Japan Sinks (1973)
by Sakyo Komatsu
original title “Nippon Chinbotsu” (Japan) / translation (1995)
Synopsis: A mighty disaster strikes Japan, it sinks under the sea. Many people die, some survive.
There isn’t much to tell, I thought the book was well written, the characters were okay and it was overall mildly amusing, and while the plot was predictable and played out like in every other disaster book, it never got boring. I read it because it’s billed as an SF book, but the only science fictional element is that Japan goes under, everything else is strictly contemporary, which might be why I prefer a book like John Barnes’s Mother of Storms, where you have a big disaster and a near future Earth setting. It’s by no means a bad book, but while it was entertaining, there was nothing extraordinary that made it stand out from the legion of other disaster novels (a genre I’m admittedly not a fan of).
Rating: 3/5
Freedom & Necessity (1997)
by Steven Brust and Emma Bull
Backcover Synopsis: It is 1849. Across Europe, the high tide of revolution has crested, leaving recrimination and betrayal in its wake. From the high councils of Prussia to the corridors of Parliament, the powers-that-be breathe sighs of relief. But the powers-that-be are hardly unified among themselves. Far from it…
On the south coast of England, London man-about-town James Cobham comes to himself in a country inn, with no idea how he got there. Corresponding with his cousin, he discovers himself to have been presumed drowned in a boating accident. Together they decide that he should stay put for the moment, while they investigate what may have transpired. For James Cobham is a wanted man–wanted by conspiring factions of the government and the Chartists alike, and also the target of a magical conspiracy inside his own family.
While billed as fantasy, this is a miscategorization, it’s really a historical novel. The book has an element of fantasy, but it’s very slight and never completely made clear whether it’s the real thing or not. That said, it’s an excellent book that weaves seemingly with ease adventure, love story, an epic backstory and philosophical musings about the nature of man and society into a compelling mix. It’s also an epistolary novel, a novel written in letters, diary entries and newspaper clippings in this case. Never having read something like this before, I was wary of how good it would work, but Brust & Bull showed me that it really did, very well even. This is a highly entertaining novel that shouldn’t be missed.
Rating: 5/5
The City of Dreaming Books (2004)
by Walter Moers
4th Zamonien novel
original title “Die Stadt der Träumenden Bücher” (Germany) / translation (2006)
Synopsis: After the death of his patron and friend Danzelot von Silbendrechsler, the young lindwurm (a german variety of dragons) Hildegunst von Mythenmetz goes on a quest. Once upon a time his patron gave up writing, after he received a manuscript from a young and unknown author, a manuscript that was of such perfection that every other writing seemed hollow after reading it. Hildegunst wants to find out what happened to this author, and to do this he has to go to the city of books, Buchhaim. But he doesn’t know of the evil that lurks there. Once in its clutches, he is abandoned in the underworld deep under Buchhaim, and it doesn’t look like he will see daylight ever again.
I love books, and a book like this pushes all the right buttons for me. Even if it hadn’t any plot, I probably would have still liked it. Just the descriptions of Buchhaim with its small and old streets full of second hand bookshops, with all its denizen whose only love is the written word, made me feel like discovering reading and books for the first time again. TCoDB is a written love letter for books, wrapped into an exhilarating adventure that never loses sight of entertaining the reader, yet always managing to be a little more than just an adventure.
Rating: 5/5
Rumo & His Miraculous Adventures (2003)
by Walter Moers
3rd Zamonien novel
original title “Rumo & Die Wunder im Dunkeln” (Germany) / translation (2004)
Synopsis: This is the story of the life of the Wolpertinger Rumo (Wolpertinger are a strange mix of dog and deer, their shape is humanoid), from his early childhood until he finds the hometown of all Wolpertinger, Wolperting, and his descent into the underworld, after the whole population of his town has been abducted from the Hel people who live deep in the underworld. He follows them to free them and the love of his life.
This is the third Zamonien novel by Walter Moers, an appealing mix of adventure, love story and coming of age story. Unlike his first book, there’s more graphic violence in the mix, people get eaten alive by cyclops in the first chapter, and death and violence follows Rumo’s throughout the story. Still, Moers hasn’t changed his style much (which is good), he is inventive as always, small details get whole pages dedicated to them, Moers goes on tangents that may or may not be important for things that happen much later in the book, and one never knows what happens next. Compared to his first book, the plot feels more focused and tighter.
Reading a book of Moers is like discovering reading anew, like a child who reads his first book, it grips you and doesn’t let you go until you’ve read the last page, and when you close the book you’re sad because you want to knew what happens next to the characters who became like close friends while reading about them, but you’re also satisfied with the excellent ending you got.
Rating: 5/5
Eisenhorn (2004)
by Dan Abnett
a Warhammer 40.000 novel
Backcover Synopsis: In the grim far future, the Inquisition moves among mankind like an avenging shadow, striking down daemons, aliens and heretics with uncompromising ruthlessness. This volume charts the career of Inquisitor Gregor Eisenhorn as he changes from being a zealous upholder of the truth to collaborating with the very powers he once swore to destroy!
I always liked the insane Warhammer 40k setting. Sure, it’s dystopic and inhuman and the good guys are barely better than the bad guys (by our present standards), but at least there are bad and good guys that are easily identifiable. It’s an universe of extremes, and compared to everyday reality, even a world of such extremes can be a satisfying escape. It might be grim and unrelenting, but at least it’s all clear-cut. At least that’s the case for most Warhammer fiction. Eisenhorn is a bit different in that respect.
In our reality, reasoning and understanding are excellent tools to better tackle the world around us, in the W40k setting they often are a path to death and damnation, but without them there’s no way that mankind could survive. And so, every Inquisitor lives on the edge, trying to learn enough to fight the enemies of the human empire, but also trying not to learn anything that could corrupt them and make them into the things they fight all along. And Inquisitor Gregor Eisenhorn is walking on that edge. Abnett shows with great care the slow character change of Eisenhorn from a dogmatic into an open-minded Inquisitor, who always has to ask himself, what ends justify what means, what price is he willing to pay?
Xenos (Novel, 2001) (5/5)
Missing in Action (Short Story, 2001) (5/5)
Malleus (Novel, 2001) (5/5)
Backcloth for a Crown Additional (Short Story, 2002) (4/5)
Hereticus (Novel, 2002) (5/5)
Rating: 5/5
Luminous (1998)
by Greg Egan
Egan’s second collection has the same ratio of high quality stories as the first, but the quantity has decreased and the size of the stories increased. Thankfully there’s no padding or any narrative fat. What could be said about the first collection, applies here as well, these stories are remorseless explorations of ideas. We have a story where a young boy has to relearn happiness, the catch is that he has to chose with a nearly rational and objective mind, what should be happy in the future to him. Another story deals with a group of explorers who know that they will never have a chance to pass on the knowledge they will gain, because they jump into a black hole. Egan’s stories at best make you think about assumptions you have about yourself or the world around you, and not only does he makes you think, sometimes you may even change your mind or learn a new way to look at the world.
Chaff (5/5)
Mitochondrial Eve (5/5)
Luminous (5/5)
Mister Volition (5/5)
Cocoon (5/5)
Transition Dreams (5/5)
Silver Fire (3/5)
Our Lady of Chernobyl (3/5)
The Planck Dive (5/5)
Rating: 5/5
Axiomatic (1995)
by Greg Egan
This is simply put the best single author collection I ever read, in terms of quality and quantity. There is not one story that is weak, every one of them has a highly original idea at their heart and always takes the exploration of this idea to its logical conclusion, without ever wavering from any possible consequences, however daring they might be.
A man who is seemingly always the same, over an infinite array of alternate worlds, a man who has grown up in the bodies of many other people, questions of morality and philosopical musings crash into reality through the help of modern technology. Reading this collection can be a mind expanding experience, and there’s a reason why I personally think that Egan’s fiction was some of the best published in the 90ths, and Egan’s the most important new writer. He asked and sometimes tried to answer questions with his fiction that nobody else had asked before, he opened areas of thought not many were comfortable with, and he had a spin on things that was completely unique and original. And this collection is a showcase for that.
The Infinite Assassin (5/5)
The Hundred-Light-Year Diary (5/5)
Eugene (4/5)
The Caress (3/5)
Blood Sisters (5/5)
Axiomatic (5/5)
The Safe-Deposit Box (5/5)
Seeing (5/5)
A Kidnapping (5/5)
Learning to Be Me (5/5)
The Moat (5/5)
The Walk (4/5)
The Cutie (5/5)
Into Darkness (5/5)
Appropriate Love (5/5)
The Moral Virologist (5/5)
Closer (5/5)
Unstable Orbits in the Space of Lies (5/5)
Rating: 5/5
Lifeburst (1984)
by Jack Williamson
Synopsis: In the near future, humanity has begun to colonize the Sol system. Unknown to them, eons past and far away, the seekers were created, self-replicating, space-faring and sentient weapons of mass destruction. And now one of their queens has targeted the sol system as her new breeding ground. And if she gets to breed, humanity will face extinction. Their only hope of survival might come from an alliance of aliens, who seem unwilling to help humanity.
The book shouldn’t have been boring. The plot conflict seemed interesting, the setting had all the nifty things a good SF book needs, aliens, space stations and what not, yet it was a pedestrian read. It’s like all the pieces for something good were there, but Williamson didn’t found a way to make them work. Instead of the awe-inspiring sentient constructs I hoped to see, all I saw was ‘killer-bees in space’.
Rating: 1/5
First King of Shannara (1996)
by Terry Brooks
0th part of the Shannara series
Backcover Synopsis: Outcast by the Druids for his devotion to the forbidden art of Magic, Bremen discovers that dark forces are on the move, led by the Warlock Lord, Brona. If the peoples of the Four Lands are to escape eternal subjugation, they must unite. But they need a weapon, something so powerful that the evil Magic of Brona will fail before its might.
I’m not a fan of prequels, so it’s no wonder that I was wary of reading FKoS, especially after reading the Voyage of the Jerle Shannara, which I thought was quite disappointing. But FKoS had all the elements that made me a fan of Brooks’s fiction in the first place, a great plot which hits all the right notes, and characters who I liked and cared for. It’s a typical heroic fantasy and a David versus Goliath plotline, but when done right this can be very entertaining. Brooks’s one problem is that his writing feels overdone at times, too many details that aren’t really that interesting and slow down the reading flow, like the extreme detailed account of the battle near the end of the book. That said, it’s still an entertaining fantasy book that shouldn’t be missed by anyone who likes Brooks’s Shannara series or heroic fantasy in general.
Rating: 4/5
The Mote in God’s Eye (1974)
by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
a CoDominium novel
Synopsis: On a remote world of the human empire, an alien vessel arrives. Unlike human ships, who use a kind of hyperjump, the vessel is driven by a light sail. Sadly the pilot is dead, but the humans find out it’s point of origin, and go there to find out more about the first alien species humankind has ever discovered.
The begin of the novel is a little bit slow going, partly because nearly all of the humans are negligible apart from moving the plot forward, but when the humans reach the motie world, the plot starts to get interesting. The motie culture and the moties themselves are the real characters of the book, and the slow discovery of what makes them unique is absolutely fascinating. The moties are one of the few really original alien species in SF. The plot around the first contact between human and moties is good enough to make it more than just the exploration of an alien culture (for those who like a bit of action), and the solution in the end just makes you wonder how long the humans can hold this Pandora box closed (well, obviously only until the sequel came around).
Rating: 4/5
