Artemis by Andy Weir

I was late on the Andy Weir bandwagon. I somehow missed all the initial fuss over The Martian and didn't get around to reading it until the movie was just about out. I still haven't seen the movie. They followed the movie with an announcement for his new book: Artemis. Then I had to wait. I hate waiting mainly because I have a tendency to lose track of things. I forgot about it until last June when I put a request on in in the library. It took a month for my turn to come up, but eventually the time was mine.

Artemis is another sci-fi of the old school focused on the science and its possibilities, or maybe more exactly it's a crime caper set in a classic sci-fi story. This one is set on a moon base in the nearish future. A small community lives there full time in a city called Artemis. This city is separated into several interconnected domes that represent a full social diversity from the rich rich and all the way down to the impoverished. Jazz, our protagonist, is pretty far down the social chain. She's a porter, a delivery girl, and a small time smuggler on the side.

Weir spent a lot of time getting the science right, or at least feasible. Oxygen is produced on site as a by-product of the aluminum smelting industry. The process is a little mysterious, but the theory sounds possible. Jazz gets involved in it when one of her clients asks her to do a little sabotage to break the monopoly that the Aluminun Smelters have.

Of course, Jazz doesn't have the whole story and quickly finds out that she's one tiny cog in interlocking plots of corporate espionage. She's in over head and learning to doggy paddle.

Jazz is an interesting character. She's angry at the world and brilliant. Her ability to improvise and plan is insane and her ability to teach herself everything from metallurgy to chemistry makes her a near genius. In fact, her blatant intelligence occasionally broke my ability to believe the story. I'm a teacher... an ability to learn like that is rare if not impossible. It strained my willing suspension of disbelief. However, as a whole she's pretty likable.

As a final assessment, Artemis is reminiscent of the literature of the golden age of sci fi in both the positive and negative ways. On the positive, the science is interesting and probably mostly feasible. The one place I noticed Weir fudging was in the aluminum smelting process. The rest of it all seemed very well researched and explained and that includes architecture, the specifics of living surrounded by a vacuum, and specific concerns of living on a moon base. On the negative, the characters are a little cartooney and have a broader base of expertise than is really possible. All in all, a lot of fun.

The Fifth Elephant by Terry Pratchett

I was just saying that I hoped there would be more novels set in Uberwald and here it is. How pleasing.

Commander Vimes of the city watch is being sent to Uberwald in his capacity as a Duke and being asked to be an ambassador to the coronation of the low king. Vimes is not what one would call a natural diplomat and he is like a bull at high society functions, so his appointment as an ambassador seems eccentric.  Of course the enigmatic Patrician, Vetinari, has his reasons. He always does.

In the meantime, Angua has gone missing. She's a werewolf and this Uberwald business is in her home territory. She's called away by an old friend to deal with some family trouble leaving Carrot without a word. Carrot, being Carrot, isn't angry but when he finds out where she's headed, he heads out after her leaving the City Watch in the hands of Sergent Colon.

Colon does his best to rise to the occasion, which ends up about as well as can be expected. In total chaos.

The Fifth Elephant is a mix of political intrigue, detective who done it, and an adventure story. Faster paced than usual for a Pratchett novel, I blasted through it in about two and a half days on intermittent reading.

This Discworld novel makes me feel like an idiot. As a general rule, a large piece of the joy in Discworld novels is noticing the interplay between the text and things that Pratchett is referencing in that text. Up to this point he's played with Shakespeare, world politics, B horror flicks and everything in between. I heartily enjoyed The Fifth Elephant but I could not spot a single allusion or literary reference. I'm convinced they have to be there....I just can find them. It's frustrating.

Dodger by Terry Pratchett

I admit to being slightly fascinated to find this other side of Terry Pratchett. I'm so used to associating him with  Discworld that these YAs are an interesting change. While less all out zany, there is still a surfeit of tongue-in-cheek humor in Pratchett's YAs.

Dodger is what Pratchett calls a historical fantasy. It is set in early Victorian England when conditions for the poor in London was scarily awful. The Dodger is a sort of sewer scavenger called a tosher albeit one who is unusually clever and quick thinking. Things change for him when during a storm he hears a woman's screams and rushes to her rescue. Successfully, I might add.

The woman ends up being more than she seems, of course, and things get complicated.

In a way the appeal to this book for me, an adult, is how it works on a meta level. Pratchett uses a large number of real historical figures in his narrative. One of these figures is Charles Dickens. This leads one to the natural connection from this Dodger to the Artful Dodger in Oliver Twist. Of course, this is all pure fiction, but it's amazing who knowing that influences the read of the story even for me who's never actually read the Dickens novel.

Also present is Queen Victoria (of course), Prince Albert, Sir Robert Peel, Henry Mayhew, and Benjamin Disraeli among others. While Pratchett is pretty clear about what is and is not historically based, his writing is so natural and convincing that it's easy to take it all as historical. I find that I want to read more on this age of British history.

The Mime Order by Samantha Shannon

Some stories stick with you and live in the memory. They are compelling and, if they are a part of a series, they demand to be finished. The Bone Season series is a little like that for me. The biggest criticism I had of the first book was that it had such a steep learning curve. That is a result of such a densely imagined and layered world. Shannon drops her readers into the middle of her world without preamble or lifeline beyond a chart or two. However, once I got my feet under me (so to speak) it was an entrancing read.

The Mime Order was similarly entrancing, but without the learning curve. Paige is back in London and in hiding from Scion. The escapees from Sheol I have scattered and gone to ground. Paige is also avoiding her old Mime-Lord, Jaxon Hall, who wants her to come back to work as his mollisher.

Paige, however, remains disillusioned with Jaxon and his intentions. She wants to bring down Scion and the Rephaim but has no money and little power to do that. She soon finds herself forced back into working for Jaxon who blocks her every attempt to spread words about the alien corruption of Scion. Amidst her frustration, Paige worries about the enigmatic Warden who she last saw during the break out.

The voyant syndicate (think supernatural mob) has always been corrupt, but something more is going on in the shadows and Paige keeps tripping into it. When the Underlord is slaughtered in his own den, Paige is the first person to discover it making her a prime suspect.

The Bone Season was really an escape story. There was some intrigue involved in laying the plans for escape but overall with was pretty straight forward. The Mime Order operates on a completely different level. There's plenty of action but the story hinges entirely on political intrigue. The whole thing is about trust and betrayal. While I anticipated many of the twists and turns, the last twist took me by surprise.

Excellent read. I'm seriously considering buying the last book new. I'm not sure I have the patience to wait for a used copy.

Fever by Lauren DeStefano

I have this pet theory. My theory states that in a trilogy, the middle book or movie is always the weakest. In most cases, the first book which covers the beginning of the over arching plot and the last book which covers the overarching climax and wrap up are better paced and written. Middles in narratives are notoriously difficult to write so the middle book in a trilogy often struggles a bit. Usually it's an issue of pacing and the individual climax of the book gets muted and lost in events that build the overall plot. Sometimes it is a big issue. Sometimes it is just a small matter of degree.

I go into all of this because it is rare for me to rate a middle book in a series higher than its predecessor. I rated Fever higher than Wither. I suspect now that source of my lackluster review for Wither  is sourced here. Something about it didn't quite pop. I'm not sure now what it was, but despite being a good premise, with a solid protagonist, and good writing, it just didn't quite come together.

Fever doesn't have that problem. In some ways it is a weaker storyline. However, DeStefano tackles a number of problems introduced in the first book. First, she spent so much time developing the sister-wives and characters in the mansion that it felt strange to discard them all for the rest of the series. From the beginning of fever, I was on the lookout for Rhine's return to the mansion in Florida. Frankly, I kind of dreaded it because her escape was such a goal in Wither. The only way I could see her going back was another kidnapping and that gets old. Thankfully that isn't what happens.

Second, this whole twin business. We know that Rhine has a twin in the first book but we never meet him. However, he does provide a rather compelling reason for her to be despite to escape such a pleasant captivity. At least on the surface. In Wither, Rowen, the twin, is a kind of non character. He is defined almost entirely by Rhine's desire to get back to him. Which is fine if he never shows up in the narrative. The moment Rhine escapes, it becomes clear the Rowen is going to be a focus in Fever and will need better development. While still mainly in his absence, Rowen's character gains depth over the course of the novel and it's not entirely sunny.

Third, DeStefano toys with the idea of an unreliable narrator when Rhine gets severely ill. It can be annoying when a character spends a third of the book half-delirious. DeStefano pulls it off though and mainly because Rhine never becomes truly unreliable and holds on to a sense of what is real. All of this serves to deepen the idea of Vaughn, the house master, as a villain. He goes from sinister in Wither to downright vile in Fever. In the process, the lack of apparent surveillance in Wither is explained even though it's never even raised as a question in the first novel.

On the negative, Rhine's relationship with Gabriel is a bit of a mystery to me. I never really buy it in Wither and it gets more seemingly ambivalent in Fever. This doesn't present too much of a problem but it tears down any sort of apparent love angle. It really seems more like a relationship of mutual reliance. If anything, it almost seems like Rhine loves Linden after all.

Over all, a better read with excellent pacing but extremely grim.

Trickster's Queen by Tamora Pierce

The problem with reading a book in series literature, for me at least, is that once I begin I feel impelled to pick up the next one and the next one until I run out of extant books in the series or the series concludes. I get really frustrated actually when I have to wait for the next installment because the writer hasn't written it yet. This is why I tend to wait for series to conclude and then read them all in one big marathon. I do T.V. the same way.  It's a character flaw.

Luckily, "The Lioness's Daughter" series is a duet. Also luckily, I managed to finish it before having to go back to school.

Trickster's Queen picks up about six months after the end of of Trickster's Choice. Aly has earned her place as spymaster and has spent the winter building and training a network of spies. The old king is dead and the Balitang family is going back to the capitol city. This sounds like a good thing. But it's not. With all the deaths, the youngest child Elsren is now the presumed heir to the throne and that's not a very safe position to be in.

The court intrigue deepens and the pressure from Kyprioth increases as fears drawing the notice of two of his god siblings. Despite her youth, Aly has earned the respect of her raka conspirators, but can she keep track of all moving pieces and keep her prospective queen alive?

This is an excellent continuation from the first book even though the feel is much different. Trickester's Queen is less action oriented. It is more focused on the plotting and intrigue. While there is plenty of action still, the narrative is more driven by following Aly's complex schemes which provides a very different reading experience.

Gun Machine by Warren Ellis

I love clearance sales. I particularly love clearance sales at used bookstores. 2nd and Charles, both locations near me, have excellent selection and an almost arcane reasoning for placing things in the clearance sections. For example, I found a brand new Meg Rosoff novel and one of Warren Ellis's novels in perfect condition.

I immediately dove into the Ellis novel and couldn't put it down. Warren Ellis is more well known for writing graphic novels such as Transmetropolitan and Fell but he has also written two novels. I tend to appreciate Ellis for his unabashedly brutal treatment of politics and power dynamics. He has a wicked sense of humor that he bends to his subjects and characters. And he has a severe case of potty mouth which I appreciate in certain settings.

Gun Machine is a gritty cop intrigue that borrows heavily from the hardboiled and noir novels of early and mid twentieth century. Detective John Tallow is world weary and disconnected until his partner dies in front of him leading to the discovery of a cache of hundreds of guns that have each been used to kill exactly once. Tallow is deeply intelligent but not in a way that stretches credibility and slightly crazy in damaged by life kind of way. He reminds me both of Dashiell Hammett's Philip Marlow and Ellis's own Spider Jerusalem (albeit more lucid and less insane).

The plot is pure intrigue and conspiracy. Tallow has to figure out the identity of the most successful serial history to prowl the streets of Manhattan.  Question number one is how did this killer manage to escape notice? Who's protecting him and why? The answer to these questions get Tallow deeper into a mess of department infighting and corruption.

This was a fun read. If I have one criticism, it is that they interplay between Tallow and his two CSU sidekicks is highly reminiscent of the relationship between Ellis's three main protagonists in Transmetropolitan: Spider Jerusalem, Yelena, and Channon. It's not much of a criticism really since that was a very fun set of characters too but it all did kinda feel like a lost issue of Transmetropolitan.

Nice quick read with short chapters. There's plenty of action to keep things moving, but Tallow's a thoughtful enough character that there's plenty of solid exposition to ground the narrative.Because of the copious amounts of foul language and violence, I can't put it in my class library, but I would give it to the occasional student.

Trickster's Choice by Tamora Pierce

Every time I think I've finally finished all the Tamora Pierce books, Jess keeps handing me another. I'm appreciative, they are good books, but whenever I start one I get trapped in it until I finish it. It's a nice problem to have I guess, but I'm looking forward to reading books that I can put down when I need to.

Trickster's Choice is the start of a the "Daughter of the Lioness" storyline set in the Tortall world. This story-line follows Alanna and George's daughter Aly. Aly takes after her father, the ex-master thief turned spy. She's headstrong and a thrill seeker and completely uninterested in the traditional life-pursuits for a young noblewoman.

What she really wants to be is a spy. However, Mom and Dad don't want their little girl in that much danger. Who would? It's infuriating to Aly though, and after a heated discussion with her mom, Aly decides to sail down the coast a little and cool down. That's where she runs into the pirates who capture her and sell her into slavery.

Soon, Aly finds herself tangled up in the local politics of the Copper Isles and talking to local gods, specifically Kyprioth the trickster god.

So, in reading Pierce it seems that she like's coming sideways at real world issues in her books. She's taken on gender issues and slavery. This one seems to be coming at issues of race and conquest. It's interestingly pragmatic about the issues in a way that we often aren't. One of the things I've always valued about books is their ability to shed light on the issues of our world without the baggage so that we can think clearly about it. Most people seem to take literature, especially fantasy, at face value, but I think when it's well done, it can be more thought provoking than even the best history which must always be examined for agenda.

In any case, good read. Appropriate for high schoolers and precocious middle schoolers. Solid themes and thought provoking. Some, minimal romance but nothing lascivious. Strong characters both female and male.

Crewel by Gennifer Albin

I think our school librarian must see me coming and groan a little. On the inside, anyway. Lately, I've been combing through the school's collection to get a good feel of what we have and what gaps we should fill. The big gaps I've been attacking just lately are when I find that we have a first book in the series but are then missing the rest of the series. I've spotted several in the last few months.

Crewel is one of those books. It's the first in a series and I suspect that Susan either bought it when it first came out or it was a donation. I don't know if any of the kids have read it, but it's in the same dystopian vein as the Matched Series or even the Divergent Series. Maybe with a little Margaret Atwood's Handmaid's Tale thrown into the mix.

Adelice lives in a rigid world controlled by the Guild of 12 and the Spinsters. Spinsters are young women with the talent to see the pattern of the world woven together like threads. More than just see it, given the right tools that can manipulate it. People can be added and removed, weather created, and materials moved from one place to another with little trouble. A young woman with the talent has no choice but to become a Spinster. Most young women dream of this. Spinsters are pampered and given the best of everything. They are also not allowed to marry or have children...which is a nice play on words really.

For Adelice though, she's not just talented, she can see the weave of the world without the specialized equipment and her parents question many of the government's rules. So when Adelice's gift is discovered, they try to hide her. It doesn't work of course and it sets her apart in a world that she is simply ill equipped to navigate.

Definitely aimed at the high school set and at a female audience. It's a decent pick for those who got into Divergent and Hunger Games.