Sequoia Nagamatsu’s collection of interlocking stories spanning centuries, explores plague and how we deal with loss. The characters are diverse and intricately linked and the plot is wildly imaginative. How does one relate talking pigs, to funerary skyscrapers, to euthanasia theme parks, to melting permafrost? Read and find out. Be aware How High We Go in the Dark has very dark moments (including the loss of children) but a strand of hope runs through out. Highly recommended.
In Elizabeth Moon’s Remnant Population, a colony’s corporate overlords order all residents off the planet. But elderly Ofelia, who has had quite enough of being bossed around, chooses to remain, a remnant population of one. Or so she believes, until she hears new of new colonists and an unexpected indigenous population. Ofelia, overlooked an devalued by her culture, turns out to be exactly the person the situation needs for an amicable resolution. This novel is perfect for those tired of typical heroines. Excellent first contact/anthropological sci-fi! And a terrific portrayal of an older woman settled into her time of life, no condescension, no cuteness.
Three people board a doomed bus: a wayward teen, a disabled vet, and an autistic child. But their problems don’t end after a snowy crash ends their lives.
A brutal despot rules purgatory. Instead of helping souls move on, he drains souls and harvests their energy. Purgatory has devolved into a nightmarish decrepit America rife with bandits and the insane.
Will a trio of unlikely heroes and their bizarre found family overcome the odds and save eternity? This richly imagined contemporary fantasy/horror adventure works as an adult or young adult fiction. Recommended!
Not your typical family saga…
This gorgeous set of interlocking stories follows the souls of two families as they navigate the 20th and 21st centuries.
Each story is the literary equivalent of a gem and collectively tell a tale with elements of magical realism, fantasy, paranormal, and science fiction. The stories celebrate humanity and cover entire arc of life, from cradle to grave, and beyond.
Deeply emotional and beautifully written. Highly recommended.
Steampunk-Alternate History-Magical Fantasy and Talking Crows!1908-Russia: A scrappy intelligence officer from war torn North America hires herself out as a mercenary in the service of Catherine the Great. Both women are “Queens,” descendants of the Gods possessing certain powers. Eryma communes with crows, and her birds provide reconnaissance and protection. Though bashed, battered and covered in tread marks, she plans to help recover a crash-landed asteroid in exchange for eternal youth. But both Catherine’s court and Eryma’s plans are suffused with intrigue.
A complex series of events ensues laced with historical distortions, magic, monsters, blood, gore, and a steam punk feel. The plot unfolds gradually, and Eryma’s intentions and history are delivered in bits and pieces, leaving room for reveals and plot twists. And the novel excels in characterization, including Eryma who’s battered but tough and resolute with a goofy sense of humor.
Grim, hard-living, violent, and lusty Dame July provides a frenemy-romance, and several acts of savagery. And Eryma’s crow community includes both a corvid genius and a comedian.
“So, if I am dead, which religion was correct?” I mused aloud.
“Yog-Slaggoth,” Lois stuck her head through the drapes “The Elder tentacled on is coming to dine on us later. Please be properly shaved, greased, and seasoned by five.”
If you’re after diversity, banter, wordplay, action, and strong female characters, A Queen Among Crows is your book. However, please observe the CLIFF HANGER WARNING sign and don’t tumble off at the end of the novel. Stand alone readers may be disappointed. On the bright side, several additional volumes of this series are already out and available.
Hotel Bars and a number of other stimuli triggered my consciousness to consider how life’s three stages intersect with literature. According to Daisy, the three stages of life should be titled:
Childhood, sexual, and the difficult to name one, postsexual.
As you’ve probably noticed, humans are obsessed by life’s sexual stage during which the focus is finding a partner in order to procreate then rearing and supporting children. Naturally many readers new to this stage flock to steamy “emerging adult” titles, erotica, and romance. Those in the child-rearing portion of this stage might crave the romance or thrills they’ve missed whilst changing diapers or being passed over for promotion, and reach for escapist titles; thrillers, fantasy, mysteries, and romance, because; let’s face it, adult life is difficult.
Second-stage literature encompasses the bulk of titles because second-stagers are obsessed with sex and spend money. And many still seek outwardly to define themselves, features that draw market savvy authors like flies to honey.
Eighty-five percent of content focuses on characters in the thirteen to thirty range.
However the postsexual generation also reads. Sure, some of them are satisfied by the same titles as younger readers. But some of the older set have lost interest in certain aspects of life’s earlier stages. Some have reached the conclusion that romance and heroics don’t hold life’s answers.
Right after finishing Hotel Bars, I came across Midlife Witch Unexpected in a independent authors group promotion. Midlife Witch exemplifies “paranormal women’s fiction,” a literary genre which places a forty-plus heroine in a plot combining elements of urban fantasy, paranormal romance, and/or mystery. Intrigued, I did a bit of research into the genre.
Have to say, I was amused by the women depicted on some of these novel’s covers, many appearing twenty-years shy of forty. The genre seems to focus on “magic, romance, and starting over.” In short, a child-free woman over forty divorces, moves to a new location, discovers special powers, saves the town or solves the case, and finds a hunky dude. At a glance, the underlying messages seem to be resilience, coping with change, and remaining powerful, attractive, and visible as an older woman.
I’m reminded of a side-of-the road billboard featuring a group of very fit almost naked older people captioned “Can you see us now?” The billboard seemed to be part of a campaign raising awareness of older adults. As an introvert, my response to the billboard was “why would you want to be seen?” And I wonder, how many third stagers care about being seen by the general population. How many still chase, public acclaim or being attractive to a younger hunky dude? What percentage? Aren’t many happy to be left to their gardening, bowls club, bicycling, and game streaming? But paranormal women’s fiction is popular, so the notion of using supernatural powers to dive back into second-stage must appeal to many readers.
Aren’t any forty-somethings and fifty-plusses writing stories about the meaning of life? Or does everyone remain captivated by the love theme?
So I queried on my sci-fi/fantasy group for novels featuring older female protagonists who are okay with themselves. Who don’t feel deficient or tossed aside. Who aren’t seeking a replacement man, replacement family, replacement career to create meaning for themselves in middle age and beyond. I’ll let you know what I uncover.
Maybe part of the issue is that stage three is an extraneous blip of existence, featuring people past prime reproductive age, with minimal evolutionary purpose. Maybe there is no meaning for this group.
But people who’ve lost meaning are usually unhappy, and studies show life happiness peaks around age sixty. Presumably, everything is less fraught; the kids are gone, the pets are dead, the job is over. Hobbies are still doable. Friends are still healthy and alive. Perhaps oldsters appreciate these experiences more keenly because they’re less embroiled in drama, and they know time is short. Maybe if you’re lucky, drama comes earlier in life. And maybe contentment’s lack of drama accounts for the dearth of third-stage literature.
Of course not everyone ages well. Some people go very dark and looney, wreak great havoc, and make great fodder for novels. Consider Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, a mystery featuring a deeply eccentric older woman.
And the activities of contented older people, whether they’re meditating, contributing to the community, writing novels, crafting, or caring for grandchildren “reverberate until the end of time, in some small way.” And may be of literary interest. Just consider Miss Marple.
Hotel Bars and the Art of Being Conscious is more of a thought experiment than a novel but a thought experiment well worth reading.
After Daisy drops her teenage son off at boarding school, she’s officially an empty nester. What should she do with the last phase of her life, the phase past child rearing, mate seeking, and striving?
These questions are pretty first world, and Daisy is a highly fortunate first world-type. She played her cards right in the dot.com era and has no economic concerns. So seated comfortably at the pinnacle of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, highly cerebral, alone but not lonely Daisy contemplates life.
In the beyond stage, though, a person doesn’t really need anyone else. At that point, all you really need to do is die, and everyone dies alone.
Daisy decides to seek meaning through experience, and the experience she chooses is bar-tending. Sure, bar-tending is social, and she’ll meet all sorts of interesting people, but Daisy is also an alcoholic, highly functional, but an alcoholic none the less. And interestingly, as she dissects her personal meaning of life, she’s entirely untroubled by her alcoholism. Much and varied alcohol is convivially consumed in the course of this tale without ill effect to the point that this book might not suit a reader in recovery.
Through bar-tending, she encounters several characters who aid her search, and the novel includes a subplot revolving around scientist Bianca. The subplot doesn’t add much interest, but the character adds philosophic and scientific street cred to some of the conversations.
But Daisy must defines her meaning of life alone, and the result is interesting, especially for readers traversing middle age and points beyond.
Hugh Hammond of The Hammond Conjecture is an everyman, who thinks with every organ other than his brain. And unfortunately, the fate of Europe lies in his hands.
He wakes in an isolation ward with no recollection of his past. Encouraged to dredge up memories by writing, the confused man diligently types away. But the emerging memories recount an impossible history: WWII ended by 1941, Europe stultifies under Nazi rule, and Britain continues to appease.
While he languishes in home for incurables and relives his spy years, the mystery of how Hammond bounced from 1970 to 1980 is slowly revealed…
I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. Hammond’s decade-old memories of his spy career are beyond embarrassing. He’s an Austin Powers, saddled with an early 1970s attitude toward woman and the raging ego of a young man, but possessing low self-esteem and a talent for making the wrong choice. Every. Single. Time. Not dissimilar to my character, Martin. Fortunately for the reader, many of Hammond’s choices and much of the dialogue are quietly hilarious.
And the alternate Europe in which the spy-action occurs is complex, believable and depicted in detail. The author does an excellent job of describing the ramifications of an early treaty between Great Britain and Nazi Germany, clear even to a reader with no detailed knowledge of WWII.
This novel will interest alternate fiction and time travel readers, as well as those who enjoy thrillers. The ending is left open, suggesting a sequel is on its way. And I appreciated the professional-level editing and formatting.
Branches, an alternative universe novel rings frightfully true, a precision hit on a raw nerve.
Still reeling from the loss of his mother, a man dives into the social media black hole surrounding an unnamed right wing president. Several of my Facebook acquaintances went this route. And at times, I worried for their mental health. Several of the negative reviews of this novel complain about the character’s political angst. But his obsession is warranted. In his alternate timeline, the worst has happened and the US has descended into storm-trouper, police-state, racial-cleansing fascism.
Then, a shadowy company extends a bizarre offer, allowing him to shift timelines. Can he find peace in the multiverse?
What follows is a series of alternate nows and near-pasts; so more alternate universe than alternate history. And the author handles these subtle and not so subtle shifts cleverly. The plot never lost me, and I found the prose entertainingly of the moment. Most of the character’s heavy-lifting is psychological, but the novel includes plenty of action.
Certain readers, including avid Trump supporters, social conservatives, and racists, will struggle with this novel. Those readers might want to lay aside their prejudices or give this book a miss.
But I highly recommend this book to those of you that can lay aside politics and the other factors that divide society. Because this book is not actually about those issues. It’s about a more insidious problem in our society. It’s about becoming lost in adulthood and missing one’s own life. The last five years, packed with hatred and anxiety, have given many excuses to lose themselves. I hope this novel gives some the insight to get back on track.
This indie published first novel appears professionally edited and formatted. And the prose is high quality.
In P.N. Shafa’s near future dystopia Descendants of Power, the 1% flee to Mars, leaving behind a ravaged climate and starving post-apocalyptic survivors.
But on Mars, the colonists continue with business as usual, i.e. predatory capitalism, the usual “how much can I get for myself” mentality. And turns out, that ethos doesn’t work well in an incredibly fragile situation like living in an oxygen bubble and eating off a slim range of genetically modified foodstuffs. Go figure. Continue reading Descendants of Power, The One Percent on Mars
