More Books than Time

Book Reviews - Romance, Fantasy, Science Fiction - By an Adult for Adults

Monster Hunter Memoirs: Sinners by John Ringo and Larry Correia

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The Monster Hunter Files, an anthology of stories set in Larry Correia’s Monster Hunter International world, prompted me to read other books by Larry Correia or set in his world.  John Ringo has written three Monster Hunter novels, that star Chad Gardenier, also called Iron Hand, set about 30 years prior to the rest of the series.  I reviewed the first novel, Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge here.  Ringo tells a pretty good story although he does go off on tangents.

Ringo’s second novel is Monster Hunter Memoirs: Sinners, tells more about Chad, this time fighting waves of monster invasions in New Orleans.

I didn’t enjoy this second book quite as much.  Sinners has plenty of action – New Orleans attracts plenty of people that believe in and practice witchcraft or sorcery – and this activity fuels the ongoing problems.  Sinners does not have quite the character depth.  We already know a lot about Chad from Grunge; we know he’s fatalistic, unwilling to say no to carnal desires, a lounge lizard, brave, smart, a natural leader, and has a good sense of humor.  Sinners builds on this Chad foundation but now we see him more as a hardened fighter, less funny, less introspective, less humble and more obnoxious.

Sinners has some very good points.  Although Chad is a girl aficionado Ringo avoids smut.  Chad talks a lot but thankfully avoids giving us the details up close and in person.

I really appreciated the Catholic, religious angle.  Remember, Chad died in Grunge and came back because St. Peter asked him to.  He converted to Catholicism in Grunge and although he’s surely not the most faithful worshiper, he believes and takes advantage of the sacraments to strengthen himself and cleanse his soul.  Ringo covers this with a light touch, just a few sentences.  If you don’t believe you can still enjoy the book.

Maybe I liked Sinners less because I read Monster Hunter International at the same time, and simply had a surfeit of monster, guns and violence.  I don’t know.  I will read further books in Ringo’s series because he is so good at telling a story, but I think I will wait a while for those.

3 Stars

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Monster Hunter Memoirs: Grunge by John Ringo in Larry Correia MHI Universe

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I enjoyed Monster Hunter Files short stories (see review here) and requested several more in the series from our library.  First one up was Monster Hunter Memoirs:  Grunge, written by John Ringo using the backstory and characters that Larry Correia created for his Monster Hunter International series.

John Ringo writes well-crafted, fast-paced near future science fiction and fantasy novels, many excellent and a few (Ghost) that are unreadable if you aren’t into smutty violence.  He is generous to fault sharing his thoughts about society and politics.  The other thing Ringo novels have is bad language, lots and lots of cussing and vulgarities.  Grunge has cussing and violence and sociology and it also has a good story with interesting, likable characters.

Synopsis

Our lead character, Chad, has two professors for parents, mom an unrepentant hippy type and dad a womanizer who hunts coeds.  Chad dislikes his mother – it is mutual, in fact she hates him – and for spite decides to get a perfect C average, 2.00000, in high school.  That is harder than it sounds since you have to know the right answers in order to get half of them wrong.  He joins the Marines and dies in the Beirut barracks bombing.

The story picks up when St. Peter asks Chad to forego heaven in favor of a mission on Earth.  Chad agrees, wakes up into a shattered, agonizing body, heals in Bethseda and looks for the sign God promised him, 57.  The 57 eventually leads him to a zombie outbreak where he meets the Monster Control Bureau (FBI) and MHI (Monster Hunter International, a for-profit eradication company).  The story goes on from there, through his training and first many missions.

Grunge has some excellent, funny moments that highlight the dead serious situation that Chad is tasks to resolve.  The Old Ones are waking up and causing mischief – think vampires, werewolves, giant blood-sucking spiders, zombies, ghouls etc. and etc.  The Fae are not pretty Disney creatures but powerful creatures who do not like humans.  The vampires do not sparkle and do not seduce nice young ladies.  To quote Chad, if an Old One or Fae got into the world the whole world would scream for decades until there is no one left.

Characters

Thus Chad justifies his life.  He hunts monsters for a living, plays violin as a hobby, studies languages for two PhDs and is a lounge lizard the rest of the time.  He looks at cute coeds the way the rest of us look at spaghetti (or chocolate).  He becomes a Catholic but somehow doesn’t quite get the 6th commandment and thinks fornication is a Sunday-Saturday avocation.

Chad makes the novel work.  Ringo did a great job on him; he feels like a real person with virtues and failings, odd habits and quirks. Ringo doesn’t spend as much time on the other characters, enough that they too feel like real people, although with less detail.

Now for the less pleasant parts.  Chad talks about girls but we do not have sex scenes, more lust scenes.  There are a couple blasphemies, F bombs and other vulgarities, lots of violence.  Chad talks about his guns, but nowhere near as much or as annoyingly, as Larry Correia did in Monster Hunter International.  (I’ve not figured out why, but a lot of science fiction authors bore the heck out of me by describing space ships and lasers in overabundant detail, and it seems we can’t get away from it even with books like this with not a space ship in sight.  All I need to know is that 1., it’s a gun; 2., it’s big; and 3., it kills things.  I do not care what type and how big it is and what type of ammunition it uses, but apparently a lot of science fiction readers enjoy that stuff.  Me, I skim through those sections if the story is good and toss the book if it’s not.)

I recommend Monster Hunter Memoirs:  Grunge if you enjoy fast-paced science fiction-y fantasy or lots of action or a complex character.

4 Stars

Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman Retell Ancient Myths and Stories

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Neil Gaimon wrote Norse Mythology using the ancient stories of the Aesir and Vanir gods, giants, huge wolves, world trees.  His characters include our familar Thor, Odin, Frey and Loki, and the less-familiar Kvasir and Aenir and still more.  Gaiman does an excellent job merging his own style into the narrative flow of the legends and is faithful to the overall feeling that these stories are oral tales.

If you’ve read any of the old myths you know that Thor and Odin and the rest are nothing like the brave and clever heroes in the movies.  Instead they are rather stupid, gullible and greedy, easy pickings for someone like Loki or the dwarf craftsmen.  Gaiman shows us these folk as they were in the legends.

The book includes 15 stories spanning from the creation of the world to Ragnarok and the world that comes after.  It includes some of my favorites featuring Loki and his genius for manipulating and deceiving the other gods.

Relationship Between Loki and Thor

All the movies and books stress the love/distrust between Thor and Loki.  Loki can’t help scheme; it is what he does and Thor can’t help getting mixed up in Loki’s maneuvers.  Gaiman keeps their relationship central to the stories.

My favorite was Freya’s Unusual Wedding.  One of the best passages is “There were things Thor did when something went wrong.  The first thing…was ask himself if what had happened was Loki’s fault.  … So he did the next thing he did when something went wrong, and he went to ask Loki for advice.  Loki was crafty.  Loki would tell him what to do.”

Loki discovers the ogre Thrym stole Thor’s hammer and wants Freya to marry him in exchange.   After several lively discussions Thor dresses up like Freya and goes with Loki to marry Thrym.  Of course Loki and Thor trick Thrym and manage to kill the ogres and escape with virtue intact and hammer in hand.

Finally Loki goes too far.  He causes Hod to kill his brother Balder; he refuses to go along with Hermod when she requests Balder back from Hel; he murders Fimafeng at one feast and gets drunk and insults every god at the next.  Thor captures him in the form of a salmon and takes him back to be punished.  The other gods imprison him with a giant serpent to drip venom onto his face unless faithful Sigyn catches the venom as it drips.  Gaiman added detail and color to this tale, including Loki congratulating himself on hiding so well.

Overall

Norse Mythology is easy to read because the individual tales are all short, making it easy to pick up for a few minutes before dinner or read before bed.  The stories themselves are true to the original which makes them a little hard to read.  We can see the train wreck coming and watch the gods’ cupidity destroy their world.

4 Stars

 

The Invisible Library – A Fantasy for Us Book Lovers

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I wanted to be a librarian until I learned that they had to work, not read the books.  Ugh.  Surrounded by books and not one to read, like a castaway with salt water everywhere and not a drop to drink.  The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman solves the problem of working vs. reading.  Librarians work until they get too old or die or are too badly injured, then retire to read as much as they want as long as they want.  Their library is The Library, the library that connects all the worlds by holding books from every world on its shelves.

The catch is the “work” that Librarians do.  Stealing, buying, stealing, copying, stealing, absconding with, stealing, trading, acquiring books, however it takes to get those elusive copies into the Library.  Think of Shakespeare’s Agamemnon, yes, that type of book, books that are rare even in their home worlds.  Which is why stealing is such a handy skill.  I can’t think of too many other libraries that hire Librarians for their martial arts skills and none where death in the line of duty is common.

If this sounds fascinating, well, it is.  Cogman hit the trifecta on this novel:  Intriguing back story, solid writing, interesting characters.  And it’s all tied up in a nifty plot.

Backstory

There are many worlds that span from extreme reality with order and logic, to extreme chaos with magic and unusual creature.  Dragons rule the reality worlds and Fae own the chaos worlds.  Humans exist in all but are basically powerless in the worlds at either end.  Fae are completely engrossed in their own, individual stories and humans play bit roles controlled by glamour and the Fae will.  Dragons enforce Reality with a capital R; I’m not sure what that would look like other than probably not a lot of fun.

Cogman contains the action in the Library (briefly) and in the London of a single world, one with roughly 19th century technology and considerable magic, also lots of dirt and smoke.  Women wear long skirts and aren’t supposed to be in charge.

Cogman uses the characters to show the world and the magic that underpins this London and the Library.  It takes skill to show a complicated world and backstory without pages of tedious explanation and she does so.

Characters

Heroine Irene is a young Librarian, sent to acquire a version of Grimm’s fairy tales that is unique to one world.  This world is on the normal/chaos boundary, where humans have self will, Fae abound and rule certain countries and London is full of vampires and werewolves.  Irene has a new apprentice, Kai, a very young dragon, which is helpful in this London as otherwise no one would take her seriously.  Irene loves Sherlock Holmes and is excited to meet Vane, a Sherlock look-alike who wants to solve the mystery of the book’s location after it is stolen (although not by Irene).  Irene, Kai and Vane are helped and thwarted by Silver, the Fae ambassador from Lichtenstein (a major power in this world).

As you can see from the characters The Invisible Library is complicated.  And it is delightful.

4+ Stars

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Lost Child of Lychford by Paul Cornell – Store Kindness to Defeat Evil

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Lost Child of Lychford is sequel to Witches of Lychford (reviewed here), a short, suspenseful novel of three ladies working to thwart demonic plans to break the barriers that protect our world.  The three ladies managed to defeat the demon but there are many worlds and many entities who threaten ours.  We meet two more in Lost Child of Lychford.

The lost child in the title is a toddler who originally appears as a ghost to Lizzie, who is the Lychford vicar cum apprentice border protector.  Lizzie must find within herself the strength to save the child and her town and her friends from the latest evil entities.

In some ways Lost Child is less powerful than Witches because we don’t really see how the new evil entities (again masquerading as people) manage to exert so much control over the three women.  It just happens, and all the while the three are dimly aware something is wrong but cannot save themselves.  Autumn, who was the weakest character in Witches, is stronger here but she still felt more like a character than a person.

Since we’re reading a fantasy suspense novel and not a crime whodunit, Cornell can get away with sparse explanations, providing just enough of a frame that we can suspend disbelief and go along with the story.  Still I would have preferred a little more meat on Lizzie’s story since she was being led to perform horrors in her church upon a child.  It was just a bit unsatisfying.

The ending was interesting because Lizzie manages to save herself with help from the ghost whom she had befriended.  Because she had been kind to the ghost child earlier, the ghost was able to give her back the strength to push off the control.  Judith later explains that Lizzie used the little boy ghost as a battery, storing kindness and goodness, then withdrawing when needed.  I love that metaphor.

Lost Child of Lychford is even shorter than Witches of Lychford, about 133 pages.  That’s the size of a long novella and I do wish Cornell would tie these stories together into one satisfying novel.  Reading these short books is a little like eating appetizers for dinner.

Overall the novel is well written with strong mood contrasts and good dialogue.   Characterization is moderately good with Lizzie confronting her own faith (or lack of it) with stress of her first Christmas as the vicar, while Autumn looks for romance and Judith deals with her own ghost.

4 Stars

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Witches of Lychford by Paul Cornell – Moody, Magic and Money

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I bought Witches of Lychford by Paul Cornell by mistake (hit “Buy” vs “See”) and what a happy mistake it turned out to be!  The characters live in Lychford, an English town fallen on harder times.  A big chain store wants permission to build a store on the edge of town, promising jobs and an economic boost that have bedazzled most town folk.

The problem is that Lychford sets on a locus, defining boundaries between multiple worlds.  Destroy the town boundary and you destroy the world boundaries.  That sets the story.

Characters

Cornell sketches in the characters enough to capture our interest but the book is short and we don’t really know any of them.  None of them are witches in the traditional sense, more guardians of the borders.

Lizzie is a modern vicar, meaning she believes more or less and wants to overlook sin.  She is new to her parish and learning to tread among the factions in town and church and looking for a friend.   We see the tension between her belief (a bit tenuous but real) and her moral sense and her training to not “judge” anyone.

Autumn spent a year in Fairy and can’t quite believe it.  She has been in and out of mental hospitals and is a thorough skeptic.  The book doesn’t show why Autumn owns a magic shop since she doesn’t believe in magic (or God or anything).

Judith is an interesting old lady, antisocial and rude, the sort of person kids make fun of.  She is the only one who has any clue about Lychford’s special nature or any training in magic.  She takes the other two ladies on as allies only because she is desperate.  Judith is the most complete character.  Our knees ache along with hers as she walks home and climbs the steps to her apartment on misty nights.

We know a little more about each lady at the end of the story.  Cornell does a good job on dialogue and interplay among them; Lizzie and Judith feel like real people while Autumn isn’t fleshed out.

Mood and Setting

Witches of Lychford could be a bit creepy or full of fake magic-y stuff.  It’s not.  The mood is somber.  We know the situation is dire and we know Judith has spent the last 70 years alienating everyone so she has no allies and no one will listen and take her warnings seriously.  Cornell shows us the town’s spooky side only once, when the three walk through the surrounding forest and Judith points out the boundary lines.

The political wrangling and outright bribery feel all too real.  We can feel exactly how uncomfortable the seats are in the town hall and feel the tension as friends and family fall into opposing camps.  That part is good.  The scenes in Autumn’s shop do not feel quite right.  Autumn is much the weakest character and her shop the weakest setting.

Overall

Witches of Lychford is short, only 144 pages in print form.  Cornell tells his story and ends when the incident ends.  He leaves tantalizing clues that Judith, Lizzie and Autumn are not done with each other or with their duties to maintain the borders of Lychford.

Per Amazon Witches of Lychford is the first book in a 3-book series.  All three books are short and fast reads, about 1 to 1 1/2 hour each. I would like to see Cornell publish them as a single book.  I was able to get the second book from our Michigan wide Melcat library system.

4 Stars

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Not Dead Enough: The Windhaven Chronicles, Dark Fantasy

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Not Dead Enough: The Windhaven Chronicles by Watson Davis is a novella written as a series of short stories that fit together – and it is not the type of book that normally appeals to me.  It is dark.  How dark?  Very.  The main characters are a semi-dead demon trapped in a book and a vampire and the vampire is the better of the two.

I decided to read this after getting Watson Davis’ newsletter.  I get a lot of newsletters and most end up in the trash with me unsubscribed.  If the writer lavishes exclamation points or features teen girls I’m out of there!!  Like, totally out of there!!  (Teen-speak and exclamation points.  Ugh.)

Davis’ newsletter was good with light humor so I asked for the book – but didn’t know what Not Dead Enough was about until it arrived.  I opened it with a sinking feeling and ended up staying up an hour late to finish.  It was good, readable, with many interesting characters and an intriguing back story.  I am glad to have taken a chance.

The Empress has used sorcery to compel Gartan to obey her, to assassinate and kill and bring pain to himself and everyone else.  She is now semi-dead, trapped in a book that Gartan wants to destroy.  The stories feature Gartan’s creative methods for bibliocide, from tossing it into a volcano to feeding to a sea monster to magic.  Gartan slowly sheds his Empress-driven cruel madness and regains some humanity.

Initially he wants to destroy the book because he wants to destroy the Empress, but as he progresses he accepts that he is in part responsible for the mess and responsible to keep the book from relaunching the Empress.  There are hints that Gartan was not always a vampire and I’m curious whether he eventually is able to free himself from that curse.

Overall this was a very good surprise, well written, with deft handling of scene changes and many varied minor characters who pass in and out through Gartan’s parade.  I enjoyed the dialogue which was refreshing, down to earth and written the way you can imagine someone speaking.

I would give this a solid 4.  It was enjoyable and well written.  I intend to read more by Watson Davis (and stay subscribed to his newsletter.)

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Obsidian Son – Great Sounding Fantasy, But What A Bust

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I don’t usually review books I don’t finish.  Since I read 5 to 10 books a week and review only a couple, I put most effort into books I like or ARCs.  I’m making an exception for Obsidian Son, the first novel in a four-part series by Shane Silvers.  Obsidian Son sounds so good and has great reviews on Amazon, a fun premise, neat cover.  It’s all there, everything except the book itself.

The story starts off with our hero, Nate Temple, wizard, bookstore owner, super rich young fellow and recent orphan, sneaking up on the Minotaur to engage in a bit of cow tipping.  He gets smeared with cow dung, arrested, interrogated by the police, released.  When he gets home to have a drink with his two best friends he simply tosses his coat into the laundry basket and makes drinks – without washing up.  Sorry, that was hard to take.

The main character is a sophomoric jerk with an overabundance of ego and a nasty attitude about women.  (Quote:   “To women and careers and the men who ride them.”)  Yet this same character hasn’t asked his office manager for a date because he might get turned down.  Yeesh.

Author Silver has way too heavy a hand with foreshadowing.  Even without getting past the first quarter of the novel I could tell that Temple’s mysterious client is himself a dragon (he smelled like rocks and snakes), that Temple’s friend Peter was somehow corrupted by someone magic (since he had on a new bracelet and suddenly had magic abilities), that Temple will discover his parents’ company used magic as much as technology.  So on.  Really, how much more obvious can someone be, yet Temple, who is supposed to be super smart never notices and never even asks his buddy Peter where he got magic?

The author clearly has little to no understanding how people who have money actually use it, or what the consequences might be of flinging Aston Martin cars around to one’s friends.  The main character thinks nothing of driving through red lights, speeding down urban streets and doing donuts to stop his flashy new car in front of his friend.  Does anyone really think that having a fancy car means he doesn’t have to share the road?  This is when I decided to pull the plug and delete Obsidian Son from my reader.

The last point is the blasphemous use of the name Jesus.  This is the name of God’s only begotten Son, not some casual throw-away interjection.  The author tossed a couple of these in the mix too.

Overall, 1 star.  Did not finish and do not recommend.

Blood and Honour – Fun Read by Simon R. Green

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Before the Nightside and Eddie Drood series Simon R. Green wrote several novels in quasi-medieval settings full of threatening dark forces and political enemies, loosely gathered into the Forest Kingdom series.  (Blue Moon Rising and the Hawk and Fisher stories are in this series.)  Blood and Honour is set in the same world, in the Kingdom of Redhart.

Our hero, Jordan, is an actor sadly fallen on hard times, now a travelling player working small town streets for a few ducats.  Three men offer him 10,000 ducats to impersonate Prince Victor of Redhart as he contends with his brothers for the throne.  Jordan is no fool and rejects the offer until he learns that Victor is aware of and approves; of course he gets a higher fee too.

Once in Castle Midnight (don’t you love the name?) Jordan finds the role is even harder than expected.  And yes, he is playing the villain.

Winning Characters

Jordan is a man in a hard place.  He figures out fast that Victor will kill him the minute he can and he knows for sure that Victor’s brothers will be happy to see him dead.  Not only that, but with the king dead, the Unreal is oozing into the castle, deadly to everyone whether actor, servant or king.

Jordan has a pretty good idea what a king ought to be, caring of his people, fair, honest, noble.  Neither Victor nor his brothers is anything like this ideal and Jordan doesn’t particularly want any of them to succeed their father.  Jordan has a few very tough choices to make and unerringly chooses the path to bring peace and restore goodness.

I enjoyed Jordan immensely.  He turned a horrible situation into something that may turn out just right, yet he never whined (or at least not much) and he faced the problem without blaming everyone else.  He took action when action needed to be taken.  And he never lost his sense of perspective or duty or honor, even when those around him failed to remember theirs.

Green does an excellent job showing us the characters, not telling us.  We see how weak and despicable Victor is when he blithely orders all 25 kitchen workers hung because he was poisoned, not caring that many were children, not even caring that he just killed off the people who make the meals and everyone likes to eat.  We see how evil Dominic and oldest brother Lewis are by their attacks and use of undead and Unreal.

Plot, Setting and Writing Style

Blood and Honour moves fast and we feel like Jordan must, with everything turning to ruin, no good way out.  The Unreal are fascinating as are the ghosts and factions in Castle Midnight.  I stayed up late to finish this!

I’ve had mixed feelings about Simon R Green’s writing before.  He does an excellent job with story and people complicated with creepy settings.  Many of his later books are downers, where you end the novel feeling like you need to take a bath and go look at rainbows and springtime flowers just to get up the next morning.  Blood and Honour isn’t like that.  Yes, there are evil, undead nasties, greed, dark sorcery, castles with bloody fangs in the walls, sharks and treachery.  But Jordan brings clarity as to what should be done, how things ought to work, and his clear thinking keeps us readers optimistic even when everything is going to ruin and damnation.

(See my review of Tales of the Hidden World for more about Simon R. Green’s darker stories.)

I didn’t realize until checking Amazon to write this review that Blood and Honour is book 2 in the Forest Kingdom series.  Reading Blood and Honour prompts me to get my copy of Blue Moon Rising out and re-read it, then get the other books in the series!

5 Stars

 

Tales of the Hidden World – Simon R. Green Short Stories

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Simon R. Green writes novels with darkish themes, usually with monsters or demons that threaten humanity whether in our normal world or the Nightside nightmarish world far below the streets of London. Tales of the Hidden World collects short stories and reminisces on  all his usual themes of death, threats, aging, and personal approaches to salvation.

Overall the stories are true to form.  The Drood story, Question of Solace, has the family Armourer Jack, drowsing at his desk in his last hour of life, wondering whether he served better in the field, fighting bad guys directly, or as the Armourer, developing new and horrible weapons.  He dies at the end.

The main character dies in my favorite story, Dorothy Dreams, or is converted into something else in Find Heaven and Hell in the Smallest Things, gets savagely beaten in Manslayer, fights undead to steal a treasure in Awake, Awake Ye Northern Winds, kills women and children in Soldier, Soldier.

Even the happiest story, It’s All About the Rendering, has the possibility of death and misfortune by red tape.  Jesus and Satan Go Jogging in the Desert has Satan going through the motions, doing his duty to temp the Son of God in the desert, knowing of course that his tempting will fail.  Christ comments that Satan could have it all if he merely repented, of course Satan does not.

I have mixed feelings about Simon Green’s novels and feel the same about this collection.  I enjoy his books as long as I read other happier novels in between with people whose company I like  His Nightside stories are dark with characters determined to throw away happiness and most of his characters are morally ambiguous.

Green included little reminisces about how he came to write each story – many were written specifically for themed collections – which was interesting.

I would give this 3 or 4 stars.