2016 Books 21 - 23
Playing catch-up on book and story reviews as quickly as I can. This entry contains reviews of three interconnected short stories. (Goodreads counts separately e-published short stories as "books," and so I include them in my counts here and in my database as well.)
All three of these short story / novellas are part of seanan_mcguire's Incryptid universe, which I have made no secret of loving. They all take place during the year (character-time) break between the series novels Midnight Blue-Light Special and Chaos Choreography, and tell of Verity Price's travel across the US with her boyfriend Dominic DeLuca. (Why they're traveling cross country and staying under the radar / out of the public eye is explained in MB-LS, and I'm not going to spoil any of that here.)
2016 Book 21: The Ghosts of Bourbon Street by Seanan McGuire; 51 pages; SeananMcGuire.com; ebook; $free on website
The Premise: (from Goodreads): Verity Price and Dominic De Luca are currently putting their relationship through what can only be termed the ultimate stress-test: they're traveling from one side of the country to the other in a rented U-Haul, accompanied only by Verity's colony of Aeslin mice and the contents of her iPod. (Dominic is receiving a crash course in modern dance and pop music.) But what's a road trip without a hidden purpose? Verity knows she's driving Dominic toward the biggest confrontation of his life-her parents-and that means she needs to start easing him in gently. What better way than with a stop in New Orleans to drink layered cocktails and meet her fun-loving Aunt Rose, who just happens to be a Predeceased American? Poor Dominic didn't set out to become part of a ghost story, but it looks like that's exactly what's happening, as the old, new, and undead collide all over Bourbon Street.
My Rating: 4 stars out of 5
My Thoughts: This is the first of three novellas that fill in the year-long gap between McGuire’s InCryptid novels Midnight Blue Light Special and Chaos Choreography. Falling on the short end of novella-dom, it’s a tightly-written, quckly-paced tale that trades on character more than action. As the start of a trilogy of linked tales, it sets stages (Verity and Dominic are road-tripping across the country, stopping wherever Verity’s whim or a Cryptid-in-need takes them) that will pay off both in the trilogy-of-shorts and eventually in the InCryptid novels. But it also stands very well on its own, with a solid beginning, middle and end. (Having read McGuire’s linked short stories of Verity’s great-grandparents Fran and John, I expected no less.) Drinks with Aunt Rose (the main character from McGuire’s novel Sparrow Hill Road) leads to a mystery that needs to be solved. We get to explore a bit of the ghostly side of this universe that we don’t really see in the novels, we get a better sense of Rose’s connection to the family, and we get some character development for Verity and Dominic.
We also get a little bit of a fight scene, because what would a Price family story bet without at least one punch being thrown? But unlike the novels, this story’s fight doesn’t lead to some massive game-change for Verity’s world. Although, one never knows what McGuire has planned further down the road.
2016 Book 22: Snake in the Glass by Seanan McGuire; 40 pages; SeananMcGuire.com; ebook; $free on website
The Premise: (from Goodreads) After New Orleans, Verity and Dominic are continuing to put their relationship through what can only be termed the ultimate stress-test: after all, there's a lot of country left to cover before they get to Oregon, and it's not like Verity is picking the most direct route. After all, she'd like him to meet her extended family before he meets her parents. Her parents are more likely to let him live if he has a few letters of recommendation. The Carmichael Hotel in Chicago has long been a favorite destination of the Price family when they need a home away from home, and what better way to test Dominic's evolving attitudes toward the cryptid world than by dropping him into a nest of gorgons? Besides, any excuse to see Uncle Mike and Aunt Lea is a good one...although there may be a few complications. There always are. When the modern world meets tradition and tradition meets practicality, it will be down to Dominic and Verity to show that sometimes, the ways you think are best are the ones that won't do anything to save you.
My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
My Thoughts: This is the second of three novellas that fill in the year-long gap between McGuire’s InCryptid novels Midnight Blue Light Special and Chaos Choreography. This time, Verity is introducing Dominic to extended family. There’s a lot of character building for Dominic in particular. In fact, in its own quiet way, this is the story that convinced me Dominic is sincere about leaving the Covenant behind and joining the Price family. The story has a slower pace than the stories that precede and follow it, giving the reader as much a respite from the usually-hectic pace of the InCryptid world as Verity herself gets. Readers familiar with the Carmichael from its appearance in some of the Fran-and-John InCryptid stories will enjoy catching up with the gorgon family that runs the establishment; even more so I enjoyed another look into the gorgon community (and mentally couldn’t help contrasting this long-established urban settlement with the more rural settlement McGuire shows us in Half-Off Ragnarok). McGuire, as always, packs these 40 pages with a ton of world-building, character development and interpersonal development, but it never feels overwhelming.
2016 Book 23: Swamp Bromeliad by Seanan McGuire; 40 pages; SeananMcGuire.com; ebook; $free on website
The Premise: (from Goodreads): The next stop on Verity and Dominic's great road trip brings them back to where it all began: Buckley Township, Michigan, the town where two expatriates from the Covenant of Saint George once decided to settle down and rebuild their shattered family. It's a sleepy, rural community, long removed from the excitement of those early days...but the woods are still dark and deep, and the things that dwell there are still dangerous to the unwary. When two little boys appear at the Old Parrish Place, claiming that a flower has devoured their friend, it's up to Verity and Dominic to go out into the woods and see whether or not there's something left to save. It's a journey into someone else's dark place, and it's hard to say who's more frightened by the idea: Verity, who knows how much she has to lose, or Dominic, who has no idea. It's time to see where the past meets the future, and how the echoes of the one continue to inform the other. It's time to return to the woods of Buckley, and see what can be seen there. It's time to bring a child home.
My Rating: 4 stars out of 5
My Thoughts: This is the third of three novellas that fill in the year-long gap between McGuire’s InCryptid novels Midnight Blue-Light Special and Chaos Choreography. These novellas are more than just an attempt by the author to fill in some of the “missing time” for Verity and Dominic while Verity’s brother Alex takes over the lead in the InCryptid novels. They’re linked not just by chronology but by theme. There’s a sense, reading them back to back, of both “the journey is the destination” and “the past is present.” Verity has been trying to soften Dominic’s first meeting with her parents and younger sister by introducing him to blood and extended family; he started this sequence meeting one ghost-aunt and ends it visiting with another. Mary Dunlavy has always watched out for the children of the Price family, and this visit is no different. One of the subtler tissues connecting all three novellas is that Verity’s aunts and uncle don’t do much more than observe: they’re watching to see how Dominic fits in, but I think almost as important they’re watching to see how Verity supports Dominic’s immersion into this world (of which he’s always been aware but has also always been an outsider to). This connectivity of family watching out for us, and judging, and hopefully finding worthy, the people we fall in love with, is something I didn’t consciously notice the first time I read each of these.
It’s also always a delight when McGuire focuses on a previously unknown, or at least un-detailed, cryptid - this time it’s the killer plant “swamp bromeliad.” And that’s another thing that ties these stories together: Dominic’s exposure to different types of cryptids in each story (ghosts in the first; gorgon society in the second; predatory plants in this one). He’s likely familiar with the types thanks to his Covenant training, but we get to see him have some first-hand experience - which involves making mistakes. That humanizes him even more.
All three of these short story / novellas are part of seanan_mcguire's Incryptid universe, which I have made no secret of loving. They all take place during the year (character-time) break between the series novels Midnight Blue-Light Special and Chaos Choreography, and tell of Verity Price's travel across the US with her boyfriend Dominic DeLuca. (Why they're traveling cross country and staying under the radar / out of the public eye is explained in MB-LS, and I'm not going to spoil any of that here.)
2016 Book 21: The Ghosts of Bourbon Street by Seanan McGuire; 51 pages; SeananMcGuire.com; ebook; $free on website
The Premise: (from Goodreads): Verity Price and Dominic De Luca are currently putting their relationship through what can only be termed the ultimate stress-test: they're traveling from one side of the country to the other in a rented U-Haul, accompanied only by Verity's colony of Aeslin mice and the contents of her iPod. (Dominic is receiving a crash course in modern dance and pop music.) But what's a road trip without a hidden purpose? Verity knows she's driving Dominic toward the biggest confrontation of his life-her parents-and that means she needs to start easing him in gently. What better way than with a stop in New Orleans to drink layered cocktails and meet her fun-loving Aunt Rose, who just happens to be a Predeceased American? Poor Dominic didn't set out to become part of a ghost story, but it looks like that's exactly what's happening, as the old, new, and undead collide all over Bourbon Street.
My Rating: 4 stars out of 5
My Thoughts: This is the first of three novellas that fill in the year-long gap between McGuire’s InCryptid novels Midnight Blue Light Special and Chaos Choreography. Falling on the short end of novella-dom, it’s a tightly-written, quckly-paced tale that trades on character more than action. As the start of a trilogy of linked tales, it sets stages (Verity and Dominic are road-tripping across the country, stopping wherever Verity’s whim or a Cryptid-in-need takes them) that will pay off both in the trilogy-of-shorts and eventually in the InCryptid novels. But it also stands very well on its own, with a solid beginning, middle and end. (Having read McGuire’s linked short stories of Verity’s great-grandparents Fran and John, I expected no less.) Drinks with Aunt Rose (the main character from McGuire’s novel Sparrow Hill Road) leads to a mystery that needs to be solved. We get to explore a bit of the ghostly side of this universe that we don’t really see in the novels, we get a better sense of Rose’s connection to the family, and we get some character development for Verity and Dominic.
We also get a little bit of a fight scene, because what would a Price family story bet without at least one punch being thrown? But unlike the novels, this story’s fight doesn’t lead to some massive game-change for Verity’s world. Although, one never knows what McGuire has planned further down the road.
2016 Book 22: Snake in the Glass by Seanan McGuire; 40 pages; SeananMcGuire.com; ebook; $free on website
The Premise: (from Goodreads) After New Orleans, Verity and Dominic are continuing to put their relationship through what can only be termed the ultimate stress-test: after all, there's a lot of country left to cover before they get to Oregon, and it's not like Verity is picking the most direct route. After all, she'd like him to meet her extended family before he meets her parents. Her parents are more likely to let him live if he has a few letters of recommendation. The Carmichael Hotel in Chicago has long been a favorite destination of the Price family when they need a home away from home, and what better way to test Dominic's evolving attitudes toward the cryptid world than by dropping him into a nest of gorgons? Besides, any excuse to see Uncle Mike and Aunt Lea is a good one...although there may be a few complications. There always are. When the modern world meets tradition and tradition meets practicality, it will be down to Dominic and Verity to show that sometimes, the ways you think are best are the ones that won't do anything to save you.
My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
My Thoughts: This is the second of three novellas that fill in the year-long gap between McGuire’s InCryptid novels Midnight Blue Light Special and Chaos Choreography. This time, Verity is introducing Dominic to extended family. There’s a lot of character building for Dominic in particular. In fact, in its own quiet way, this is the story that convinced me Dominic is sincere about leaving the Covenant behind and joining the Price family. The story has a slower pace than the stories that precede and follow it, giving the reader as much a respite from the usually-hectic pace of the InCryptid world as Verity herself gets. Readers familiar with the Carmichael from its appearance in some of the Fran-and-John InCryptid stories will enjoy catching up with the gorgon family that runs the establishment; even more so I enjoyed another look into the gorgon community (and mentally couldn’t help contrasting this long-established urban settlement with the more rural settlement McGuire shows us in Half-Off Ragnarok). McGuire, as always, packs these 40 pages with a ton of world-building, character development and interpersonal development, but it never feels overwhelming.
2016 Book 23: Swamp Bromeliad by Seanan McGuire; 40 pages; SeananMcGuire.com; ebook; $free on website
The Premise: (from Goodreads): The next stop on Verity and Dominic's great road trip brings them back to where it all began: Buckley Township, Michigan, the town where two expatriates from the Covenant of Saint George once decided to settle down and rebuild their shattered family. It's a sleepy, rural community, long removed from the excitement of those early days...but the woods are still dark and deep, and the things that dwell there are still dangerous to the unwary. When two little boys appear at the Old Parrish Place, claiming that a flower has devoured their friend, it's up to Verity and Dominic to go out into the woods and see whether or not there's something left to save. It's a journey into someone else's dark place, and it's hard to say who's more frightened by the idea: Verity, who knows how much she has to lose, or Dominic, who has no idea. It's time to see where the past meets the future, and how the echoes of the one continue to inform the other. It's time to return to the woods of Buckley, and see what can be seen there. It's time to bring a child home.
My Rating: 4 stars out of 5
My Thoughts: This is the third of three novellas that fill in the year-long gap between McGuire’s InCryptid novels Midnight Blue-Light Special and Chaos Choreography. These novellas are more than just an attempt by the author to fill in some of the “missing time” for Verity and Dominic while Verity’s brother Alex takes over the lead in the InCryptid novels. They’re linked not just by chronology but by theme. There’s a sense, reading them back to back, of both “the journey is the destination” and “the past is present.” Verity has been trying to soften Dominic’s first meeting with her parents and younger sister by introducing him to blood and extended family; he started this sequence meeting one ghost-aunt and ends it visiting with another. Mary Dunlavy has always watched out for the children of the Price family, and this visit is no different. One of the subtler tissues connecting all three novellas is that Verity’s aunts and uncle don’t do much more than observe: they’re watching to see how Dominic fits in, but I think almost as important they’re watching to see how Verity supports Dominic’s immersion into this world (of which he’s always been aware but has also always been an outsider to). This connectivity of family watching out for us, and judging, and hopefully finding worthy, the people we fall in love with, is something I didn’t consciously notice the first time I read each of these.
It’s also always a delight when McGuire focuses on a previously unknown, or at least un-detailed, cryptid - this time it’s the killer plant “swamp bromeliad.” And that’s another thing that ties these stories together: Dominic’s exposure to different types of cryptids in each story (ghosts in the first; gorgon society in the second; predatory plants in this one). He’s likely familiar with the types thanks to his Covenant training, but we get to see him have some first-hand experience - which involves making mistakes. That humanizes him even more.