Microreview [Book]: The Doors of Eden by Adrian Tchaikovsky

Tchaikovsky's weird alternate biospheres are the highlight of this first contact thriller-esque sci fi

The Doors of Eden is a novel about alien worlds, as you've never seen them before - because every one of these alien worlds is, in fact, our earth, in a timeline where the development of sentience spun off a little differently each time. Within the confines of our planets fixed geological ages: the early conditions for life, the Permian extinction, the era of dinosaur potential (although not always dinosaurs), the meteor strike and the march to our own present, The Doors of Eden imagines planets full of immortal trilobites, isolationist orthocones, raptors, rodents, asshole cats (naturally), giant amphibious scorpions and of course some spiders, all of whom inherit the earth at some point and must then figure out how to keep going with the hand they are dealt. Most of the inhabitants of most of these worlds remain unaware of each other most of the time, but for a few, knowledge of each others' existence comes either accidentally or deliberately through accessing doors between realities - and its these convergences which create the plot of this book.

We open with the story of Mal and Lee, two young women who take on cryptid hunting as a hobby, only to have it go horribly wrong when they accidentally go through a portal on Bodmin Moor and find themselves being chased by weird dinosaur birds. Lee makes it back, her girlfriend Mal does not, and Lee spends the next four years trying to make sense of the whole experience. Elsewhere, government agents Julian and Alison are investigating a criminal case into which mathematician Kay Amal Khan has been drawn, and when the gory death of a group of thugs implicates a man who looks rather unlike the average homo sapiens and a woman who looks very much like an older, grittier Mal, storylines collide, a creepy interdimensional computer genius racist gets drawn into the mix, and everyone finds themselves in a dimension hopping thriller with more episodes and reversals than I can reasonably summarise here, with the universe at stake.

Most of the species of the various earths are introduced through extract from an in-universe academic text which outlines the different divergence points in chronological order, although in the case of several of the main species, we meet their representatives before the worlds they come from are fleshed out. The introduction of Neanderthals - who are able to operate more comfortably in our world than, say, the three foot tall ferret creatures or the gargantuan space bugs -  drives the sense of early contact in The Doors of Eden, and the juxtaposition of Neanderthal society and culture with Homo Sapiens remains an interesting aspect of the story whenever it comes to the fore. In contrast, the inclusion of the "birdmen" is interesting but significantly more episodic, and some of the other species representatives are more explanatory factors for elements of worldbuilding that would otherwise feel like deus ex machinae than active "characters" as such.

What I liked about The Doors of Eden had far more to do with its concept than its somewhat disjointed plot. For most of the novel I was content to be reading a story that was just a vehicle for exploring alternate evolution and, towards the end of the novel, the concept of alternate timelines in general, rather than having any specific aspirations of most of the characters. At times, The Doors of Eden is held back by the lack of roles for its most interesting humans (Mal, Lee and Kay), instead relying on the viewpoints of bigoted genius Rowe's henchman Lucas, and the less objectionable but somewhat bland Julian and Alison. All of the present day narrative comes from a human perspective, which makes sense in that The Doors of Eden is already too jam packed for a deep dive into what alternative cognition would look like for these species from the inside, but it does mean we are sometimes focused on painfully incomplete human interpretations of alien behaviour.

That said, The Doors of Eden does keep a lot of balls in the air and its three act plot - a first act with equal parts horror and real-world thriller, a second of dimension-hopping adventure, and a third of time-bending science exploration and world-saving shenanigans - covers a ton of fast-paced, interesting ground that it's impossible not to get swept along with. While it can be challenging to follow a narrative where many of the characters thrown together through circumstance haven't even bothered to learn each others' names, by the endgame there's an intriguing core of human and non-human characters whose fates we are (with the exception of Rowe and Lucas) pretty invested in. Some of the personal and interpersonal outcomes are harder to root for - am I supposed to be cheering on a character cheating on their spouse just because I can see they have chemistry with the person they are cheating with? - but, hey. The end of the world is at stake here, so there is something we can all generally agree on even if the particulars of who ends up in what dimension banging who might not be something we should dwell on.

Fundamentally, though The Doors of Eden is a tricky book for me to put a final quantification on, simply because I don't think landed where I expected it to be, and I'm not sure what to make of what it was. As speculative science fiction, this is an awesome premise, and there's so much chewy worldbuilding included that it basically carries the novel on its own. The mash up of science fiction and thriller adventure has potential but it never quite squares the circle of balancing the action between characters who are interesting and fresh-faced, and those who are experienced and capable, sidelining the former while the latter remain a bit of a snoozefest. Still, this is solid Tchaikovsky and as an exploration of sentience with an awesome hook, that kept me searching Wikipedia for real-life critters of bygone ages, I have to give this one a thumbs up for keeping me entertained, and if it sounds like your thing you could do much worse than to give it a go.

The Math

Baseline Score: 7/10

Bonuses: +1 An intriguing central concept.

Penalties: -1 Doesn't give its central characters enough to do.

Nerd Coefficient: 7/10

POSTED BY: Adri, Nerds of a Feather co-editor, is a semi-aquatic migratory mammal most often found in the UK. She has many opinions about SFF books, and is also partial to gaming, baking, interacting with dogs, and Asian-style karaoke. Find her on Twitter at @adrijjy.

Reference: Tchaikovsky, Adrian. The Doors of Eden [Tor, 2020]

Interview: H.G. Parry, author of A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians

In Western Europe, it is the Age of Enlightenment.  In the Caribbean,  a slave rebellion is brewing. Now, add magic!  Enter H.G. Parry's newest novel,  A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians, published in June from Redhook. In this sprawling historical fantasy, magic is used to keep powerful people in power, and to keep the powerless in chains. But what happens when the status quo goes out the window? With lots of banter and a fast moving plot, Parry forces her characters to ask questions and face situations that will change their world forever.

Something I love about novels like this one, is that a) they entertain me, b) they give me my fantasy fix, and c) they send me down wikipedia rabbit holes because I want to know who all of these people really were and what actually happened. If you like that kind of experience too, you're in luck, as Declaration is the first in an expected duology.

Based in Wellington, New Zealand, Parry grew up reading and loving classics such as Beowulf, The Lord of the Rings, Jane Austen's works, and everything Dickensian. (If fact, if Dickens is your thing, may I recommend Parry's The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep? I loved it!)    Her short fiction has also appeared in Intergalactic Medicine Show, Daily Science Fiction, and various anthologies.  You can learn more about her at her website hgparry.com or by following on her twitter, where she is @hg_parry.

Parry was kind enough to answer my questions about the research she did for this new novel, how she created the magic system for the story, respectfully writing a Black enslaved character, doing world building through dialog, and more.

Let's get to the interview!

NOAF: Your newest novel A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians involves the politics of the late 18th century - the French Revolution, the Haitian Revolution, what was happening in Western Europe, and what was happening in the Americas at that time, among other historical events. Why did you choose that particular moment in history, and what was your research process like?

H.G.P.: It was really the other way around—this book grew because I started getting obsessively interested in late eighteenth-century politics, particularly around the French Revolution and the abolition of the British slave trade, and frankly I didn't know what else to do about it! It's a truly fascinating time--a time of radical ideas and radical science and radical politics, of brilliant rhetoric spilling over into revolution and war, of unprecedented social change and upheaval. There's a real feeling of the old order passing away, and being on the brink of an exciting new world. And from a writerly point of view, it's full of people trying to change things for the better, and having to make difficult choices about how to bring about those changes. It's irrestistable.

In terms of research, I started with biographies—you can probably tell of whom when you read the book, because most of them became major characters. I was very fortunate to be travelling through England and Paris at various times when I was writing this book, so I could visit a lot of museums and historical sites for those plot-lines in person. (I came very close to getting accidentally locked in William Wilberforce's house overnight, which would have been peak research. A guard came and found me in the library on closing time.) But most of it was just hours of reading. I was working at a university, so I could raid the library and online resources for anything that interested me—books, contemporary accounts, old newspapers, parliamentary records, all the good stuff. I also read a lot of historical fiction and watched a lot of period dramas, mostly for fun, but also to see what other authors had made of the same material. Since these "other authors" include Charles Dickens, Hilary Mantel, and Susanna Clarke, this was probably more terrifying than helpful, but it was very helpful!

NOAF: History, intrigue, global conversations, and magic? What fun! Talk us through the magic system of your alternate history. What kinds of things can people do with their magic? Is it something you are born with, or do you have to learn how to do it? Can anyone do magic, or only certain people?

H.G.P.: In this version of the world, everyone has the potential to be born with magical gifts—they might be able to conjure fire and water, or manipulate the weather, or summon shadows to do their bidding. They occur naturally, but they can be refined and developed with study and practice. In Europe and Great Britain, these abilities are only allowed to be practiced by the Aristocracy and are policed by the Knights Templar, who lock Commoner magicians into bracelets that limit their magic. As the book starts, certain reformers have begun to argue that magic should be available to everyone, regardless of birth, which is where things start to get heated…

NOAF: I'm a fan of worldbuilding through dialog and witty banter, and I hear A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians has both! Do you have any tips for writing effective dialog? Is banter and fun dialog as fun to write as it is to read?

H.G.P.: The very early version of this book actually started out almost entirely in dialogue, on purpose, like a stage play. It isn't quite that now, but still, there is definitely dialogue! And banter! And parliamentary debates and arguments and long fire-lit discussions about principles! One of my favourite things about the eighteenth century is the utter delight it takes in words and wit and rhetoric, and I really wanted to bring that to the page.

The only tip I can think of is to remember that dialogue is always doing double-duty as character development—the characters need to be revealing themselves not just by what they say, but what words they choose, the pattern of their sentences, the way they choose to direct the conversation. That, and to watch the gap between what characters say and what they mean. Even if characters aren't lying on purpose, they're rarely being completely honest with themselves or with each other, and that's where the tension and the poignancy lies.

Banter: oh, probably far, far more fun to write than to read! If it was up to me the characters would just drink tea and exchange witty barbs and never get any plot done.

NOAF: One of your main characters, Fina, is a slave on a sugar plantation. Writing about slavery can be delicate. What can you tell us about how you developed Fina's character and her worldview?

H.G.P.: It's very, very delicate, and it should be. With anything that draws on difficult history, you want to do justice to the experiences of the people who really lived through it without exploiting those experiences, and that's a difficult balance. Writing Fina is a little bit different to researching and writing a purely historical novel, because you also need to balance how that experience would be shaped and changed by the fantastical elements of the book. A lot of Fina's life and perspective is drawn from those of men and women at the time who provided first-hand accounts of their enslavement, as well as from what we know about women who fought in uprisings and particularly during the Haitian revolution—I was very interested in Mary Prince, the first enslaved woman to publish her memoirs in Britain, though she was born a few decades later than Fina. At the same time, she's the only major character without a direct historical counterpart, partly because her plotline is very dependent on the magic system, partly because I wanted her to be a person who might have been overlooked by our history, but who turns out to be crucial to this one.

In Fina's world, slave-owners force the people they enslave to take an alchemical compound that keeps them powerless to move except to obey orders. Fina becomes immune to the spellbinding as she grows and comes into magic of her own, and if this is discovered she would be killed. Until she can escape, she hides it, which means essentially pretending to be locked in her own body all day, every day, without a single involuntary movement or expression. So she's very driven by her anger and her determination to save the others who were enslaved with her; she's also very used to concealing her feelings and even disassociating from them in order to survive, and she's increasingly growing to understand and take possession of her power.

NOAF: What was your favorite scene in A Declaration of the Rights of Magicians to write? What was the first scene you wrote?

H.G.P.: Honestly, I've loved writing so much of this book, mostly because of the relationships between the central characters. I love writing Wilberforce and Pitt talking about anything at all, I love writing Robespierre and Camille Desmoulins, I love writing Fina and Toussaint L'Ouverture. All the magical politics and parliamentary proceedings were an absolute joy. If I had to choose, though—there's a very intense confrontation between Robespierre and Camille towards the end of the book, and it was one of those glorious scenes that just wrote themselves and barely needed to be touched afterwards.

The very first scene is probably now going to be in Book Two, so I can't spoil it! But it was Pitt and Wilberforce, and it was about the duel Pitt historically fought in 1801, because he was an idiot.

NOAF: This is book one in the Shadow Histories. What's next for these characters? Should readers plan for a trilogy, or something longer?

H.G.P.: Shorter, actually: it's a duology. Without spoilers, this book covers the period around the French Revolution and the Haitian Revolution; the second book revolves around the rise of Bonaparte and the Napoleonic Wars. It also starts to veer from the path of our own history, because magic tends to do that.

NOAF: What are some of your hobbies? What do you like to do to unwind?

H.G.P.: I'm the boring kind of writer who writes one project as an exciting break from writing another and thinks this counts as a hobby, so: writing! Also reading! Aside from that, I watch far too many BBC period dramas, draw, hang out with my rabbit sidekicks, and (pre-lockdown) love travelling to other countries. I've also raised many families on the Sims.

NOAF: Thank you so much!

POSTED BY: Andrea Johnson lives in Michigan with her husband and too many books. She can be found on twitter, @redhead5318 , where she posts about books, food, and assorted nerdery.

Microreview [book]: In Evil Times by Melinda Snodgrass

The second in the Imperials series puts both of the protagonists - the Heir to the Empire Mercedes, and lowborn would-be officer Tracy - through changes as they explore and struggle through their post High Ground space naval careers.

Thracius "Tracy" Belmanor has graduated from The High Ground and helped foil a plot. His reward is to get a ship posting, but not at the full rank he deserves, because that would disturb the social order for a lowborn person like himself to have it. Class and social prejudice plague him as he tries to make his way in the Imperial Navy, and finally come to blows when his sense of honor, justice and right are tested time and again by the realities of the Empire and what it is doing. And the feelings Tracy had for Mercedes, the unattainable Heir to the Empire, in the High Ground? Those have to be locked in a box, right?

In the meantime, Mercedes, the Infanta, has problems of her own. Her unprecedented attendance at The High Ground as a female cadet, and graduating, has led her to a posting on a ship. Even as she strives in her first postings, Mercedes has to juggle her career, her desire to prove herself in a military capacity so as to bolster her position as heir, the desires of her husband, Boho, and a growing problem within the Empire. The feelings for Tracy that she felt in the High Ground? Those have to be locked in a box, right?

These two stories twist, connect and intertwine in In Evil Times, sequel to The High Ground, by Melinda Snodgrass.

The world that Snodgrass creates continues to fascinate from the first novel, especially since we expand from the pressure cooker of the High Ground space station to see the Empire, on the ground, as it were, as well as in the depths of space. We get slices of society all around, from Mercedes’ center of Imperial power, to the very humble existence that Tracy’s father as a tailor has, to the life of military officers. We get a painted portrait of what this stratified, socially conscious world is like and how people fit into that system, resist that system and find themselves in trouble for opposing that system. We also get a better sense of how aliens, an oppressed stratum of society, fit and struggle in a human dominated Solar League. Aliens are very much third class citizens, and the consequences of that are explored in the book both from Tracy and Mercedes’ perspectives.

The plotting and action sequences of the book are another highlight of the book. There is significantly less action than in the previous novel since the rigors of an academy are replaced with a lot of time traveling to places on ships. There are some excellent set pieces, including a stand off on an alien planet, and a “closed room” firefight that show the author’s well honed skills at blocking and presenting these sequences in an entertaining and vivid way. More so, like the first novel, plotting the strands of the character, their careers, the events of the novel, is also top notch for the most part--although a strange and large time jump mid sequence did feel a bit discordant and took me briefly out of the story.

The heart of the book though are these two characters, Mercedes and Tracy. Melinda doesn’t make it easy for either of them in the social striations, strictions and structures they have to survive in. Lowborn commoner and the Heir to the Empire CAN’T work as a pairing, a realization  that is reinforced time and again in the narrative, and yet that relationship that cannot, should not work, and doesn’t come to fruition is an undercurrent and underpinning of a major strand of both of their characters. The countervailing strand, of duty, plays on both characters and leads them down what may well be opposing paths. The reverses and struggles, aspirations and hopes of both characters come through in all of their advances and setbacks, and the author writes characters to care about, to cheer on and to suffer their travails with. Both are vividly realized. The minor characters that the book details also come across as full blooded and dimensionally realized characters. I particularly felt for

The novel’s themes are even stronger than the previous mentioned worldbuilding, character, plotting and action sequences. We got a strong dose of the class differences and (in this day and age importantly in our own world) the class stratification of the society of the FFH, a society that makes in aristocratic terms a mirror to our own society’s issues and problems. This allows the author to explore issues of immigration, class conflict, social hierarchies and the difficulties of those who would challenge such systems, both those low and high in the social structure. It is these class conflicts and how the character, the internal strength, and weaknesses, of the characters really play out. The set-piece meeting of Tracy and Mercedes again at bringing a lost colony world into the Empire really brings this all home. Above and beyond the action beats, and the worldbuilding of the colony so at odds with the Empire itself, it is what both characters do there that forges them into their subsequent threads, and fateful decisions made by both Mercedes and Tracy alike. The master plotting from the author aligns the themes of the book and the internal character arcs of both Tracy and Mercedes, making for a rich reading experience.

One thing I have to say, though, and readers might shy away from the book and series thereby, is that this is an unpleasant social structure and universe in many ways, and Snodgrass is not shy about exploring that, to a fault. Xenophobia, violence and sexism (especially the role of women) are not great in the Solar League, and the novel is really up front about it, and hits the theme time and again. The aforementioned set piece on bringing a lost colony world into the Empire is deeply unpleasant on a number of levels given current politics and readers who don’t want contemporary politics reflected so strongly in their fiction may be turned off thereby.

Like most books mid-series, In Evil Times really isn’t designed to stand alone. While this book does, with the Lost Colony world, provide an opportunity for the author to explain a lot of the background that had to be inferred or taken from context in The High Ground (providing detail on how the Empire *got* that way), this really isn’t the place to start the story of these two characters. The book does summarize and call back to the first novel, especially in character beats and emotional arcs, but its a poor substitute, I think, for actually reading the first book, unless you really wanted to skip the academy setting in favor of these characters on space ships, making their way in interstellar actions, adventures and changes. It took me a while to get to this book following the High Ground, but I do not intend to make that mistake again to pick up the next book in the Imperials series. One nit: These books never seem to have had e-book versions, so I will have to rely on audio, as I did the first two books, in order to do so.

---
The Math

Baseline Assessment: 6/10

Bonuses: +1  strong pair of viewpoint characters with very strong character arcs, characters strong enough to cheer, cringe and root for.
+1 for excellent use of theme to explore contemporary social hierarchies in the form of her future aristocratic society.

Penalties: -1  Some of the themes of the book are almost too much in one’s face, especially in the Lost Colony world set piece.

Nerd Coefficient:  7/10  an enjoyable experience, but not without its flaws

Reference: Snodgrass, Melinda. In Evil Times, [2017, Titan Books]

POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I’m just this guy, you know? @princejvstin.

Thursday Morning Superhero: Comic Con at Home

Comic Con at home has come and gone and from my perspective it was quite successful at capturing the appeal of Comic Con and delivering it to my home.  While social media impressions were down over 90%, I don't think the goal was to ever replace the in person experience.  My family had a great time printing out our badges, setting up our signs, and pouring through the schedule to identify what panels we wanted to "attend".  We even secured some exclusive merchandise and my daughter scored swag from Lego in the form of a comic book that they printed on demand and mailed to our house.

The Panels:

While it doesn't capture the excitement of actually being in Hall H during one of the big-time panels, the panels that I "attended" felt like a traditional Comic Con panel without the traditional series of bizarre question and answer sessions that normally wrap up each session. As I noted, the ability to watch panels at your convenience was welcome and it also ensured that I would not miss out on any content I wanted to see.

Of all of the panels I watched either by myself or with my family, the four that stood out were the panels featuring Phineas and Ferb, Marvel's 616, Amazon Prime's Truth Seekers, and the return of Bill and Ted.  After attending the tear filled farewell to Phineas and Ferb panel years ago, I was delighted to hear that a new movie, Candace against the Universe, will launch on Disney+ on August 28!  Disney+ also highlighted a new docu-series, Marvel's 616, that looks absolutely delightful. The series will focus on the history of Marvel comics as told from the perspective of various creative talent. Each episode is unique and the two that were highlighted focused on women in comics and obscure villains. Truth Seekers, a new comedy from Simon Pegg and Malcolm McDowell looks like an absolute delight and the return of Bill and Ted next month is most excellent. There were many other phenomenal panels that you can still check out!  See the full schedule and YouTube links here! 

Gandalf the White via The Loyal Subjects

The Merch:

In preparation for online drops I did my usual research into what Funko was offering and how to scoop the new Lord of the Rings figures from The Loyal Subjects.  Despite seeing rumblings on Twitter about how fast everything was selling out, things ran smoothly from my end and I should be getting some Pops, Action Vinyls, and even a dumpster fire in the mail shortly via 100Soft!  I am most excited about the Lord of the Rings figures from the Loyal Subjects and they will even feature a "Covid-19" foot stamp to note the bizarre comic con experience of 2020.

Final Thoughts: 

I am curious how Comic Con at Home will impact future conventions.  I am sure some studios didn't get the buzz they wanted due to online panels, but others probably benefited from more exposure. It will be interesting to see a cost/benefit analysis for movies and television shows, along with the merchandise vendors who had no issue selling out of exclusives. From a selfish standpoint, I loved being able to customize my SDCC schedule in a way that worked for me and it was also very easy to share panels that were of interest to my kids with them. While the difference between the in-person convention and the virtual one are huge, it really felt like I was back at SDCC and quite enjoyed my experience. 

POSTED BY MIKE N. aka Victor Domashev -- comic guy, proudly raising nerdy kids, and Nerds of a Feather contributor since 2012.

6 books with (Half of) Kit Rocha

Kit Rocha is the pseudonym for co-writing team Donna Herren and Bree Bridges. After penning dozens of paranormal novels, novellas and stories as Moira Rogers, they branched out into gritty, sexy dystopian romance.

The Beyond series has appeared on the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists, has been nominated for best erotic romance in the RT Reviewer’s Choice award five times, and won in 2013 and 2015. Find out more at their website.

Today, Bree (@mostlybree) tells us about her Six Books.


1. What book are you currently reading? 

Right now, I'm tearing my way through an advance copy of Alyssa Cole's upcoming gentrification thriller When No One Is Watching. Alyssa Cole has a habit of writing terrifyingly prescient books (if you like near-futuristic and want to be convinced we need to break up tech corporations yesterday, check out The A.I. Who Loved Me), but this one is something special. It comes out on September 1st and everyone should be pre-ordering it yesterday!

2. What upcoming book are you really excited about?

Well, I suppose I kind of answered that but that's okay, I have more! The second book in Milla Vane's A Gathering of Dragons series [A Touch of Stone and Snow]  comes out in July, and I'm so, so excited about it. And I'm really looking forward to Tasha Suri's new trilogy that kicks off with The Jasmine Throne, as she was one of my favorite new-to-me author discoveries of 2019.

I also read the deal announcement for Hannah Whitten's debut For the Wolf and screamed in my office, so I want that one a whole lot! Someone involved needs to call me!


3. Is there a book you’re currently itching to read again? 

I am a massive rereader. There are books I read every year! (Melanie Rawn and Anne Bishop have both had that place of honor for two decades.) Right now I've been meandering my way through the Wheel of Time series again because I'm really excited about the upcoming TV show! I also have a discord chat server where we discuss books and they've all been talking about Nalini Singh lately, which means I'm about to go pick up some of her Psy/Changeling books and read them for the mumblemumble-th time.




4. How about a book you’ve changed your mind about – either positively or negatively?

I have a very fraught relationship with a lot of my childhood favorites. I'll always love Pern, but the original series is a mess of terrible consent and foundation level misogyny. (Among other things.) The same is true of a lot of my favorite books from my teens. So it's not so much that I change my mind, as that I take the things I love about them with me while acknowledging the parts that I wish weren't there.





5. What’s one book, which you read as a child or a young adult, that has had a lasting influence on your writing?

I'm going to go with one that might surprise people who know me, and say Z for Zachariah. For those who aren't familiar with the book (which is, I should add, very unlike the 2015 movie adaptation) it's the story of a girl left alone after an apocalypse, and her struggle to survive on her own...and then to survive not on her own.

I think that's the book that made me fascinated with dystopian and post-apocalyptic fiction. Over the years I'd read a lot of it--some great, some terrible--but that was the original spark. And wrestling with the question of what kind of world we'd build if we had to start from scratch is a lot of my current writing obsession.

6. And speaking of that, what’s your latest book, and why is it awesome? 

My book is, coincidentally, about the apocalypse! Ha!

Though that's not entirely true. While the book takes place after an apocalyptic event (45 years after one, in fact) the book itself is about friendship, and community, and hope. It may sound a bit odd, but my favorite part of writing about a world where all rules and systems have been swept away is imagining that some people (the people who the rules and systems weren't doing much for) would do it better and smarter this time.

So I wrote a book about a couple of ladies who happen to have superpowers thanks to unregulated genetic experimentation, and they're using those superpowers to build a library.

That's it. That's the book. Mercenary librarians. I think that's pretty awesome. :)

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POSTED BY: Paul Weimer. Ubiquitous in Shadow, but I’m just this guy, you know? @princejvstin.

Interview: R.F. Kuang, author of The Burning God

photo credit: Kobi C. Felton

Congratulations to R.F. Kuang, for her Astounding Award win, at the Hugo Awards last weekend.  I highly recommend watching her powerful acceptance speech, in which she talks about the stark realities of how new authors and "bright new talents" are "welcomed" into the genre.

The Burning God,  the third book in Kuang's Poppy War series, will be available this November,  which means you have plenty of time to read the first two books in the series, The Poppy War, and The Dragon Republic. The series follows an orphan named Rin, who earns her place in an elite military academy. When a brutal war lands on their doorstep, the students realize how ill prepared they are to make the decisions necessary in a war. Sure, any soldier can fight, but it takes a different kind of strength to face collective decisions and collective trauma.  When interviewed at RT Book Reviews about the first book in the series, she said of The Poppy War: "I chose to write a fantasy reinterpretation of China's twentieth century, because that was the kind of story I wasn't finding on bookshelves".

For those of you who are caught up on the series and eagerly awaiting The Burning God, you can look forward to untrustworthy political allies, Rin's return to her roots, and the difference between who wields the power versus where the power actually lies.  This last installment in the trilogy promises to be an emotionally brutal experience for readers. The gorgeous cover art for all three books was done by the incomparable JungShan Chang, whose ink artwork could easily inspire a thousand more novels.

Kuang took the time to answer my questions about her writing process,  the pressure of writing this last installment, her future projects,  her interest in diaspora literature and translation studies, and more. You can learn more about Kuang by visiting her website RFKuang.com  or following her on twitter, where she is @kuangrf.  She has been nominated for the Nebula, the Locus, and the World Fantasy award, has won the Astounding Award, and The Poppy War won the Crawford Award and the Compton Crook Award for Best First Novel.

spoiler alert:  While this interview does not contain any spoilers, I can not guarantee the same for the articles and websites I have provided links to.

(this interview was conducted prior to her Astounding win,  which is why mention of the award and the acceptance speech is absent from our conversation)

NOAF: When you first started outlining and writing The Poppy War, did you know how the trilogy would end?

R.F. Kuang: Yes, I knew the ending before I knew the beginning. I always come up with the ending first. I'm a pantser rather than a plotter, but I can't get started on a story unless I know where it's all going; I need to give some direction to the story engine. I've been picturing the final scene in my mind for years and years, so it's a relief to finally get it down on paper. So yes, I actually always conceived of The Poppy War as just the prequel material to the stuff I really wanted to write.

NOAF: You wrote The Poppy War when you were nineteen. How has your writing style, and your writing goals, changed since then, if at all?

R.F.K: Probably the most positive change is that I don't sound like a teenager anymore. I think my writing has matured simply because I've matured. I've (hopefully) gotten rid of a lot of the tell-tale younger writer quirks. I've worked very hard at my craft through a combinations of workshops (I can't recommend Odyssey enough), craft books (have currently acquired Wonderbook, edited by Jeff VanderMeer under enthusiastic recommendations), and reading everything I can get my hands on. I'd like to think my prose has gotten sharper and leaner in the past five years.

My writing goals haven’t changed–all I want is to write great books that lots of people read. But I have found myself moving away from epic fantasy. The next project, set in Victorian Oxford, is more of an alternate history, and the project after that will likely be a contemporary thriller. Maybe I'll come back to fantasy at this point; I'm just getting a bit tired of it at this point in my career. I'm ready to stretch my wings and see what else I can do.

NOAF: You mentioned in an interview you did at Tor.com that the "whole trilogy has been about cycles of violence, abuse, and responses to trauma".  Was writing this trilogy emotionally taxing for you?

R.F.K: Of course it was.

NOAF: Across the whole series, who has been your favorite character to write?

R.F.K: This answer changes every time I give it. I've become so fond of all my main characters' voices; it feels like they've really become a part of me. In The Burning God, I think I had the most fun writing Master Jiang's scenes. Some of them were extremely fraught and complicated, but others were so lighthearted and funny. I think he's the character with the most radically different sides (literally), so balancing those shifts in personality was challenging in a very fun way.

NOAF: Without giving too many spoilers, can you tell us which scene was the most fun to write? Which scene was the hardest to write?

R.F.K.: The last scene was the hardest to write by far. Aside from the obvious emotional heft, there was just a lot of pressure. This is what I've been building up to for three years, so of course I wanted to get it absolutely right. It's also a rather complicated scene – a lot of emotions shift in a short period of time, and the characters have to make incredibly difficult decisions – so it took a lot of tries to get right on a technical, craft level. Once I was structurally satisfied with it, I still spent months poring over every last sentence, particularly the dialogue. It was difficult to write and difficult to let it go.

NOAF: You're currently pursuing a MSC in Contemporary Chinese Studies at Oxford. "Contemporary Chinese Studies" sounds, um, huge and nearly all encompassing. Do you have a particular focus? Why did you choose that as your focus?

R.F.K.: Well, Contemporary Chinese Studies is just the name of the program. I focus on modern Chinese literature. Right now, I'm working on a thesis on Chinese sf novels by Liu Cixin and Chen Qiufan, focusing on the ways they deal with the anxieties about colonial modernity. I don't know if sf will remain my focus when I transition to doing my PhD, but generally I'm interested in diaspora literature, translation studies, and representations of war and violence.

NOAF: Thank you so much for doing this interview, and congratulations again on your Astounding Award!

POSTED BY: Andrea Johnson lives in Michigan with her husband and too many books. She can be found on twitter, @redhead5318 , where she posts about books, food, and assorted nerdery.

Microreview [Book]: Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Mexican Gothic asks for your patience and rewards you with gut-punches.

Mexican Gothic is a serpent of a novel that slithers through its proceedings. It takes it’s time as it moves with a predatory glint in its eye, looking like it’s ready to strike until it doesn’t, and you’re left with paralyzing dread, waiting for the attack to finally come. And it sloughs its skin again and again, continuously giving you a new outlook of what it looks like as you wonder when it’s finally going to stop and you can see its eventual form. It’s a slow burn with a petrifying veneer covering something even more terrifying.

The novel begins with protagonist Noemi Taboada, a young socialite who receives a distressing message from her cousin, Catalina, in which she speaks of being haunted by preternatural forces. Concerned for her mental health, Noemi travels to High Place - the quintessentially Gothic abode that Catalina moved into after marrying Virgil – to find out what is going on.

But High Place domiciles more than just Virgil and Catalina. Almost all of the members of Virgil’s family – the Doyles– live within. There’s Francis, Virgil’s softhearted, sensitive brother—Florence, the older, stern, and no-nonsense cousin—and Howard, the invalid, quiet, near-putrefying uncle. There’s an ineffable sense of connection between the family that feels stronger than a familial bond, but hard to put your finger on what exactly that is until later reveals. And moving in an out of the story unobtrusively are the compliant, one-dimensional servants whose lack of personality adds to the foreboding atmosphere.

Atmosphere is something Mexican Gothic relies on during its slow build, and Silvia Moreno-Garcia incorporates a familiar dread endemic to the genre, while also deviating away from its dreary trappings and static moments in which the novel could be aimlessly going around in circles. While Mexican Gothic may be the antithesis of an action-packed thriller, the moments in which it moves at a slow pace are infused with dynamic dread. Some Gothic novels tread water in a placid lake, while Mexican Gothic treads water in a stormy sea with sharks and piranhas circling around you, as your heart races and sweat beads.

Another horror trope that it uses skillfully are dream sequences. A lot of horror novels use dream sequences to pepper the story with shocking imagery that bears no import to the themes or plot. But every single dream sequence in Mexican Gothic either foreshadows or fills in information for the story. Even a couple dream sequences that may seem pointless at first will reveal itself to cleverly hint at or build on the secrets of the novel.

Covering a story in a location like High Place where often mist envelops the area, robbing it of vivacity, is a liability to overfilling your story with dreariness. But Mexican Gothic’s rich color palette comes more from the characters than the setting. Each character keeps the story alive, whether it be through endearing sensitivity, biting and witty remarks, or full-forced malevolence. Every major character is fully-drawn and distinctive as they bounce off each other in ways that will make you vacillate from feeling sympathy to distrust to dread for almost all of them.

Images of an ouroboros eating its own tail is a motif in Mexican Gothic. Family figuratively eat each other in this novel—over-relying on each other to a degree that breaches conventional boundaries. Characters kind of eat other in ferocious ways, as they attack in the confines of High Place—like an ouroboros has circled around them, trapping them, and they’re forced to tolerate each other in a confined, irritating place. But Mexican Gothic offers shreds of hope that when you’re confined, feeling unable to escape your situation, there are morsels of good and handholds to pull you out of there. Mexican Gothic may slough off its skin constantly, like a serpent, but through portraying fully-formed humanity,  it doesn’t reject the idea that its final skin will look less dreary and hopeless as the setting of a Gothic novel.

The Math

Baseline Score: 8/10

Bonuses: +1 For having some of the most well-written sentences I’ve read this year.

+1 For having crippling (in the best horror-like way) character development and emotional complexity.

Negatives: -1 It’s not quite as scary as it could be.

Nerd Coefficient: 9/10

POSTED BY: Sean Dowie - Screenwriter, stand-up comedian, lover of all books that make him nod his head and say, "Neat!

Reference: Moreno-Garcia, Silvia. Mexican Gothic [Del Rey, 2020]