modo translates as “The Deeper The Better”.  Really?!  My Latin skills suck.

The Buntline Special - Mike Resnick

   2010; 295 pages.  Book 1 (out of 4) in the “Weird West Tale” series.  New Author? : No.  Genres : Steampunki; Alternate History; Western.  Overall Rating: 7*/10.

 

    It’s the 1880s Old West in a parallel universe, one where the western boundary of the United States is the Mississippi River.  The lands to the west of there are controlled by the Apache medicine man, "Geronimo", aka “Goyathlay”, and his Cheyenne counterpart, "Hook Nose", aka “Que Sul-La”.  Together, they weave powerful magic that keeps the White man from invading their lands.

 

    The exclusion of the Americans from Indian territories is not absolute.  A few towns and cities are allowed; they promote trade and cooperation between the two empires.  One of these is Tombstone, Arizona.

 

    As is true in our dimension, this alternate Tombstone seems to attract both the best and the worst breeds of gunslingers.  Wyatt Earp is the marshal there; his brothers are his deputies and Bat Masterson is one of his allies.  On the “black hat” side is the infamous Clanton clan and the McLaury brothers.  Into this tense stand-off rides the gunman who can gives the Earps the upper hand.

 

    Doc Holliday.

 

What’s To Like...

    The Buntline Special is the reimagining of the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral in a steampunk world.  In addition to the historically accurate participants, Mike Resnick includes others who were bystanders, such as Kate Elder, plus some interesting persons that weren’t there, such as Thomas Edison and Ned Buntline.  But there is no doubt that the main protagonist of the tale is Don Holliday.

 

    The presence of Edison allows for some marvelous inventions to come into play.  Things such as electric stagecoaches, lie detector machines, fluoroscopes, a super-hardened brass alloy, and, possibly the most intriguing one of all: robotic hookers.  Magic also figures into the storyline (useful hint: do NOT piss off a Native American medicine man!), and a couple of paranormal creatures are added to make things interesting.

 

    For the most part, the story is set in Arizona, in the greater Tombstone area.  The book includes five drawings strewn throughout the text; I thought they were a marvelous addition.  Since I’ve lived in Arizona for quite a while, it was neat to see one of our lesser-known tribes, the Hualopai, play a part in the story.

 

    There are some nifty “bonus sections” at the end of the book, including a Bibliography, a historical news article about the O.K. Corral gunfight, a Cast of Characters, and an “About the Author”.  The text abounds in witty dialogue, ingenious contraptions invented by Edison and manufactured by Buntline, and the goings-on at the bawdy house.

    The O.K. Corral gunfight is the highlight of the book.  But it’s not the “final ending”; there’s another 50 pagers after that happens, mostly resolving the paranormal challenges of the plotline.  All the plot threads get tied up, and if this adventure tickles your fancy, there are three more books in the series . 

 

Ratings…
    Amazon: 4.2*/5, based on 88 ratings and 48 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.49*/5, based on 1,334 ratings and 210 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    “Geronimo wants to know who he is facing.” said Obidiah.

    “Bat Masterson and John Henry Holliday,” replied Holliday.

    “Doc Holliday?”

    “The very same.”

    Obidiah turned to Geronimo and spoke to him in the latter’s native tongue.  Geronimo stared at Holliday and then said something to Obadiah.

    “He wants to know if you really killed seven men in a card game in Mexico.”

    “Probably not,” answered Holliday.  (pg. 55)

 

    “I don’t like you much, Holliday,” said Frank.

    “Well, you have that in common with a lot of other men,” said Holliday easily.

    “Oh? Sounds like they’d be interesting men to know.”  He looked around the saloon.  “Where are they?”

    “Buried in graveyards from here to Texas,” said Holliday.  “And a few in Colorado, just for good measure.”

    “You don’t make friends real easy, do you?” said Tom.

    “Let’s just say I’m choosy.”  (pg. 224)

 

“The government didn’t ask for me because of my winning smile.”  (pg. 34)

    There’s a small amount of profanity in The Buntline Special.  I noted ten instances in the first 10%, all of which were the mild epithets involving hell and damn.  Later on, there are a couple of f-bombs, an excretory product, and an SOB.

 

    My bigger criticism of The Buntline Special is with the pacing.  Far too many pages are devoted to discussing Doc Holliday’s terminal illness: tuberculosis, or as it was called in those days “consumption”.  Ditto for the repartee between the White Hats and Black Hats.  One of the baddies, Johnny Ringo, has it in for Doc, and a lot of ink is expended on those two taunting each other.  Bat Masterson’s sudden handicap, which we’ll not detail here, also is drawn out far too long.  On the other hand, the part I found really interesting, the roles played by the Native Americans, is given short shrift.

 

    Despite all this, The Buntline Special kept my interest, as did Book Two of this series, The Doctor and The Kid, which I read seven years ago, and is reviewed here.  I attribute that Mike Resnick’s writing and storytelling skills.  Book Four, The Doctor and the Dinosaurs, is on my TBR shelf.  I can’t wait to see how Resnick works T-Rex into this storyline.

 

    7 Stars.  Add ½ Star if you read this series in its proper order.  I have a feeling I should’ve done that.

Mission Clockwork - Arthur Slade

   2018; 251 pages.  Book 1 (out of 4) in the “Mission Clockwork” series.  New Author? : Yes.  Genres : Steampunk; Young Adult & Teen; England; Historical Fiction.  Overall Rating : 8½*/10.

 

    Modo hasn’t had an easy life so far.  Very few hunchbacks do.  Especially when they have a hideous face to go along with the grotesquely bent spinal column.

 

    Modo is presently doing what most hunchbacks do: he’s in a cage in a traveling freak show called “Merveilles et Mort”.  This is in 19^th century England, when there’s no such thing as child labor laws.  Modo is one year old.

 

    Right now, there’s a gentleman right outside Modo’s cage, staring at him, and offering good money to buy Modo from the show’s proprietor.   How odd.  But there’s method to the gentleman’s madness.  He’s heard that the boy-hunchback has a secret talent.

 

    He’s been told that Modo is a shape-shifter.

 

What’s To Like...

    Mission Clockwork is set in Victorian-era London, primarily in the poorer, darker neighborhoods, and both aboveground, including the rooftops, and underground, especially the sewers.  One of my recent reads, Terry Pratchett’s Dodger, was set in the same time and place, and it was fun to revisit it.

 

    It’s not a spoiler to reveal why Modo’s new owner, Mr. Socrates, bought him.  Socrates runs a British intelligence agency, and sees a huge potential in anyone who can self-rearrange his facial and body characteristics.  Modo is content; he has a personal combat trainer named Tharpa, and a kindly caretaker, Mrs. Finchley, both at Mr. Socrates' expense.  It’s a much better life than being locked in a cage with people gawking at you.

 

    The first task assigned by Socrates to Modo is to infiltrate a secret group of terrorists that is rumored to be plotting some sort of spectacular destruction in London in the near future.  Efforts to infiltrate the group thus far have been fruitless, but perhaps a shape-shifter can succeed.  Now, after years of training and upbringing, the teenaged Modo is ready to go out and do some official reconnaissance work.  There is, of course, some risk to his life, but hey, such sacrifices are occasionally necessary for Queen and Country.

 

    I liked that Modo’s special talent, while unique, also has limitations.  Yes, he can transform himself into someone else just by studying them for a bit.  And yes, it feels good to not have that ugly face and uncomfortably large growth on his back for a change.  But the transformation wears off after a short while, usually in a matter of hours, so Modo is always under a time constraint when using it.

 

    The ending is both spectacular and exciting.  It's a bit over-the-top, but that's standard fare in a “YA-ish” tale.  The main storyline is resolved, evil plans are thwarted, and Modo experiences his finest hour.  Mission Clockwork is both a standalone novel, and the first book in a series.  There is an short excerpt from Book 2, Mission Clockwork: The Dark Deeps, to close things out.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Knacker (n.) : someone who buys up old horses, then kills them for their meat, bones, and/or leather.

Others: Costermongers (n., plural).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.2/5 based on 269 ratings and 84 reviews.

    Goodreads: 3.63/5 based on 3,574 ratings and 459 reviews.

 

Excerpts...

    When Octavia had been a child in the orphanage, she had often dreamed a man would come to rescue her.  He would say, “I‘m your father and my ship was wrecked.  That is why you are here in the orphanage.  Now I can take you home.”  Or he would be a rich uncle.  As she grew older, she hoped it would be a young prince, and she pictured him so frequently that she could actually see his face.  In the end no one came, so one day she left on her own and began her life as a pickpocket.  (loc. 988)

 

    “I can read.”

    “Well, congratulations, Modo.”  She floated over and grabbed the book from his hands.  “Ah, Hamlet.  He’s too much of a gabber, that boy.  Wouldn’t survive a second in our world.”

    “It’s Shakespeare!”  He raised a hand as though on the stage.  “‘O, that this too too solid flesh would melt/Thaw and resolve itself into a dew!’  See!  It’s marvellous!”

    “Marvellously boring.  Though there is a good sword fight at the end.”  (loc. 1983)

 

Kindle Details…

    Mission Clockwork is usually priced at $2.99 at Amazon, although today and for a very limited time it is free!  The other three books in the series normally go for $2.99 (Book 2), or $3.99 (Books 3 and 4), and right now they too are discounted to $0.99 apiece, so I snapped them up.  This appears to be a completed series, but the author also has a more-recent 5-book YA fantasy series for you in e-book format titled the Dragon Assassin.

 

“I nodded off and fell into a story.”  (loc. 195)

    The nitpicking about Mission Clockwork is minor.  This is a “Teen and Young Adult” book, so I didn’t note any cusswords or adult situations cropping up.  You’d think that would make it a boring read for me, since I’m much older than the target audience, but that wasn’t the case at all.

 

    The book is written in Canadian, which is logical since the author grew up in Saskatchewan.  Therefore you occasionally run into weird spellings such as favourite, and greying, but at least worlds like judgments and recognized are spelled in “Yankee” fashion.  I spotted a couple of typos, such as Her/He, and wolf like/wolflike, plus one uncapitalized first word in a sentence: humour.  Overall though, I thought the editing was done well.

 

    Consistent with its target audience being Teen-&-Young-Adult, the storyline contains lots of action, with very little blood and gore, despite a couple of fatalities occurring along the way.  Yet it still entertained me from beginning to end, and I'm way out of the target age bracket.

    So if you’re looking for a kewl Steampunk adventure, set in a fascinating historical time period, loaded with thrills, intrigue, and having a hunchback shape-shifter for a protagonist, Mission Clockwork will be a perfect match for you.  Regardless of your age.

 

    8½ Stars.  We should not neglect to mention the story’s costar, young Octavia Milkweed, who is also one of Mr. Socrates’ agents.  She and Modo start off on the wrong foot, then spend a lot of time learning to work together, and more importantly, trust one another.  It all works out, of course, and I'm fairly certain  (is that an oxymoron?) that Octavia is going to become a recurring character.  But will she also be the catalyst for this series developing a Coming-of-Age plotline?  Who knows, but stay tuned.

The Pincers of Death - Toby Frost

   2017; 320 pages.  Book 6 (out of 6) in the “Space Captain Smith” series.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Science Fiction; Space Opera; British Empire; Steampunk.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

 

    For Captain Smith and the ragtag crew on the John Pym, it’s do-or-die time.  Literally.  They, and the rest of the forces of the British Space Empire, are about to take on the ghastly Ghast Empire for control of the universe, and neither side intends to take prisoners.  The allies of the Ghasts – the Lemming Men, the Edenites, etc. – have been vanquished in earlier books in the series; now it’s time to squash the final foe like a bunch of bugs.  Which seems fitting since the Ghasts are a super-evolved version of ants.

 

    Of course the Ghasts have all the usual advantages that any evil space empire comes with: overwhelming manpower (okay, bugpower), overwhelming spaceship superiority, and an insanely psychopathic leader who calls himself “Number One”.

 

    But the British Space Empire has some potent weapons of their own.  First of all, they have tea, and we all know that’s the fuel that drives the British Empire.  Second, they have “moral fiber” – er, “moral fibre” – and that has to be worth something, right?  Finally, they have a leader, Major Wainscott, who loves to show his fortitude (and other things) by dropping his pants at the start of any armed conflict.  Actually, he likes to drop his drawers for any reason he can think of.

 

    So the battle lines are drawn, both sides have made their preparations, and there’s just one more detail to take care of before commencing the hostilities:

 

    To play a series of rugby-like matches in the gladiatorial arena, culminating in the championship “Hyperbowl” game, played on genuine galactoturf.  Because that will certainly demonstrate the value of “moral fibre”.

 

What’s To Like...

    The Pincers of Death is the sixth, and apparently final book in Toby Frost’s great steampunk sci-fi spoof series, Space Captain Smith.  The title refers to Number One’s personal group of praetorian guards.  If you’re reading these books in order, be assured that Book Six is just as witty, wacky, and snarky as the preceding five.

 

    All your favorite characters are back, both good and evil, including Suruk the Slayer, Rhianna the Flower Child, Wainscott the Flasher, Number One the Vainglorious, and 462 the dog lover (well, “ant-hound lover anyway”).  But there’s a bevy of new characters as well, most notably the Straalian Bush Captain Shane and his kangaram Rippy for the good guys, and the Criminarch of Radishia for the baddies.  The Criminarch is a clever portrayal of an American president; you can read the book to find out which one.

 

    As usual, the text includes numerous literary and music references.  In the first category, there are nods to Samuel Beckett, T.S. Eliot, Noel Coward & Oscar Wilde, and George Bernard Shaw.  In the second, the nods go to Bach, Kate Bush, Minnie Riperton (who?), Frederick of Mercury (LOL), and the little-remembered folk group (except by Toby Frost and me), Fairport Convention.  Toby and I are also probably the only ones who remember the old TV series The Prisoner, which also gets worked into the storyline.

 

    The Pincers of Death is written in English, not American, so in addition to the quiff and saveloy cited below, you’ll find strange words like tosser, troppo, doo-lally, smalls (undies), scoffing (scarfing), boffin, and skewiff.

 

    The ending is remarkably exciting for a sci-fi spoof story, and includes several nice twists.  A short epilogue closes things out, which I thought was done quite well.  The Pincers of Death is both a standalone novel and the finale in the series.  I read these books in order, but I don’t think that's absolutely necessary.

 

Kewlest New Word ...

Quiff (n.) : a piece of hair, especially on a man, brushed upward and backward from the forehead (a Britishism).

Others: Saveloy (n., and another Britishism).

 

Ratings…
    Amazon:  4.6/5 based on 41 ratings.

    Goodreads: 4.11/5 based on 46 ratings and 10 reviews

 

Excerpts...

    “When you meet the Criminarch, there will be a moment, a brief moment, when you will be close enough to attack Number One and snap his scrawny neck.”

    “And then?  How will I escape without being shot.”

    “Well, you won’t.”

    “Right,” Smith said.  “I see.  That’s a bit of a flaw in your plan, isn’t it?”

    “Not really.”  (loc. 1411)

 

    Suruk approached.  “Friends, the time for war is upon us.  Less yakking, more hacking.  You look troubled, Piglet.  Fear not.  Tomorrow, we will stand among the heroes of the Space Empire.  And if you die, which is reasonably likely, think of the welcome your ancestors will give you in the afterlife.”

    “I’m a robot, Suruk.  My ancestors were typewriters and word processors.”  (loc. 3872)

 

Kindle Details…

    The Pincers of Death is presently priced at $3.99 at Amazon.  The rest of the books in the series range in price from $5.99 to $7.99.  Toby Frost has five other e-books at Amazon, parts of two other series.  These range in price from $3.99 to $16.99.

 

“Time to float like a butterfly and sting like a melting clock, as Muhammad Dali would say.”  (loc. 1659)

    The quibbles are few.  The first half of the book is all about the athletic meet; while the second half is devoted to the final battle.  But those two threads don’t have much to do with each other.  I kind of got the feeling that these were two separate novellas that the author stitched together at a later date.  But hey, it works, so what’s there to complain about?

 

    There’s an annoying issue with italicizing text for no apparent reason and which occurs sporadically throughout the book.  But that’s a technical glitch, not a literary one.  Finally, reading prudes should note that there’s a small amount of mild cussing, mostly confined to the words hell and damn although d**khead gets used once.  There’s also one roll in the hay and a character who frequently partakes of something called Martian red weed.  Overall though, I thought this was a “clean” story.

 

    I found The Pincers of Death to be every as enjoyable as the other books in this series.  I never felt like the storyline was going stale, and Toby Frost's sense of wit and humor resonated with me.  I should give a quick shout-out to my local library for carrying the first two e-books in this series, which is how I discovered Captain Isambard Smith and Company.  I was hooked after those two tales.

 

    8 Stars.  Here are a couple more things you'll learn by reading The Pincers of Death.  1.) What reaction occurs when you mix a large amount of Supercola with a large amount of Imperial Mintats.  2.) What Captain Smith’s favorite magazine is.  3.) Why Charlie Chaplin walked like a penguin.

Embassytown - China Miéville

   2011; 369 pages.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Steampunk; Hard Science Fiction.  Laurels: 2012 Locus Award for Best Science Fiction Novel.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

    Embassytown lies at the edge of our universe.  Literally.  It straddles the hazy line between the Immer (the “Always”) and the Manchmal (the “Sometimes”).  You and I would call the Immer the Universe.  No one is sure exactly what the Manchmal is like.  Those who have bravely journeyed there have never returned.

    Avice Brenner Cho was born and raised in Embassytown.  She is an “Immerser”, meaning she’s traveled the Immer,  That's somewhat unusual for somebody from her hometown.  Now she's returned to her roots, which is even more uncommon.  Hardly nobody who leaves Embassytown ever wants to return home.

    The city hosts all sorts of ambassadors from all sorts of other parts of the cosmos.  Kedis, Shur’asi, Pannegetch, and of course, humans from Terre.  The proper term for the sentient natives of this land is “the Ariekei”, but they're more commonly referred to as “the Hosts”.

    Communicating with the Hosts is a daunting task, and is mostly relegated to ambassadors.  The Hosts rarely deign to communicate with anyone less than an envoy, but recently they’ve taken interest in Avice.  For reasons unknown, they want her to perform something called a “simile” ritual, with the promise that she will not be harmed and will be amply compensated for her participation.

    Avice complies, and apparently lived up to Ariekei expectations.  They have declared Avice to now be a simile.  And a very specific one at that.

    Henceforth, Avice is the simile known as “a girl who was hurt in darkness and ate what was given her.”

What’s To Like...

    The storyline in Embassytown is anything but typical.  We aren’t saving the galaxy from annihilation or rescuing a princess; indeed, we’re doing little more than defending a city and trying to understand what makes the Ariekei tick.

    The world-building is phenomenal.  You’re on a planet far away from Earth, and several centuries in the future.  Things are different, and the English language has evolved.  It's now called Anglo-Ubiq, and China Miéville invents all sorts of new words to tell his story, such as miabs, automs, shiftfather, floaking, trids, corvids, “into the out”, sublux, and exoterres.  Sometimes he gives a brief explanation of what these mean; other times you can figure them out from context.  For example, you can pretty much guess that “sublux” means “less than light speed”.

    Also, the book is written in “English”, not American”, so you have jewellery and licences, colours and rancour, metres and artefacts, etc.  All China Miéville novels are a vocabularian’s delight.  I was delighted to run across ogees (a crossword puzzle word) and politesse (a word I first heard Mick Jagger sing), and the elegant phrase “homo dispora”.

    The story is told in the first-person POV (Avice’s), and the settings are limited to Embassytown and the surrounding countryside.  The Ariekei have a whole different way of looking at language, and are fascinated by the bizarre human habit called “lying”, something totally foreign to them.  They go as far as to hold “Festivals of Lies” to see if any of them are even capable of telling lies.  And just as they start to come to grips with falsehoods, something unprecedented happens.  New ambassadors show up, and the Hosts go berserk.  Literally.

  

    The ensuing chaos builds to a good, logical, not-particularly-twisty ending, which surprisingly has a hopeful tone to it.  There’s certainly literary room for sequels (surely further adventures wait for Avice and the Manchmal begs to be explored), but if Miéville has penned any, I’m not aware of them.

Kewlest New Word...

Polysemy (n.) : the coexistence of many possible meanings for a word or phrase.

Others: Semitic (adj.); Politesse (n.); Unbowdlerized (adj.); Louche (adj.); Risible (adj.); Scupper (as a verb); Misprisioned (v.); Necrophage (n.).

Kindle Details...

    Embassytown sells for $12.99 right now, which is fitting for a work by a top-tier steampunk sci-fi author.  China Miéville’s other novels go for anywhere from $4.99 to $13.99.  If you have enough patience, China Miéville occasionally offers generous discounts on his books, sometimes as low as $1.99.

Excerpts...

    “What’s out there?” I said.  Wyatt shook his head.

    “I don’t know.  You’d know better than me, immerser, and you don’t know at all.  But something.  There’s always something.”  There was always something in the immer.  “Why’s there a pharos here?” he said.  “You don’t put a lighthouse where no one’s going to go.  You put it somewhere dangerous where they have to go.”  (loc. 3358)

    It had seen us – us similes made of Terre, not merely us similes – as key to some more fundamental and enabling not-truth, spoken with dandy élan though only a word-trick, hinted at that shift born of contact.  Before the humans came we didn’t speak so much of certain things.  Before the humans came we didn’t speak so much.  Before the humans came, we didn’t speak.

    Through a dissembling made of omitted clauses it laid out its manifesto.  Before the humans came we didn’t speak: so we will, can, must speak through them.  It made a falsity a true aspiration.  (loc. 4165, and how the Ariekei taught themselves to lie – by dropping clauses from the end of a truth.)

 “This is what I excelled at: the life-technique of aggregated skill, luck, laziness and chutzpah that we call floaking.”  (loc. 253)

    Overall, I’d call Embassytown a difficult, but not slow, read.  You have to stay alert; it can get confusing at times keeping track of what all those new words mean.  But if you find yourself wondering if you are fully grasping what some of the made-up words mean, head on over to Wikipedia and read their article on the book.  I did, and was pleasantly surprised at my degree of comprehension.

    My main problem while reading Embassytown was figuring out the plotline.  Both the world-building and Avice’s backstory are wonderfully detailed, but it takes a lot of words to present them.  Somewhere around 25%, it dawned on me that I had no idea what the storyline was, mostly because it hadn't been introduced yet.

    Fortunately, China Miéville is a fantastic writer, so much so that even his long and drawn-out planetary descriptions and Avice’s biography held my interest.  I would  however caution other writers not to emulate Miéville in this regard.  Don't wait until the tale is more than one-quarter finished before introducing the main plotline.

    8 Stars.  Here's an excerpt from the Wikipdia article: In attempting to portray an authentically "alien" alien race, Miéville commented that he finds it almost impossible, stating "if you are a writer who happens to be a human, I think it's definitionally beyond your ken to describe something truly inhuman, psychologically, something alien."

    I think that's what China Miéville was trying to accomplish in Embassytown, and FWIW I think he succeeded admirably.

The Kaiser Affair - Joseph Robert Lewis

   2013; 224 pages.  Book 1 of “The Drifting Isle Chronicles” trilogy.  New Author? : No.  Genre : Steampunk; Fantasy; Paranormal.  Overall Rating : 8*/10.

    Bettina Rothschild and Arjuna Rana are two of the finest detectives in Eisenstadt.  They work super well together, which is no surprise since they also happen to be husband and wife.  Bettina supplies the beauty and the brains, and Arjuna contributes the brawn and several other useful skills, including having a photographic memory.  Both of them are deadly accurate with their coilguns.

    So it’s no wonder when the head of the Ministry of Justice, Gisele Kaiser, calls them to her private office and commissions them to take on an ultra-sensitive case.  It seems that one of the city’s foremost art-thieves has just successfully managed to brazenly escape from the maximum-security Torghast Prison.

    There are a couple of rather bizarre things about the case though.

    For starters, breaking out of Torghast is no small feat.  There are multiple guards to bribe, and gangland criminals to hire to assist in the getaway.  That takes money and connections, neither of which a mere burglar is likely to have.

    Then there’s the request by Gisele Kaiser that the investigation be handled in utmost secrecy.  Well, that’s somewhat understandable, since the art thief’s name is Ranulf Kaiser, Gisele’s brother.  If word gets out about this, the political scandal will be enormous.

    But the oddest part about the case is the timing.  Ranulf Kaiser had just about completed his prison sentence.  He was due to be released from prison in less than a month.

    What’s so important that he’d jeopardize his entire future by escaping now?

What’s To Like...

    If you’re a fan of Steampunk, you’ll love The Kaiser Affair.   World-building is a Joseph Robert Lewis forte, and he doesn’t disappoint here.  There are some neat gizmos: you can drive around in (steam-powered) autocarriages; shoot  your coilgun at criminal lowlifes, and if you’re daring enough, take a flight in the just-been-invented autogyros.  There’s a huge “drifting isle”, called Inselmond, floating  about a mile above Eisenstad, and if you listen carefully enough, you’ll find that all sorts of birds can talk, which sometimes makes them a very convenient source of information.

    Legends abound about how and why the drifting isle got there, and there’s even speculation that it might be populated.  No one can tell, because all you can see from earth is the rocky bottom of it.   There’s also talk about some sort of secret society of assassins in Eisenstadt, called “The Shadows”.  But nobody’s ever seen them, so who knows if it's true or not?

    I liked the strong female leads for both the good guys and the baddies.  Ditto for the fact that Bettina, although still rather young, has to use a cane to get around.  Perhaps this is a subtle tip-of-the-hat to Robert Heinlein, who used to frequently endow his heroes with disabilities in his Sci-Fi stories was back in the 1950’s.  Education-wise, Bettina has earned a degree in Chemistry and one of the other female characters has a PhD in Mechanical Engineering.  It’s a neat world where women are just as educated as the men.

    The pacing is brisk, and there’s lots of action to keep you turning the pages.  There is an element of Fantasy also woven into the story:  some of the weaponry is magical, and you can consult astrologers (called “starcasters”) if you want, although their helpfulness is at times limited.  Along with all the thrills and spills, Joseph Robert Lewis also touches on a serious theme – racial prejudice – and I thought this was a very nice touch.  Finally, the banter between our two protagonists is often hilarious and always witty.

    There are 23 chapters, plus an epilogue, covering 224 pages, so it’s easy to find a good place to stop reading for the night.  The R-rated stuff is limited to a couple cusswords, one roll-in-the-carriage, and some implied (but never carried out) mild bondage.  The settings are limited to Eisenstadt and the Drifting Isle, but that allows the author to develop both sites in detailed fashion.   Everything builds to a suitably exciting ending, with a twist or two in it that I didn’t see coming.  The Kaiser Affair is a standalone story, with all the story threads tied up nicely.

Kewlest New Word. . .

Riparian (adj.) :  relating to or situated on the banks of a river.

Excerpts...

    “A murder of ravens, a parliament of owls, a brood of chickens, and a flight of swallows,” Bettina said.  “But a flock of birds. A flock.”

    Arjuna looked up from his waffles slathered in syrup, butter, and strawberries.  “I’m sorry, what?”

    “A flock, Arry,” Bettina sipped her tea and peered thoughtfully out through the café windows at the bright morning light on the bust street outside.  “I know what a murder is, and a parliament, and a brood.  They’re all real words.  But what is a flock?”

    He smiled and finished his coffee.  “It‘s a word, dear.  Try not to overthink it.”  (loc. 443)

    “I asked you, what is that thing in your hand?”

    The tall Dumastran turned his head and looked at the shining silver bow resting on his shoulder as though he were seeing it for the first time.  “Oh this?  Yes, well, Strauss smashed my poor little coilgun in  that miserable tomb, so I had to make do.”

    “Make do?”  Bettina cleared her throat.  “Dear, when one makes do in a miserable tomb, one usually manages with a dusty old rock or a filthy old bone.  One does not make do with an ancient recurve bow, doubtlessly forged from strange alloys using long-lost metallurgical secrets.”  (loc. 2226)

Kindle Details...

    The Kaiser Affair currently sells for $2.99 at Amazon.  The other two books in the series, Black Mercury by Charlotte E. English, and The Machine God by MeiLin Miranda, both sell for $3.99.  Joseph Robert Lewis has a slew of other Fantasy e-books to offer, ranging from free to $2.99 apiece.  I read the Aetherium series a few years ago, when it was just a trilogy and the books had different titles.  It is now a (completed) 8-book series, and you can pick up the Omnibus edition, containing all eight stories for $9.99, which is a really good deal.

 A mind like a library, the body of an angel, and the stomach of an adolescent.  Two out of three aren’t bad, I suppose.  (loc  582)

    The Kaiser Affair has fabulous world-building, lot of action and adventure, and fascinating characters.  Yet one important thing is missing: a compelling storyline.  As other reviewers noted, this really is just a 225-page chase scene.  Entertaining, yes.  Epic, no.

    At the end of the e-book, there’s an “extra” that perhaps sheds some light on this.  Titled, “A Note about The Drifting Isle Chronicles”, it gives the background of how the story came to be, which is a rather unique process.

    First, a group of writers with diverse genre focuses got together and spent weeks doing the world-building.  Once that was finished, each author took a separate piece of this new world (which essentially is just Eisenstadt and Inselmond) and wrote a novel in whatever genre they specialized in.  The result was a trilogy having three different authors.

    I can think of two other writers who have tried something similar, albeit in both cases, it was aimed at encouraging Fanzine Fiction.  John Scalzi developed one in his Old Man’s War universe, and Eric Flint did one in his 1632 alternate dimension series.  My impression is that neither one went over particularly well.

    I suspect that any “shared” setting has an inherent weakness: nothing earthshaking can happen.  For example, Joseph Robert Lewis can’t annihilate half the population of Eisenstadt with a neutron bomb, because two other authors are using the same setting and would have to accommodate such an event in their storylines.  Thus, you're limited to penning stories that don't disturb the world-building and don't kill off any of the main characters.

    Whether this had any impact on this particular collaborative world-setting I can’t say.  But I note that in the end, only three writers used the world that they (and others?) built, and ANAICT none of them ever penned a second novel set in it.

    8 Stars.  There may be nothing “epic” about the storyline in The Kaiser Affair, but I still enjoyed it from the first page to the last.  Joseph Robert Lewis can probably write a story about paint drying that will still keep a reader turning the pages.  If you can be happy with a Steampunk story that doesn’t involve saving humanity, then this book's will be a delight.