Smoke - Dan Vyleta

Smoke is a new fantasy novel by Dan Vyleta. It’s set in a world with certain similarities to the Britain of the Victorian era; however, in this world, a user’s aggressive or negative thoughts and actions are made visible, through the medium of the mysterious ‘Smoke’.

The world consciously evokes Dickensian literary heritage. There’s pastoral green hills, lined with the arrogant offspring of the nobility. There’s small towns, filled with vice and danger, traps for the unwary. And then there’s London, a hive of scum and villainy, wreathed in smoke – and in Smoke. This substance both displays an individual’s lack of moral fibre, and encourages it – as a physical manifestation of darker impulses, when breathed in, it can heighten those impulses. This means that a society is in place in which the nobility rule with a visible moral rectitude – after years of training in finishing schools, they are at least nominally, sufficient paragons of virtue that they do not Smoke. This validates their control of the country – when the urban factory workers and fieldhands, struggling with their own visible small evils, see a man walk through them with a white shirt, unmarked by sin – then they have no intellectual space to argue against divine right, or over oppression.

Sections of the book take place in one of the finishing schools for noble sons, and the prose here is reminiscent of Thomas Hughes, with a harder edge. There’s ritual here, the comforting traditions of day to day life. There’s also casual brutality, entitlement, and a well concocted feeling of conformance to the social order. In other words, this is a school for scions, and privilege permeates the very air, seeping off the page at the reader.

Overall, this is a closed Britain, one with a quiet system of oppression, and a firmly inward, self-referential focus. It’s well (and chillingly) drawn, whilst remaining familiar – with fascinating differences.

The characters are something else again. We follow, in the main, two unlikely friends. One is seemingly quiet, reserved, even withdrawn – a measure of perfection in a world where Smoke is always a danger to one’s social standing.  He’s also friendly, and eminently likable – and a perfect foil to his friend. The latter struggles with a complex home life, and a difficult emotional legacy – sitting atop a carefully constrained fountain of rage, always on the edge of letting it loose. Vyleta shows us a boy becoming a man – or perhaps a monster, it’s hard to say. Watching his fears as the black anger rises up internally, the feeling of release in violence and despair is a kind of joy, tinged with concern. Vyleta has given us an excellent portrayal of a duo bonded together by happenstance, but magnetically drawn together. In their petty guilts, unwise risk taking, in their innocence and the loss of it, they are heartbreakingly familiar, and cunningly crafted protagonists – and thoroughly entertaining.

The plot begins as a standard schoolboy yarn, of sorts, a tale of little triumphs, victories in the schoolyard, the agony of defeat in teenage antagonisms. But it gradually broadens the field, leaving the school behind for the houses of the wealthy and their politics, and the raw dangers of larger cities. There’s a slow burn on this one, a sense of impending avalanche as our heroes chase their way across the country, torn between a broader conspiracy and the intimate dangers following them from their school. There’s social commentary here, and a smidgen of wonderfully awkward romance. There’s world-changing science and some wonderful moral moments mixed in as well.

Is it worth reading? I think so. It’s very original, taking a small change and running with it to create a vivid, fully formed world, with well developed players and a plot which, if sometimes rather slow, is very compelling. Definitely worth a look. 

The Reapers Are The Angels - Alden Bell

This book is many things at once: a character study, a journey novel, a post apocalyptic adventure. The last of these is probably the best place to start. The text is set in an America a generation after a Night of the Living Dead-style event; Cities are shattered. Government is non-existent. Hordes of the dead are roaming the earth in a cannibalistic frenzy. Uninfected survivors are holed up in fortified enclaves, or travelling (carefully) between them. The setting is familiar, the timing less so - the portrayal of younger characters who have known nothing but this shattered world is well done, and the older characters memories of a kinder world are delicately dropped into the context around them - emphasising the state of the remnants in which they now find themselves.

However, this is not Resident Evil style novel, full of characters lurching from one danger to another, constantly in danger of being devoured. Rather than making the infected threat explicit, they are typically used as background, to ground the actions of characters in this new world. While the rise of the infected has created a new form of society, they are shown in the text more as a fact of life (like hurricanes, or flash floods), an unreasoning force which must be dealt with, rather than a vibrant, close range threat. This is not a novel where the heroic female protagonist saves the earth from a zombie horde, or even escapes from it. The time period forces us into a new mould, where the characters must integrate the reality of infected into their lives, and societies.

In another way, this text is a journey novel. Specifically, it follows the travels of a young woman named Temple, as she attempts to escape a pursuer with murder in mind. Whilst the pursuit itself is interesting and tense enough, the real colour here comes from the characters and situations that Temple encounters as she travels across this more desolate America. Rich survivors, holed up in a compound with electric fences and dark secrets, bizarre mutants, a fortified train...each is marvellously portrayed, and helps draw the reader into this unique world. Rather than "World War Z", the text puts me in mind of Steinbeck, particularly "The Grapes of Wrath", and "Of Mice and Men". It isn't plot driven per se, but sets out to show the reader a world, and the characters and ways of life embedded within that world. The journey is clever, the settings excellent; the characters are believable, and, to some degree, disturbing. In each case, they are very well portrayed.

Finally, this can be seen as a character piece, a study of the interactions between Temple, a girl who is never entirely sure who she is, and her companions and nemeses. I won't go into detail here, for fear of spoiling the plot, but will say that Temple's struggles with her past are excellent, her actions and reactions drawn from a central character which is consistently and marvellously portrayed. The text is written in her voice, laconic, sharp, effective - a narrative which, in its structure, emphasises the character it surrounds.
To summarise, this is an excellent book. A character study where the characters are believable, if perhaps not always sympathetic, a journey novel where the travel - both internal and external - and setting are excellently portrayed; a post apocalyptic adventure with enough zombies for anybody - though perhaps not occupying the same position in the text as they do in books like "I Am Legend".

This book sets out to do a great many things, and does them all well. I was drawn in and wrung out by it, and enjoyed it immensely. Well worth it.

The Demi-Monde: Winter - Rod Rees

The Demi-Monde: Winter is a text which is defined by its setting. Fortunately, that setting is quite clever. If you read the back of the book (or the `Back of book' text on Amazon) and were put off, you might want to give it another look. I'm glad I did.

Essentially, the Demi-Monde of the text is a virtual simulation, constructed and populated by the military, with 30 million virtual people (or `Dupes'), and architected to simulate a perpetual state of war, through population pressure, resource scarcity, political extremism and various other factors; the most notable of these is the `seeding' of the setting with several high-functioning `dictator' personalities, which have risen to control their respective areas of the Demi-Monde simulation. Essentially, the Demi-Monde is a simulated hell, populated by millions of suffering normal individuals, and led by the worst minds of human history.

However, something has gone wrong; the means of entry into this virtual world have been locked down. The few soldiers inside captured and used unspeakably, unable to wake up and return to reality; and somehow, the US President's daughter has wandered inside, and disappeared. The protagonist is a female jazz singer, selected by necessity, who is sent to retrieve this missing daughter and get them both out of the Demi-Monde.

Oddly enough, I didn't come to the text expecting much; the idea of a virtual world ruled by psychopaths seemed a little off-the wall, a pastiche version of Tad Williams `Otherland'. The conceit of the President's daughter being lost gave it something of a `24' feel - it sounded, really, a little silly. But somehow, it works. The protagonist is well written, given strong views and a forceful personality, but not imbued with any special talents. Her motives are convincing, and internal dialogue consistent.

The supporting cast, both real and `dupes' are equally well done. Many of them are deeply unpleasant people, as befits the setting, and they act that way - though usually with some self-justifying pragmatism. Interestingly, the reader finds themselves invested in the `dupe' characters, despite the fact that they aren't real, at about the same rate as the protagonist. By the end of the text, each of the characters is `real', and we care about their fates, even though we are told that they are simple simulations. Interestingly, several of the characters maintain fairly solid personae through the text, but others develop in interesting, unexpected, and appropriate ways.

The plotting is excellent; laced with twists, turns, and unexpected circumstances. The fast-paced prose gives it the feel of a thriller, and the well-drawn series of events makes it a good one. Perhaps my only complaint is the overuse of capitalisation in the middle of Dem-Monde concepts (for example, one of the dominant political creeds is UnFunDamentalism). A few of these make up amusing puns, but after a while, I just wanted to get through a page without any capitalisation - still this is a minor niggle.

Overall, the central conceit is interesting, with enough variations on the familiar `virtual world' theme to make it unique. The world itself is intriguing, the characters well drawn, the dialogue snappy and the plot fast and furious, making for an excellent debut. The Demi Monde does not disappoint.

Kojiki - Keith Yatsuhashi

Kojiki is the first in a new series by Keith Yatsuhashi. It suggests a world in which some of the older forces of Japanese legend, the kami and associated myths, are real – some of them sitting behind the scenes in our modern day. They struggle to control a disaster they unleashed on the world, one which could destroy everything if it broke free. As the text opens, that disaster is straining to be unleashed.

The world is our own, familiar in many ways. Modern Tokyo seethes with activity, and the cap of Mount Fuji towers in the popular imagination. People live and work, and in some cases, go on historical tours. The author shows us a land filled with people similar to the reader, just going about their day to day lives. It’s drawn broadly, but with sufficient style that I was able to picture it vividly. Alongside this mostly familiar geography, however, sits one entirely separate. There exist manifestations of elements – air, water spirit, earth, fire – who were once involved in a titanic struggle, which broke the world, and reshaped it into its current form. They live in a space of concept and memory, drawing disciples to them, in a half-world, a liminal space intersecting only marginally with what we think of as real. There are castles in the air, delicate battlements drifting in a breeze. A sturdy rock guardian, shaping and breaking the earth when required. Serried ranks of samurai-disciples, ready to fight and die for their elemental ruler. There’s some wonderfully imaginative set pieces here – volcanic fires, devastated cities, the struggle between elemental s played out against a backdrop of modernity. I would have liked to have delved deeper into the half-world (though there are some rather hefty infodumps throughout) – we see some of how the current situation was created in flashbacks, but there’s a rich mine of mythos here to be excavated – perhaps later books will put it on display.

The characters suffer a little against their backdrops. We’re given a protagonist who enters this strange world of the supernatural at the same time as the reader, and her acclimatisation to this world goes hand in hand with our own. But whilst we’re sat alongside her, I never quite felt that I got to know Keiko. She’s smart, cautious, and occasionally funny. But what drives her to excel, what gives her passion and informs the decisions she makes? This is alluded to gently, over the course of the text, but it needed to be looked at in more depth, I think, some meat put over the bones of the character. She’s perfectly readable, but never quite feels real. The same is true of several of the kami. They seem defined by their elements, and have character traits on display, but we can’t get at the details that define them. Some of this is resolved in flashbacks, again, but glimpses of the past don’t give the characters as a whole enough heft. The exception is the nominal villain, the fire lord – a tormented figure, driven to madness, and defined by love. Here is a complex, well drawn antagonist, one moment a beast, the next displaying noble motives and a mind like a steel trap. His journey, and resolution, bring the characters up considerably – they’re defined in their interctions with what they oppose, and why, and it feels like this struggling, tragic figure is the lynchpin of the narrative.

The plot – well, it starts with a bang, It felt a little confusing in the early stages, as we followed our protagonist in being drenched with information and context, trying to get up to speed. There’s a slow burn happening after a frantic start, but once ti gets going, it’s easy to become invested in the battles between dragons, the fire and ice, the shadow warriors crawling out of woodwork, and so on. There’s a stutter between the slower segments and the rapid-fire action – but the latter is very well done, and the former work well enough as well. Certainly by the end I was flippinmg apges to see what happened, and that’s never a bad thing. It has the florid style mixed with the gently personal touch of a good manga. If you’re in the mood for a unique spin on fantasy, a space where dragons and elementals war with each other over broken Tokyo – then this book is worth your time.

Black Halo - Sam Sykes

Black Halo is the second in Sam Syke’s  ‘Aeons Gate’ series. It’s got a serious amount of action n kicking off, but there’s also some character development there – less openly, but over the narrative course of the text.

The environment – ah, this is one Sykes does well. There’s a steaming jungle here, an island of death and life intermingled. Quite which one it will be for the protagonists is left open. Still,  you can feel the steam pouring off the broad leaves, the surf pounding away in a perpetual mixture of rage and disappointment. It’s a small, contained world – and it’s in reaching outside of those constraints, physically and mentally, that our characters develop. Still, the author gives us the fever-ridden hellholes of a thousand nightmares, a tepid swamp begging for disaster – and then successfully walks it back. Perhaps the local e is not one of death and despair, but delight – reminiscent of Odysseus’s travels, here is a place which may kill with madness or with kindness

Anyway, something the author does well is shape his environment – horrifying as it may be. The transitions between paradise and hellscape are delicately, convincingly done, the reader’s perceptions following the characters. There’s a sense of remoteness, and a sense of place – where the story takes place feels real.

The characters remain as diverse and broadly unlikable as ever. One of the perpetual surprises of this series is that the adventurers don’t simply turn on each other in a swift bloodbath. In part this is due to the outside pressures they encounter, which keep them facing outward rather than inward with their penchant for violence – but there’s also some interesting group dynamics at work. I particularly enjoyed the burgeoning but problematic romance between Lenk and Kataria – the latter being part of a species that wants nothing more than the total annihilation of the ‘disease’ that is humanity. It makes for some awkward conversations, mostly with one trying not to murder the other. In amongst the backdrop of seething dislike, this is actually a really strong character piece. There’s characters in a crisis of faith, desperately trying to shape their value system. The aforementioned semi-murderous cross-species romance. A dragonman working out what it means to be the last of his kind, and whether it’s better or worse to just kill people instead. Villains with philosophical outlooks on freedom, choice nd the mentality of humanity which demand atrocious actions.

In short, it’s good stuff.

The plot – well, it’s actually rather slow for some time, a gradual buildup akin to boiling a frog in a pot. That said, the buildup is interesting, with a slowly growing sense of dread – and some genuinely exciting set-piece moments between character building. The conclusion is legitimately excellent, tying together the existing strands of narrative to  create a convincing crescendo.

Is it worth looking at? Well, it’s a solid follow up to the earlier Tome of the Undergates. The pacing felt uneven to me, and the characters often actively unlikable – but the setting was convincing, and those characters, if difficult to like, were certainly believable. The plot is a slow burn which pays off – so I’d say it’s worth approaching if you’re already invested in the series. Otherwise, try the first book in the sequence. 

The Fat Years - Chan Koonchung

The Fat Years is a multifaceted commentary on a near future China, which is largely indistinguishable from the modern variant confronting readers today. Due to an unparalleled economic crash, this China is now entering a period of massive growth, and acting out its apparent destiny as the world's latest superpower. Against this background of economic prosperity, a variety of themes and ideas are cast. First, there is the mystery plot, featured in the book blurb - a month appears to be missing from the collective memory of the Chinese, and none of them seem especially concerned by it; a few individuals seem to remember the events of this `missing month' and attempt to investigate what has occurred. The pacing here is deliberate, but the central conceit is quite clever. A word of warning: some of the key `mystery' details are accidentally revealed in the preface. Whilst the preface is fascinating, and worth a read, I'd recommend looking at it as an epilogue instead.

There is also a gentle romance plot playing out between several protagonists; it's slow, pleasant, and mature, and a thoroughly rewarding read. It served as a wonderful counter to the more popular `whirlwind romance' plots going around at the moment. Each of the participants has their own humanity and fragility exposed, and the prose that does this is wonderfully executed.

Balanced against both of these plots, and interweaving with them, are themes and commentaries on the state of this `future' China. The most easily accessible is the apparent complacency of the future Chinese population, who seem to accept with little argument that China is the best place in the world - even as local courts are forced to meet quota's for executions. There is something of a parallel to the late British Empire here, which may be intentional; the contrast between late-stage Imperialism and the future state of Communism is startling more for the similarities than the differences.

Our main protagonists are, by and large liberal (by the standards of their society), and the political message is less of a subtext in this book than an overarching theme. But the reader isn't left to suffer through polemic; whilst there are arguments presented about the intrusion of the state, the potential loss of liberty and civil rights, the author is careful to project several opposing viewpoints, arguments for stability over total freedom, arguments for pragmatism and economic success over a devotion to minority ideals. These certainly make interesting reading, from both sides, even if one is presented a little more sympathetically.

This isn't a political screed, but it is a highly politicised text, with the rumblings of policy, decisions, and philosophical musings pervading the fabric of the world that the author presents us - and it is all the better for that. `The Fat Years' isn't the easiest read, but it is extremely intriguing, and well worth the time invested. Try it - just be prepared to grapple with different societal mores and conceptualisations. And remember to read the preface last!

Half a War - Joe Abercrombie

Half a War is the conclusion to Joe Abercrombie’s ‘Shattered Sea’ series. It’s wrapping up a saga of revenge, blood, love and honour. In short, it manages to do so in a thoughtfully thrilling, compelling fashion.

There’s a new protagonist for this volume, Princess Skara. Originally a member of the elite, she becomes the victim of tragedy, forced on the run after the death of her family at the hands of the High King’s troops. Skara initially comes off as frail and terrified, a teenager with broken moorings, trying to find a feeling of sanity in a world which is now swirling out of control. Over the course of the text, though, she finds a path to becoming something else. Skara has charisma, a way with words, and moves from being fragile to near-ruthlessness. She’s become aware very quickly of the brutally final consequences of trust and failure in this world, and takes steps to armour herself against it, and to find her own revenge. Abercrombie manages this gradual transition masterfully, keeping Skara sympathetic as she slowly moves into a pragmatic ruler, her external actions not displaying the conflict in her heart, visible to the reader. She’s not got the furious energy of Thorn from the previous book, fighting with charisma and words rather than iron, but they share a lethal sense of focus.

Alongside Skara we spend time in the company of Raith. Raith begins as a sword-bearer, but becomes involved with Princess Skara. He’s a seething ball of rage, a fist looking for a face to bunch. A berserker, a killer, and also a very damaged boy, trying to become a man – though never sure what sort of man he’d like to be. Raith prevents a face to the world, as Skara does, a nice parallel between the power of words and the power of blood. He also looks to Skara, in some ways, as a means of indicating what the right thing to do is, an interesting compromise of the moral imperative, given her own internal conflicts. Raith is Skara’s mailed fist, willing, even eager, to fight and fight and maybe, one day, die. But he’s also struggling with loyalties, to his new master, and to his old – and that conflict feels like it may rip him open.

There’s some old favourites on display as well. Father Yarvi is in full on plotting-mode, spinning byzantine schemes out of thin air, to the despair of his enemies. Mother Wexen’s shadow falls across the conflict, a woman, like Yarvi, determined to do what she thinks she must. Thorn Bathu reaves and murders, and comes home to a husband standing in the light. As a supporting cast, they benefit from having been protagonists – and it’s a joy to catch up with them again as things move to a conclusion.

Narratively, that conclusion is rather well done. There’s some absolutely top class siege scenes. Abercrombie has always known how to bring out the visceral terror and ecstasy of warfare, and wrap it into the larger context. The politics here is tense, the prose a complex and taut web of words. 

There’s a sense that the right word, or the wrong one, could bring everything crashing down. We see these characters that have been our friends or enemies over the course of the series, as they reach their ends – and it’s heartwarming in some cases, heart-breaking in others. But it’s always valid and genuine, the emotion from their closings as real as a fresh wound, and as undeniable. By the end, the situation in the Shattered Sea feels settled – at least for now – and we’re left to wonder what could happen next.

Is it worth reading? Absolutely. As a conclusion to a series, it ends well, with great characterisation, a plot contemplative when it needs to be, but willing to give out its fair ration of fast-paced action, in a world that’s always been a pleasure to be involved with. So yes, if you’ve come this far, then this is a conclusion that you’ll want to read.