Review: The King's Daughter

 Almost two and half years ago, I ended a review of Vonda N. McIntyre's The Moon and the Sun, writing about the "lost" movie:

"The movie, starring Pierce Brosnan, has been filmed but remains unreleased pending special effects, four years later.

Maybe something went wrong elsewhere, but you'd think they'd try to recoup some financial losses by releasing it as straight-to-video, or have a limited release first. Surely, book fans would flock."

 The movie is now released and has grossed about a million so far in the first week (#10). 

Here's a clip of a scene paired with the trailer:

The trailer doesn't give a good sense of the story, which is mirrored in this strange review from The Guardian, which says the movie's good--I would agree--but obsesses over the problem of the title. However, the reviewer may not have pondered long enough. The title is rather thematically potent, and in a few other regards.

The problem of the trailer and the review may be the movie's failing to nail its identity at the start. The movie opens as a story book, which would be useful as a children's story, a comedy, or a fairy tale. The closest the movie approaches is the lattermost, but the focus isn't on a fairy tale nature. Perhaps it would have been better done without the storybook and skipped straight to the daughter's arrival in the castle. Or perhaps better still, would be to establish the previous life and her desire to exit that life. A leisurely opening would have worked fine--or at least better. Perhaps they hadn't enough film footage for it to flow.

The main body of the film is solid, tightly woven and seems quite aware that it is a historical fantasy with strong elements of romance--perhaps "love" is the better operative word, in a broader sense than romance that only concerns a couple. 

Without the opening, I'd have said the movie deserved an 8 or so out of 10. Solid entertainment with some thought.

The opening should only drop the movie to a seven, not to a five, which is where it is at the moment, unfortunately, but people were probably confused about what kind of movie they were seeing. I had the advantage, having read the book first. Hopefully, the numbers go up as it progresses. 

It should be popular with the female type holding some measure of history, court, and adventure. A good date or family movie? Maybe go buy popcorn while the storybook unfolds.

The director, Sean McNamara, talks about the movie here:

Krampus (2015)

Some minor spoilers. 'Tis the season.

Several movies have tried on the old legend (Wiki). If the IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes ratings are to be trusted (6.2/10 and 66%), this is the best of them--a slice above tolerable, although horror usually does get lower ratings. 

As a family unites and divides over the Christmas holidays, Krampus and his little helper wreck havoc on a family that's already torn apart.

The writers, who were nominated for a few speculative awards, have done animation, kaiju, and superheroes. They display brilliance mixed with suspect choices. It seems to be the story of one person although it shifts through many--some of whom don't make logical choices, or at least we are not privy to their logic.

The final frames show the film could be interpreted two ways--asking viewers to reinterpret the movie a bit--but each possibility is undermined by earlier events, so the way of interpretation is up in the air.

In some ways it's very much a Christmas film, in other ways it's warped (although some might maintain any horror movie about Christmas warps the Christmas spirit).

Interesting effort, nonetheless. Watch for the brilliance, and roll with the less admirable choices.

Shotgun Lullabies by Sheree Renée Thomas [part 1]

The voice driving the stories and poems of Sheree Renée Thomas does have a lullaby quality, sung through the mouth of a shotgun--explosive and melodic, it pleases even as it bites:

In the beginning God walked barefoot ’cross the land. She spread Her big toe wide ’cross the rich, deep earth and danced. She stomped so hard with Her rockbottom feet, the earth split right open. Still She danced. Her big toe sunk deep, and the sweet waters rise quick, quick. That’s how we got the rivers, and the lakes, and the creeks.

Thomas often uses dialect as once was popularized by nineteenth-century American writers like Mark Twain but fell into disfavor by the next generation that saw it as a gimmick or cheaply sensational. Here, though, it's digging into the music of the voice, listening to the native language of speakers--sonorous and sensuous. 

A powerful draw to this chapbook is Thomas's voice. It seduces and mesmerizes. It speaks from the fundament of images, sound, and earth.

As you can see by the above sample, Thomas is interested in not just sound and voice but also myth--the larger than life, tall tales that aren't so tall that you might wonder, "Maybe?" They often crawl into the space between realism and speculative fiction. The narratives are less stories than myths where the mythic figure emerges, say [Sukie Diamond, for instance], unscathed through the Antebellum South where the world and the people she encounters are shaped by her being there.

Listen to a reading of Thomas's center story, "Malaika Descending," here.

If you haven't anything by Thomas yet, this is a great place to start. Mildred meets with the neighborhood, some weeks after her "Aunt Malaika" had passed. Her memory isn't a pleasant one altohugh the "aunt" raised Mildred. Somehow Mildred makes a trip to Hell and find Malaika there. It's a dark tale but, nonetheless, full of hope--even for a life after life. This isn't high-octane invention, but suggestive and moving. Well worth your time to check out.

Review: Futuristic Violence and Fancy Suits by David Wong

Futuristic Violence and Fancy Suits  

by David Wong 

St. Martin's Press  

Thomas Dunne Books  

Sci Fi & Fantasy

David Wong's unique, humorous voice is a major draw for his fiction. He wrote the strange paranormal investigator series, John Dies at the End (the last book, What the Hell Did I Just Read, reviewed here).

His best characters are deeply flawed and have a modus operandi, a philosophy for living.

Zoey's father, a deadbeat beat dad who happens to be a famed rich inventor, has just died, which means that people are trying to kill her since she has the key that everyone wants to unlock some technological wonder. The novel opens enticingly enough:

The radio had stopped working years ago, and so Zoey made up for it by singing a hit pop song from her time called "Butt Show (and I Don't Charge Admission)" while she plugged in the strand of Christmas lights she had tacked around the top of the car's interior. She peeled the lid off her chili, watched steam waft into the frigid air, and decided that things really could be worse. Zoey always tried to appreciate the little things in life, like the fact that just a generation ago you couldn't devote both hands to eating a bowl of fast-food chili while the car drove itself (how did people use to eat car chili? With a straw?). She had also recently upgraded her phone to one that displayed a little holographic image of the caller, but so far she had found this feature was only useful for terrifying her holophobic cat, which hardly justified the cost of the upgrade. However, a moment later that feature did allow her to see that the call that saved her life came from a man who was fond of wearing fancy suits.

And we're off to the races in her Toyota with her hopeful would-be abductor trailing close behind.

Zoey isn't sure whom to trust--just as she finds someone to trust, even becoming attracted to him, he's dead. Somehow Zoey has to get past those who want to kill her, and those who want to use her for money for the technology she unwittingly has the key to.

Part of the pleasure of the novel is the near-futuristic milieu--a city so deeply rich in money and technology that we join a wide-eyed Zoey at the surprises that await her. Everyone's online and recording everyone, so that it's impossible to run away and anonymously melt into the crowd. She hates her father's absence and resents his using her this way, but she becomes accustomed to the lifestyle as she sticks around.

Part of the mixed pleasure and pain is that the author may love Zoey too much. She isn't terribly flawed in a significant way. Occasionally her personality takes off when expressing her desire for what clothes she'll wear, but as is, she's a little too idealistically drawn. In the John Dies at the End series, the female protagonist is defined by her contrast with her boyfriend. Zoey doesn't really have a companion here to be defined against.

Her antagonist is powerful and possesses a most wondrous reason for being--wondrous, not in that he's agreeable but fascinating. Unfortunately, he is so generously mocked, we don't quite believe he's a real threat to our protagonist.

It may be that since Zoey Ashe has a whole series planned around her, the author has a long-range arc laid out for her that isn't yet visible. She does become a master of her destiny near the end of the novel, but one can hope for an increased dynamic in the next novel of the series. Still, with Wong's skill for odd-ball characters, readers should look forward to the next novel, soon to be released--October 13, 2020.

Review: Knocking the Stars Senseless by Clif Mason (II)

Part II

Note: This is part II of an essay begun here.

This recurring theme [that beauty can enlighten tragedy] returns in “Ghost Music” as it deals with the speaker’s loss of his father: “The singing tongue is cut from autumn’s river.” In essence, Mason’s speaker asks us in his songs: How can we keep singing when the world is full of pain? The answer comes, through much pain, at the poem’s end:

Wind picks his pocket again as he ambles.

It steals again sweat from his body, music from his ears.

It takes again the gait from his legs, the taste from his tongue.

The more it steals, the less he feels bound by gravity.

He laughs as the wind bears him off like a kite.

When I critiqued his poems, I often slammed Mason’s use of “stars” in his poetry as I’d seen too many awful poems written with that in them, but through judicious use and careful building of his motif, he’s made the stars his own. It is in the book title and the titular poem, after all. And it’s cleverly deployed, to boot. The stars could be incandescent dots that candle the night, or those whom society reveres, for whatever reason, or the heavenly afterlife (“to drink from the stars’ chalice / the black anodyne of sleep.”—“Fugue for the Sandy Hook Dead” or in “I Wore the Night Like a Roquelaure” where when a grandmother passes, the speaker’s song becomes “the new star of resolve / in her brain’s core.” That last poem, especially at its titular moment, seems to be the transformation of the speaker who turns grief into something transcendent.). And “senseless” could be unconscious or a lack of meaning. All of these senses fuel Mason’s poetry. (Am I eating crow? Very well, I eat crow.)

In “The Sea Anemone Must Wed Lightning” Mason writes of suffering as a thing we carry, perhaps belongings we should value:

What can I say of this suffering,

except that it is mine? I will carry it

into autumn, holding it over

my head as, crossing a river,

I would a bundle of clothes.

Later, the speaker sings what he wants songs to do:

I want the song that will lift

the moon’s white bone back

into its black socket. I want the song....

that will raise a fallen

child, if only for a day

The final poem, “Thanksgiving Song,” refines this idea of song (brought up in “I Wore the Night Like a Roquelaure” – discussed above) as the magic that words carry in them and the magic that we carry within us:

I can sing with the broken bone

of the yellow half-moon....

Each name sings

light needles into ebony dusk....

we are all

yes, each & every one, the last

least, best unexpected thing.

This poem—with a few rivals for being the best in the book—deserves to be anthologized in a dozen or two good anthologies. Poet Patrick Hicks also singled out this poem. Forgive the excerpt as only the whole poem can do it justice.

Judith Sornberger writes that his work is “Incantatory as Whitman” which you’ll find in a poem like “Depression”:

All the harvesters are falling apart, shaking & shuddering

& collapsing before they can leave the fields.

All the luxury automobiles are falling apart

in garages & shops & on the street

All the bridges & skyscrapers are falling apart

falling to rust & poisonous dust & bent & sheered rebar.

These excerpts and examinations should more than adequately suggest why you should acquire this book for yourself (or get your library to do so, if you cannot afford it).

What makes these poems stand out above most contemporary poetry: His poems tell you why you should read them. The images and sounds—even interesting philosophic content—suck the reader in. Not the particular political stance as if poetry were more about politics than aesthetics (although, yes, Mason toes the line of the politically correct), not the surreal inscrutability (although, yes, Mason uses some of that), not a bolus of images that are hard to swallow (although, yes, Mason’s imagery astounds and confounds), but he uses his silvery tongue to get us to leap after, to travel to this strange land we tread upon and intriguing scenarios, or some other spark of interest to keep us reading and rereading.

For example, “Darkfall” opens with intrigue and mystery:

For centuries we seeded the cemeteries

so it was no surprise the soil

grew nothing but headstones.

How can those lines not get one to read on? This is part of what makes this book rise above its peers. If poets and poetry readers aren’t flocking to this book this year, then there’s too little justice in the world, but at least it exists and we the lucky, who have read it, can lift it over our heads as if crossing a river and call on others to hear these songs.

Review: Knocking the Stars Senseless by Clif Mason (I)

Clif Mason and I met at a poetry workshop, not quite a decade ago, and he was an excellent poet then. An English professor and Dean of Humanities, he is gentle, soft-spoken and rounded out by insight. This is a man who writes poems whose speaker stands before a stuffed otter in a museum and mourns its passing (see “The Otter”).

What poems was he workshopping? If you have Knocking the Stars Senseless in your hands, then you have some of them. I have the sense that he’d been working on these poems long before we saw them. He kept working on them after they were published.

So when I read people being amazed at Clif Mason’s suddenly being “prolific” because he has had three different poetry books released from three different presses within a year, I feel his pain. He has been agonizing over these for perhaps more than a decade—a handful maybe twice that. So prolific? No.

He wasn’t just adding and removing commas, either. Merciless as Ming, he’d quarter poems to stubs or stretch them on the rack beyond their original form. They’d appear in form, aligned as a stone army, and be stripped out of uniform to throw them into cubist arrays. He was tireless in his revisions.

I review books—of friends, strangers and people who chose to be enemies—as subjectively as possible. There are nigh glowing reviews here of people sharpened themselves into daggers and sweet dismissals of candied personalities. I try to review as if I’m friends with the reviewee and the people looking for good books to read. As a matchmaker, I don’t want to let either down.

Moreover, Mason’s voice is a new voice that needs to be heard. Have you devoured the sounds of Ocean Vuong’s words? Does your heart quicken at the submerged wisdom and surreal images carved by W. S. Merwin? Then savor Clif Mason because their sauces flavor his volume’s stew. Until I read the other two volumes, I’m not yet willing to concede that he is a major writer—he may be, but time will have to decide that, anyway. I will say that his voice (not to mention this volume in particular) is one that needs to be reckoned with.

To get a sense of the book’s trajectory, peer into the opening prose poem, “Double Narrative: This Waking Life”:

When I yearned for the incense of candle & canticle, I sought the fulcrum of trance & tragedy, hawk & hook.

           

The book I wrote unwrote itself as I typed. Characters disappeared as if kidnapped.

This is both true in his personal life and in the larger world. The personal, literal truth is how, as I mentioned earlier, the book has gone through its own radical changes, but in the larger sense Mason laments violence—such as Sandy Hook and Auschwitz—where people did “disappear,” lives brutally brought to an end. He writes in “Day of the Dead”: “Have you found the trunk of moldering toes? // This is the age of amputation // We learn to live with less & still less.”

“This Waking Life” from the title has its own double hook. “Waking” suggests that we are awake, but also that we are still asleep, in need of being roused—a perpetual state.

In “Nightwalk in the Republic” the poem is more or less a palindrome of lines—the same forward as backwards, except for tiny alterations you have to pay close attention to. The speaker fears sleep as the news of another mass shooting torments his dreams—a perfect scenario for this poetic form. The opening/closing change are perhaps the most potent. It opens (I had to stop myself from quoting more—just one thing, you said):

Owl calls on a cold night—

solemn, commanding hoots.

I wander, lost, full of midnight’s wanderlust

and closes:

as I wander, lost, full of midnight’s wanderlust

& command solemn hoots

from the owl calling on a cold night.

Note the owl, in the first instance, lacks an article (a, an or the), which makes it more mythic—a name, perhaps—the owl of all owls, the god of owls, the original progenitor. The owl could be a symbol of wisdom or of its power, its predatory nature. Perhaps both.

(All of the above do seem to apply. The poem “Insomnia” confirms and further sketches the owl’s nature: “Night is the owl’s kingdom....//The owl rules the world of shadow & hazard.”)

The owl “calls on” which could be a simple sound, or it could be visiting or asking help from the cold night. The commanding hoots helps determine its powerful intentions, hinting at a supernatural nature that gets the night to do its bidding.

When we return to these images, the speaker now commands. He is no longer powerless, but his powerlessness, his lostness, his lust for midnight’s wandering have become a kind of power as he demands the owl to call. Given the voice, we assume he can do this in this transformation although one is free to question that ability. We would have two very different poems, depending on which one chooses.

Strangely, both do seem to apply to the situation. This duality applies to the opening poem (seen above, such as the “candle & canticle, fulcrum of trance & tragedy, hawk & hook”) and throughout the book. The poet sings in a beautiful melancholy voice as he raises a candle to shed light on our place in the world. It is a fine balancing act since it calls on beauty to enlighten our tragedies.

[review continued here]

Larque on the Wing by Nancy Springer

 

You will know from the first paragraph whether you’ll want to read this book or not:

Mother used to call it change of life, but Larque never expected to change quite so much. Gender, for God’s sake, which is really basic, the first thing anybody notices about a person. Then, becoming not only male but gay—what a way to do the big Four-Oh, when all along she thought she was quite happy.

This won the James Tiptree award, which is all about gender examination, and this is a tour-de-force of such an examination. So if you believe in two genders, or immutability of sexuality (especially by puberty), read no further.

The strange gender extrapolations is the novel’s strength. The narrator is a painter in her mid-life and suddenly to the chagrin of some of her family undergoes changes and gains a doppelganger named Sky who says, “Boogers” upon meeting our protagonist. The doppelganger is a youthful version of the protagonist:

“Who are you?” 

“Traitor,” the kid shot back, “you should know. I’m you.”

Sky is Larque’s adolescent escort not only through the changes of life, gender, and sexuality but also through adolescent difficulties—high expectations from her mother, abandonment of her father once her mother divorced him. There’s also Shadow, the cowboy animus, who knows the male side of her.

The weakness is the voice, which feels more light-hearted YA than adult, although perhaps that can be explained by the narrator going through a second puberty—a time of confusion. It isn’t just the colloquial expressions but the reactions. Examples:

“for God’s sake.... Childhood’s a bitch.... Adolescence was hell.... She’s a twerp.”

and

Sky snorted like a pony and got up from the table. “Look what you turned into,” she muttered. 

“Look what I was to start with,” Larque shot back. 

“You like this place you’re living in? Looks like a dump to me.” 

Larque felt all the attractiveness of child abuse as a life option. Yet, the obnoxious kid spoke truth. The place was in fact a dump. Dog hair rolled everywhere.

and

[Hoot, her husband, inquires about her doppelganger’s abilities:] “Does [Sky] walk through doors?” 

“I don’t think so.” 

“Are you sure?” 

“Reasonably sure.” Actually. I don’t know and I don’t really care. Give me a break.
 

and

“Liar. You lie all the time.” 

Larque slapped the brat.

If you like many extrapolations and playful YA, you may well like Larque on the Wing. It takes lots of risks.

The Jealous Kind by James Lee Burke,

I can't recall if I've read James Lee Burke before but perhaps not. His characters are razor-sharp in their realism, his plots gripping as slides the blade.

Where to start? He won Edgar Awards for Black Cherry Blues and Cimarron Rose while Amazon readers ranked Purple Cane Road as his best. He also has two collections of stories published in literary journals like Antioch, Chariton Review, Southern Review, Shenandoah, and so forth. So I think I'll try those out next.

Someone at The New York Times Book Review called The Jealous Kind's examination of the 1950's “nostalgia noir.” I didn't realize it was part of a series (the Holland Family), but I didn't feel left out.

Aaron Holland Broussard gets embroiled in a fight with a rich kid, Grady Harrelson, over his soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend Valerie Epstein, which involves the delicious dialogue exchange:

“I thought maybe something was wrong and y’all needed help.” 

“Get lost, snarf.” 

“What’s a snarf?” 

“Are you deaf?” 

“I just want to know what a snarf is.” 

“A guy who gets off on sniffing girls’ bicycle seats. Now beat it.” 

The music speaker went silent. My ears were popping. I could see people’s lips moving in the other cars, but I couldn’t hear any sound. Then I said, “I don’t feel like it.” 

“I don’t think I heard you right.” 

“It’s a free country.” 

“Not for nosy frumps, it isn’t.” 

“Leave him alone, Grady,” Valerie said. 

“What’s a frump?” I said. 

“A guy who farts in the bathtub and bites the bubbles. Somebody put you up to this?” 

“I was going to the restroom.” 

“Then go.”

Grady's family is connected to high and low places, so this seemingly one-time bold perhaps foolish act carries long-term consequences that get worse and worse. Fortunately for him, he gets Valerie on his side (as his girl) and, less fortunately, Saber, his best buddy, who is the problematic kind of best buddy at best:

Saber was the only kid in school who how to stick porcupine quills in Krauser [the shop teacher who billed himself a WWII war hero but was a pain in the students' butts] and keep the wounds green on a daily basis. Krauser believed it was Saber who'd hung plunger through the hole in the ceiling, but he couldn't prove it and was always trying to find another reason to nail Saber to the wall. But Saber never misbehaved in metal shop, whereas other guys did and in serious fashion."

My main problem with the novel is the main character as an adult telling the tale. He seems to buy into his teenage reasoning, but the kid makes foolish choices which only makes things harder on himself. I didn't quite realize this until I was three-quarters through the book. His father had excellent advice of not even talking to these people, but Aaron does anyway. By luck, Aaron's mistakes are shown to be nothing and his enemies have done all the real damage. Writerly ingenuity would have been the better path, but the plot was rather convoluted, so maybe Burke needed to tame the multiplying threads.

It's a good enough novel, but probably not the place to begin.

A Man’s Gotta Do: Cold in July by Joe Lansdale

Cold in July 

by Joe R. Lansdale 

Tachyon Publications 

General Fiction (Adult) , Mystery & Thrillers

Ann hears a noise and wakes her husband, a young father, to listen. He hears the sliding glass door open, so he grabs his .38 and ventures downstairs to greet his uninvited guest, who is passing a flashlight over the walls including a cheap landscape painting, which the narrator cover a Picasso (probably a joke since the subject doesn’t come back up).

When the two men meet, face to face, the narrator freezes and the burglar gets the first shot, missing the narrator which finally wakes him to action, putting a bullet in the burglar’s head.

The cops investigate the scene and recognize the burglar as Freddy Russel, who like his father, has been in and out of prison. They take the narrator down to get his and his wife’s statements. They assure him it’s an easy case of self-defense.

Ann and the narrator clean up the mess back home. The narrator struggles with guilt that even the temptation of snuggling with his wife can distract him from.

 

Even through the next day, guilt plagues him, despite the kudos he receives from the locals who all already know. Thinking of the burglar’s sparsely attended funeral, he drives to the cemetery to watch, despite the police chief warning him not to. The burglar’s father is there, none too pleased. He makes veiled threats about the narrator’s son, Jordan, kicking off the next series of crises where the narrator has to do what he can to protect his family.

Joe Lansdale described his novel, Cold in July, as having come from a dream. It doesn't feel exactly dreamlike, but it does have an unusual structure (I described Dan Braum's short novel as having a similar shifting structure over here but this one doubles Braum’s).

It’s a story of manhood: what it is, what a man has to do. By the end, it becomes less and less clear of the necessity of the narrator''s involvement although some might claim that, yes, he needs to be involved, yet the novel has to work to justify this involvement. That, though, may only make the investigation of what makes a man all the more interesting.

To some extent, manhood is always under the microscope in a Lansdale tale, but I have yet to read a more thorough investigation by Lansdale.

#

What follows becomes less of a review than a discussion of the work itself. If you read the novel, consider that a pass key to the rest of the discussion. If you haven’t read the novel, note that the literary police are watching you on your computer cameras and will raid your house if you read on.

Warning: Spoilers (to an extent)

The novel’s structure is unusual. That it works, throws into question structural plots. We open with a thriller, followed by a mystery, and end with a vigilante justice tale. Other plots, such as psychological (guilt about killing, guilt over fatherhood), might be thrown in as well. What holds the novel together is the question of manhood. What is it? This is what I love most about the novel. It isn’t just blind acceptance or total questioning of what manhood is, yet to some extent it expects us to accept some manhood justifications that should be questioned if not necessarily jettisoned.

When they find out Freddy Russel isn’t Freddy Russel, the protagonist has less and less reason to be in the novel. In fact, the novel focuses more and more on the other men. The protagonist does gain a lost father, perhaps finds his own fatherhood (if it was ever in question—which maybe it is since he has taken off, leaving his son, to go on an adventure he doesn’t have to take).

In this regard (not in the excitement department, which doesn't flag), the novel is flawed yet so is manhood. So maybe that’s all right.

#

I didn’t realize at first that this had been made into the movie. The movie departs in that the narrator isn’t justified in shooting an unarmed burglar and he slips on the trigger, which may be a more interesting question—something that could trigger more guilt (although the question of guilt melts away in both book and movie as soon as the narrator has to protect his son).

In both the novel and movie, the narrator discovers that Freddy isn’t Freddy, but the movie lacks motive for literally throwing Russel Sr. on the train tracks. The perpetrators have no call to do so and aren't challenged for doing this (although that does make it easier to make the narrator and Russel Sr. sudden allies, which makes less sense in the novel).

The movie has a more visceral motive to launch the boys into a vigilante story. The protagonist and I had to turn our heads. Still, for the most part, the narrative and themes are intact. Both are worth checking out.

How to Fracture a Fairy Tale 

Jane Yolen 

Tachyon Publications 

SF & Fantasy, Teens & YA

How I feel about Jane Yolen’s How to Fracture a Fairy Tale has a lot to do with the book’s title. It is what drew me to the book, as a reader and as a writer. I started at the beginning and was reading through. The first couple of essays and stories caught my attention, but my interest started to flag. Maybe because I’ve read so many fairy tales and rewritten fairy tales, they lose their shininess after a few. A writer really has to alter the fairy tale significantly or remove the traces of the fairy tale in an updated telling. It isn’t enough to wave politics to reflect today’s mores (unless this is your first book of revised fairy tales).

I skipped to the poetry to see how those fared and found what I was looking for in the title. The commentary and poems show the writer’s mind at work. The writer herself said the poems were written to go with the stories, so I wondered why they were so separated from their story pairings. Maybe some people don’t like commentary. Maybe some don’t like poems, but the design should at least stand the poems beside the stories if not the commentary as well. Let those who only like stories turn one page instead of making everyone else—who is intrigued by the interplay between works, the way a fairy tale can be reconstructed in different ways—flip to the end of the book to read together what was intended to go together.

To me, the ordering affects how I’d rate the book. As it stands, it’s fine with some interesting retellings. If it were ordered as it seemed intended from the title and from the commentary, I’d recommend readers mob the book. At least, my mind became more engaged when I reordered.

The highlights of the collection include “Snow in Summer” (a Snow White retelling with a down-home voice) and “The Bridge's Complaint” (a bridge tells his version of the troll and the billy goats, mostly for the surprising perspective), “Great-Grandfather Dragon's Tale” (this describes an unusual “man raised by wild animals” tale—dragons, no less—interesting for its frame structure and the emotion evoked by a simple symbol). In “Cinder Elephant” Cinderella is overweight and can speak in the language of birds.

Even if the stories aren’t stunning, they contain intriguing aspects such as “Happy Dens; or, A Day in the Old Wolves' Home” where wolves in a nursing home get to tell their side of the story (a curious and ambiguous ending). There’s a nice wish-fulfilment one where the prophet, Elijah, saves Jews from concentration camps while another tells of a mother who’s died to return as a vampire.

A few, like the thrilling novelette “One Ox, Two Ox, Three Ox, and the Dragon King,” could have been improved by updating the fairy-tale-ness a little further, perhaps modernizing the language a little more or erasing more of the fairy-tale tracks.

The collection is definitely worth investigating. Maybe you agree with the present ordering, or maybe you can try it as the book seems to suggest it wants to be. Either way, turning the page isn’t too hard a chore to get the book that you want. I, for one, want How to Fracture a Fairy Tale.

A Birthday Lunch by Martin Walker

A Birthday Lunch 

by Martin Walker 

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group 

Vintage 

Mystery & Thrillers

"When not solving mysteries in his beloved little town of St. Denis, Bruno, the chief of police, likes to cook and share his meals with local guests and dear friend."

That's opening line to this little ebook, the size of a short story or novelette. By the tags and the word mysteries in the blurb and the police chief protagonist, I thought this would be a mystery, but I guess the dependent clause was a clue that it wan't a mystery. If Walker normally writes mysteries, readers might be disappointed in this offering which is, simply, a man who gets a gift, makes dinner, and gives his gifts.
The dinner is so detailed one imagines that one might be able to recreate them based on their descriptions, so fans who like to cook will enjoy that part.

The readers for this longish vignette is specialized: those who want to learn more about the character Bruno, those into cooking, and those who like French archaeology and culture. 

The Mad Scientist's Guide to World Domination: Original Short Fiction for the Modern Evil Genius, edited by John Joseph Adams

In preparing to review this John Joseph Adams anthology, I grappled with what it means to be a "mad scientist." The quintessential anthology was Stuart David Schiff's Mad Scientists. From these and from scientific ethics (at least that was why the subgenre originally arose), I distilled the quintessential elements of the sub-genre--that is, a scientist believes himself working for the greater good though he may not be. It seems that now, at least in reading the anthology under review, we have lost sight of the original point of the trope, which is both good and bad: good, in that we trust scientific endeavors (no questions asked); bad in that science, to be rigorous, requires that we ask questions, not just to challenge our assumptions bound to be behind any study but also to probe our own ethics.

I pointed to this story as the basis of the Mad Scientist trope. (I have other thoughts on the use of the trope here). Some stories just have a scientist doing something crazy, like Arthur C. Clarke's "Big Game Hunt" which has a scientist try to control a giant squid, but it lacks the dynamo that makes the sub-field fascinating.

Most famously, we have Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, the scientist who wanted to create life. What was his motivation: to bring back loved ones? to spawn new creatures? to play God? Whatever his motive, I think we can understand it at least to an extent, so long as we isolate his original motive from the outcome. Frankenstein's sin may be his lack of follow-through, or maybe just the attempt itself if you believe the movie versions. Whatever his motive and whatever his sin, it is their contrast that powers Shelley's famed novel. Otherwise, the mad-scientist tale comes off flat.

Some narratives contrast two ethical stances, one or both of which may be problematic (who is the mad or madder scientist?) Sometimes the mad one isn't even the ostensible mad scientist. While the narrator isn't always "mad" or a scientist, the ones who aren't problematic is some fundamental manner dull the narrative.

Many feature unreliable narrators, but that need not necessarily be as we witness in Frankenstein. As you can tell by the title of this anthology, the stories can run from humorous to the serious, but still a contrast between one's goal and ethical outcome make stronger stories. If it's just a gag, the story will fall flat.

• Professor Incognito Apologizes: An Itemized List • short story by Austin Grossman

This is an apology told in the mad scientist's voice, which is this story's primary strength. It feigns at the mad scientist trope to talk as a metaphor for the failure of relationships.

• Father of the Groom • short story by Harry Turtledove

This literalizes a common joke about bad brides. 

• Laughter at the Academy: A Field Study in the Genesis of Schizotypal Creative Genius Personality Disorder (SCGPD) • short story by Seanan McGuire

Interesting thought-piece on the creation of mad scientists.

• Letter to the Editor • short story by David D. Levine

This is a kind of tour-de-force critique of Superman (or Ultimate man) with a call to action. What makes this succeed is the switch on whom we should root for. The ending doesn't carry the same weight, but as a letter-to-an-editor format, it's still impressive for those limitations. 

• Instead of a Loving Heart • short story by Jeremiah Tolbert

A robot, who serves a mad scientist, has to contemplate his existence against the impending arrival of something more intelligent and more powerful than anything that has existed before.

• The Executor • short story by Daniel H. Wilson

A mad scientist has set up a legacy for his descendants, but in order to get it, someone has to answer the riddle within five seconds.

• The Angel of Death Has a Business Plan • short story by Heather Lindsley

The protagonist works with mad scientists on their monologue. Cute.

• Homo Perfectus • short story by Dave Farland

Damien uses pheromones to get in with Asia, but as he approaches what he thinks he wants, he recognizes a subtler and more accurate approach.

• Ancient Equations • short story by L. A. Banks

A mad scientist need not use science but call up Kali, for more than one reason.

• Rural Singularity • short story by Alan Dean Foster

A reporter finds a young girl capable of miracles--scientific ones--but he doesn't quite buy into what he's told. Interesting but ends still questing for significance.

• Captain Justice Saves the Day • short story by Genevieve Valentine

A good secretary is needed to keep these guys in line--not that they'll ever notice.

• The Mad Scientist's Daughter • novelette by Theodora Goss

This was a runner-up for the Locus award. It has inherent drama just from the scenario: a bunch of mad scientists' daughters gather to tell their stories. They are neglected and abused but from so great a remove that the narrative gears are absent. Interesting concept, though.

• The Space Between • novella by Diana Gabaldon

While this sounded interesting, it may require knowledge of the series, which I have yet to explore. It seems interesting, but probably not a good entry point into the series.

• Harry and Marlowe Meet the Founder of the Aetherian Revolution • short story by Carrie Vaughn

Carrie Vaughn gives a thrilling episode in her series with. Although the story can be appreciated alone, it would help the reader to be versed in the background of this dynamic duo. Their relationship seems to be developed elsewhere.

• Blood & Stardust • short story by Laird Barron

Laird Barron has an ugly henchwoman who was been raised as the mad scientist's child but steps out (see also Goss's work, albeit a bit more dynamic)

• A More Perfect Union • short story by L. E. Modesitt, Jr.

L. E. Modesitt, Jr., more than most of the writers here, really works on the trope in "A More Perfect Union" and takes it into an interesting direction: political science. Unfortunately, the writer must have had constraints for the tale isn't as engagingly told as it could be.

• Rocks Fall • short story by Naomi Novik

Naomi Novik's "Rock Fall is more of superhero comic-book villain, but the scenario is the setup is unique. The follow-through didn't fully click.

• We Interrupt This Broadcast • short story by Mary Robinette Kowal

Mary Robinette Kowal's place us empathetically in the mind of a true mad scientist who makes devastating miscalculation. Solid work.

• The Last Dignity of Man • novelette by Marjorie M. Liu

Marjory M Liu's "The Last Dignity of Man" has a similar slipstream which flips Ford's situation (opening and development are fascinating, the closing not so much). 

• The Pittsburgh Technology • short story by Jeffrey Ford

A handful of works don't really engage the trope but still provoke thought. Jeffrey Ford's "The Pittsburgh Technology" tackles a familiar set-up: a loser looks for a better life and is given the opportunity (arguably slipstream--the opening isn't strong, but that ending zings).

• Mofongo Knows • short story by Grady Hendrix

Grady Hendrix's "Mofongo Knows" is really the highlight of the anthology. It takes you inside the decline and "fall" of a dynamic superhero Steve Savage and his foe, the "Gorilla of the Mind, Mofongo," who can influence people and things through the power of his mind. However, Mofongo has been captured by Savage and they've been a sideshow ever since. Mofongo seems to exist merely to have someone to taunt and be taunted by. When Savage passes, the course of Mofongo's life will change--for good or for ill. It starts humorous and becomes surprisingly moving.

• The Food Taster's Boy • short story by Ben H. Winters

The collection closes with strong work by Ben H Winters. A mad scientist conducts a cruel experiment just to witness cinematic results that don't quite pan out as he expected. Interesting (since it's intentionally problematic) thought piece.

Review: The Serpent's Shadow by Daniel Braum

Daniel has constructed a story (call it a "half-novel") that is both simple and exceedingly strange. It opens with this to set the stage and tone which gains significance later):

"My sister’s voice eclipsed whatever it was I had been thinking of. Something about space. And the stars. An image of opal green scales faded from my memory. Regina was right. I was staring out our balcony doors at the Mayan ruin on the shore and I…I must have nodded off. I shifted my head and all I saw was glare and the reflection of our fancy hotel room in the glass."

Dave and his sister, Regina, fly with their parents to Mexico over Christmas to vacation anong the Mayan ruins. Dave runs into Anne Marie, a Guatemalan from Albany, attending SUNY but visiting Mexico like Dave. Dave is immediately smitten:

"a tall girl in blue jean cut-offs and a tight shirt. The shirt was one of those black t-shirts with the white sleeves.... She was wearing one of those palm hats from the guy at the curb and unruly dark curls stuck out in all directions from beneath it.... I couldn’t look away even though she was looking right at me and was totally going to notice. She looked over her shoulder as if expecting someone to follow through the exit. Then she glanced around the crowd, smiled and walked in my direction. I guessed she was about my age but something about the confidence with which she carried herself made her seem so much older than everyone milling about, jostling for position in line and the crowd."

They hook up and travel with her sister and fiance to the Mayan ruins where they meet a guide whose ideas of contemporary and ancient Mayans are mystical.

This is where it gets strange. The story primes us for horror. We're given Love Story A, which slides into Horror Story A, and morphs into Horror Story B (and possibly Love Story B). This isn't to say that Horror Story B wasn't lurking in the background all along, but I, at least, was surprised where the story lead.

The flavor of the tale is very much Lucius Shepard at his best (the 80s and early 90s) when Shepard used Latin America as a dark, inexorable, supernatural thrum, edging his readers closer to the ineffable.

This tale could have been tighter with more character development although the characters are etched with deft strokes: "Regina made that exasperated look she reserved for Mom and Dad’s more embarrassing parental displays such as blatantly hoarding extra bags of peanuts on the plane ride down here."

Overall, it's a satisfying read. Horror fiends will be pleased.

What's to love in "The Boys"?

Why did I watch the first season and look forward to the next? Moral ambiguity.

Spoilers follow, but as few as possible.
Hughie Campbell, average John Doe of the tech world, is standing at the curb with his ordinary girlfriend, making their next big move in their relationship when A-Train zips by. Hughie is holding his girlfriend's hands. Nothing more.

A-Train tells the cameras that he had to prevent a robbery, but it turns out that is incorrect, according to a Fed, Billy Butcher, who learns that Hughie has not yet signed his non-disclosure worth $45,000. So a major superhero, who is supposed to be good, kills an innocent bystander and lies about it.

He has a reason, which we learn a little at a time. Meanwhile, Hughie joins forces with Butcher to learn more about what happened, which gets Butcher and Hughie embroiled in their own moral quandaries although Butcher has been at this for quite a while.

Madelyn Stillwell, the manager of "The Seven" superheroes, has to maintain not just the reputations of the superheroes, but also to enhance them financially.

Starlight, the newest addition to The Seven, learns that her childhood idols aren't so squeaky clean. Somehow she manages to dodge all of the moral ambiguity mud slung around. It will be interesting to see if they will hose her with moral ambiguity or leave the too shiny cellophane on.

Besides the religion angle that should be more realistic or cleaned off, my only gripe about the show is that there are only eight episodes.

The show is available on Amazon Prime.

Top 20 Dwarf Star Poems

Disclosure: I have a poem in here and am pleased to be included. I won’t suggest where or if it belongs on any of these levels. Readers can judge for themselves. I link to it at the bottom. It’s part of a whole suite of moon poems that accrue meaning. For interested parties, I’ll include other poems of that series that I can find online, so they can get a feel for how they fit together.

Observations on the top 20:

I organized the poems into groups although I could see them sliding up or down according to one’s taste. I was definitely surprised to find three of my top four to be haiku. I love haiku, but they’re rarely done well. These are not only emotionally potent but carry double duty.

Forms that slip from prose poem to haiku, so far, seem better without the haiku.

The list in the admirable middle group could be argued to be higher. They generally capture something of a feeling or thought that resonated with me. John C. Mannone’s is clever, but I feel it operates at a higher level, especially as it takes one voice and transforms it into another.

Once again Star*Line has the most representatives here with five (a quarter of the representatives!). Scifaikuest has three, and Troutswirl has two, both in the top group. Again, I don’t try to balance gender, but it is awfully close. Bruce Boston and F. J. Bergmann are the only poets to appear in the top Rhysling and Dwarf Stars while Christina Sng is the only poet to have two good ones in one.

It will be interesting to see how others vote on these poems.

Note 1: Within each group, poems are organized alphabetically by title.

Note 2: If I can find the poem online, a link will be provided. I had a hard time locating most.

The Mid 8

• “all my nightmares,” Christina Sng, Scifaikuest (online), November 2018.
• “emerging,” Christina Sng, Colorado Boulevard, August 2018.
• “empty house,” Maryalicia Post, Ribbons 14:3.
• Failing Masterpiece, Bruce Boston, Star*Line 41.1.
• “the little girl stopped,” Jennifer Hambrick, Atlas Poetica: 25 Science Fiction Tanka and Kyoka, eds. Julie Bloss Kelsey & Susan Burch.
• Men on Mars and Witches from Venus, John C. Mannone, Tales from the Moonlit Path, November 2018.
• News Update, Herb Kauderer, Star*Line 41.3.
• Rapunzel, F. J. Bergmann, Abyss & Apex, January 1, 2018.

The Top 4:

• “crash of waves,” Paul Geiger, Troutswirl, July 18, 2018.
• The Everlasting Self, Tracy K. Smith, Wade in the Water (Graywolf Press, 2018).
• “ocean swim,” Peter Jastermsky, Troutswirl, August 1, 2018
• “return trip,” Julie Bloss Kelsey, Scifaikuest (print), May 2018.

The Clever 8:

• cannibalizing parts, Lauren McBride, Scifaikuest (print), November 2018.
• Ghazal, Joshua Gage, Star*Line 41.2.
• Everything started with the Big Bang, they say, Juanjo Bazán, Star*Line 41.2.
• The Evolutionary Race, Peter Payack, Asimov’s SF, March/April 2018.
• “moebius strip,” Lucy Whitehead, Otata 33.
• The Pillars of Creation, Jason Gray, Literary Matters 11.1.
• “There was an A.I.…,” Robert Dawson, Star*Line 41.4.
• where to hide an alien in plain sight, LeRoy Gorman, Scryptic 2:4.

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Trent Walters, Man on the Moon poems online, the first is the nominee. The others are part of the poetic suite.

Life on the Moon v1.0, Trent Walters, Red FlagPoetry,  

Life on the Moon v.2.0 Right Hand Pointing (about half way down, formatting off--for formatting, see first poem)

O Moon (Self/Coda) Menacing Hedge

O Moon (Jehovah)  Lune

O Moon (Shakespeare) Lune

Cassandra Rose Clarke: The Mad Scientist's Daughter

The Mad Scientist's Daughter 

by Cassandra Rose Clarke 

Angry Robot

In a post-ecological-disaster world, Cat has been her own teacher, wandering nature. But her dad, a cyberneticist, brings home Finn, a being Cat initially took for a ghost. Finn becomes her teacher, a great resource for stories, math and science. At a party it becomes clear Finn is a robot although Cat remains convinced of his being a ghost until he admits what he is.

As she gets older, she becomes more and more fond of Finn. She gets in a fight at school with a kid who calls Finn an "it." She dates other boys, but they are all dis-satisfactory. One night she kisses Finn with disastrous consequences. Her father doesn't seem to buy her excuses but also doesn't seem to mind, either.

She goes to college. Her mother dies, and there is a see-saw between Finn and human lovers.

While it isn't heavily science fiction, it is SF--hypnotically told. Although Clarke's exploration of tropes is limited, she can tell a good tale. Because of the romantic nature and the serious treatment of romancing an AI, the novel doesn't seem well named except for her father's reaction to her kiss (not that he knows for certain what happened--or does he?). What's fascinating is what remains unstated but holds Cat's riveted to Finn. It must be unquestioning devotion. Even when she takes on other lovers, he does not. He remains faithful and hurries to her side when he's needed.

The narrator voice opens wonderfully childlike, aging as the narrator ages, and the detail is precise and evocative. The story title is predated by one written by Theodora Goss (I reviewed it as part of this JJ Adams' Mad Scientist anthology). They seem to have little overlap, and this has a stronger narrative thread, perhaps due to focusing on one character and being a novel.

I don't read many love stories as I don't find them realistic. Strange then that I was taken in by this one with an automaton. The ending did push character credibility, but still recommended if you're in the mood for a good storyteller.

Blake's 7

When Paul Darrow recently died, I decided to revisit the series, Blake's 7, one of the first SF TV series to have a grand narrative

The Set-up: 

Roj Blake is invited to a meeting of political dissidents undermining the Federation. They tell him that he used to a major rebel against the Federation, but he's had his memories erased. He struggles with this and goes off on his own, only to witness, helplessly as Federation troops massacre the twenty defenseless dissidents.

Blake is caught and made to look like a child molester. His defense lawyer doesn't believe Blake's claim until he looks at the records himself. Meanwhile, Blake is shipped off to a penal colony. En route, the Federation guards get greedy when they find an empty ship, full of alien technology. After a few guards die under mysterious circumstances, they send a few prisoners aboard to claim the ship, rescue or find out what happened to the guards, so as not to lose further, vital crew.

The Good

What's working is this disparate crew--misfits, forced to align in order to circumvent the Federation. Some of them are true criminals. It's hard to know who to trust and how far.

They also have this alien technology they have to learn to use.

The best may be the suggested narrative arc in the first season when Terry Nation was writing. He did create narrative threads that were better used later (e.g. telepathy), but we had a sense that this would be a big tale.

Tanith Lee wrote a few episodes, including a somewhat odd tale called, "The Sand."

The very last episode of the series ends in the same way as a famed Western movie less than a decade old at the time. It's interesting and disappointing at the same time.

The Bad 

After season one, any pretense of a grand narrative is abandoned except "Federation bad, we good." The viewer is best advised to watch season one as what-might-have-been, and then watch the rest as tales of a never-ending space opera--watch less for arcs than episodes although some pretense is made toward continuity. The end of season four makes an interesting finale but a somewhat sloppy way to tie off loose ends. The series actually seems to build toward the opposite thematic conclusion, but it's still interesting.

The characters that were forced together still stick together although based on their original characters, they should have abandoned one another long before. Their character natures are abandoned for episodic plots.

The writers have no sense of gravity in particular, physics in general.

Comparisons

This reminded me of the promise of the first season of Orphan Black, which when it got hugely popular, it had come up with more and more absurd ways to further the plot. Milk milk milk the dead cow. Murdered by its own success. Blake's 7, however, abandons any idea of a grand plot. Was it ever intended to be a grand plot? It's hard to say.

Apparently a new Blake's 7 is in the works, according to IMDb, but hopefully it doesn't fall for the same trap as its predecessor--a victim of success.

Review: The Man in the Next Bed by David K. Shipler

The Man in the Next Bed
by David K. Shipler
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Vintage
General Fiction (Adult)

David K. Shipler won the Pulitzer and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for nonfiction. This, however, a foray into fiction, claimed to be his first, is an impressive assault. It probably falls somewhere between a short story and novelette.

Gibson has been diagnosed with cancer. He jokes with the nurses and doctors, some of whom laugh, others either don't get it or ignore it. He gets a roommate added to the room. The roomie has been bleeding from the anus and the doctors and nurses are concerned, but he doesn't do needles, he says. Meanwhile the young man who feels obligated to tell his mother, and instantly regrets it.

This is the story of how two men process illness differently. It's a good story with an ending that's perhaps more ambiguous than the author intended. Nonetheless, it's a moving work. There's also an attention to detail, to reality that makes the story feel this could be us in the hospital, which possibly explains Shipler's awards.

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This is not a story that lends itself to spoiling since it is the whole experience. I do want to talk about the ending in the vaguest sense. Still maybe read the story first before reading further critique/analysis.

For those who have read the story, here's a top-secret link that only cool people like yourself has access to.

Review Dark Screams: Volume Two, edited by Richard Chizmar, Brian James Freeman

Dark Screams: Volume Two 

by Robert R. McCammon; Richard Christian Matheson; Graham Masterton; Norman Prentiss; Shawntelle Madison 

ed. Richard Chizmar, Brian James Freeman 

Random House Publishing Group - Hydra 

General Fiction (Adult)

The Deep End • Robert R. McCammon

Glenn Calder lost his son Neil two weeks ago in the town's Olympic swimming pool. It didn't strike him immediately, but there was a strange mark on his neck, and the fact that someone has died in the pool several years running. And then fortuities and insights occur to him such that  he plans to go after the creature himself.

Good story. It won the Stoker award.

Interval • by Norman Prentiss

The airline Michelle works for is undergoing bankruptcy. Meanwhile, flight 1137 is delayed. People keep inquiring, but t he status is blank. It merely says "announcement forthcoming." No one knows what it means, but they expect the worst. The delay lengthens... unnecessarily it seems between when something goes wrong and when they tell people about it. Something is lapping this all up.

Good if coy for a tad too long.

If These Walls Could Talk • by Shawntelle Madison

Eleanor has arrived at a three-story Victorian house to set up a shoot for  America's Mysterious Hotspots. The plaster is crumbling in places, and in trying to clean it up they find a body that had been missing for years. They rush to call the cops. But people keep disappearing.

Nice title. Horrifying ending image worthy of something Poe might do. It could have better telegraphed, with more background. The reasoning does not yet resonate.

The Night Hider • Graham Masterton

Dawn wakes from a dream of sleigh bells to a burned man standing in her room. She manages to escape the first time, but will she again when he appears the next night?

This was my favorite. Some good stories here, but this one was really creepy.

Whatever • Richard Christian Matheson

A band named Whatever hit the music scene with a splash, hitting the world with lyrics with serious intent.

Matheson is one of my favorites--the voice and usually creepy stuff. Interesting but maybe I was looking for a certain kind of horror that this didn't strike me. Or maybe the horror that was here should have shown up earlier and traced what that might have meant.

A good collection, worthy of your delectation, assuming your delectation follows horror. Perhaps this bodes well for the rest of the series.

Review: The Planet Thieves by Dan Krokos

The Planet Thieves

by Dan Krokos 

Starscape 

Macmillan-Tor/Forge 

Children's Fiction , Sci Fi & Fantasy

This won the Hal Clement (Golden Duck) Award for YA SF fiction.

Cadet Mason Stark boarded the SS Egypt with seventeen of his fellow cadets from the Academy for Earth Space Command. It was supposed to be a routine trip, so he sneaked off to where he wasn't supposed to be to pull a prank on his sister. Except suddenly there's a red alert indicating the Tremist were near. The Tremist were aliens who had been at war with humanity for sixty years.

Stark is caught and sent to the brig. A friend springs him as the battle isn't leaning toward the humans. He, Tom, and Merrin grab projectile weapons and sneak up on the Tremist kind who is gloating over the vanquished humans, demanding to know where the "weapon" is. The cadets launch into battle but their weapons have little effect. The king's armor just seems to absorb the energy. All seems lost, but Mason has a few tricks up his sleeve and gets a Tremist suit of his own. Can he and his cadets be enough to turn the tide against the Tremist?

I picked this one for its fantastic pulpy title alone. Pure genius. It's a thrill a minute--perfect for readers who want high-impact, high energy narratives.  Here's a sample to get a feel for it:

Tom waited for them in the elevator, holding it open with his arm. “Get in!” he hissed. 

Just as the talon stopped cutting into the wall. 

“Shh, quiet,” a man’s voice said from down the corridor. “Listen.” But Mason knew there could be no men left; the chuffing sounds the P-cannons made had faded to silence. So who had spoke? It didn’t matter: facing the Tremist unarmed would help no one. Mason and Merrin padded toward the elevator as quietly as they could. Now he wanted to run, but their footsteps would give away their presence. 

Then the ship’s computer, Elizabeth, said, “Cadet Renner, please stop blocking the elevator door.” 

Mason and Merrin jumped into the elevator and spun in time to see three Tremist charge around the corner. They were at full sprint, faster than he thought men could move. Their plate armor shimmered wetly, shifting between purple and black, catching the sterile light of the spaceship and making it alien. Mason saw his own face in the flat mirrored surface that was the leading Tremist’s faceplate. 

Tom had moved his arm, but the door was still open. They were only thirty feet away now. 

“Shut the door!” Mason yelled, pressing himself against the wall. 

“Thank you,” Elizabeth replied airily, and the door began to shut. 

The three Tremist paused when they realized they wouldn’t make it in time, and then lifted the talons to their shoulders. The soldier part of Mason’s brain, the part that didn’t get afraid, noted the angle at which the Tremist held their weapons, how, in the next second, each beam would slice through them at the breastbone.

The door sealed; Mason dragged Merrin and Tom to the floor as the talons’ green beams crisscrossed through the door and heated the air above them until it was crackling. Then the car descended, giving the illusion of the beams rising up through the door until they disappeared through the ceiling. 

The air was hot and baked and smelled like electricity. 

The door opened on the next level down, into a corridor identical to the one they just left.  

Tom had his dataslate plugged into a port on the elevator. “Erasing our destination level . . . now! Bought us a few minutes.” 

Merrin took the pad out of his hand. Her fingers danced over the screen until it flashed red. “There—the elevator is frozen.”

I loved it, but did wish for a little wider scope or canvas. There is some bogus science here--about a planet throwing off the balance of gravity in a solar system, but oh well. The novel's a blast and hopefully it will encourage kids to stretch their imaginations and maybe investigate the sciences.

There's a second book in the series where Mason is on edge of getting kicked out of Academy II for defending cadets from bullies. Fun stuff. Fingers crossed that more in this series are forthcoming.