We'll have a gay old time getting the review back together...
Hey,
Couple more books and here's what I thought.
First up, Amberlough by Lara Elena Donnelly. The basic description of this book is a Le Carr spy novel written by Oscar Wilde. That's not strictly true, but it gives you a sense.
Amberlough is the capital city of the country that shares its name. Amberlough and three other countries are arranged in a loose confederation of states, but there's a growing right-wing movement to unify the country and impose a more repressive society -- something that corrupt, cosmopolitan, devil-may-care Amberlough isn't really in the mood for. Luckily, it's just a small, fringe group of Unity politicians. Then they start winning elections.
Cyril DePaul is a top agent for Amberlough's in-house spy agency. After a gruelling mission to a war-torn region, he currently has a cozy job keeping tabs on Amberlough's police force and helping them out from time to time. It's especially cozy because one of the most (if the most) notorious smuggler of illicit goods is Aristide Makricosta...who happens to be DePaul's lover.
Cyril gets assigned a field mission to find out how the Unity party is winning their elections. He uncovers some pretty big secrets and soon he's trying to figure out how to get Aristide and himself out of the country and far away from Unity zealots. As his schemes spin up, he recruits Cordelia Lehane, a dancer at the nightclub Aristide frequents. So begins a race against time to get people out of the city before Unity manages to seize power.
So this was a pretty good book. I only had two nits -- 1.) DePaul makes an important decision early on in the book that doesn't seem well motivated. They try and back-fill the rationale a bit later, but still, DePaul is a pretty experienced agent and it doesn't seem like his decision makes a lot of sense in that light. Still, it drives the book forward. 2.) Very clearly angling for a sequel and does a poor job of tying up the important loose ends at the end of the book.
That aside, the writing is good and clips right along and the worldbuilding is excellent. Amberlough is a mix of Steampunk Victorian London and Cabaret Berlin and there are lots of great little details that don't overwhelm. I'm particularly enamored of the slang in Amberlough. There's a lot of clever wordplay.
One example of that wordplay that didn't fully set in until after I read the book was the way in which cigarettes were referred to as "straights". In real life, cigarettes are sometimes called "nails" so I had that connotation in mind. Of course, two days after I read the book, I realized that cigarettes are also called "fags" and calling them "straights" in a book with gay themes was, I thought, pretty clever.
So yeah, a wobbly ending, but it's a fun book and well-worth checking out.
After that, I zipped right through Kings of the Wyld by Nicholas Eames. It's a fantasy novel, but it treats adventuring groups like rock stars.
So Clay "Slowhand" Cooper was the tank for a group called Saga known far and wide for their many exploits (as told by a series of bards who keep dying on the group). But Saga broke up and Clay got married and settled down and now he's happy being a town watchman. Then Golden Gabe shows up and begs Clay's help to "get the band back together again" so that they can go save Gabe's daughter currently on the far side of the world being besieged by a horde of monsters so vast they fill the landscape.
Reluctantly, Clay agrees and the two set off to find the other members. The wizard is selling potions to cure impotence, the assassin is king and the deadliest warrior alive has been imprisoned in stone. So...they've got a bit of convincing to do. Then they just have to cross hundreds of miles of treacherous forrest, cross a forbidding series of peaks and then shatter the monster horde and their leader to rescue Gabe's daughter.
Of course they do (you know how these books go), and the journey is absolutely worth the price of admission. Again, lots of great world-building on display here and again, no huge info-dumps to overwhelm readers. The magic system is never defined, but it never plays deus ex machina. The characters, if a bit comedic, do seem lived-in and they're a bit deeper than you might think.
If you like D&D fantasy and it's tropes, you'll probably really enjoy this one. Even if that's not your thing, it certainly makes for some great beach reading. The book leaves itself and opening for a sequel, but, quite honestly, the book is very stand-alone and I wouldn't care if there was a follow-up. I certainly would like to see more from Mr. Eames though.
later
Tom
Couple more books and here's what I thought.
First up, Amberlough by Lara Elena Donnelly. The basic description of this book is a Le Carr spy novel written by Oscar Wilde. That's not strictly true, but it gives you a sense.
Amberlough is the capital city of the country that shares its name. Amberlough and three other countries are arranged in a loose confederation of states, but there's a growing right-wing movement to unify the country and impose a more repressive society -- something that corrupt, cosmopolitan, devil-may-care Amberlough isn't really in the mood for. Luckily, it's just a small, fringe group of Unity politicians. Then they start winning elections.
Cyril DePaul is a top agent for Amberlough's in-house spy agency. After a gruelling mission to a war-torn region, he currently has a cozy job keeping tabs on Amberlough's police force and helping them out from time to time. It's especially cozy because one of the most (if the most) notorious smuggler of illicit goods is Aristide Makricosta...who happens to be DePaul's lover.
Cyril gets assigned a field mission to find out how the Unity party is winning their elections. He uncovers some pretty big secrets and soon he's trying to figure out how to get Aristide and himself out of the country and far away from Unity zealots. As his schemes spin up, he recruits Cordelia Lehane, a dancer at the nightclub Aristide frequents. So begins a race against time to get people out of the city before Unity manages to seize power.
So this was a pretty good book. I only had two nits -- 1.) DePaul makes an important decision early on in the book that doesn't seem well motivated. They try and back-fill the rationale a bit later, but still, DePaul is a pretty experienced agent and it doesn't seem like his decision makes a lot of sense in that light. Still, it drives the book forward. 2.) Very clearly angling for a sequel and does a poor job of tying up the important loose ends at the end of the book.
That aside, the writing is good and clips right along and the worldbuilding is excellent. Amberlough is a mix of Steampunk Victorian London and Cabaret Berlin and there are lots of great little details that don't overwhelm. I'm particularly enamored of the slang in Amberlough. There's a lot of clever wordplay.
One example of that wordplay that didn't fully set in until after I read the book was the way in which cigarettes were referred to as "straights". In real life, cigarettes are sometimes called "nails" so I had that connotation in mind. Of course, two days after I read the book, I realized that cigarettes are also called "fags" and calling them "straights" in a book with gay themes was, I thought, pretty clever.
So yeah, a wobbly ending, but it's a fun book and well-worth checking out.
After that, I zipped right through Kings of the Wyld by Nicholas Eames. It's a fantasy novel, but it treats adventuring groups like rock stars.
So Clay "Slowhand" Cooper was the tank for a group called Saga known far and wide for their many exploits (as told by a series of bards who keep dying on the group). But Saga broke up and Clay got married and settled down and now he's happy being a town watchman. Then Golden Gabe shows up and begs Clay's help to "get the band back together again" so that they can go save Gabe's daughter currently on the far side of the world being besieged by a horde of monsters so vast they fill the landscape.
Reluctantly, Clay agrees and the two set off to find the other members. The wizard is selling potions to cure impotence, the assassin is king and the deadliest warrior alive has been imprisoned in stone. So...they've got a bit of convincing to do. Then they just have to cross hundreds of miles of treacherous forrest, cross a forbidding series of peaks and then shatter the monster horde and their leader to rescue Gabe's daughter.
Of course they do (you know how these books go), and the journey is absolutely worth the price of admission. Again, lots of great world-building on display here and again, no huge info-dumps to overwhelm readers. The magic system is never defined, but it never plays deus ex machina. The characters, if a bit comedic, do seem lived-in and they're a bit deeper than you might think.
If you like D&D fantasy and it's tropes, you'll probably really enjoy this one. Even if that's not your thing, it certainly makes for some great beach reading. The book leaves itself and opening for a sequel, but, quite honestly, the book is very stand-alone and I wouldn't care if there was a follow-up. I certainly would like to see more from Mr. Eames though.
later
Tom