Hotel Carousel – Review

What fun! I really enjoyed S.H. Hughes' book Hotel Carousel. Science Fiction mystery, with sometimes kitschy humor. Neat. I downloaded it after reading an overview on an online site.

From the book page:

Janski Fox had a plan. Buy gold Armani Wellingtons on her credit card. Obtain a refund. Now she's over 24,000,000,000,000 miles from home irradiating drain hair to repay the debt. When a chewing gum failure destroys the ship taking Janski to join a mineral ore mining team, what's left crashes at the Hotel Carousel, where a non-paying guest soon realises Janski is the perfect mouthpiece to help it confess its crimes--hopefully she won't die like the others did! As well as staying alive, Janski must prove she's not a jewel thief, outwit a bunch of Psi officers wishing to excavate her mind, convince a mad professor that scooping out her brain isn't such a good idea and save Muse, a royal fugitive who has the genetic hots for her. And then there are the manoeuvring tests... Hotel Carousel: All Aliens Welcome!

I finished this book several weeks ago, and due to myriad complications just got a chance to write the review. I didn't have to go back to the book to find names, situations, etc., because I remembered them all. A sign I enjoyed the book.

The omniscient narrator keeps the story from getting out of hand, and also inserts these great descriptions of the "guests" at Hotel Carousel. They're all from somewhere else, and since Janski is totally out of this galaxy--very few of them (except Muse) resemble anything she knows. But this telling about aliens doesn't get overdone. It's applied skillfully and when needed.

All the characters were distinguishable not just by their quirky alienness, but with distinct personalities that played throughout the book. The several mystery elements were straightforward, which is important in a book with so many peculiar characteristics. Along with sleuthing to save her job (and her life) Janski is involved in action scenes that are believable and well portrayed.

Hotel Caoursel is witty, well written and a fun read.

Patrick Patterson and the World of Others – Review

I read an author interview at Kindle Author and decided to purchase this book.

I really enjoyed James Edward Fryar's book, Patrick Patterson and the World of Others. It's a fresh voice and a different story from SciFi I've recently read.

The story (excerpted from the book page):

For almost thirteen years, Patrick Patterson has lived a quiet, simple life in the tiny town at the edge of Texas, called Farwell, but he is suddenly whisked away by a rag tag group of warriors and others across the United States to discover his true identity and a destiny clouded in mystery.
Never in his wildest dreams did he think that he'd walk through an underground city filled with citizens from across the universe, contend with powerful enemies from the edge of the galaxy, or travel to the Arctic Circle on a high speed train.
Now, he must decide what he truly desires and whether he even wants to take up the mantle of hero...or alien.

So we're in the present, with aliens among us, and we don't even know it. Patrick didn't know it either, until right before his thirteenth birthday. Then he gets to meet these aliens--up close and personal, and some are pretty gruesome.

Fryar seamlessly melds the fantastic into the common place, and accepting the story is easy. The characters help with this, as they are believable--especially their emotions. The story moved along well, but wasn't predictable. There were a few glitches (aren't there always?), such as irregular sentence structure:

"Patrick found a greasy woman cooking at the stove that he assumed was Pratt's wife"

??the stove is Pratt's wife?? But these were few and offset by some nice language:

"...cars like tiny bubbles of oxygen through the vein of the enclosed Lincoln Tunnel, and back out, into the beating heart of Times Square".

I particularly like the overall presentation; what is shown in the prologue, was important to the entire story, and ties up nicely at the end.

But it isn't quite The End, because Patrick, after he escapes the nasty, alien baddies, still has to make his trip to a distant planet (the true World of Others) and face his destiny. I look forward to the next book.

No Hero - Review

I received the publisher's e-ARC of Jonathan Wood's No Hero from netgalley.
Publication date: ~19 July 2011
Publisher: Night Shade Books

From the publisher: "What would Kurt Russell do?" Oxford police detective Arthur Wallace asks himself that question a lot. Because Arthur is no hero. He's a good cop, but prefers that action and heroics remain on the screen, safely performed by professionals. But then, secretive government agency MI12 [MI37] comes calling, hoping to recruit Arthur in their struggle against the tentacled horrors from another dimension known as the Progeny. But Arthur is NO HERO! Can an everyman stand against sanity-ripping cosmic horrors?"

I really liked the first-person non-hero, Arthur Wallace. Jonathan Wood has written this character with style and personality that grabs the reader from the opening page. The supporting cast are also well written, from the loquacious science guy to the steampunk cyber authority, and the "Let's stick to business" leader of MI37. No Hero is an action Sci Fi adventure akin to the movies Men in Black and, Arthur's favorite, Big Trouble in Little China. In No Hero the aliens are seeping through from another reality—an updated version of the usual "world is doomed" scenario. This is also a popular theme in SF right now, with true science speculating on different universe dimensions with different physical properties. The idea is that our universe has a membrane that secludes us from different entities and physics.

I especially like Wallace's continual shock that he is in a real "save the world" situation—sometimes he is exhilarated, but most often is aghast at his position in it all. His frustration at not really knowing what is happening is palpable. The whole idea of another dimension is as alien to him as the aliens.

But, there were story problems—or actually, elements in action adventures that usually gripe me. Jonathan Wood wrote from the accepted rules of the genre and did a fine job, but I am always bummed by the ineffective "good guys" who have limited skills, power, etc. while the "bad guys" (in this case the Progeny) seem invincible. I suppose this is to get the reader to cheer for the underdog. I could accept the underdog role of Wallace and his MI37 team, but the supposed Keepers of the Status Quo Between Realities (the Dreamers) were a bunch of duffs. And while Wallace was frustrated with inadequate information, the final action scenes left me frustrated with the continual deflection of any real answers or presentation of what was really happening. I still can't figure why the Dreamers were so ineffective. Nor could I figure out how people like The Sheilas (and a few others) came to be.

The potential for further books with Arthur Wallace and MI37 fighting anomalies of the universe is clearly set up, and for all that I don't often like some of the devices of this genre, I know I'll grab the next Wood books and enjoy the action and unique situations.

Bright of the Sky - Review

Bright of the Sky by Kay Kenyon
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I downloaded this eBook after reading a blurb about it in Kindle Nations (I think).

I liked the writing, the concept and the characterizations. The beginning was a bit slow, with the introduction of characters that weren't even necessary to the true story. The point of view shifted a lot, and it took me many pages before I realized who was the main protagonist. Once I got to that point, I found the action very dynamic; it kept me "turning" the pages and wondering what would happen next.

Why isn't this a 4-star or more? Partly because of the tedious beginning, and then because of several glitches in the storyline where information seemed thrown in or inconsistent with what was previously told.

I imagine I'll read book 2--again, because of the good character development. I want to know what happens to these people.

View all my reviews

The Incredible Premise

A number of years ago, I read The Discrete Charm of Charlie Monk by David Ambrose and I recently revisited it. The book is incredibly inventive--filled with VR, biogenics and more. A mystery with political overtones and families in distress. Each page brings something different.

Product Description from the publisher:

"Charlie Monk is the ultimate spy, willing to do absolutely anything to accomplish his mission. He has no conscience, no fear...and no memory. Charlie's friend, Dr. Susan Flemyng, thinks she may have found a way to give him his memory back. As the two of them embark on a series of scientific experiments to try and recover Charlie's long-lost memory, they find something terrifying in the deepest recesses of Charlie's mind. Their discovery will turn science on its head, call reality itself into question-and force Charlie and Dr. Flemyng to risk their lives for the entire human race."

"The entire human race." Now there's a broad statement. One which many SF books fall into—perceiving the intricacies of western civilized endeavors as really having global impact. ENTIRE is too massive a word. Ethnologists are still discovering "lost tribes," so it's a bit over the top to think that some Dr. Frankensteins in D.C. will really be able to make changes in the entire human race.

Oh well, it's a premise that has been used for decades. A premise that repelled me from SF books in mid-twentieth century when everything was male-driven and western Judeo-Christian driven. I find fault with it, but books sell because of it. Most readers are, after all, part of the societies that consider themselves the "entire human race" and so if they see a threat to their niche, they assume it's global.

Reminds me of that great movie "The Gods Must be Crazy."

Ambrose, nonetheless, continues to create upbeat, nervy, and intriguing stories. They are often marketed as mainstream and not SF or mystery, even though his web site's sub title is "Hitchcock meets Hawking."