Guest Post: ZOOM OTHELLO by H. Kevin Opela

It has become hackneyed to say that coronageddon has changed everyone’s lives, but that doesn’t make it any less true. Our lives have been forever disrupted by a seemingly random act of nature, and each of us is trying to figure out how to make sense of it in our own way. How do we continue to find meaning without our jobs, without our friends and family by our side, without human interaction? And while every one of us will define their answer differently, in the aggregate I believe our collective answer is that we are all trying to discover a new path in this new reality. 

For me, that meant coming back to the thing that gives my life the most meaning – theatre - and figuring out a way to make it work on a digital stage. And so I started by asking myself, “How can theatre continue (even thrive) in a time of social distancing?” The only way to answer that was to experiment, and so Zoom Othello was born.

After each performance, the audience is invited to remain online and share their thoughts and questions with the cast and me. The questions I hear most during these conversations are “Why Zoom?”, “Why Shakespeare?”, and “Why Othello?”

The answer for “Why Zoom?” is mostly mercenary. I wanted to take advantage of the incredible popularity of the platform. It’s simple to use, good quality and, most important, almost everybody is familiar with it. Theatre doesn’t have to be populist, but it does require a willing audience. So if I was going to do something new, I had to do it where the most people would have access to it.

The answer to “Why Shakespeare?” might seem to contradict that, but art lives in contradictions. That made it an almost obvious choice – that and my affinity for the Bard! I wanted to see if the immediacy of an online platform made Elizabethan language more - or less - accessible to the general public. What could we do with the extreme limitations of movement, staging, costuming, props and scenery? How can we effectively stage a fight scene when the actors are on different screens, thousands of miles away? How about love scenes? Can we create an emotional connection with the audience through an imperfect medium?

Which is probably what prompted most people to ask the last question, “Why Othello?” But to me, Othello is the best choice. It is one of Shakespeare’s most tightly wound plays. The characters’ choices are easy to understand, and they don’t suffer from too much psychological complexity. Heavily focused on plot, it drives forward relentlessly to an explosive climax.

More important, though, is that it’s all about contagion. One character, Iago – our ‘index patient’ – spreads the plague of jealousy to every other character. No one is immune. And in the end, there’s no justice. Iago is never punished, he never suffers for his crimes. But the world around him, the world he was a part of, is forever changed. To me, it is the perfect analogy for what’s going on right now.

Our collective story – the story of all humanity - is one of defiance in the face of chaos. When the chaotic forces of the universe threaten, we are compelled to strike out on a journey of discovery; we innovate; we create. That’s why we have art and industry. That’s why we tell stories and build narratives. It’s how we define who we are and stake a claim in the history of our species.

I undertook Zoom Othello to embark on my own, small journey of discovery. Like the characters in the play, I am raging against a contagion that I can’t see and against which I cannot win. But I refuse to allow the chaos to deny me the chance to plant my stake, and to say “I was here.”

Othello will continue it's performances this week:

Thursday, May 14 at 8:00 pm EST (Act IV)

Friday, May 15 at 7:00 pm EST (Act V)

Join Zoom Performance
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87391802207

Review of SAL AND GABI FIX THE UNIVERSE

TITLE: Sal & Gabi Fix the Universe (Sal & Gabi #2)

AUTHOR: Carlos Hernandez

423 pages, Disney Hyperion, ISBN 9781368022835 (hardcover)

DESCRIPTION: (from the inside front cover): Will Sal’s Papi destroy the universe? Papi, a calamity physicist, believes he has made a breakthrough that will let him close all of the wormholes Sal and Gabi have made in the membrane between universes. But how will that affect Gabi’s baby brother, Iggy, who needs to be connected to another universe in order to remain healthy? And what will it mean for Sal, who uses the holes to stay in touch with other versions of his Mami Muerta? As if he needed more problems, a Gabi from a far-off world shows up determined to stop Sal’s papi at any cost. She believes that sealing all the holes will only bring about utter destruction. It’s already happening in her universe… While Sal works to keep both Papi and this other Gabi under control, he has to worry about finding a new home for Yasmany, and he’s also tasked with co-directing Culeco Academy’s performance of Alice in Wonderland for parent-teacher night. It’s a lot for one guy to juggle, even if he is a showman. Good thing he has some help – a multiverse full of friends and a few clever AIs. Wait … did that toilet just talk?

MY RATING:  Five stars out of five.

MY THOUGHTS: Last year, I ended my review of Carlos Hernandez’s Sal & Gabi Break the Universe thusly: “Also: the sequel has been announced, and I cannot wait to find out how Sal & Gabi Fix the Universe and what happens before they do!”

Reader, I was not let down at all.  Sal & Gabi Fix the Universe is full of all the humor, warmth, and creativity of its predecessor. It avoids the series sophomore slump neatly, telling a complete story of its own while still building on and enhancing the story of the first book. (I have no doubt a reader could pick this book up without having read the previous and not feel lost at all, so adept is Hernandez at working in the backstory while moving the current plot forward. But I definitely recommend reading them in order for greater character and world-building depth.) It increases the stakes the characters face naturally and in proportion to what has gone before (rather than cranking it up beyond 11 with little/no sense of logical escalation). And the characters are not static: they continue to grow and reveal themselves to the reader at surprising moments.

Fix the Universe continues to subvert the YA/MG trope that all the kids are good and smart and all the adults are evil or clueless, and that neither ever listens to the other. Sal, Gabi, Yasmany, and Aventura are smart—there’s no doubt about that – but they’re also plagued by insecurities that make them question the path forward. Unlike many other main characters, these kids are willing to talk about their issues with the adults in their lives. Not always without prodding, and not always completely – but eventually the necessary conversations do happen. The Vidón and Reál parents, Principal Torres, and the other teachers and school staff we see may occasionally be clueless – Coach Lynott particularly so – but  they’re not completely uncaring or disconnected from what the kids under their care are going through. They do their best to listen to the kids and offer help finding solutions to whatever problems the kids present to them. Of course, Sal, Gabi and company don’t tell the adults about the biggest of the problems – the fact that “EvilGabi” wants to destroy the membrane between universes – until it’s almost too late. But the problems they are presented with? Finding a better living situation for Yasmany, helping redesign the big Parent-Teacher Night performance? The adults don’t solve these problems for the kids, they solve them with the kids, and pretty much let the kids take the lead. And when the kids break rules, there are firm and logical consequences: when events conspire so that Principal Torres thinks Sal, Gabi, and Yasmany have taken a “magic” trick too far, upsetting the whole school, the consequence is that Sal is not allowed to bring any of his tricks to school until he earns Principal Torres’ trust back.

In fact, Principal Torres shines in this book. The Vidón and Reál parents are all still an important part of the narrative, but Principal Torres is there at every turn, modeling what a good and effective school administrator should be like: concerned for her students’ health and welfare more than anything else. She makes clear her belief that hungry students are poor students, and that upset students are poor students. She feeds, she listens … but she’s also strict. Most of the teachers and staff follow her lead, some more than others, feeding students’ curiosity and creativity. Of course, not every adult is the ideal – but interestingly, Hernandez keeps the worst of these (Yasmany’s family) off-screen. We hear about how they treat him in a way that makes the harm they’re causing very clear and real, but we, and our narrator Sal, never have to actually see it.

While the adults fill certain roles, it’s the kids who are the focus, of course. One of the things I love about these books is how normal the kids are. No Perfect Heroes saving the day here. Sal, Gabi, and company are heroic precisely because they are not perfect but refuse to let their imperfections stand in their way. Sal knows his insecurities can hamper his friendships; Gabi knows she can be a bit too intense and overwhelming; Yasmany knows he needs to learn how to control his anger (toward others and toward himself) better; Aventura knows her single-mindedness sometimes causes her to lose sight of the bigger picture. The many ways these character traits collide throughout the book provide most of the narrative tension, much like in the first book. Hernandez could have eschewed all the sci-fi shenanigans and written a book about middle school kids navigating friendships and familial issues and it would have been just as excellent, because he understands how kids talk to each other and how their inner monologues burst into external conversation at the unlikeliest, and occasionally most inconvenient, times. The scenes of the kids working out their communications issues, acknowledging when they’ve wronged each other, then building each other up, are some of the best scenes in the book.

And a number of those scenes have to do with the nature of grief and how we deal with it. The grief manifests in several forms: Sal’s long-standing ache over the death of his mother matched with Senor Milagros, the head custodian’s, loss of a spouse and EvilGabi’s loss of a boyfriend, but also Yasmany’s grief over not having a family that loves him. Even the Reál family’s worries that baby Iggy will get sick again are a form of grief (anticipatory as it may be). Throughout the book, we see that there is no one correct way to process grief or move past it; everyone has to find their own way through.

One of the chief ways in which Fix the Universe differs from Break the Universe is that this time there is a “big bad” – the Gabi who wants to remove the membrane separating universes. But here again, Hernandez subverts the tropes: she’s not All-Knowing, she’s not Power Hungry or Pure Ego. She’s a girl who thinks she knows what the right thing to do it, and does everything in her power to achieve it. She’s clearly grieving, from almost her first appearance, for the world she’s losing, no matter how brave a spin she may be putting on it, and that grief affects her decisions as much as Sal’s did in Break the Universe. The presence of a “big bad” this time out shows that Hernandez didn’t want the second book to be a beat-by-beat repeat of the successful formula of the first, and Fix the Universe is all the better for that decision.

The book is about grief, and it’s about dealing with not being perfect, and it’s also about love. Love abounds on every page: parents’ love for their children, children’s’ love for their parents, spouses love for each other, friends’ love for each other. Every type of relationship is represented as equally valid: the Vidón’s monogamous heterosexual relationship; the Reál’s polyamorous conglomerate; Principal Torres’ marriage to her non-binary spouse whose pronouns are “they,” Senor Milagro’s widowership; the budding love affair between a pair of highly-specialized AIs; Sal being aromantic (which I’m not sure, on retrospect, was made explicit in the first book but which didn’t at all surprise me when revealed here). And the platonic love of friendship between the four main teens is given equal weight (with the implication that maybe, just maybe, there may be something more romantic between Yasmany and Aventura down the line) with the various romantic permutations we get to see.  None of this surprises me, as Carlos Hernandez is one of the most joyously loving people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting.

I mentioned that this book is complete in and of itself as much as it builds off of the previous volume. All the major and minor plot threads are tied up, and if this is the last we see of Sal, Gabi, and their ever-growing co-mingled occasionally interdimensional families, I feel content. But there’s a hint near the end of this book of an intriguing untold adventure that I’d surely love to read. I hope that someday, Carlos Hernandez will bring us back to this world.

Series Saturday: Terriers

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then blog about.



We all have That Thing (or sometimes, Those Things) that friends have been recommending for months/years/decades that we just, for one reason or another, put off reading/watching/experiencing. For me, the reason is often, but not always, that I’m afraid I will not like That Thing as much as my friends did and thus will disappoint the friends – which would bother me far more than being disappointed in That Thing myself. But sometimes, it’s just because That Thing isn’t available in a format I can experience it in.

For most of a decade now, my friends Dave and Jim have been extolling the virtues of a short-lived television series called Terriers. And for most of that time, it’s been difficult to find given that it’s never been released on DVD and I didn’t really have access to any streaming services that it may or may not have been on. But Dave recently discovered the show is available on Hulu, informed Jim and myself, and well… there really was no reason not to watch it, since I have Hulu (even if I rarely use it).

For those unfamiliar with it, Terriers ran on FX for one 13-episode season back in 2010. It starred Donal Logue as Hank Dolworth, recovering alcoholic ex-cop, and Michael Raymond-James as Britt Pollack, former break-and-enter-man, who share an unlicensed private eye business in Ocean Beach, CA. The main cast was rounded out by Kimberly Quinn as Hank’s ex-wife Gretchen Seiter; Laura Allen as Britt’s live-in girlfriend Katie Nichols; Jamie Denbo as the boys’ lawyer/employer Maggie Lefferts; and Rockmond Dunbar as Hank’s former police partner Detective Mark Gustafson, plus frequent guest stars Loren Dean as Gretchen’s fiancée Jason and Karina Logue as Hank’s sister Stephanie.  Folks, this is one of the tightest casts I’ve seen on a television series. They all have great chemistry; there’s not a single relationship (romantic, platonic, familial, or business) that isn’t completely believable. Even the single-episode guest stars have the right level of timing and rapport with the regulars (especially D.J.”Shangela” Pierce in the “Pimp Daddy” episode – one of those one-off characters I suspect we’d have seen more of had the series been renewed – and Noel Fisher in “Missing Persons”).

Of course, it helps that the cast actually has strong material to work with. The dialogue is sharp: witty, biting, deeply emotional one moment and tension-breaking the next. And while the main characters share a sense of humor, they don’t speak alike at all. This is one of those rare shows where the writers understand their characters well enough to not put the wrong words, the wrong turns of phrase, into their mouths.  The season arc, mini-arcs and single-episode plots all weave together almost perfectly. Small seeds in early episodes pay off in big ways down the line (examples that aren’t too spoilery: a throw-away line in the pilot in which Hank jokes that he’s possibly going senile because he doesn’t remember putting dishes away leads to a great reveal a few episodes later; Britt’s casual willingness to at least threaten violence to get information in the early episodes of course creates problems later on). If I went back and watched with greater scrutiny, I would not be surprised to find a lot of small moments of dialogue or visuals that hint at things to come. Very often, the “case of the week” mirrors themes of the overall arc or features smaller character moments that play into the whole. And the show is yet another example of why Short Seasons work so well: with only thirteen episodes, there’s less chance of a “filler” episode causing the viewer to lose interest or contradictory details sneaking in to derail the viewer with “wait, didn’t they say something completely different last episode” thoughts. You’re more likely to be derailed by “wait, that’s what he meant when he said X” or “holy shit, did they set that up four episodes ago? I think they did” thoughts. The season arc that starts in the pilot (looking for a friend’s daughter, Hank and Britt stumble on a much larger real estate mystery) is concluded in the season/series finale (which also, sort of subtly, sets up who the “big bad” for the start of season two would have been). But not every episode features the season arc up-front. There are several episodes in the middle where the case of the week is the central concern and the season-arc is either barely mentioned or moves along incrementally, and those episodes work to relieve tension for the characters and the viewers (the aforementioned “Missing Persons” and “Pimp Daddy” are excellent examples). The mini-arcs (Hank’s sister’s mental illness; Gretchen’s impending re-marriage; Britt and Katie’s relationship speed-bumps) are spaced out well and feed each other. There’s never a sense that too much is going on, never a sense that any particular storyline isn’t getting the room it needs. If anything, my one complaint/regret is that Maggie Lefferts and Mark Gustavson, while fully-realized characters played solidly by their respective actors, are more clearly around to Move Plot Along or Create Complications. I hope that, had the series gone to season two, they would have been given mini-arcs of their own.

Tonally, Terriers is absolutely modern noir. The setting may be the sunny San Diego area and the clothes may be lightweight and warm-weather appropriate, but Hank and Britt could just as easily be operating out of 1930s Los Angeles. They’re the main characters, they’re the “nice guys,” but they walk a very morally grey line throughout the series. Like the best noir detectives, they’re our protagonists but they’re not always good guys. Hank may have a handle on his alcoholism, but he’s impulsive to a fault, his recklessness making situations worse more often than fixing them. Britt may be happy-go-lucky but he’s got a dark streak that rears up at the worst times. They have blind-spots where their families and friends are concerned. They want Justice to prevail, but they’re often willing to cut corners to make it happen. They’re all heart, but they’re also downtrodden: Hank’s truck looks like it could stop working at any moment, and Britt’s motorcycle doesn’t look much better. Money is always an issue for both of them, and creates numerous complications. Still, you can’t help but root for them. Their hearts are in the right place even if their methods are sometimes a little suspect. And man, are they both charming.

Terriers ultimately didn’t get picked up for a second season, which is a shame. Friends Dave and Jim theorize that had the show debuted just a couple of years later, in the midst of Peak TV, it might have made it at least through season two if not three. But would it have been the same creature if it was picked up a few years later? Would it even have had the same cast? By 2014, Donal Logue had moved on to starring in the proto-Batman series Gotham, while Michael Raymond-James was appearing somewhat regularly on fairy-tales-in-the-real-world series Once Upon A Time. No, I think it’s preferable that Terriers was produced when it was, with the cast it had. I’m hard pressed to think of anyone else at all playing Hank and Britt with such chemistry. I also wouldn’t be adverse, since reunions are all the rage, for another 10-13 episode run taking place now and showing us where the guys and gals have ended up, provided the writing is as complex and sharp as we’d expect.

Review of CARSON OF VENUS THE EDGE OF ALL WORLDS

TITLE: Carson of Venus: The Edge of All Worlds (ERB Universe #1, Swords of Eternity Super-Arc #1)

AUTHOR: Matt Betts

278 pages, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc., ISBN 9781945462238 (hardcover, paperback, ebook and audio)

DESCRIPTION: (from the back cover): Stranded on an alien world for nearly two decades, Earthman Carson Napier finds his own past haunting him in strange and terrifying ways when he’s confronted by a sinister madman bent on ruling Amtor. To stop his opponent and his insidious weapon, Carson must gather an alliance of friends and former enemies alike in an epic struggle for control of the planet. A stand-alone novel, this book also launches ERB, Inc.’s new canonical line of stories and the “Swords of Eternity” four-book super-arc. The book also includes a new Pellucidar-related short story by Christopher Paul Carey.

MY RATING: Five out of five stars

MY THOUGHTS: If I didn't know better, I would think I had just read a long-lost Edgar Rice Burroughs manuscript discovered somewhere in the depths of the offices of Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. in Tarzana, CA. Matt Betts does a truly wonderful job of matching the tone and pacing of Burroughs' five original Carson of Venus books, and that includes a pitch-perfect prologue in which Betts, visiting the Burroughs offices to pitch a different project, meets Carson Napier himself – or at least Carson’s astral projection, reaching someone on Earth for the first time since the death of Burroughs himself back in 1950. Burroughs often inserted himself in his pulp adventures as the man asked by the characters in question (Tarzan, John Carter, Carson, etc.) to turn their true-life adventures into novels for the masses.

In typical Carson Napier fashion, once the action starts it doesn't stop: Carson and his team (the love of his life, Duare, and his best friends Ero Shan and Nalte) manage to turn a simple scouting mission into a combination of search-and-rescue, espionage, and a bit of social influencing as they come across other characters, despite orders from their jong ("king") to simply scout and return with information. It's not that Carson and his friends intentionally disobey orders -- it's that they just keep stumbling on things that take them further from home and closer to the source of their (and their kingdom's) latest problem. The action ranges across locations on Amtor (the native name for Venus) both familiar to long-time readers and newly-revealed in this adventure. The action scenes contain all the derring-do one expects of a Burroughs novel and all of the near-fatal-misses one expects of a Carson book. Unlike a number of Burroughs’ more well-known characters, Carson is not a capital-H Hero or a superhuman. He’s a man who made a mistake in his calculations (aimed his rocket-ship for Mars but ended up on Venus instead, inspiring some readers to call him “Wrong-Way Carson”) and just keeps finding himself in one dangerous situation after another with no choice but to survive or die.

I've always felt that as much as Burroughs interconnected his series in his original novels (Tarzan has traveled to Pellucidar; Jason Gridley's "Gridley Wave" allows communication between Barsoom, surface Earth, and Pellucidar), Carson always seemed the odd man out: he communicated his adventures to Burroughs via astral projection, but otherwise seemed to have little or no connection to the others Burroughs wrote about. Betts reveals a previously-unknown friendship between Carson and Gridley from before Carson left Earth, and (this is not really a spoiler) an appearance by Gridley in this novel not only deepens the connective tissue but also sets up the "Swords of Eternity Super-Arc" of which this is the first book. For those concerned: this IS a Carson of Venus novel first and foremost. The nods at the Super-Arc help propel this story rather than sidetrack or derail the action (the way most tie-ins to DC or Marvel Comics "Events" often derail the action of the ongoing series they appear in), and the story Betts starts in chapter one concludes in this book. No cliffhangers, no "to be continued in the pages of...". Betts follows Burroughs in telling a complete-in-one adventure yarn that still feels like a part of something larger.

But Betts isn't simply a Burroughs imitator. The author's sly sense of humor and ability to craft exciting action sequences carries through and enhances the story in ways mere imitation would not, especially in the creation of three new characters that I hope we'll see more of in any future Carson of Venus novels. I sincerely hope ERB Inc. will continue to tap Betts to write further Carson novels. He's clearly able to bring a modern sensibility to standard Burroughs fare, integrating it cleanly without denigrating or over-writing the original Master.

The book also comes with a bonus short story written by Christopher Paul Carey, which fills us in on just how Jason Gridley came to appear in front of his old friend Carson on Venus. This is the true start of the "Swords of Eternity Super-Arc," and it's a tightly-told tale that takes place in Pellucidar, is narrated by Jason Gridley, and introduces new ERB character Victory Harben. It’s not a spoiler to mention that while Victory is a new character, her personal history comes from material Burroughs actually wrote; her family can be traced back to several different Tarzan novels. We get to see just enough of her that I can confidently say she is absolutely a Burroughs heroine: as smart, tenacious, and strong as Jane Porter-Clayton, Dejah Thoris, and Duare. I'm excited to see where the Super-Arc takes her between here and the fourth book in the “Swords of Eternity” Super-Arc, Victory Harben: The Fires of Halos, which will also be written by Carey. She is sure to  join the pantheon of Burroughs characters people want to know more about.

Oh, and speaking of Victory: to steal a movie phrase, be sure to stick around for the “after-credits scene.” If you’re the type of reader who skips the acknowledgements, etc., at the end of a book, you might miss out on an interesting little teaser.

**NOTE: This review was written after reading an Advance Review Copy provided by the publishers in exchange for an honest and unbiased review.**

Reading Round-Up: April 2020

Continuing the monthly summaries of what I’ve been reading and writing.

BOOKS

To keep my numbers consistent with what I have listed on Goodreads, I count completed magazine issues as “books.” I read or listened to 11 books in April: 5 in print, 5 in e-book format, and 1 in audio format. They were:

1.       Lightspeed Magazine #119 (April 2020 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams. The usual fine assortment of sf and fantasy short stories. This month’s favorites for me were Yoon Ha Lee’s “Always The Harvest,” Andrew Dana Hudson’s “Voice of their Generation,” Celeste Rita Baker’s “Glass Bottle Dancer,” and Fred Van Lente’s “Neversleeps.”

2.       The Long Goodbye (Philip Marlowe #6) by Raymond Chandler. Marlowe makes a friend, and the friend commits murder and goes on the run, leaving Marlowe to figure out what really happened while he’s arrested as an accomplice. Listened to the abridged audiobook narrated by the always excellent Elliot Gould.

3.       The Burglar in Short Order by Lawrence Block. Finally, a collection of every short story, vignette and non-fiction piece featuring or about the writing/creation of Block’s burglar/bookshop owner Bernie Rhodenbarr. Not a bad piece in the bunch, including a new essay about how certain characters don’t age but do sometimes fade gracefully from the spotlight.

4.       Miles Morales: Spider-Man Volume 1: Straight out of Brooklyn by Saladin Ahmed, Javier Garron, others. Like I said about Seanan McGuire’s “Spider-Gwen” runs last month: Saladin Ahmed has gotten me invested in a character I knew almost nothing about before he started writing the character. I knew vaguely who Miles Morales was because of all the press when he succeeded Peter Parker as the Ultimate Universe Spider-Man and again when he was merged onto the main Marvel Earth, but otherwise my only familiarity was from the Into the Spider-Verse movie. Now I’m totally on board with Miles, his family, and his friends.

5.       Miles Morales: Spider-Man Volume 2: Bring on the Bad Guys by Saladin Ahmed, Javier Garron, others. A solid second collection, continuing Miles’ adventures and increasing the tension surrounding what new villain in town Ultimatum wants with Miles.

6.       Common Source (John Simon Thrillers #3) by Bryan Thomas Schmidt. Schmidt’s third near-future-SF buddy cop thriller lowers the city-wide stakes slightly (no terrorists looking to destroy major landmarks) but increases the personal stakes, as android cop Lucas George must deal with several of his brethren gone rogue and his Maker going missing. Full Review coming closer to the book’s May release date. (I received an Advance Review Copy from the publisher.)

7.       How to Flirt in Fairieland & Other Wild Rhymes by C.S.E. Cooney. I am really not a strong poetry reader, and I usually don’t feel equipped to judge poems on anything more than an “I liked it” scale. I can say that I enjoyed this collection of fantasy poems, all of which tell stories one wants to fall into.

8.       Carson of Venus: The Edge of All Worlds by Matt Betts. Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. launches an official, canonical new set of books starting here: the first new official Carson of Venus novel in decades. New canonical Tarzan, Pellucidar and John Carter novels will follow over the coming year. A longer review is forthcoming next week, but suffice to say I loved it and want more! (I received an Advance Review Copy from the publisher.)

9.       A Sinister Quartet, edited by Mike Allen. A wonderful collection of fantasy-horror novellas by C.S.E. Cooney, Jessica P. Wick, Amanda J. McGee, and Editor Mike Allen. I loved every part of this book, but can’t give a more detailed review at the moment pending possible review publication elsewhere. (I received an Advance Review Copy from the publisher.)

10.   The Adventure of the Naked Guide (The Blood-Thirsty Agent #3) by Cynthia Ward. Ward’s third, penultimate, adventure of Lucy Harker takes her from war-time Germany into the hidden world beneath the Earth’s crust for a reunion with family and with old foes. Non-stop action from start to finish.

11.   The Klaus Protocol by Frank Schildiner. A most excellent Russian spy thriller set in the Asian theater of war in the days before World War Two. Full Review HERE.

STORIES

I have a goal of reading 366 short stories (1 per day, essentially, although it doesn’t always work out that way) this year (366 because it’s a Leap Year). Here’s what I read this month and where you can find them if you’re interested in reading them too. If no source is noted, the story is from the same magazine or book as the story(ies) that precede(s) it:

1.       “The Least of These” by Veronica Roth, from Lightspeed Magazine #119 (April 2020 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams.

2.       “Always The Harvest” by Yoon Ha Lee

3.       “Voice of Their Generation” by Andrew Dana Hudson

4.       “A Subtle Web: A Tale From The Somadeva Chronicles” by Vandana Singh

5.       “Bow Down Before The Snail King!” by Caleb Wilson

6.       “Glass Bottle Dancer” by Celeste Rita Baker

7.       “Neversleeps” by Fred Van Lente

8.       “The Witch Sleeps” by Rati Mehrotra

9.       “In The Land of Rainbows and Ash” by Seanan McGuire, on the author’s Patreon page.

10.   “How To Submit” by Don Redwood, from Daily Science Fiction, edited by Jonathan Laden and Michele-Lee Barasso

11.   “A Bad Night For Burglars” by Lawrence Block, from The Burglar In Short Order

12.   “Mr. Rhodenbarr, Bookseller, Advises A Young Customer On Seeking A Vocation”

13.   “The Burglar Who Strove To Go Straight”

14.   “Like A Thief in the Night”

15.   “The Burglar Who Dropped In On Elvis”

16.   “The Burglar Who Smelled Smoke”

17.   “The Burglar Who Collected Copernicus”

18.   “The Burglar Takes A Cat”

19.   “Monsters” by Jim Butcher, from Parallel Worlds, edited by L.J. Hachmeister and R.R. Verdi

20.   “The Dark of the Sun” by Christopher Paul Carey, from Carson of Venus: The Edge of All Worlds, edited by Christopher Paul Carey

21.   “The Sinister Quartet (Introduction)” by Mike Allen, from The Sinister Quartet, edited by Mike Allen

22.   “The Twice-Drowned Saint (Being A Tale of Fabulous Gelethel, the Invisible Wonders Who Rule There, And The Apostates Who Try To Escape” by C.S.E. Cooney

23.   “An Unkindness” by Jessica P. Wick

24.   “Viridian” by Amanda J. McGee

25.   “The Comforter” by Mike Allen

So that’s 25 short stories in April. Once again under “1 per day,” putting me further behind for the year so far. (April 30th was the 121th day of 2020.)

Summary of Reading Challenges:

“To Be Read” Challenge: This month: 0 read; YTD: 3 of 14 read.

366 Short Stories Challenge: This month:  25 read; YTD: 84 of 366 read.

Graphic Novels Challenge:  This month: 2 read; YTD: 9 of 52 read.

Goodreads Challenge: This month: 11 read; YTD: 50 of 125 read.

Non-Fiction Challenge: This month: 0 read; YTD: 4 of 24 read.

Read the Book / Watch the Movie Challenge: This month: 0; YTD: 0 read/watched.

Complete the Series Challenge: This month: 1 books read; YTD: 6 of 16 read.

                                                                Series fully completed: 0 of 3 planned

Monthly Special Challenge: April was National Poetry Month, so my goal was to read some poetry. I am notoriously not a reader of poetry, but I did manage to read one poetry collection by C.S.E. Cooney.

May is Asian-American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, so my goal is to read a number of authors either from or descended from that part of the world and maybe squeeze in some non-fiction about that part of the world.

Sunday Shorts: Two Dark Portal Fantasies

Sunday Shorts is a series where I blog about short fiction – from flash to novellas. For the time being, I’m sticking to prose, although it’s been suggested I could expand this feature to include single episodes of anthology television series like The Twilight Zone or individual stories/issues of anthology comics (like the 1970s DC horror or war anthology titles). So anything is possible. But for now, the focus is on short stories.

Portal fantasy stories – where a child passes through a door/window/wardrobe/tornado/etc. and emerges in a fantasy land – are all the rage again these days, especially in short story and novella form. In April, I read two short stories almost back-to-back that approached portal fantasies from a very dark angle.

Seanan McGuire (author of the “Wayward Children” novellas that explore what happens when those portal kids come back to the mundane world) posts a new short story every month on her Patreon for folks who subscribe at a certain level. April’s story was “In the Land of Rainbows and Ash.” You can tell from the title, perhaps, but definitely from the second paragraph (“They are the skeleton keys which, when turned, can open wide the world, because they do not know any better.”) that this is not going to be a happy, light frolic into a fantasy world. The narrator (a gryphon, although her family prefers to be called “griffin”) manipulates the young arrival from the get-go, pushing her towards her destiny in this land. The griffin’s twin natures (nurturing bird and predatory cat) war within herself as she works at the behest of a higher power. The internal conflict is palpable throughout, as is the growing sense of dread that this is not going to end well, all juxtaposed with a fantasy world that is sunny and beautiful, as are the creatures within it.  As is my usual wont, I won’t spoil the ending. I will say that, as with the unconnected-to-this “Wayward Children” books, McGuire’s incredible ability to subvert tropes, her intricate wordplay, her ability to get to you love a character you should be hating with a few small turns of phrase, are all used to full effect here. To read the story, though, you’ll need to subscribe to Seanan’s Patreon at the “short story per month” level.

C. Robert Cargill’s “We Are Where the Nightmares Go” appears as a reprint in the May issue of Lightspeed Magazine (Issue #120. The story will be free on the Lightspeed website on May 21, or you can buy the ebook edition of the issue and read it right away.) Again, we know we’re in for something dark not just from the title but also from the very first paragraph when the author tells us “But those are the children who came back. No one talks about the other children, the ones who walk through basement doors and rabbit holes never to return…” We can be pretty sure that whatever happens, our unnamed protagonist child will not be journeying home again (and shouldn’t the fact that the heroine of the story stays nameless also be a hint we’re not meant to get too attached?). Where the portal world of the McGuire story is a sunny fantasy world with dark secrets, Cargill shows us a nightmare world of killer clowns and a Thing on the Other Side of the Doorway who speaks in obtuse language meant to confuse as much as lead. There’s a gauntlet to be run, mazes and carnivals of dark intent and a series of lost, maimed children to be encountered. The plucky heroine never loses her motivation. Maybe she’ll be the one to break the cycle and make it home after all? Again, I don’t want to spoil the wonderfully dark turn at the end. But I will say Cargill lays the clues out very well along the way. I read the story twice, just because I had to see where the seeds were dropped after reading the ending.

Series Saturday: WATCHMEN 2019

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.

I am one of those people who felt that Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen twelve-issue comic book series (or “maxi-series,” as DC called them back in the day) did not need a sequel. Or Prequels. Or any addendum or continuation or expansion at all. I actually feel this way about most of the 12-issue maxi-series DC produced at the time, including Camelot 3000 and Silverblade.) I’ve reread Watchmen a few times since the original publication in monthly form and still feel it’s a complete, beautifully constructed, layered, and yes dark/cynical story. (The fact that it and Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns almost irrevocably shifted the tone of mainstream comics towards the dark and fatalistic, and how I feel about that, is a discussion for a different post.) I should admit at this point that my last reread of Watchmen, in graphic novel form, was well over a decade ago, just as a warning that I may not remember every single story nuance. Maybe it’s time for a reread.

This explains why it took me quite a few months after Damon Lindelof’s live-action Watchmen sequel finished running on HBO before I decided to bow to the pressure of friends whose opinions I trust and just watch the darn thing.

And I still say: Watchmen the comic book series didn’t need a sequel. But if it had to have one, I’m glad HBO’s Watchmen the television series is the one we got. Damon Lindelof and company did a great job telling a story that builds off of the original without negating, contradicting, or being a simple re-tread. The writers matched the themes, motifs, and style without being slavish. They gave us a world we can believes follows from the stunning events of the original graphic novel’s finale, through the introduction of new characters interacting with some, but not all, of the characters who survived the original story.

The script is an excellent example of how to use the brevity of the short season format to make a story truly compelling. If there are any extraneous or wasted scenes, they’re hard to find. Okay, I’ll admit, I would have been happier with fewer Jeremy Irons scenes. I respect the man and his abilities, but in this case I think a less would have been more. His scenes went from “oooh, mysterious, I wonder how this fits with everything else” to “oh god, just get him out of wherever he is and into the action with everyone else already.” (That’s about the best I can do expressing my reaction without spoiling anything for the probably few of you reading this who haven’t watched the show and still intend to. Although I think who he is becomes obvious pretty quickly.)

The time-jumps, flashbacks, and pacing of the big reveals are perfectly crafted. Mysteries simmer just long enough, secrets come to the fore at just the right moment. (Okay, with the exception again of the Jeremy Irons sub-plot, which does drag – but when the sub-plot collides with the main plot, it does so explosively. I’d have maybe liked it a little earlier, but I’m not sure it would have fit as well anywhere else.) The dialogue is sharp, managing to be intelligent and witty without condescending to the audience.

The cast also deliver at the top of their game.

Regina King is absolutely mesmerizing from first scene to last. As the focal point of the story, the character off of whom everything else flows, you have to believe her from beginning to end. King plays Angela’s strength and sensitivity with such nuance that you can’t help understand the anger that extends as a mixture of both and pushes so much of the action forward. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II does a fantastic job matching her in their scenes together, but truly, truly shines in the last two episodes (about which I can’t say more without spoiling a big reveal, but suffice to say Abdul-Mateen plays it brilliantly). Jean Smart is just seriously bad-ass throughout, playing the conflict of her character’s storied history against the practical realities of the day. Tim Blake Nelson always brings humanity to the socially-awkward characters he plays; Wade Tillman could have been a one-note character but Nelson explores all the depth the script implies, especially in the Wade-centric episode. Louis Gossett Jr., Don Johnson, and Frances Fisher shine in supporting roles; other directors might have been tempted to let them steal the show from the main cast but they are expertly utilized. This might be the first thing I’ve seen Hong Chau in, and her performance as Lady Triue really walks that line between sickly-sweet and sweetly-psychotic; when she finally has scenes with Jeremy Irons the similarities and counterpoints of their characters are expressed with looks and words left unspoken. Jeremy Irons himself is the consummate scenery-chewer (I swear I saw glimpse of his twin characters from Dead Ringers in certain scenes), ably abetted by Tom Mison and Sara Vickers (another new face to me). And let’s face it: it’s never easy portraying a main character who spends most of their time divorced from the majority of the cast/plot. Irons rises to the occasion.  And I would be remiss if I didn’t compliment Dylan Schombing (as Topher) and Jolie Hoang-Rappaport (as Bian). Both kids exhibited a haunted quality perfect for their characters’ damaged childhoods that some adult actors would be hard-pressed to pull off. Neither kid was hugely important to the action, but they needed to be solid to give the adults in their orbit something to play off of. I expect we’ll see more of them in the future.

And for the record? I’m one of those people who thinks Watchmen (2019) does not need a sequel. It tells the story Lindelof and company wanted to tell and is complete in and of itself. The small unanswered questions viewers are left with are food for thought, just like what Moore and Gibbons left us with back in 1987. I know HBO has said they’ll only do another season if Lindelof is on board, and he has no interest in the project. I really hope HBO sticks to their guns.

Review of THE KLAUS PROTOCOL

TITLE: The Klaus Protocol

AUTHOR: Frank Schildiner

158 pages, Frank Schildiner Books, ISBN 9781395000780 (format)

DESCRIPTION: (from online retail listings): "You will do this, Comrade Captain," Yehzov said in a strangled whisper, "or the torture you received from Commandant Blokhin will feel like the gentle caress from a lover." SOVIET UNION 1938: Army Captain and former military intelligence officer Konstanin Kalinin has a simple choice. Discover a high ranking traitor stationed on the Soviet/Japanese Asian border, or receive a slow death by torture. He has less than two months to untangle a web of deceit and death as two countries prepare for bloody war. Can Konstanin discover the double agent before the spy or the Soviet secret police capture or kill him? Based on real events just prior to World War 2, THE KLAUS PROTOCOL is a mystery thriller set before the little known war between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan. 

MY RATING: Five stars out of five

MY THOUGHTS: Frank Schildiner’s new self-published novella retains all the hallmarks of his traditionally-published works: fast-moving action and strong characterization built off of meticulous research into the genre or series in which he is writing. Fans of Schildiner’s fantasy/horror Frankenstein and Vampire Hunters novels from Black Coat Press or his short story work in a variety of New Pulp anthologies will not be disappointed in his first straight-up spy novel.

After a short framing sequence, Schildiner immerses the reader in the Soviet Union political landscape of the late 1930s. The depth of his research into the back-stabbing manipulations by various Soviet sub-leaders of the military and secret police shines through on almost every page without ever distracting from the on-going action. He artfully avoids info-dumping historical perspective on the reader (saving most of that for the author’s note at the end) by tying the backgrounds and butchery of the real-life leaders to the internal thoughts and previous experiences of his protagonist, Captain Konstanin Kalinin.

Kalinin himself feels like a character out of a LeCarre novel: an everyman with a certain set of skills who finds himself thrust into situations potentially beyond his abilities but who rises to the occasion (not without error along the way; Kalinin is good, but he’s not perfect) rather than be overwhelmed. Although this novella takes place before World War Two, I can easily envision a world in which Kalinin and LeCarre’s George Smiley are at least aware of the others’ activities and successes from opposite sides of the political chessboard. And because Kalinin is an everyman (troubled marriage, troubled career, a bit downtrodden but not completely without hope), it is very easy to root for him to succeed despite the fact that failure could spell defeat for the Soviet Union in their war against Japan.

The mystery aspect – Kalinin’s mission to uncover who is behind the leak of military secrets – is played out well: multiple plausible suspects, red herrings, characters with their own sub-agendas and secrets, and an ultimately satisfactory reveal. But don’t read the author’s end-notes first if you want to be surprised or try to work it out yourself alongside the main character. The action sequences, including several motorbike chase sequences, are exciting, and the several scenes of torture (usually with our main character on the receiving end as opposed to other characters) are brutal while staying shy of being “too much.”

There are a number of intriguing secondary characters that add depth to the story as well. Strong female characters abound as a match for Kalinin (whether they’re on his side or not is something I won’t spoil). Fans of M*A*S*H will recognize a particular type in the character of Sergeant Mosin, who I would be happy to see in a short story of his own. And of course both the real-life and fictional bad-guys are well-drawn and complex.

This one comes with full recommendation to fans of historical spy novels and action-adventure novels. It’s out now for Nook and Apple Books, and should be on Amazon in a few days.

Reading Round-Up: March 2020

Continuing the monthly summaries of what I’ve been reading and writing.

Going strictly by these numbers, March was a slow reading month for me. Except not really. It’s just that a good chunk of what I read in March was proofreading, copy-editing or beta-reading on books that won’t be out until later in the year: one novel, two novellas, a memoir, and a large pile of short stories. They’ll be added into the tally for whatever month the books actually come out in.

BOOKS

To keep my numbers consistent with what I have listed on Goodreads, I count completed magazine issues as “books.” I read or listened to 8 books in March: 5 in print, 2 in e-book format, and 1 in audio format. They were:

1.       Lightspeed Magazine #118 (March 2020 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams. The usual fine assortment of sf and fantasy short stories. This month’s favorites for me were Kristina Ten’s “Tend To Me,” Tahmeed Shafiq’s “Love and Marriage in the Hexasun Lands,” and A.M. Dellamonica’s “Living The Quiet Life.”

2.       The Haunting of Tram Car 015 by P. Djèlí Clark. An intriguing novella set in an alternate Cairo in which magic works and supernatural creatures interact with humanity, with a very steampunk feel. And it’s a mystery, featuring two detectives trying to figure out exactly is haunting the titular tram car and how to exorcize it. Interesting characters, strong world-building.

3.       A Dead Djinn in Cairo by P. Djèlí Clark. This is actually the first novelette set in Clark’s alternate history magic-imbued Cairo, but I read them out of order. The order doesn’t really matter – there are two characters from this one who play supporting roles in the other, but otherwise they are stand-alone tales in the same setting. I really, really loved the lead detective in this one and hope to see more of her. This is a very “fair play” mystery – all the clues are there for the reader to follow.

4.       Choke Hold (Angel Dare #2) by Christa Faust. This made it onto my To Be Read Challenge for 2020 because I should have read it a long time ago. It’s a sequel to Faust’s award-winning first Angel Dare thriller, Money Shot, and it’s every bit as intense and full of violence and sex. The sex isn’t particularly graphic, but it’s also not completely off-screen. Faust is one of only two female authors to appear under the Hard Case Crime imprint, and I have to assume low sales are why we haven’t seen a third Angel Dare book, as this one ends with a strong hint that Angel’s story isn’t over. Sad, because for noir/crime/thriller fans this should be an ideal series.

5.       Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Recommended by my friends Dan and Mikayla, I finally listened to Ali’s first memoir, narrated by the author. What an incredible story of indoctrination and rebellion at the personal level and how it can also affect the larger picture. I find that I get much more out of memoirs when I can listen to the actual author read/perform their own story.

6.       Spider-Gwen: Ghost-Spider Volume 1: Spider-Geddon by Seanan McGuire, Rosi Kämpe, others. I have been out of touch with most Marvel and DC Comics for a long time, including the Spider-Man family of books. I started buying monthly issues again largely because of the comics work Seanan McGuire, Saladin Ahmed, and Kat Howard have been doing the past two years, including Seanan’s Spider-Gwen runs. I have to say Seanan did a wonderful job introducing me to a character I was completely unfamiliar with and getting me to care about her quickly. And the art is fun, even in the midst of a line-wide crossover event (Spider-Geddon) for which I was not reading ANY of the other titles.

7.       Spider-Gwen: Ghost-Spider Volume 2: The Impossible Year by Seanan McGuire, Takeshi Miyazawa, others. The second and final Spider-Gwen: Ghost Spider volume collects the second half of McGuire’s initial run at the character, setting up the title’s relaunch.  More solid characterization, and lots of “let’s blow up everything in Gwen’s world” scenes.

8.       Ghost-Spider Volume 1: Dog Days Are Over by Seanan McGuire, Takeshi Miyazawa, others. A new, shorter, series title for a relaunch that sees Gwen taking advantage of her status as one of the only Spider-folk who can cross dimensions on her own to go to college on Marvel’s core-Earth where nobody knows who she is. Except the Jackal does, and he wants her as he’s wanted every version of Gwen. McGuire writes the creepy stalker character very well.

STORIES

I have a goal of reading 366 short stories (1 per day, essentially, although it doesn’t always work out that way) this year (366 because it’s a Leap Year). Here’s what I read this month and where you can find them if you’re interested in reading them too. If no source is noted, the story is from the same magazine or book as the story(ies) that precede(s) it:

1.       “Giant Steps” by Russell Nichols, from Lightspeed Magazine #118 (March 2020 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams.

2.       “Living The Quiet Life” by A.M. Dellamonica

3.       “Many Happy Returns” by Adam-Troy Castro

4.       “Reliable People” by Charlie Jane Anders

5.       “Viewer, Violator” by Aimee Bender

6.       “Tend To Me” by Kristina Ten

7.       “Three Urban Folk Tales” by Eric Schaller

8.       “Love and Marriage in the Hexasun Lands” by Tahmeed Shafiq

9.       “Another Beautiful Day” by Seanan McGuire, on the author’s Patreon page.

10.   “The All-Night Horror Show” by Orrin Grey, from The Dark #58 (March, 2020), edited by Silvia Moreno-Garcia and Sean Wallace

11.   “The Summer Is Ended and We Are Not Saved” by Natalia Theodoridou

12.   “Escaping Dr. Markoff” by Gabriela Santiago

13.   “Casualty of Peace” by David Tallerman

14.   “Goodbye” by Jim Butcher, from author’s email newsletter

15.   “Whoever Fights Monsters” by Cynthia Ward, from Athena’s Daughters, edited by Jean Rabe

So that’s 15 short stories in March. Once again way under “1 per day,” putting me further behind for the year so far. (March 31th was the 91th day of 2020.)

Summary of Reading Challenges:

“To Be Read” Challenge: This month: 1 read; YTD: 3 of 14 read.

366 Short Stories Challenge: This month:  15 read; YTD: 58 of 366 read.

Graphic Novels Challenge:  This month: 3 read; YTD: 7 of 52 read.

Goodreads Challenge: This month: 8 read; YTD: 39 of 125 read.

Non-Fiction Challenge: This month: 1 read; YTD: 4 of 24 read.

Read the Book / Watch the Movie Challenge: This month: 0; YTD: 0 read/watched.

Complete the Series Challenge: This month: 0 books read; YTD: 5 of 16 read.

                                                                Series fully completed: 0 of 3 planned

Monthly Special Challenge: March was Women’s History Month, so my goal was to read primarily female writers. Of the eight books read in March, five were by female authors (okay, yes, three were by Seanan McGuire.) (Also, of the 15 short stories read, 8 were by female authors.)

April is National Poetry Month. I am notoriously not a reader of poetry, but I’m going to try to read at least a little.

Series Saturday: The Blood-Thirsty Agent

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.

In Cynthia Ward’s action-packed novella series “The Blood-Thirsty Agent,” Lucy Harker is a dhampir – a child born of the sexual union between a vampire and a mortal. In this case, Lucy’s mother is the famous Mina Harker, and her natural father is Dracula, Lord of the Vampires. The time is the early 1900s and the action ranges from cabin suites on the Titanic to the trenches of World War One to the Hollow Earth, allowing the author to work in winks at, and pastiches of, some of her (and my) favorite adventure characters of the time period.

The Adventure of the Incognita Countess introduces us to Lucy, her family, and her unique role as an agent of Her Majesty’s Secret Service under the direction of the man called “M.” As a dhampir, it is Lucy’s job to protect the Empire from vampires and other supernatural creatures. But her assignment on the Titanic is of a more mundane nature: bodyguard for an American carrying secret plans back to the President. Things take a more pulp/supernatural turn when Lucy encounters the beautiful Clarimal Stein, who has a secret of her own: she is the vampire Mircalla Karnstein. They also run afoul of a German “science hero” up to no-good.

Incognita Countess sets the tone for the series and gives us a good sense of the alternate history these characters live in: a world where Titanic is powered by secret heat-ray technology Britain has reverse-engineered from the Martian invasion of several years before and where the Germans are intent on stealing that technology. There’s a pulp-weird-science, almost steampunk vibe to a world that otherwise is recognizable as our own, and the stories are as fast-paced as a classic Doc Savage or Shadow tale. The novella length suits each adventure perfectly, but especially in this first book – after all, Titanic was only on the seas for so long before that iceberg hit; the impending doom of the ship (which the reader is aware of but the characters are not) lends an immediacy to Lucy’s triple missions (protect the American; find out what the Germans are up to; kill the vampire).

There are dozens, if not hundreds, of interpretations of Bram Stoker’s Dracula in which the vampire and his victim, Mina Murray Harker, fall in love. (See Francis Ford Coppola’s film version, in which Mina is the reincarnation of Dracula’s lost love, or the novel Dracula the Undead by Bram’s nephew Dacre Stoker as just two examples.) Ward, to her credit, goes in a different direction: Dracula forced himself upon Mina and she only found out she was pregnant after the vampire had been defeated. There is no love lost by any of the characters for Lucy’s natural father; it’s pretty clear our lead character is the product of supernatural rape and that she’s never encountered her natural father. I find this choice far more interesting, and Lucy’s feelings about her conception far more compelling, than yet another story in which Dracula and Mina are in love and have children.

Lucy is an outsider to society, pretending to be many things she is not in order to survive and serve the realm: she pretends to be the child of Mina and her first husband, Jonathan Harker; she pretends to be a normal mortal when in fact she has tremendous power thanks to her dual heritage; she pretends to be an upstanding heterosexual woman when she isn’t. And she struggles with having to hide so much of who she is under a veneer of late Victorian societal norms.

In each book, Lucy finds herself questioning something she’s been taught as not just true but TRUE: in Incognita Countess, it is the truism that vampires are emotionless creatures capable of pretending to have feelings but in fact having no humanity at all. In The Adventure of the Dux Bellorum, it is the “fact” that being anything other than heterosexual is a sin. And in the upcoming The Adventure of the Naked Guide, it is the concept that England’s colonial expansions are a force for good in the world while Germany’s encroachment on the sovereignty of other nations is an abomination. In each novel, it is encounters with other characters that force Lucy to reevaluate her world-view, starting with the seemingly emotional vampire Clarimal Stein. And in challenging Lucy’s worldview, Ward challenges the reader’s as well. Like the authors she’s influenced by (Burroughs, Stoker, Doyle, Verne, among others), Ward couches social commentary – social criticism – in the folds of pulp adventure tales.

I also find it interesting that all three of Lucy’s adventures occur in places removed from “normal” society, and spaces to which access is tightly controlled in one way or another: the guest-rooms and deeper sections of Titanic; the trenches and other side of the enemy line in World War One western Europe; and finally the world at the center of the Earth which Edgar Rice Burroughs named “Pellucidar.” Ward never shows us Lucy in everyday society – the closest she comes is interacting with humans aboard Titanic, but even there she’s dealing with a heightened and claustrophobic version of everyday society. The settings are not “normal” because our heroine is not “normal.”

As mentioned, Ward also works in tributes to her influences. We do eventually get to see Mina Harker. Lucy’s stepfather, the “M” who heads the Secret Service, is quickly revealed as Mycroft Holmes so of course there are mentions of her step-uncle and his partner-in-business. There’s technology derived from the Martian invasion chronicled by H.G. Wells. On Titanic, Lucy spends several scenes talking to Lord Greyborough, who is rumored to have been raised by apes. And of course, there’s the upcoming third book’s trip to Burroughs’ Pellucidar, with mentions of several characters from that series. There may have been more subtle nods that I missed, but the big ones are plainly obvious and totally enjoyable. None steal the focus from Lucy herself, but in playing off of them we get to see more of Lucy’s personality and internal struggles.

I hear that the fourth Blood-Thirsty Agent novella, due out later this year or early the next, will be the last. If so, I’ll be sad to see the series end just as I feel I’m really getting to know Lucy and Clarimal. All good things do come to an end, but I hope that we’ll get to see more of Lucy’s upbringing and meet more of her stepsiblings before the end.

In the mean-time, I highly recommend The Blood-Thirsty Agent series to fans of alternate history, steampunk, pulp adventure, vampires in love, and LGBTQ representation in genre fiction. Published by indie Aqueduct Press, the novellas can be purchased in print or ebook form:

·         The Adventure of the Incognita Countess

·         The Adventure of the Dux Bellorum

·         The Adventure of the Naked Guide [forthcoming]