Book Review: HALF SICK OF SHADOWS

TITLE: Half Sick of Shadows

AUTHOR: Laura Sebastian

448 pages, Ace Books, ISBN 9780593200513 (hardcover, also e-book and audio)

DESCRIPTION: (from the back cover): Everyone knows the legend. Of Arthur, destined to be a king. Of the beautiful Guinevere, who will betray him with his most loyal knight, Lancelot. Of the bitter sorceress, Morgana, who will turn against them all. But Elaine alone carries the burden of knowing what is to come--for Elaine of Shalott is cursed to see the future.

On the mystical isle of Avalon, Elaine runs free and learns of the ancient prophecies surrounding her and her friends--countless possibilities, almost all of them tragic.

When their future comes to claim them, Elaine, Guinevere, Lancelot, and Morgana accompany Arthur to take his throne in stifling Camelot, where magic is outlawed, the rules of society chain them, and enemies are everywhere. Yet the most dangerous threats may come from within their own circle.

As visions are fulfilled and an inevitable fate closes in, Elaine must decide how far she will go to change fate--and what she is willing to sacrifice along the way.

The Lady of Shalott reclaims her story in this bold feminist reimagining of the Arthurian myth from the New York Times bestselling author of Ash Princess.

MY RATING: 4 out of 5 stars

MY THOUGHTS: I’m not sure that there are any truly “new” ways to reinterpret the core of the Arthurian mythos, but Laura Sebastian introduces some interesting tweaks to the most commonly accepted/popular versions of the story that are out there, including a couple of large and unexpected changes to character histories. These changes will probably not please readers who expect every story about Camelot to march to the standard beats of the childhood of Arthur, the Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot love triangle, the Arthur/Morgana/Mordred history, the quest for the Holy Grail, and the final battle between the forces of Arthur and Mordred. But I found Sebastian’s rearranging of relationships and histories intriguing and would love to know more about how she made the story choices she made. To say “this is not your grandfather’s Camelot” is probably accurate. And I think that’s perfectly okay. (Your mileage may vary, of course.)

Sebastian riffs on the traditional idea that Arthur’s childhood was spent away from his father’s court – but instead of Arthur being unaware of his true heritage and raised by Sir Ector as younger brother to Sir Kay, Arthur is traded by King Uther to the magical island nation of Avalon as a hostage to prevent further war between Albion and Avalon (a fairly common practice in medieval times), and grows up with a half-fae Lancelot as well as fellow human transplants Guinevere and Elaine along with half-sister Morgana. She deals with the on-going confusion about Arthur’s half-sister’s name (sometimes Morgan le Fey, sometimes Morgana, something Morgause) by giving him two half-sisters, twins named Morgause and Morgana.  These are foundational changes that add new breath to the story without veering too far from the familiar. She also takes the somewhat daring step of making Mordred Arthur’s bastard half-brother rather than his bastard son. I’ll admit that this particular change threw me, as it didn’t seem to add anything to this narrative other than giving Arthur a blood relative rival for his father’s throne. I didn’t hate this change, but it didn’t seem as smooth a fit as the other changes Sebastian makes, especially since Mordred is pretty ineffectual as a foil, appearing in a bare handful of scenes. Likewise, the expected Arthur/Guinevere romance is present but is somewhat tangential to the Elaine/Lancelot romance. In a book inspired by The Lady of Shallot, this should not surprise anyone. Also fair warning: Merlin fans will be disappointed. He’s in a couple of key scenes, but he is not the master manipulator/mentor figure he’s usually portrayed as.

Elaine is the narrator, and she tells the story in three time frames, only one of which is linear. The “present day” time frame starts with the friends being told it is time to leave Avalon because Arthur’s father had died and it’s time for him to claim the throne. The flashbacks to how Elaine came to Avalon, met the others, and studied under Avalon’s head oracle, Nimue, are revealed when current events inspire Elaine to remember key moments of their past – thus, not in chronological order but mirroring the way we all tell people about our pasts: “Oh, then there was the time we…” And then there are Elaine’s disjointed and sometimes contradictory visions of the future, of the ways in which Arthur will come to that final battle, and even what will happen after. These are of necessity also not linear/chronological, because in this world the nature of visions is to change as present-day decisions strengthen or weaken the possibilities the future holds. This is the way I prefer to see prophecies handled in fiction: not as a single immutable “must happen” event, but as something open to interpretation and change. One of the central ideas of the book is that the future is only solidified once it is in the past. Jumping across these time frames, sometimes in mid-chapter, kept the book interesting for me.

I’m also not sure just how much this qualifies as a “bold feminist retelling” the way the cover copy claims. Yes, Elaine is the narrator of the story, which focuses equally on her friendships with Morgana and Guinevere and touches slightly on her mentoring by Nimue. But an oft-repeated refrain in the book is that the friends must do “All For Arthur” – meaning whatever it takes to get him on the throne of Camelot. Throughout the book, the female characters (and Lancelot) subvert their own needs, sacrifice their own happiness, to assure Arthur meets his destiny – even though Arthur himself doesn’t seem really capable of accomplishing the tasks set for him without his friends’ interference. Half Sick of Shadows is definitely a bold, one could even say controversial, take on the Arthurian legend – but I’m not convinced it’s really “feminist” in the way the cover copy claims. (In fact, I’d go out on a limb and say that it possibly fails the Bechdel test, as most of the conversations between the female leads are about the two guys.) That being said, I do wonder if this is just the first book in a series, and that the major decision Elaine makes at the end of the book will in fact lead to a much broader reinterpretation that further centers the female characters. If this is a series, I’ll definitely be signing on for book two.

I received an Advanced Reading Copy via NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Book Review: THE CHOSEN AND THE BEAUTIFUL

TITLE: The Chosen and the Beautiful

AUTHOR: Nghi Vo

272 pages, Tordotcom Publishing, ISBN 9781250784780

DESCRIPTION: (from the back cover): Immigrant. Socialite. Magician.

Jordan Baker grows up in the most rarefied circles of 1920s American society―she has money, education, a killer golf handicap, and invitations to some of the most exclusive parties of the Jazz Age. She’s also queer and Asian, a Vietnamese adoptee treated as an exotic attraction by her peers, while the most important doors remain closed to her.

But the world is full of wonders: infernal pacts and dazzling illusions, lost ghosts and elemental mysteries. In all paper is fire, and Jordan can burn the cut paper heart out of a man. She just has to learn how. In The Chosen and the Beautiful, Nghi Vo reinvents F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby as a coming-of-age story full of magic, mystery, and glittering excess.

MY RATING: 5 out of 5 stars

MY THOUGHTS: Nigh Vo’s reinvention of The Great Gatsby gives voice to characters Fitzgerald barely allowed to speak and classes of people he barely acknowledged existed (if at all), and in doing so opens up the narrative in wonderful, startling ways. And the author does it all while adhering pretty closely to Fitzgerald’s plot and pacing. Vo and fellow authors like Victor LaValle (The Ballad of Black Tom, which reinvents Lovecraft’s “The Horror at Red Hook”), are at the leading edge of writers who are confronting the racism in American classics (sometimes blatant, as with Lovecraft, sometimes by total exclusion from the narrative, like Fitzgerald) by filling in the time-gaps in the original novels or by showing key scenes from a new or different character’s perspective.

Vo does this first and foremost by having Jordan Baker, who is barely a presence in Fitzgerald’s novel, become our narrator in place of Nick Carroway. Giving us the story from any woman’s perspective would change how we see the events of Gatsby but giving it to us through the eyes of a character Fitzgerald didn’t bother to develop allows Vo to fill in scenes Fitzgerald doesn’t give us. And since Jordan is so ill-defined in the original novel, Vo can make the character anyone she wants Jordan to be – in this case, a child ripped from her homeland by an earnest missionary and raised in relative high society. We never quite learn whether Jordan was actually an orphan when she was brought to the States, but the heavy implication is that she was “rescued” perhaps against her family’s will. Vo uses Jordan to shed light not just on how the rich view anyone who is different but also on the unsavory aspects of the Chinese Exclusion Act and other anti-Asian-immigration legislation of the era. (And if that isn’t timely and pertinent in 2021, you’re not paying attention.)

Vo also expands the sexuality of the main characters. Jordan is clearly bisexual (or maybe what we would now call pansexual) as are, by implication at least, Gatsby and Nick and perhaps even Daisy. We never see Gatsby and Nick in the act, as it were, but Jordan sees through their denials pretty easily. There’s no judgement between the characters, although there is a fair amount of jealousy. And this is one spot where Jordan is more like her rich white peers than she’d like to admit: they all seem to “get away” with same-sex liaisons without fear of repercussion – even though in that time period being found out as a “degenerate” could result in jail time, psychiatric hospitalization, and loss of job/family/etc. (I put “get away” in quotes because while the societal repercussions may not be explored, the emotional ones are – these characters devastate each other over and over again, and it’s both fascinating and infuriating to watch.) The possibilities of being caught by the police never seem to occur to the characters, although there is a nod toward the magic that hides a gay nightclub in plain sight.

And that’s the other major difference between The Great Gatsby and The Chosen and the Beautiful: the magic. Vo builds the societal acceptance of magic into virtually every page of the book. “Demonaic” liquor enables Jordan and Daisy to float around the ceilings of Daisy and Tom’s mansion at the start of the book. We learn that Jordan is able to do paper magic, building things and even people out of paper. She’s the only one she knows who can do this, until she meets some Chinese performers via one of Gatsby’s parties and discovers how much more powerful this magic can be. There’s the heavy implication that the “money” behind Gatsby being able to afford his mansion and parties is literally infernal. The magic isn’t just set-dressing. Vo has clearly given a lot of thought to how it all works, and to how and where it informs/influences the events of the original novel.

And here’s where I have to admit: I have no recall of every having read The Great Gatsby in high school or college. Classmates assure me we did, but it was probably one of those books I skimmed the Cliff Notes for because I hated being told what to read when I was in high school. I also have never seen the various movie adaptations. So once I was done with The Chosen and the Beautiful, I decided I had to read Gatsby to see how closely Vo stuck to the source material. After doing so, I was even more impressed with the magic Vo introduces – little innocuous turns of phrase in Fitzgerald’s hands turn into beautifully detailed magic in Vo’s. Which really can be said of the whole book. I liked Gatsby well enough once I finally read it for what it is, but Vo expands it into so much more.

I received an e-ARC from NetGalley in advance of the book’s June 1 publication date, although this review is being posted well after that date.

Book Review: THE IMPOSSIBLE RESURRECTION OF GRIEF

TITLE: The Impossible Resurrection of Grief

AUTHOR: Octavia Cade

82 pages, Publisher, ISBN 9781777091767 (paperback, eBook)

DESCRIPTION: (from the back cover): IN A DYING WORLD, GRIEF HAS A LIFE OF ITS OWN...

With the collapse of ecosystems and the extinction of species comes the Grief: an unstoppable melancholia that ends in suicide. When Ruby’s friend, mourning the loss of the Great Barrier Reef, succumbs to the Grief, the letters she leaves behind reveal the hidden world of the resurrected dead. The Tasmanian tiger, brought back from extinction in an isolated facility, is only the first... but rebirth is not always biological, and it comes with a price. As a scientist, Ruby resists the Grief by focusing her research on resilient jellyfish, but she can’t avoid choosing which side she’s on. How can she fight against the dead and the forces behind them when doing so risks her home, her life, and the entire biosphere?

MY RATING: 4 out of 5 stars

MY THOUGHTS: There are plenty of books out there that utilize grief as a physical, palpable threat to the health and happiness of the protagonist, but Octavia Cade’s recent novella The Impossible Resurrection of Grief rocked me particularly hard, and part of the reason this review is so delayed is because I’ve been trying to figure out why it affected me so.

Part of it, of course, is simply the way Octavia Cade writes. Granted, I have not read everything Cade has ever written, but I’ve read enough to know that when I see her name on a story I’m in for some deep character immersion, emotions tapped into and explicated in ways that the reader can’t help but connect with and linger over. This novella is no exception. Cade brings us into the mind of a woman watching her best friend deteriorate alongside the world around them. Ruby is as yet untouched by the Grief but compassionate enough to feel guilty: guilty about being untouched by the Grief, guilty about the loss of her friend, guilty about the fact that the thing she loves (jellyfish) are surviving climate change when so much isn’t. The guilt doesn’t immobilize her but rather motivates her to investigate the letters left behind by Marjorie and discover what those afflicted with the Grief are capable of accomplishing before they die. Ruby goes on a journey from wanting to save her friend to wanting to understand why her friend succumbed to wanting to honor her legacy, and I was fully invested throughout thanks to the relatable voice of the narrator.

As adults we’re often told to just ‘suck it up’ and move on when it comes to losses. What ‘moving on’ looks like is highly individual: do we cut loose whatever we lost and pretend it never existed? do we acknowledge the absence in our life analytically? do we obsess over it, analyze where we went wrong, try to fix it? Ruby does all of this in the course of The Impossible Resurrection of Grief, which leads her into danger several times. Through Ruby, Cade reminds us that there is no one way to process loss, to experience grief. Through Ruby, Cade also reminds us that we can never totally understand the depth of someone’s attachment to a thing (or person or concept) that they love, and thus cannot truly understand how the loss of that thing might drive a person to emotional despair or suicide. Ruby knows Marjorie loved the Great Barrier Reef as much as Ruby loves jellyfish, but she can’t understand the depth of her friend’s grief because Ruby hasn’t lost the thing she loves the most.

The Grief itself is a sort of nebulous phenomena. It seems mostly tied to losing something outside of yourself that you were passionate about rather than, say, the loss of a relationship or the death of a family member. I think Cade implies that Grief can be brought on by these other events, but the focus seems to be on losing some larger interest totally and, more important, irreplaceably. We all have had those hobbies/interests/passion projects that we think we’ll never leave behind but eventually do – that’s not what Cade is connecting the Grief to. Those types of things we can come back to (and often do), even if our feelings aren’t as strong the second or third time around. But the loss of a species or biome we’ve devoted our life to studying, in a way that makes it impossible for that species or biome to come back? Gone is gone. (Yes, I know, people make a lifetime of studying extinct species, particularly dinosaurs. Usually, that attachment comes from curiosity about what those species were like rather than from having experienced those species first-hand.)

The Impossible Resurrection of Grief takes place in a future near enough for the reader to be familiar with the technology the characters use in their daily life but far enough away that our impending climate change is this world’s present. It’s not just the Great Barrier Reef that’s been lost to rising temperatures and lost shoreline: different types of birds and terrestrial predators are gone as well, and Ruby meets people suffering the Grief because of how much they loved those populations. These losses are imaginary for us and the author, an exercise in what might happen if the climate continues to change in the direction, and at the rate, it’s currently going. But they are all too real for Ruby and the people in her life, and Cade does an excellent job of making them real for us as well.

There are some brutal moments within the narrative – Marjorie succumbing to the Grief (which is not a spoiler, given it’s in the book’s back cover description) in particular is packed with torment for Marjorie and Ruby both – that some readers might want to be aware of. Suicide, whether by intentional act or slow attrition, is always in the background when the characters discuss Grief. But it is never gratuitous and always pertinent to Ruby’s journey of understanding.

Deep immersion into a character’s mind, solidly realistic climate change repercussions, ruminations on the way we’re told to handle loss and grief – all of these are reasons The Impossible Resurrection of Grief affected me as deeply as it did, and I suspect each future re-read of the novella will open up more reasons. And I will be reading it again, certainly.

READING ROUND-UP: April, 2021

Very much belatedly, the monthly summary of what I read and listened to in April 2021!

BOOKS

I read 9 books in April: 5 in print, 2 in e-book format, and 0 in audio format. They were:

1.       Lightspeed Magazine #131 (April 2021 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams. The usual fine assortment of sf and fantasy short stories. This month’s favorites for me were An Owomoyela’s “The Equations of the Dead,” Seanan McGuire’s “Swear Not by The Moon,” Ashok K. Banker’s “The Giving One,” and Genevieve Valentine’s “Blood, Ash, Braids.”

2.       Angel of the Overpass (Ghost Roads, Book 3) by Seanan McGuire (writer). The third novel featuring hitch-hiking ghost Rose Marshall (also known as The Girl in the Green Silk Gown, the Phantom Prom Date, and more) brings her afterlife-long battle with her killer, the immortal Bobby Cross, to a head. There’s action, character growth, world-changing moments, and my favorite ghost dinosaur ever. FULL REVIEW HERE. (Did I mention the ghost dinosaur? Seriously worth the price of admission alone.)

3.       Glitter + Ashes: Queer Tales of a World That Wouldn’t Die edited by dave ring. Wonderful collection of post-apocalyptic short stories centering characters from across the LGBTQIA+ spectrum.

4.       A Field Guide to the Spirits: Poems by Jean LeBlanc. Poems about life, love, grief, and more, many with a fantasy, science fiction, or mythological tone.

5.       Harryhausen: the Lost Movies by John Walsh. Interesting coffee table book tracking all the film projects Ray Harryhausen ended up not working on, from his own aborted ideas to the opportunities he turned down to work on others’ projects. Tons of original sketches, test models, and photographs make this a must-read for any Harryhausen fan.

6.       Ancient Songs of Us by Jean LeBlanc. More poems by a truly wonderful poet.

7.       The Impossible Resurrection of Grief by Octavia Cade. A stunningly emotional novella in which loss and sadness bring on Grief, an irreversible mental and physical deterioration. FULL REVIEW TO COME.

8.       Prince Neptune by Cody Simpson. Poems by the former teen singer/songwriter/YouTube star (and current potential Olympic swimmer), focused on saving the environment but also on teen emotional and sexual angst.

9.       A Master of Djinn by P. Djèlí Clark. The first full-length novel in Clark’s alternate history, magic-infused steampunk Cairo is a wonderful fair-play murder mystery. FULL REVIEW HERE.

STORIES

I have a goal of reading 365 short stories (1 per day, essentially, although it doesn’t always work out that way) this 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 Equations of the Dead” by On Owomoyela, from Lightspeed Magazine #131 (April 2021 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams

2.       “Swear Not by The Moon” by Seanan McGuire

3.       “The Ocean Between the Leaves” by Ray Nayler

4.       “Complete Exhaustion of the Organism” by Rich Larson

5.       “The Justified” by Ann Leckie

6.       “The Giving One” by Ashok K. Banker

7.       “Blood, Ash, Braids” by Genevieve Valentine

8.       “Single Origin” by A.Z. Louise, from Fantasy Magazine #66 (April 2021), edited by Christie Yant and Arley Sorg

9.       “The Woman with No Face” by Alice Goldfuss

10.   “So. Fucking. Metal.” by Shane Halbach

11.   “How I Became MegaPunch, or, Why I Stay with Dylan” by Y.M. Pang

12.    “Earth to Charity” by Seanan McGuire, on the author’s Patreon page.

13.   “Forward, Victoria” by Carlie St. George, from The Dark #71 (April 2021), edited by Sean Wallace

14.   “A Study in Ugliness” by H. Pueyo

15.   “Worm Blood” by Octavia Cade

16.   “Wrath of a Queer God” by Anthony Moll, from Glitter + Ashes: Queer Tales of a World That Wouldn’t Die, edited by dave ring

17.   “Didn’t My Lord Deliver Daniel” by Christopher Caldwell

18.   “The Descent of Their Last End” by Izzy Wasserstein

19.   “Soft” by Otter Lieffe

20.   “The Black Hearts of La Playa” by Jordan Kinella

21.   “The Bone Gifts” by Michael Milne

22.   “When the Last of the Birds and Bees Have Gone” by C.L. Clark

23.   “A Future in Color” by R.J. Theodore

24.   “Champions of Water War” by Elly Bangs

25.   “A Sound Like Staying Together” by Adam R. Shannon

26.   “Be Strong, Kick Many Asses” by Ann-Julie Riddle

27.   “Venom and Bite” by Darcie Little Badger

28.   “The Currant Dumas” by L.D. Lewis

29.   “The Limitations of Her Code” by Marianne Kirby

30.   “You Fool, You Wanderer” by Brendan Williams-Childs

31.   “A Party-Planners Guide to the Apocalypse” by Lauren Ring

32.   “Imago” by A.Z. Louise

33.   “Safe Haven” by A.P. Thayer

34.   “Note Left on a Coffee Table” by Mari Ness

35.   “The Valley of Mothers” by Josie Columbus

36.   “For the Taking, For the Making” by V. Medina

37.   “When She Nothing Shines Upon” by Blake Jessop

38.   “The Last Dawn of Targadrides” by Trip Galey

39.   “The Dreadnought and the Stars” by Phoebe Barton

So that’s 39 short stories in April. Back to a bit more than “1 per day” but I’m still slightly ahead for the year. (April 30th was the 120th day of 2021.)

Summary of Reading Challenges:

“To Be Read” Challenge: This month: 0 read; YTD: 6 of 24 main titles read. (0 of 4 alternate titles read)

365 Short Stories Challenge: This month: 39 read; YTD: 143 of 365 read.

Graphic Novels Challenge:  This month: 0 read; YTD: 8 of 52 read.

Goodreads Challenge: This month: 9 read; YTD: 46 of 125 read.

Non-Fiction Challenge: This month: 1 read; YTD: 8 of 24 read.

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

Complete the Series Challenge: This month: 0 book read; YTD: 0 of 14 read.

                                                          Series fully completed: 0 of 4 planned

Monthly Special Challenge:   April’s mini-challenge was poetry, as April is National Poetry Month. I am not a consistent reader of poetry, but in April I usually try to read at least a couple of poetry collections. I managed three: two by American poet Jean LeBlanc and one by Australian Cody Simpson. I also read a couple of poems in Fantasy Magazine #66: “Appeal to the Doppleganger” by Terese Mason Pierre, and “The Knitting Bowl” by Tristan Beiter.

May’s mini-challenge is to read some works by authors of Asian Pacific and/or South Asian descent, for Asian Pacific and South Asian Heritage Month.

Book Review: A MASTER OF DJINN

TITLE: A Master of Djinn

AUTHOR: P. Djèlí Clark

500 pages, TorDotCom, ISBN 9781250267689 (hardcover, e-book, audiobook)

DESCRIPTION: (from the back cover): Cairo, 1912: Though Fatma el-Sha’arawi is the youngest woman working for the Ministry of Alchemy, Enchantments and Supernatural Entities, she’s certainly not a rookie, especially after preventing the destruction of the universe last summer.

So when someone murders a secret brotherhood dedicated to one of the most famous men in history, al-Jahiz, Agent Fatma is called onto the case. Al-Jahiz transformed the world 50 years ago when he opened up the veil between the magical and mundane realms, before vanishing into the unknown. This murderer claims to be al-Jahiz, returned to condemn the modern age for its social oppressions. His dangerous magical abilities instigate unrest in the streets of Cairo that threaten to spill over onto the global stage.

Alongside her Ministry colleagues and her clever girlfriend Siti, Agent Fatma must unravel the mystery behind this imposter to restore peace to the city - or face the possibility he could be exactly who he seems....

MY RATING: 5 stars out of 5

MY THOUGHTS: In his first full-length novel, P. Djèlí Clark expands the alternate-history, steampunk-flavored Cairo he introduced us to in the short story “A Dead Djinn in Cairo” and the novella The Haunting of Tram Car 015. Characters from both “A Dead Djinn in Cairo” and The Haunting of Tram Car 015 appear in the novel in various lead and supporting roles, but one does not have to have read those previous stories to understand what’s going on in A Master of Djinn. (Although I will say that reading the short story and novella will enhance your enjoyment of the world and understanding of the characters’ personalities and inter-relationships.)

Clark has crafted a multi-layered murder mystery that the formidable Agent Fatma, along with her mysterious lover Siti and newly assigned work partner Hadia, must solve before the city of Cairo, and perhaps the entire world, fall into chaos. Thanks to an opening chapter that presents the mass-murder from the perspective of one of the victims, the reader heads into the story knowing more than the investigative team – but that’s not the same as knowing everything. The clues necessary for the reader to solve the mystery are there to be found, as are the requisite number of false clues and moments that seem to mean more than they really do. The case takes several interesting twists before the ultimate reveal. I had my suspicions early-on about who this person claiming to be al-Jahiz really was, but there were also moments where I thought I could be very wrong. This delighted the mystery fan in me: I love having my guesses turn out to be wrong as much as I love being correct, because being wrong means I can re-read the book to see where the correct clues were. Of course, I am not a fan of mysteries where all the clues are red herrings and the answer is something the reader could never have guessed. But that’s not a trap Clark falls into, thankfully.

I’d have been happy enough with A Master of Djinn being a straightforward mystery set in this alternate world. But the book provides so much more. There’s a rich history to be explored, with Egypt becoming a world power based on the revival of magic into the world and Colonialism being overthrown in some parts of the world earlier than in our own timeline. It’s 1912, and the international conclave hosted in the middle of the book gives us interesting looks at what a “World War One” would look like in this setting. There’s a magic system that I think we’ve only scratched the surface of in the tales told so far: not just various types of djinns and other Middle Eastern magical beings, but goblins in Germany and hints at other types of beings al-Jahiz’s actions released into the rest of the world as well. These magical beings have been involved in some of the fights for regional freedom mentioned, so you know these world powers will put such beings to use when full-scale international war does break out (with the possible exception of America, where Puritanical beliefs seem to have essentially outlawed magic use). The Colonialist mind-set of the era, the European fascination with “adopting” local culture while disdaining the actual people, is on full display throughout the book and Clark does not let his characters leave it unremarked (at least among themselves, even if politics prevents them from saying anything to the actual perpetrators).

The character relationships are also beautifully established. Fatma is essentially a loner. She has eschewed being assigned a partner for this long mostly on strength of personality and successful cases, but department policy can’t be pushed off forever. Hadia’s arrival at the crime scene the day before she’s supposed to officially meet Fatma creates a wonderful level of friction between the two women that plays out as one of the sub-plots. First impressions give way to shared experiences, and Clark charts that growth subtly through dialogue and body language. Fatma at the same time is learning more about Siti, their sexual relationship moving into the romantic – but Siti has secrets of her own that influence both the relationship and the main plot of the novel, which I will not spoil here. We also learn a lot more about Fatma’s past thanks to her interactions with both Siti and Hadia, but there’s plenty we still don’t know about all three women that I look forward to seeing revealed in future books set in this universe.

Clark further develops the Ministry beyond the vague structure and mission established in the previous short story and novella, giving us more intimate looks at Fatma’s immediate superior, the Ministry’s support staff (including a delightfully surly Djinn librarian), and fellow investigators (including the stars of The Haunting of Tram Car 015, Hamed Nasr and Onsi Youssef). Hamed and Onsi are supporting characters here but I hope we’ll get more of their own adventures in the future. Likewise, Fatma’s main contacts outside of the Ministry, bookie/underworld contact Khalid and Cairo police Inspector Aasim Sharif (who reminds me, perhaps intentionally, of Holmes’ Inspector LeStrade), are further developed from their previous appearances, although they play smaller supporting roles than Hamed and Onsi. I was also intrigued by the details revealed about an all-female criminal organization, the Forty Leopards, and the hierarchies and interactions of various temples dedicated to Egypt’s earlier, pre-Mohammedan, gods.

Excellent alternate-history fantasy world-building, multi-dimensional characters, on-point political commentary, and a top-notch murder mystery combine to make P Djèlí Clark’s debut novel a must-read. Go get it!

NOTE: Although I’m posting this review after the release date, it is based off an electronic advance reading copy I received from NetGalley.

Book Review: ANGEL OF THE OVERPASS

TITLE: Angel of the Overpass (Ghost Roads Book 3)

AUTHOR: Seanan McGuire

320 pages, DAW, ISBN 9780756416898 (paperback, e-book, audiobook)

DESCRIPTION: (from the back cover): The third book of the Ghost Roads series returns to the highways of America, where hitchhiking ghost Rose Marshall continues her battle with her killer—the immortal Bobby Cross.

Lady of shadows, keeper of changes, plant the seeds of faith within me, that I might grow and flourish, that I might find my way through danger and uncertainty to the safety of your garden. Let my roots grow strong and my skin grow thick, that I might stand fast against all who would destroy me. Grant to me your favor, grant to me your grace, and when my time is done, grant to me the wisdom to lay my burdens down and rest beside you, one more flower in a sea of blooms, where nothing shall ever trouble me again.

Rose Marshall died when she was sixteen years old and on her way to her high school prom. She hasn’t been resting easy since then—Bobby Cross, the man who killed her, got away clean after running her off the road, and she’s not the kind of girl who can let something like that slide. She’s been looking for a way to stop him since before they put her body in the ground.

But things have changed in the twilight world where the spirits of the restless dead continue their “lives.” The crossroads have been destroyed, and Bobby’s protections are gone. For the first time, it might be possible for Rose to defeat him.

Not alone, though. She’ll need every friend she’s managed to make and every favor she’s managed to add to her account if she wants to stand a chance…and this may be her last chance to be avenged, since what is Bobby Cross without the crossroads?

Everything Rose knows is about to change.

MY RATING: 5 stars out of 5

MY THOUGHTS: It’s pretty much a given at this point that when a Seanan McGuire series reaches the third book, change is in the wind. The changes may be somewhat subtle, the changes may be massive, the changes may upend everything you thought you knew about the characters – but there will be changes. McGuire doesn’t write static worlds where every episode ends with the status quo maintained. So yeah – go into Angel of the Overpass, the third Ghost Roads book, expecting Rose Marshall’s world to be different at the end than it was at the beginning. There’s a reason “Everything Rose knows is about to change” is the tagline for the book’s description, after all. And Seanan is not one to fail to deliver what the cover copy promises.

But here’s the thing about change: it tends to sneak up on us. Rose Marshall, like most of us, only sees the steps that lead her to a major life change in retrospect. In the moment, those small steps are just something to be dealt with – another narrow escape from Bobby Cross’s clutches, another awkward conversation with her boyfriend the ghost-car, another mission from powers greater than she is. Rose is too “in the moment” to see where each of these moments is leading her. (I can relate. Rose may not age, but I’m really wondering how I’m going to be 55 in a few months, when I was just 25 last week.)

It’s a credit to McGuire’s skill with the little moments that they’re all important enough in their own right to keep Rose’s attention, and this reader’s, from looking too far ahead. So when the big change to Rose’s status quo does happen, it’s a surprise to the character and hopefully to the reader – but a surprise with a logical lead-up as opposed to one that comes with no connection to what came before.

“Life (or in Rose’s case, Afterlife) is what happens while you’re making other plans” is a pretty solid theme throughout Angel of the Overpass. It’s exemplified not just by what Rose thinks she’s headed towards (life without the threat of Bobby Cross) as compared to where she ends up, but also by the way events outside of Rose’s usual sphere of control affect her. Things are different in the Twilight now that the Crossroads have been destroyed. This major upheaval is not Rose’s doing at all – for the details, you’ll have to see McGuire’s InCryptid series which stars various members of Rose’s adopted mortal family the Prices. Again, it’s a credit to McGuire’s deft hand that readers of The Ghost Roads series don’t need to have read InCryptid to understand the enormity of what’s happened: a cosmic force has been killed, and the various levels of reality (Daylight, Twilight, Starlight, and perhaps even the Midnight) are reeling from it. And like everyone else, Rose has to find ways to exist in this new strangeness. Gee, I bet most of us can relate to that.

Of course, there’s the usual amount of fight scenes and mayhem in line with the previous books in the series (Sparrow Hill Road and The Girl in the Green Silk Gown). Some minor fights before the boss level conclusion, because Rose wouldn’t be Rose if she didn’t get into more than one jam per book. And there are a number of sweet moments with various characters as well. No, I won’t give you details about the fights or the sweet moments. I try very hard to avoid major spoilers in my reviews. Even if I do really want to make giddy exultations about that one new ghost Rose encounters… But no! I shall not. (Insert evil laughter here.)

Some online vendors are advertising Angel of the Overpass as Ghost Roads Book Three of Three. It may be the end of the first trilogy, because again: major life changes for our favorite hitchhiking ghost by the end, but I know Seanan would like to write more Rose Marshall books. And when she does, I’ll be here to read them, because I really can’t wait to see what Rose does next.

Note: I received an advanced reading copy via NetGalley.

Reading Round-Up: March 2021

Much belatedly, the monthly summary of what I read and listened to in March 2021!

BOOKS

I read 13 books in February: 7 in print, 6 in e-book format, and 0 in audio format. They were:

1.       Lightspeed Magazine #120 (March 2021 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams. The usual fine assortment of sf and fantasy short stories. This month’s favorites for me were Claire Wrenwood’s “Homecoming,” Yoon Ha Lee’s “The Empty Gun,” Sarah Grey’s “Brightly, Undiminished,” and P H Lee’s “The Bear Prince.”

2.       Lumberjanes Vol. 17: Smitten in the Stars by Shannon Watters and Kat Leyh (writer), Kanesha C. Bryant (art), Maarta Laiho (colors), Aubrey Aiese (letters), Sophie Philips-Roberts (editor). This graphic novel collects issues #65-68 of the monthly Lumberjanes series. This time out, Camp Director Rosie and counselor Jen’s attempt to take the Lumberjanes on a night of stargazing is interrupted by the arrival of a goddess, a cat-napping, and the Roanoke and Zodiac cabins sneaking out to search for aliens. It’s another really fun installment, and I’m going to be sad when the series draws to its announced end in the near future.

3.       The Inconvenient God (The Polity Book 1) by Francesca Forrest. This novelette serves as the introduction to the world of The Polity, where the prevailing government is moving the populace from worship of individual gods to themed abstractions. Old, waning gods are “decommissioned,” that is, turned mortal, through the efforts of a specialized department. The novelette is narrated by Decommissioner Thirty-Seven, who has arrived on a college campus to decommission a local trickster god (and patron of lazy students) named Ohin. Things do not go smoothly and secrets about the university’s and Ohin’s histories are laid bare. I was totally sucked into this story. FULL REVIEW HERE.

4.       Lagoonfire (The Polity Book 2) by Francesca Forrest. Decommissioner Thirty-Seven’s adventures continue in this novella. The action starts with Thirty-Seven being sent to investigate the possibility that the first god she decommissioned, Laloran-morna, is involved in corporate sabotage. More of Thirty-Seven’s personal history is revealed in this story, as is more about the Polity itself. You can read Lagoonfire without having read The Inconvenient God, but reading the novelette first adds some depth to the novella. FULL REVIEW HERE.

5.       Village Fool (A Little Village novella) by ‘Nathan Burgoine. The latest holiday-themed gay romance novella from ‘Nathan Burgoine shifts the action from Christmas to April Fool’s Day and gives us the back-story to the relationship between IT worker Owen and physical therapist Toma, who had been mentioned briefly in previous Little Village novellas. Burgoine’s usual warmth, romance, and fine character work are all present (along with plenty of trademark geeky good-natured snark). It’s a sweet story I highly recommend. And one does not have to have read the previous novellas in order to read this one. FULL REVIEW HERE.

6.       The Gilded Ones by Namina Forna. Sixteen-year-old Deka lives in a world in which women are second-class citizens: adult women must wear masks in public and can only hold certain jobs. Social status is indicated by the expensiveness of the masks women wear. At sixteen, girls are put through a ceremonial bleeding: if their blood runs red, they enter society. If their blood runs gold, they are put under the death mandate. Deka loses all hope when her blood runs gold – but then she is conscripted into a special battle corps of Alaki – near-immortal warrior women whose blood runs gold – to protect the empire from invading deathshrieks. Forna’s world-building, from the socio-political aspects to the magic, is fantastic and Deka is an intriguing narrator. This is billed in various places online as “The Deathless, Book 1” so I’m assuming there’s more to come in this world and with these characters.

7.       A Voice in the Darkness: Memoir of a Rwandan Genocide Survivor by Jeanne Celestine Lakin. The third book I’ve read about the Rwandan Genocide Against the Tutsi, a horrific event I’m still trying to wrap my mind and heart around. The two books I read in February were memoirs by men who survived the genocide by taking refuge in the “Hotel Rwanda.” Lakin’s memoir is of survival on the streets and in the fields, narrowly evading death multiple times in the company of her 3-year-old twin sisters. Lakin talks about the fear, the abandonment by Hutu family members and former friends, and the physical and sexual abuse she experienced as a child survivor of only 11-years old. The difference in experience between the hotel survivors and those who had to fend for themselves, and between men and women, is stark. My next planned read about the subject is a memoir by the leader of UN forces in the Rwandan capital during the Genocide, Romeo Dallaire.

8.       Blind Tiger (The Pride, Book 1) by Jordan L. Hawk. A new series set in the same alternate history of Hawk’s Hexworld/Witch Police novels, but with the action set in Prohibition-era Chicago. Sam Cunningham flees small town life to live with his hexmaker cousin in the big city, but when that cousin is murdered Sam must team up with the operators of a local speakeasy (called The Pride because the owners are a family of familiars who shift to various Big Cat forms) to solve the mystery and stay alive. As is usual with the Hexworld novels, there’s an awkward meet-cute between the two lead characters, a romance, and some hot sex. FULL REVIEW HERE.

9.       Faery Tales: One Woman’s Search for Enchantment in a Modern World by Signe Pike. One of my non-fiction To Be Read Challenge titles for 2021. Pike recounts her search for faeries across North America and the United Kingdom and how it changed her view of herself and what she wanted to accomplish. Along the way she meets a variety of colorful local folks and learns about the ways people approach the possibility of the supernatural co-existing with us. An interesting, easy read.

10.   Biff! Bam! Eee-Yow! The Subterranean Blue Grotto Guide to Batman ’66 Season Two edited by Jim Beard. Another wonderful book of essays covering each episode of season two.

11.   Minky Woodcock: The Girl Who Handcuffed Houdini by Cynthia von Buhler. One of my fiction TO Be Read Challenge titles for 2021, this graphic novel collects von Buhler’s first mini-series for Titan Books’ Hard Case Crime imprint. Minky Woodcock is the daughter of a famous detective who will not train her to take over his agency, so while he’s away and her ne’er-do-well brother is absent, she takes on a case to prove herself. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle hires her to prove Harry Houdini is a fraud. Mixing real-life events and people with fictional characters, von Buhler proposes a “true” reason for Houdini’s unfortunately early death. It’s a compelling story with interesting characters, and the second mini-series, The Girl Who Electrocuted Tesla, is currently releasing in monthly comics form.

12.   First, Become Ashes by K.M. Szpara. Szpara’s second novel explores self-discovery after trauma and outgrowing abusive origins in the context of a multi-narrator road-trip story. Dealing as it does explicitly with physical and emotional abuse, rape, and consent violations, this will not be an easy read for many people. FULL REVIEW HERE.

13.   The Black Canary: Bird of Prey by Robert Kanigher and Gardner F. Fox (writers), Carmine Infantino, Murphy Anderson, Alex Toth (artists). This graphic novel collects a number of Black Canary’s seminal Golden Age and Silver Age solo stories from Flash Comics #86-88 and 90-104, Comics Cavalcade #25, DC Special #3, Adventure Comics #399 and 418-419, and The Brave and the Bold #61-62 (her team-ups with Starman). Black Canary is one of my favorite characters and revisiting her evolution from mysterious guest-star in Johnny Thunder’s feature to replacing him and gaining a supporting cast of her own to returning in the Silver Age with powers is always fun. The Golden Age episodes feature an awful lot of BC and her male companion (first JT, then detective Larry Lance) getting knocked unconscious, and the early Infantino art feels a bit rough in comparison to the Murphy Anderson and Alex Toth art of the later stories, but they’re all enjoyable.

STORIES

I have a goal of reading 365 short stories (1 per day, essentially, although it doesn’t always work out that way) this 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.       “Homecoming” by Claire Wrenwood, from Lightspeed Magazine #130 (March 2021 issue), edited by John Joseph Adams

2.       “Dispatches from the Cradle: The Hermit -- Forty-Eight Hours in the Sea of Massachusetts” by Ken Liu

3.       “And Now, A Preview of Coming Attractions” by Adam-Troy Castro

4.       “The Empty Gun” by Yoon Ha Lee

5.       “Olivia’s Table” by Alyssa Wong

6.       “The Bear Prince” by P H Lee

7.       “A Place for Hiding Precious Things” by Amber Sparks

8.       “Brightly, Undiminished” by Sarah Grey

9.       “The Code for Everything” by McKinley Valentine, from Fantasy Magazine #65 (March 2021), edited by Christie Yant and Arley Sorg

10.   “Man vs. Bomb” by M. Shaw

11.   “Close Enough to Divine” by Donyae Coles

12.   “Arenous” by Hal Y. Zhang

13.    “The Hand of the Forest” by Seanan McGuire, on the author’s Patreon page.

14.   “The Sin of America” by Catherynne M. Valente, from Uncanny Magazine #39 (March 2021), edited by Lynne M. Thomas and Michael Damian Thomas

15.   “Colors of the Immortal Palette” by Caroline M. Yoachim

16.   “The Book of the Kraken” by Carrie Vaughn

17.   “It Accumulates” by Joanna Parypinski, from Nightmare Magazine #102 (March 2021), edited by Wendy N. Wagner

18.   “Forever is Composed of Nows” by Will Ludwigsen, from Bachelors #1, edited by Steve Berman

19.   “Babydog” by Ryan Vance

20.   “Whatever A Body is Not Obliged to Do” by L.A. Fields

21.   “Last Night at Manscape” by Nick Mamatas

22.   “Little Doors” by Claire Madrigano, from The Dark #70 (March 2021), edited by Sean Wallace

23.   “Immortelle” by Jelena Dunato

24.   “Las Girlfriends Guide to Subversive Eating” by Sabrina Vourvoulias, from Apex Magazine #122 (March 2021), edited by Jason Sizemore

25.   “A Future of Towers Made” by Beth Cato, from Clockwork, Curses, and Coal: Steampunk and Gaslamp Fairy Tales), edited by Rhonda Parrish

So that’s 25 short stories in March. Not quite “1 per day” but I’m still slightly ahead for the year. (March 31st was the 90th day of 2021.)

Summary of Reading Challenges:

“To Be Read” Challenge: This month: 2 read; YTD: 6 of 24 main titles read. (0 of 4 alternate titles read)

366 Short Stories Challenge: This month:  53 read; YTD: 104 of 365 read.

Graphic Novels Challenge:  This month: 3 read; YTD: 8 of 52 read.

Goodreads Challenge: This month: 13 read; YTD: 37 of 125 read.

Non-Fiction Challenge: This month: 3 read; YTD: 7 of 24 read.

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

Complete the Series Challenge: This month: 0 book read; YTD: 0 of 14 read.

                                                          Series fully completed: 0 of 4 planned

Monthly Special Challenge:   March was Women’s History Month, so my intent was to read as many female authors as possible. On the “short story” side of things, I did pretty well: 17 of the 25 stories read were by female-identifying authors. On the “books” side of things, comparatively, I did less well: if I include all the creators involved in Lumberjanes Vol 17, 9 of the books I read were written/created by female-identifying authors/artists.

April’s mini-challenge is poetry, as April is National Poetry Month. I am not a consistent reader of poetry, but in April I usually try to read at least a couple of poetry collections, so we’ll see how I do.

Book Review: FIRST, BECOME ASHES

TITLE: First, Become Ashes

AUTHOR: K.M. Szpara

304 pages, Publisher, ISBN 9781250216182 (hardcover, also available in e-book and audio)

DESCRIPTION: (from Goodreads): The Fellowship raised Lark to kill monsters. His partner betrayed them to the Feds. But Lark knows his magic is real, and he’ll do anything to complete his quest.

For thirty years, the Fellowship of the Anointed isolated its members, conditioning them to believe that pain is power. That magic is suffering. That the world beyond the fence has fallen prey to monsters. But when their leader is arrested, all her teachings come into question. Those touched by the Fellowship face a choice: how will they adjust to the world they were taught to fear, and how will they relate to the cult's last crusader, Lark? For Kane, survival means rejecting the magic he and his lover suffered for. For Deryn, the cult's collapse is an opportunity to prove they are worth as much as their Anointed brother. For Calvin, Lark is the alluring embodiment of the magic he's been seeking his entire life. But for Lark, the Fellowship isn’t over. Before he can begin to discover himself and heal a lifetime of traumas, he has a monster to slay. First, Become Ashes contains explicit sadomasochism and sexual content, as well as abuse and consent violations, including rape.

MY RATING: 4 out of 5 stars

MY THOUGHTS: In First, Become Ashes, K.M. Szpara asks some heavy questions about belief and identity, filtered through the first-person narration of four quite different voices: a true believer, a former believer, a skeptical believer, and an outsider who wants to believe. Any one of these characters could have narrated the entire book and the story would have been compelling enough. Splitting the narration between the four allows readers to read between the lines of their individual stories to see a bigger picture. Multiple narrators also allow the author to show some of the breadth and depth of how different people process trauma and abandonment.

At its heart, First, Become Ashes is about how belief shapes identity, and how loss of belief can sometimes shatter that sense of self (unless something equally worth believing in replaces it). In this regard, lovers Lark and Kane are a study in contrasts. When we first meet Lark, he is resolute in his belief in the teachings of Nova and the Fellowship. Nova can do no wrong, anything she requires of him must be for the good of the community no matter how painful or unpalatable it might be. Lark is willing to be used and abused if it means he’s really as special as Nova claims; he’s willing to abuse others if it means he gets to fulfill the destiny laid out for him in whatever passes for the Fellowship’s scriptures. When we finally read chapters from Kane’s perspective, we see a man who has lost all faith in the tradition in which he was raised. He recognizes Nova’s abuses for what they are; he realizes that in believing her lies he’s been forced to hurt the man he loves and be hurt in turn. Lark’s total devotion to the cause empowers his magic – Kane’s departure from the faith destroys his. As Lark goes on his quest to hunt a monster, to fulfill what he’s been trained and raised to do, questions about whether Kane and others might be right in their assessment of Nova’s rituals and intent lead to Lark’s magic seeming to fail him in certain situations. Wanting to bring Lark home safely, to rescue the man he loves from their former life, Kane’s magic seems to work in certain situations despite his lack of belief. Both men wonder if they can survive in a world without the control and structure the Fellowship demanded, as do the few other “Anointed” we meet.

As a Fellow rather than an Anointed, Deryn provides yet another point-of-view to be considered: what if the magic is real, even if the mission is false and the structure of the Fellowship is abusive? Anointed and then demoted, they question everything: their place in the Fellowship, their role as Lark’s sibling, their worth to the society outside the Fellowship. But they never really question the magic itself, and in fact encourage others to believe in it, including FBI Agent Miller who has been investigating the Fellowship her entire career. Deryn and Miller are characters whose separate experiences explicate how abandonment also shapes sense-of-self. Without spoiling anything, what they have in common is that they were both told they were something special, only to be told that they weren’t special enough. Everything Deryn and Miller do is motivated by needing to understand why things changed, why they were cast aside for others. There are no chapters from Miller’s perspective, so we never really get to see her own take on being abandoned, but her experiences are mirrored in Deryn and over time they become kindred spirits.

And then there’s Calvin: a cosplayer and social media “influencer” who is as aware of the Fellowship as anyone who lives near their compound in Baltimore but has no idea how deep the teachings go. Calvin would have been the target audience if someone had filmed a documentary or reality show about the Fellowship; he might even have been one of those folks who becomes obsessed with the subjects of such a show. Calvin combines aspects of the other characters in his “outsider” perspective. He has been abandoned by his family for not being what they wanted him to be (like Deryn and Miller), he desperately wants magic to be real (like Lark) but is appalled at the cost once he becomes aware of it (like Kane).

Readers should be warned that Szpara does not go light on the emotional or physical abuse these four characters have experienced. Most of it is revealed in flashback but some of it is current, and there’s no “fade to black / let the reader infer” when these events happen. I leave it up to survivors of abuse to discuss how accurate/realistic the characters’ reactions are. Likewise, I leave analysis of the consensual BDSM scenes to members of that community to weigh in on.

First, Become Ashes is not an easy read, with all of the raw emotional and physical trauma the four main characters experience. But it is an engrossing read with characters I came to deeply care about.

(NOTE: I read an e-ARC of First, Become Ashes which I received from NetGalley. I completed reading the book well before publication date but this review was delayed for a variety of reasons having nothing to do with the book itself.)

Book Review: BLIND TIGER

TITLE: Blind Tiger (The Pride, Book 1)

AUTHOR: Jordan L. Hawk

206 pages, JLH Books, ISBN 9798711192763 (print, also available in e-book; audiobook forthcoming)

DESCRIPTION: (from Goodreads): 1924, Chicago. Prohibition is in full swing and gang bosses rule the city with might—and magic. When Sam Cunningham flees his small-town life to try his luck in the big city of Chicago, he quickly finds himself in over his head in a world of gangs, glitz, and glamour. Fortunately, he has his cousin Eldon to teach him the trade of hex-making. Everything changes the night Sam visits The Pride speakeasy and meets grumpy cheetah-shifter Alistair Gatti. After losing his first witch to the horrors of the World War, Alistair isn’t interested in any new entanglements, romantic or magical. Especially when said entanglement comes in the form of kind, innocent Sam. When Eldon is brutally murdered, Sam becomes drawn into the dark underworld of the Chicago gangs. Sam must find the missing hex Eldon created for one of the crime bosses—before whoever killed Eldon comes back for him. Together, Alistair and Sam begin the search for the mysterious hex, diving deep into the seedy side of Chicago’s underworld while dodging rival gangs. And as they come to rely on one another, Alistair realizes he’s falling for the one man he can’t afford to love.

MY RATING: 5 out of 5 stars

MY THOUGHTS: Fans of Jordan L. Hawk’s previous alternate history/fantasy/gay romance books will not be disappointed with Blind Tiger, the start of a new trilogy in the same alternate history timeline as his Hexworld books. Blind Tiger is full of the action, mystery, humor, romance, and steamy sex that are Hawk’s hallmarks.

For those not familiar with the world-building of the Hexworld series, a recap: it’s a world just like our own, with most of the same history intact, except that magic is a known quantity. Witches (a gender-neutral term in this world) are able to imbue written hexes with magic drawn from their shape-shifting familiars (also a gender-neutral term). Normal people can then use those hexes to do everything from keeping iceboxes cold when there’s no electricity to healing sickness – and occasionally, if the right hex is used, much larger scale magic. Any witch can bond with any familiar (but not more than one in either direction), but the magic works best when the familiar bonds to “their” witch (a nebulous-defined term that basically means that they are “meant to be together”). The books in Hawk’s Hexworld series all take place in 1890’s New York City, focused on the witches and familiars of that city’s Witch Police. Over the course of four books and a couple of short stories, Hawk has been developing a larger conspiracy involving the public’s perception and acceptance of familiars fanned to unhealthy levels by both government and religious leaders. Hawk has said he’ll eventually return to that storyline but had this idea that just wouldn’t wait. And thus, we have the start of the Pride trilogy, which moves the action to a different city (Chicago) and a different decade (the 1920s).

Whatever finally happens in 1890s NYC, it’s implied that in 1920s Chicago people are a bit more accepting of familiars in general but not necessarily of the more “dangerous” ones. Familiars are specific shapeshifters: they can transform into one animal and only one animal. When that animal is a cute dog or cat or bird, no one seems to care. But when that animal is something large and predatory, say “big cats” like lions, tigers, and cheetahs, people are still afraid. The members of the Gatti family all turn into big cats, and they’ve used that fear to carve out a place for themselves as “independent operators” within the territory of a gang overlord named Sullivan. Their position is ordinarily precarious but becomes even more so after the murder of Eldon Cunningham. Hawk does a wonderful job of setting the stakes for this “found family” from the very start of the book and then ramping those stakes up as the action progresses.

As the book synopsis indicates, the characters at the heart of the story are Alistair Gatti and Sam Cunningham. There’s an awkward meet-cute in the speakeasy the Gattis own, Sam introducing himself as “Sammy … Sam … Sam,” which Alistair riffs on immediately (but only until it’s clear Sam doesn’t like it; then Alistair backs off). These are two quite different men: Sam is shy, insecure, skittish where Alistair is grumpy, too sure of himself, bold. But they have something in common (other than the witch-familiar bond that Alistair recognizes right away and Sam has no reason to think even exists): both are suffering from forms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and abandonment issues. The formative experiences that lead to the PTSD, and the ways in which each man deals with it (or doesn’t) are revealed slowly throughout the book and I don’t want to spoil anything. But I can say that Hawk writes these characters with a sensitivity and keen understanding of both PTSD and abandonment disorders that infuses both men with deep layers the reader will appreciate. This is true of pretty much every Hawk character I have encountered; just because there’s sex in these books doesn’t mean the characters are flat or undeveloped. But in this particular book, it really stands out. I look forward to how Alistair and Sam’s relationship will progress through the second and third books of this trilogy, and how they will help each other deal with the PTSD triggers they inevitably will encounter.

I also look forward to the development of the rest of the Gatti family over the next two books. The Gatti siblings are all orphans who adopted each other and do everything they can to protect each other. In addition to the five siblings, the family extends to include witches, lovers, and spouses (not always the same person; even when a familiar finds “their” witch, there’s not always a romantic connection nor does there need to be for the magic to work). We get glimpses of these relationships and tidbits about how they came to be, and we get a good sense of each family member’s personalities – but it would be nice to get to know them even better, to see the depths in them that we get to see in Alistair and Sam. Heck, I’d even like to see more of the crime-lord Sullivan.

The mystery of Eldon’s murder is very “fair play.” The clues are all there for the reader to pick up on, but not so obviously presented that you’ll guess whodunnit and why within the first half of the book.

And the steamy sex is steamy. As one would expect from a Jordan L. Hawk book.

Romance, erotica, mystery, and fantasy all under one cover and all equally well-written: Blind Tiger has something for everyone.

Book Review: VILLAGE FOOL

TITLE: Village Fool

AUTHOR: ‘Nathan Burgoine

74 pages, Bold Stroke Books, ISBN 9781635559828 (e-book)

DESCRIPTION: (from Publisher website): Owen is only confident in two places: at work, supporting clients through IT woes, and when he’s sitting around a gaming table in the role of a smooth and charming bard. He’s never acted on the crush he’s had on his physiotherapist—and total cubcake—Toma. Even though Owen’s no longer Toma’s patient, and his crush hasn’t dialed down in the slightest, Owen can’t figure out how to make a move.

When a friend decides to play a prank involving Owen’s contact list, Owen spends the morning of April Fools’ day inadvertently texting smooth and charming thoughts about Toma... to Toma himself.

By the time Owen discovers the prank, things are completely out of control. Discussions of thighs and awards for the World’s Best Chest have been handed out—not to mention they’ve set an accidental coffee date—and there’s no taking that sort of thing back. When this joke finally gets told, Owen’s convinced he’ll be the punchline, but with a little luck and some nudging from his friends, the last laugh might be the best of his life.

MY RATING: 5 out of 5 stars

MY THOUGHTS: If you’ve read either of ‘Nathan Burgoine’s other “Little Village” romance novellas (Handmade Holidays and Faux Ho Ho) you will not be surprised at how endearing Village Fool is nor how relatable the main characters are. If this is your first “Little Village” romance, you’re in for a treat. Yes, this is the third book in a series if we look at them in release order, but each “Little Village” novella stands alone so you can jump right into this one without having read the previous two (and maybe it will inspire you to read the others!).

Like its predecessors, Village Fool is a holiday romance, but instead of the usual Christmas or New Year’s setting we get April Fool’s Day. Now, I don’t know about you, but April Fool’s Day is not one of my favorite holidays, having involved more bullying than humor in my childhood. But I don’t dislike the holiday enough to write off a romance with April Fools pranks at the core unread, especially when that book is written by one of my favorite authors (overall, and specifically of gay romance). Unlike its predecessors, where the holiday itself is not just the set-up but a key component of the plot, Village Fool really could have taken place at any time of year. Friends play pranks on friends all the time. But setting it on the holiday keeps the “Little Village” holiday theme going, and it works just fine.

I identified heavily with Owen, the novella’s POV character. Like him, I am far smoother and more personable when I’m on the job (corporate trainer in my case, IT support for Owen) or when I’m among very, very close friends (the Bittersweets Club and D&D circle for Owen) than when I have to make conversation with a guy I find interesting/attractive (my current ongoing crush is also a total “cubcake” like Toma, but he works in the food industry not as a physiotherapist). Like Owen, my friends tease me about my crush and I get a little angsty about why I can’t seem to formulate complete sentences around him. Also like Owen, I would be devastatingly embarrassed if my friends pulled a stunt like Felix does at the start of Village Fool to force the “just ask him out already” issue. (Unlike Owen, I still have no idea if my crush might be even remotely into guys, but that’s a topic for my therapist and not a book review…) The TL;DR of this paragraph is: Owen is recognizable, relatable, and very easy to like.

And even though we don’t get any scenes directly from Toma’s POV to see inside his head, we can tell that he’s also relatable and likeable. His every interaction with Owen is supportive, friendly, eventually flirty. He’s not happy that the date he thought he was finally going on was a misunderstanding and he’s not willing to let Felix completely or easily off the hook. But Toma also understands why Owen is so much more upset about the situation than he is and he’s willing to back off and give Owen space if that’s what Owen wants.

In the hands of other authors, this misunderstanding would garner a novel’s worth of anger and angst before the situation gets resolved, with both characters second-guessing their own feelings as well as the other character’s motivations and responses. Burgoine threads that needle expertly: Owen’s reactions, borne out of humiliation, are a bit more histrionic (without being soap-opera scenery-chewing) while Toma’s are more grounded (without being dismissive of Owen’s feelings), and both men’s reactions are totally in character.

The alternating chapters of present-day and flashbacks format works as well in Village Fool as it did in Faux Ho Ho, adding nice levels of tension and release. Again, it’s a style that not every author is fully effective with, but Burgoine is a master.

There’s also just the right amount of interference from Owen’s circle of friends in both the present and the past to help nudge things towards a Happily Ever After ending (although in Felix’s case the “nudging” is what creates the drama in the first place). The alternating flashback chapters fill us in not just on how Owen came to know Toma, but also how he met Silas, Ru, and Felix and started to feel like maybe the Village was someplace he belongs. The prank and its aftermath don’t occur in a bubble; we get glimpses of a well-developed group of friends without those glimpses being winky-nudgy-youshouldhavereadtheotherbooks distractions. I was happy to see Silas and Dino (from Faux Ho Ho) and Ru and Fiona (from Handmade Holidays) in varying-sized supporting roles along with mentions of other residents and businesses in the Little Village district.

I don’t think I will ever get tired of stories set amongst the group of friends we’ve met in these three novellas, and I hope the “Little Village” series goes on for a long time regardless of whether the “holiday” theme continues. If you like stories that include awkward meet-cutes, friends who are family, and happily-ever-after gay romance, pick up Village Fool and the other Little Village novellas.