Review Category: Books

Rising high above Tel Aviv, Central Station is a giant spaceport and gateway to the stars. On the ground level, humans rub shoulders with androids and the mysterious ‘Others’, connected by a digital consciousness that stretches to the asteroid belt and beyond. This collection of short stories by Lavie Tidhar tells of these people and beings, each tale offering a different perspective from the characters, showing how they interact with one another and their place in the city they inhabit.

Tidhar’s prose draws the reader in, bringing this world to life with ease. There are many concepts on offer – ranging from genetic modification to artificial intelligence – yet the characters are never sacrificed in favour of the technology; in fact, the two of them combine seamlessly to create a unique vision, one that will leave the reader thinking long after the final page. Not only intelligent, it’s emotional too, telling of loves lost and those only just begun, of those wishing to escape their past and those hoping to bring it back.

All but a couple of these stories have already seen print in sci-fi magazines over the last five years, but they have been substantially altered to fit the course of the narrative, linking all together to form a cohesive whole. Each is of an incredibly high standard, and readers will take the time to savour every word, relish the structure of every sentence. Tidhar is reminiscent of an early William Gibson, not just in sharing that short and punchy style, but in his ability to create a world where the speculation is believable enough to fit seamlessly into the narrative; somehow, despite being set centuries into the future, it feels just around the corner.

Tidhar’s last two books, The Violent Century and A Man Lies Dreaming, were rightly given great acclaim, so were always going to be tough acts to follow. Central Station maintains that standard, cementing Lavie Tidhar as one of science fiction’s great voices, an author who creates scenarios and characters that feel destined to become classics, ones that readers will be happy to revisit time and time again. It’s a compelling collection that mixes the epic and the intimate, one that succeeds at being profound, incredibly moving and, quite simply, stunning. 

CENTRAL STATION / AUTHOR: LAVIE TIDHAR / PUBLISHER: TACHYON PUBLICATIONS / RELEASE DATE: MAY 26TH 

Some ideas are so obvious and clever that you wonder why it’s taken the world so long to come up with them. Warlock Holmes: A Study in Brimstone is a good idea, take the world of Sherlock Holmes and rather than making the central character an incredibly astute detective, turn him into a wizard.

G. S. Denning has taken a bundle of classic Holmes tales and rewritten them based on this simple premise. Warlock, unlike Sherlock, is a brilliant wizard filled with arcane might and ability. Alas, his focus on matters arcane and powerful have also meant that he’s not really focused on the real world. The result is that Watson is the true detective, using his skills and perception as an army doctor to fill in the gaps on the cases. Meanwhile, Warlock uses his supernatural powers to navigate the choppy waters of criminal underworld, in a world where unnatural creatures are lurking in every corner.

Of course, this is all still set in Victorian London. Most good subjects of the Empire know that magic isn’t really, so happily look the other way when confronted by were-rat urchins and the like. Inspector Lestrade is a vampire, and Inspector Torg Grogsson is literally an ogre. The rest of Scotland Yard don’t like them or Holmes, so that hasn’t changed. 

Warlock Holmes: A Study in Brimstone is clever and funny supernatural silliness.  Dennings has twisted and warped Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s world, to make it strange and sinisterly magical, and yet he’s somehow managed to preserve the core charm of the original stories. Watson is still as brave and loyal as he always was, and Warlock is every bit the genius Sherlock is, all be it in an entire different way and with more buffoonery. The cases themselves work well as stories in their own right, though each one is also a parody of sorts of the original stories. In a market filled with Sherlock style reworkings, this stands out as clever and well done. If you ever wondered how much better Sherlock’s would be if people could hurl hellfire at each other, well this one is for you.

WARLOCK HOLMES- A STUDY IN BRIMSTONE / AUTHOR: G. S. DENNING / PUBLISHER: TITAN BOOKS / RELEASE DATE: MAY 27TH 

The Great War is over and Britain is still reeling from its after-effects. Shirley Fearn, a teenage schoolgirl who lives in a small country village, believes she has a part to play in rebuilding the nation. She wants to be a teacher, giving hope and direction to Britain’s fractured youth. But Shirley’s ambitions are not entirely altruistic. She is infatuated with her own teacher, the mysterious Mr. Tiller, who has walked with a limp since returning from the battlefields of France and who – as local rumour has it – “isn’t a real man… not after that injury.”

Shirley doesn’t understand what that means. Neither does she care. All Shirley wants is to love Mr. Tiller, train to be a teacher and then return to the village to work beside him. What she doesn’t realise is that Mr. Tiller left the battlefield with something greater than his disfigurement – an object is buried deep inside him, an object that has given Mr. Tiller a prophetic insight into the future, and Shirley will soon become an important part of Mr. Tiller’s mission to save the world. With the May Day celebrations fast approaching, Mr. Tiller asks something terrible of Shirley. Is Mr. Tiller mad, or does Shirley really hold the fate of mankind within her grasp?

Aliya Whiteley’s novella is a confluence of social realism, rural coming-of-age story, and speculative science fiction. It only runs to 120 pages but, thanks to the poetic simplicity of Whiteley’s prose, it is more intimate and more thematically textured than many novels four times that length. Told in the first person, Shirley is a precocious narrator who isn’t always easy to like, but Whiteley writes with such disarming honesty that we still have sympathy for everything Shirley feels: her frustration with country life, her fascination with Mr. Tiller, her initial ambivalence towards the blacksmith’s son Daniel, which gradually becomes something more and threatens to derail Mr. Tiller’s prophecy, setting a brutal and unexpected climax into motion. It is an intriguing ‘what if?’ of a tale, one that keeps us transfixed and wondering right up to the final pages and with an ending that won’t easily be forgotten.

THE ARRIVAL OF MISSIVES / AUTHOR: ALIYA WHITELEY / PUBLISHER: UNSUNG STORIES / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Following on from Marked, the second instalment of the Soulseer Chronicles continues the adventures of Lucky de Salle, who went the first 25 years of her life believing herself to be an ordinary human who just happened to be able to see ghosts, before travelling to the mystical Underlands and discovering she’s actually a daemon princess and also possibly the Soulseer of legend. When her daemon sister Kayla is kidnapped by a death cult, Lucky and her entourage set out to rescue her, and along the way she begins to gradually learn precisely what being the Soulseer actually means.

The second book in a fantasy series has the potential to be more satisfying than the first; with backstory and scene setting all out of the way, the author is freed to delve deeper into their created world, without having to worry about getting readers up to speed with its intricacies. Cursed, however, doesn’t take advantage of this and, as it consists largely of a rescue mission plot, the series’ overall development mostly stagnates. The sisterly relationship between Lucky and Kayla, damaged by the latter’s lifelong lies, was one of the most interesting things about Marked, and now that things had reached a point where they could figure out what they now meant to each other, Kayla’s absence is felt in a frustrating rather than dramatic way, as her abduction takes her out of much of the story.

The undercurrent of romance is still there and once again avoids the pitfalls common to love triangle subplots. Rather than Lucky being unable to choose between her suitors, she simply ignores the issue due to more pressing concerns. With Jamie the angelic Guardian and Jinx the demonic Deathbringer both vying for her affections, the fact that both of them are supreme badasses yet also emotionally sensitive, makes them equally appealing and means that the side you’ll fall on depends whether you prefer your fantasy men to be noble and brooding or wicked and mischievous. 

Lucky’s royal status again puts her in the way of power struggles between ruthless and brutal daemon lords, and reminds us of the difference between the general populace of the Underlands and the decadent sadism of its rulers. While the story allows us to accept that not all daemons are bloodthirsty psychopaths, it would have helped if we were able to get a proper feel for just how common or unusual such casual violence is supposed to be.

Now that events have calmed down a little for Lucky, hopefully book three of the Soulseer Chronicles will take us further into the Underlands, to experience the stories hidden there.

CURSED / AUTHOR: SUE TINGEY / PUBLISHER: JO FLETCHER BOOKS / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

In his foreword to the many pages of illustrations that make up Star Wars: Galaxy of Colouring, designer Nicolas Beaujouan aptly explains this seemingly new trend of adult colouring books by saying, “Drawing and colouring are really healthy hobbies, and there is no conflict between adulthood and the creative reverie of childhood”. In his full-page intro to the images ahead, he also sets out the tone of this nicely assembled and (and surprisingly thick) book, by passionately (albeit briefly) discussing the impact of Star Wars, ending with “Star Wars is not just a dream, but a waking dream”. And in this colouring book, there is certainly scope to dream.

Across over 100 pages, images from the Lucasfilm archive and illustrations by Ronan Toulhoat and Kanthesis, fill this large colouring book and give us a great deal of un-coloured characters. From Han Solo, Princess Leia and Darth Vader to General Grievous, Devaronian and Figrin D’an and the Modal Nodes, this book boasts quite a few character diagrams for the pleasure of the avid Star Wars fan. It is also nice to see the level of affection that went into a project like this, evident in both the aforementioned foreword and some images affectionately taken directly from set pieces in the films (Battle of Yavin, Battle of Hoth and the Endor Speeder Chase, The Boonta Eve Classic Podrace).

However, some of the illustrations do come stylistically shaded to the point that, say, the odd Death Star Officer or Darth Vader comes mostly filled with deep shadow, and may not require much further colour assistance. Also some of the prequels are less focused on than the original trilogy and, while understandable and unavoidable considering the film was not out during the books making, you can’t help but feel the absence of images from The Force Awakens, now that we have practically all seen the film. There are also some lacking names like Jango Fett (though Boba unshockingly features heavily) and the Max Rebo Band- who else among us couldn’t wait to get our coloured pencils on Sy Snootles? No? Just us then…

However these are really minor quibbles in a book that, like the Clone Troopers (prior to Order 66 that is) does its job well. Featuring mostly great illustrations, with almost a Sin City like graphic novel feel to a few of them. As well as others inspired by the posters of some of the films in the series (the last image in particular is taken directly from the 1977 original posters). Some may not even want to colour in some of these pages (in these days of unspoiled Star Wars merch being our future pension getters) but for the majority that do, there is plenty to enjoy, with some redux images leaving open backgrounds where you can really grab yourself a sketching pencil and let your imagination go wild. Presented with a golden fold out cover and back, this is an attractive colouring book for the more artistic of Star Wars fans. Just keep out of reach of the younglings…

STAR WARS: GALAXY OF COLOURING / ARTISTS: RONAN TOULHOAT, KANTHESIS / PUBLISHER: EGMONT / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

The ‘strangenesses’ have begun: Geronimo Manezes has started to levitate and graphic novelist Jimmy Kapoor suddenly finds himself face-to-face with his own fictional creation. Meanwhile, an abandoned baby displays miraculous powers of perception and a jilted socialite launches thunderbolts from her hands. They do not realise it yet but they are all descended from the jinn, that race of mythical creatures we normally associate with exotic fairy stories but which are, in fact, far more complicated and deadly. 

Countless centuries ago, a beautiful jinn princess called Dunia fell in love with a mortal man and bore him a seemingly inexhaustible parade of children. Now the descendants of those children are discovering they possess fantastical powers, and not before time – the veil between our world and Fairyland is separating and four ‘dark jinn’ have broken through, intent on causing chaos and destruction. Only Dunia and her children can prevent the apocalypse that threatens to destroy us, but are they already too late?

Salman Rushdie’s latest book is not only a beautifully written satire-as-fairytale but the subject matter is bang on trend. For those of us who are interested in the paranormal, the Jinn are becoming a familiar subject – soldiers have returned from the Middle East talking about the jinn and the suspected supernatural aid they may be giving to IS and there has even been speculation that jinn and demons might be the same thing.

Although he avoids those kind of comparisons, and the powers his jinn children demonstrate are more akin to the X-Men than the occupant of Aladdin’s lamp, Rushdie’s cleverly-titled take on the famous ‘1001 (Arabian) Nights’ (Two Years Eight Months & Twenty-Eight Nights adds up to 1001) is a very different but no less compelling re-imagining of what the jinn might be. It is also a wonderful Chinese box of storytelling that evokes not only 1001 Nights but also The Manuscript Found at Saragossa and Cervantes’ Don Quixote, reminding us that intricately woven multiple narratives overloaded with a tremendous cast of memorable characters and suffused with humour, romance and drama aren’t purely the domain of long dead authors.

It’s a shame that when many people think of Salman Rushdie they only remember the controversy surrounding his ‘Satanic Verses’ and the accompanying fatwa (and gags like “how fat is your wa going to be? Will I have to widen the doorway so they can get in?” (yep, this writer wrote that gag for a long forgotten BBC radio series called Week Ending and is still using it – pitiful) but he’s a prolific author whose work has often tiptoed the tightrope between the real and the phatasmagoric, and his 2003 Booker Prize winning novel Midnight’s Children was declared ‘the Booker of Bookers’ – the most deserving winner of the previous 25 years. That Rushdie should still be writing so potently and still be continuing to push back the frontiers, when he could easily pull up a deck chair and languish on the frontiers he already owns is wonderful, inspirational and profoundly (but only in the best way) terrifying.

Rub the lamp all day long, the genie will always give a precocious flick of her Barbara Eden-inspired pony tail and reply: 10/10, Master.

TWO YEARS EIGHT MONTHS & TWENTY-EIGHT NIGHTS / AUTHOR: SALMAN RUSHDIE / PUBLISHER: VINTAGE / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

Someone is watching Caitlin O’Hara, and they are using her son to do it. In the second installment of The Earthend Saga, the child psychologist finds herself unwillingly equipped with the powers that she was forced to channel in order to save the life of her patient in the conclusion of A Vision of Fire. These powers allow Caitlin to heal even the most disturbed of her patients, but as any self-respecting science-fiction fan knows; power comes at a price. 

Struggling to both reconcile and harness her newfound abilities, Caitlin’s world falls out from under her as her young son Jacob begins exhibiting the same terrifying symptoms as her patients from the previous novel. Determined to save him regardless of the person cost, Caitlin delves deeper into the mystery of the ancient civilization of Galderkhaan, without realizing that halfway across the world, agent Mikel Jasso is doing the exact same thing. Jasso has discovered a perfectly preserved city from the Galderkhaani era under the ice of the Antarctic, but the links between his research, his collection of stone artifacts, and the mystical happenings occurring across the globe have dangerous implications for them both. 

A Dream of Ice improves leaps and bounds on its predecessor in almost every way. The narrative is crisp and sharp; the storytelling is genuinely intriguing, and the dialogue is realistic, engaging and often times humorous. The first novel was told primarily from Caitlin’s perspective and while she remains the protagonist in this second outing, the spotlight is shared with other well-observed new characters, which allows the story to evolve in such a way that every page feels breathtakingly fresh and exciting. The writers teased the idea of putting Caitlin’s likeable 10 year-old son in peril last time, and the game is stepped up here, which not only raises the bar of Caitlin’s investment but serves as strong emotional baiting, as anyone who has read the first novel will know, very few who find themselves afflicted with the visions from the other world emerge unscathed. 

Anderson deploys all of the devices that morphed her into a cult icon to great effect, but the material is both original and captivating enough to prevent anyone from wondering where Mulder is. A thrilling ride that sets up high expectations for the upcoming The Sound of Seas due to be released later this year.

A DREAM OF ICE / AUTHORS: GILLIAN ANDERSON, JEFF ROVIN / PUBLISHER: SIMON & SCHUSTER UK / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

‘What you hold in your hands’, warns the insider cover, ‘is a piece of a very large puzzle’. Peter Levenda (author of the non-fiction version of Sekret Machines) is not wrong. Based on true events, the story presents the experiences of a multitude of witnesses to supernatural occurrences, as told through a fictional narrative.

We begin in 2014 with Major Alan Young, a pilot on a routine night patrol in Afghanistan. Confronted by an enemy that disrupts his weapons system and is undetectable by radar, Alan is helpless to watch as the asset he was tasked to protect, is destroyed before his eyes. Young dismisses ISIS and the Taliban as culprits, based on the limitations of their real-life arsenal, but is reluctant to reveal what he really saw until his debrief is interrupted by the CIA demanding he sign a pre-written letter of resignation. Whatever the CIA believes Alan was witness to, they want him out of the way.

Meanwhile Jennifer Quinn, daughter of the uber-rich Edward Quinn, despises her father’s wealth but feels comfortable enough to use it as a means to subsidize her numerous charitable causes. Edward however has pulled her funding, forcing her home just in time to be informed that her father has committed suicide. We know different; Edward knew too much, and was forced at gunpoint to leap from his office window to spare his daughter’s life.

In present day New York, Timika owns a conspiracy theory debunking website. On false pretense of a bomb scare, government officials have cordoned off her offices. Timika has received a package from Jerzy Stern, challenging her to read his material. We don’t get much time to digest any of this as before we’re hauled back to 1939 in Poland, where a young Jerzy’s experiences at the hands of the Nazi regime are harrowing enough, even without his supernatural discoveries. This all takes place within the first 90 pages of a 650+ page book and only covers four of a vast array of characters, which should indicate the kind of white-knuckle adventure this story embarks on.

The prose is a joy; effortlessly pulling off the feat of making the unbelievable appear not only plausible but utterly, terrifyingly, realistic. The language is enriched with all the flair that DeLonge employed to great effect in his former incarnation, as lyricist for punk rock band Blink-182. Billed as the first of a trilogy, Sekret Machines redefines ‘provocative’; we defy you not to lie awake questioning everything that you ever thought you knew after you’ve turned the last page.

To paraphrase the author, take off your pants and your jacket, and settle in for the thrill ride of the year.

SEKRET MACHINES / AUTHORS: TOM DELONGE, A.J. HARTLEY / PUBLISHER: TO THE STARS / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

In his introduction to this terrific book of interviews with directors and actors of sci-fi, horror and fantasy (or to use the book’s catch-all term the ‘fantastique’), author Tony Earnshaw provides some very good advice to wannabe film journalists. “Be professional, polite, punctual, and, above all else, prepared.” The interviews in this book show that Earnshaw is all of these things and more; he’s an interviewer who knows exactly what questions to ask, and, for twenty-five years (as a film critic for the Yorkshire Post), has been asking them of some of the biggest names in the film industry.

John Carpenter, George A. Romero, Tim Burton, William Friedkin, Quentin Tarantino, George Lucas, Peter Jackson, Neil Jordan, Wes Craven, and Terry Gilliam are just some of the luminaries included in Fantastique, a collection of thirty interviews conducted by Earnshaw between 1994 and 2015. Harking back to the days of round table interviewing and press conferences, Earnshaw catches many of these older directors during key moments in their careers: Friedkin, interviewed in 1998, gives his thoughts on the reissue of his horror masterpiece, The Exorcist; Gilliam, in 1995, talks animatedly about Twelve Monkeys in 1995; and Lucas, interviewed in 1999, chats openly about The Phantom Menace (revealing reasons behind his twenty-one year directorial hiatus along the way).

Rubbing shoulders with these giants in the book are the younger generation of filmmakers, and it’s equally interesting to hear the stories given by these – at the time of interview – relative newbies. A pre-Hostel Eli Roth talks about his struggles to get Cabin Fever up and running, Frank Khalfoun discusses his 2012 Maniac remake, James Watkins, Susan Hill, and Jane Goldman do a round table on The Woman in Black, Neil Marshall talks Dog Soldiers and The Descent, Ben Wheatley gives his views on Kill List, Alejandro Amenábar discusses The Others, and Edgar Wright (with Simon Pegg and Nick Frost) chat happily about making Hot Fuzz. There is the occasional banter and disagreement thrown into the mix (Neil Jordan takes Earnshaw to task for potentially misquoting him at one point), and it all makes for a read that’s informative and never less than wholly enjoyable.

Some of the interviews are more in-depth than others: Carpenter’s 2008 look back at The Thing is disappointingly brief; on the other hand, Craven and Neve Campbell (On Scream 3), Christopher Nolan & Christian Bale (on Batman Begins), Danny Boyle (on 28 Days Later), M. Night Shyamalan and Bryce Dallas Howard (on The Village) and many others go into considerable, often fascinating, depth. And it’s always good to see unsung filmmakers, like as Paul W.S. Anderson and Roland Emmerich given the chance to talk about their films with an intelligent interviewer.

Throughout its 405 pages, then, Fantastique is packed with nuggets a-plenty for the cult film fan. And with a number of interviews previously unpublished, and all interviews unabridged, Fantastique makes for a collection of the very best from one of the top journalists in the field.

FANTASTIQUE / AUTHOR: TONY EARNSHAW / PUBLISHER: BEAR MANOR MEDIA / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW

 

Genre fans have long rejoiced in arguing impossible questions; who is tougher, Hulk or Superman? Which is quicker, the Millennium Falcon or the Starship Enterprise? This is because we love a good statistic, but the problem with statistics is that they are very dull to look at. 

Fortunately, there is an ongoing fad where our favourite tidbits and facts from the franchises that we love so much are being produced and laid out in a fun format that makes them a little bit more digestible: the infographic book. This is where an author has researched the topic at hand in depth and produced these facts alongside crude art that signifies what is being dissected. It may include specifically coloured pie charts or comparison drawings to make things easier on the eye. 

The latest of these books covers both the original and prequel trilogies from the Star Wars universe and is pretty extensive. It covers such varied topics as the fastest space vessels or pod-racers, to individual heights of key characters. Ever wondered how many kisses there were in all six episodes? This has got you covered. Have you ever pondered how expensive it would be to hire the Cantina band for a wedding? Sorted (it’s 3,000 credits by the way). We are even shown exactly how much Han Solo owed Jabba the Hut, with the debts incurred broken down individually. 

There are some very interesting bits of information in here, including all shooting locations in the real world for the six films and an exact layout of the Cantina bar, but there are also some pretty pointless facts laid out, as well as some hard to understand infographics too, as there are some acronyms and abbreviations that only a true hardcore fan would understand easily.

On the whole, this is more fun than annoying, but you can’t help but feel it would have been better to separate the two trilogies into different volumes and then really delve down into the intricacies of each set of three films. Sometimes it feels like the information on show is just skimming the surface – no more so than when it only uses two pages to break down how many lines of dialogue each character has in the two trilogies, yet misses out major characters like Princess Leia, Luke Skywalker and C3PO, yet includes Jar Jar Binks.

But, we can forgive minor issues like this because it does offer a heck of a lot of information. The Force is fairly strong in this one.

STAR WARS GRAPHICS / AUTHOR: VIRGILE ISCAN / PUBLISHER: EGMONT / RELEASE DATE: 5TH MAY