Shifting Reality by Patty Jensen

Shifting Reality was a surprise for me. I downloaded some samples from Amazon and was flicking through them when I was abruptly hooked by Patty Jansen.

The story bolts out of the gate right from the first word. No waffling, no info dumps, the technology neatly outlined within a few paragraphs. Within the first chapter, the world has already taken shape along with the character's place within it. You know her priorities, the pressures she's under and her relationships with other people. Better yet, you care.

It's the kind of opening I love. That feeling like you've just harpooned a whale and forgotten the rope wrapped around your leg. That feeling of 'I guess I have no choice now, I'm following this through to the end'.

Melati is a teacher within the New Jakarta space station, assigned to oversee fast-grown clone soldiers. When one of her charges makes an incredible claim, she must solve a mystery of identity theft and murder against a background of war. She's hampered by class clashes between decks and two cultures that would both like her to shut up and stop pointing out the obvious.

Melati is a brilliant protagonist. She has a sharp moral compass that won't allow her to overlook wrongdoing, but she's not standing on any soapboxes. She lives in a morally gray world and accepts it. The times she speaks up or intervenes she is completely within reason to do so, such her uncle knowingly serving human traffickers at his restaurant despite Melati being a former victim of theirs. Which makes it all the more frustrating when people tell her she's overreacting.

In a way, she's like Steve Rogers if he was female, dark-skinned and Muslim. Stripped of the privileges of Roger's gender, race and religion, Melati makes similar refusals to back down from what she knows is right, but the world isn't half as prepared to listen. And she doesn't have the option of punching anyone in the face.

The twists and turns of the story can occasionally be difficult to follow, but for the most part is clear. My only real criticism is that the antagonist/s (?) comes out of nowhere. There is some set up, but it doesn't make for a particularly satisfying pay-off. However it's implied that this will be explored further in the sequel, so I'm happy.

Shifting Reality is accessible, well-written science fiction that balances fantastic flights of imagination with real-world issues. The characters are human and relateable, even when their actions are silly or distasteful, and the plot will suck you in from the word 'go'. Whether you like a good mystery or a good sci-fi, this is the book for you.

"Words, words, words. No one ever did anything. They just made promises." 

Movie Review - Undead

Here's a link to another movie review I wrote recently (this time within the correct genre for this blog! Yay!)

I will never get tired of this film. If you like low budget zombie films and the uniquely Aussie sense of humor, Undead is for you.

http://www.thereelword.net/hidden-gem-undead-2003/

Liquid Gold by Tansy Rayner Roberts

It's not often sequels can live up to the original. Fortunately for Tansy Rayner Roberts, Liquid Gold is one of them.

Her original novel Splashdance Silver gleefully embraced high fantasy tropes. Liquid Gold does the same, but starts to move ever so slightly into science fiction territory, adding a splash of time travel into the mix. I personally prefer the original, but it's like the difference between Tim-Tams and Maltesers - they're both chocolate so I'm hardly going to bitch about it.

The novel begins with the accidental (or not) death of Kassa Daggersharp. Her motley crew split off in separate directions, Aragorn to contemplate life not magically bound to a crazy pirate wench, Tippet to pursue his career as a bard, and Daggar to follow a scary blonde mercenary that has stolen something of world-destroying significance.

The real backbone of this story is Daggar and his blonde mercenary. She feels like she should be the main character of her own novel (Roberts, if you ever read this, yes that is a request) and has great chemistry with Daggar. As always, snark and banter is where Roberts' characters shine and there's a vast cast of quirky personas to love.

Where the story sags, unexpectedly, is Kassa and Aragorn. Aragorn's storyline has a touch too much angst and Kassa's is a touch too ridiculous. While both elements were always present in Splashdance Silver, Liquid Gold doesn't quite balance them properly. More importantly, the main villain doesn't quite live up to Talle's level of stylish evil, although to be scrupulously fair, no one could match that conniving glossy-haired gem of villainy.

I guess I was just hoping to learn more about Kassa and Talle's mutual grudge, so I can finish my smutty slash fanfic - I mean, um, get answers, about the mysterious grudge between these two fascinating characters. Still, despite the lack of Talle, Liquid Gold is still a fun romp through crazy world I love very much.

"The gods can cope with individual atheists, but they take it personally when they start forming committees."

The Alien Says Don't Take Your Meds by Tansy Raynor Roberts

http://uncannymagazine.com/article/the-alien-says-dont-take-your-meds-neurodiversity-and-mental-health-treatment-in-tv-sff/

I love this article. It articulates an issue I've been peripherally aware of, but couldn't quite put my finger on. The metaphor of magical people (generally women) being diagnosed as crazy and locked away is relevant metaphor, because sadly that did happen back in the day when someone was an embarrassment or inconvenience.

However these days when attitudes to mental health issues are so different, we need to have more than one kind of interpretation - particularly when the above metaphor implicitly implies that these issues don't exist. Frankly it's dangerous for kids that absorb this idea and disrespectful for the people who live with these issues day in and out. Few things enrage me as much as seeing the 'powerful' moment onscreen when a character throws away their medication, like Erik Selvig in Thor 2. (In all seriousness, it can be dangerous to stop flat without a 'weaning off' period, particularly in regards to medication for anxiety or depression).

I'm not saying the supernatural can't be an interesting story-telling device (otherwise I wouldn't be working on this blog!), just that there's on over-abundance of the supernatural-diagnosed-as-crazy metaphor. Try something new. The British Being Human series is a perfect example, where vampirism is a metaphor for addiction, the werewolf faces the same issues as a person with HIV, and the ghost behaves like an agrophobic just coming out of an abusive relationship. It doesn't always work perfectly (I can see where critics of Mitchell's third season storyline are coming from) but it delves into the very human question of how you move forward after a horrific, life-changing event.

I love Tansy Raynor Roberts for her Mocklore and Creature Court series, but this is the first I've seen of her work that isn't straight-out fiction. I think I'll find out what else she's written...

Movie Review - The Jammed

For those of you interested (who am I kidding, you're not) I also do movie reviews and other articles on the website The Reel Word.

Here's my review of The Jammed, a grim little film about the Australian human trafficking industry. No fantasy or escapism here, I'm afraid.

http://www.thereelword.net/hidden-gem-the-jammed/

Great Zoo of China by Matthew Reilly

I was really trying not to do this. I did not want to review this book.

The Great Zoo of China is just... bad. Really, really bad.

Like the worst rip-off of Jurassic Park you've ever read, but with a  half-arsed attempt at dragons instead of dinosaurs. And not in a fun I-know-this-is-crap-but-I'm-going-to-have-fun-with-it-anyway. More like Matthew Reilly pitched this idea to his publisher when he was drunk, and then had to write it sober to a deadline that kept getting pushed forward, and the stress killed whatever love he had for the material, and he would have stopped but his kitchen really needed a renovation... You get the idea.

To be honest, I don't care that the human characters are flat and one-dimensional. In a story like this, they're just walking meat puppets. They're only around long enough to die gruesomely. But the one thing that should have been developed coherently are the dragons.

Unfortunately the story can't decide what metaphor it's exploring. Jurassic Park's dinosaurs, depending on whether you go by the book or movie, were either an exploration of the dangers of technology or the consequences of not applying technology wisely. The Great Zoo of China is initially similar, then sort of devolves into a weird "don't use dangerous dragons as cuddly theme park attractions, except for the good dragons, they're okay" space-whale aesop.

The sad part is Reilly completely missed the interesting point, which was "holy crap, they're knowingly enslaving intelligent life!" No wonder the dragons were so uptight. If I were a carnivorous ancient reptile forced to perform circus trips for barely evolved creatures I'd have eaten back in the good old days, you bet I'd be up for some carnage.

By neatly sidestepping all the tricky, interesting questions like 'how do you deal with sentient life with a legit grudge, blue-and-orange morality, and really big teeth' the book loses a lot of its oomph. It felt like someone was trying to mash a creature feature and a junior high school fantasy novel together. The two tones just don't mesh. If Reilly were going to take inspiration for dragons, he should have used something more sophisticated than Eragon.

*Re-reading last paragraph.* Wow, that was really mean. I never thought I'd compare anything to Eragon.

Okay, I take it back. He should have used something other than Dragonriders of Pern. Maybe The Hobbit or Liveship Traders. Both use intelligent dragons that are indifferent or opposed to humankind and have tones that would fit better into the creature-feature that Great Zoo of China desperately wants to be. In the words of Matthew Reilly himself:-

       "A monster movie is only as good as the monster in it."

Short Story Recommendations

And just for something different, here are some short stories. Both are available free online (links below) and are set in Australia.

Reading Coffee by Anthony Panegyres - Mixes history with superstition. A young girl with the ability to foresee death watches events unfold in Kalgoorlie 1916 (anyone who knows much about Australian history may already be spoiled).

Brisneyland by Night by Angela Slatter. Urban fantasy set in Brisbane! A half-breed Weyrd investigates the disappearance of children.