Of Monsters and Mainframes by Barbara Truelove
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I truly didn't know I needed this in my life, but here I am, chuckling after a neat read.

It's PART Chambers-cozy, but that's only later on. Mostly, it's an outright creature-feature movie from the lowest budget B days where Abbot and Costello meet the mummy, Dracula and the werewolf.

Of course... with a very sharp space-opera supercomputer AI PoV twist.

Me, I was just hoping it'd turn out to be a cool hacking meets survival horror type book, but it became something really delightful and more complex than that.

Ghost ship, indeed. :)

I can't say I'd want to see a bunch of knock-off novels in this vein, mind you, because it MIGHT get really old in the wrong hands. But in Truelove's hands? If she wrote a whole SERIES of this, with these wonderful characters, I'd gobble them up until we hit two dozen of them... AT LEAST.

As it is, I'm STILL enjoying some light-hearted chuckles in memory of quite a few of the events in the novel. That's precious to me.

This book's synesthesia would have to be a bit of rough but comfortable fur under my fingers and a bit of ozone in the air.


Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to requests. Just direct message me in goodreads or email me on my site. I'd love to get some eyes on my novels.

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Ringworld by Larry Niven
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Something like my fourth read of this book.

The first time I read it was way back in the '80s and I was simply thrilled for any kind of big-concept, awe-inducing SF, whether it was a Hugo or Nebula winner or not. Of course, this one was, and it remains one of the greats.

Maybe by the second or third time reading it, I was wondering if I should feel a bit weird about the psycho-sexual dynamics, but by now, it's no biggie. It's future, stemming from the free love culture, but at no point is it icky. Indeed, the ADVENTURE, the great alien dynamics (Puppeteers!! Woooo! Kzin! Humans!) and jaw-dropping discoveries (not just Ringworld, itself, but the enormity of a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of its exploration) and the mysteries of its limited-Dyson sphere construction.

It's funny, of course. This is the most classic example of a concept: "BDO" Big Dumb Object. Back when I heard such a thing, I thought it was awfully dismissive of the true JOY such a thing can evoke in a reader. Indeed, the idea that SOMEONE could have created such a thing--something that could hold the equivalent landmass of 3 million earths, all able to be POPULATED by humanoids--is truly jaw-dropping.

I retain my sense of awe. My imagination runs in overdrive.

Or, indeed, maybe I just feel lucky to have read it.

I miss awe in SF, but this captures it well.

This book's synesthesia is all in the heart's pounding, the excitement of discovery, the scent of sweat and exertion.


Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to requests. Just direct message me in goodreads or email me on my site. I'd love to get some eyes on my novels.

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Post Office by Charles Bukowski
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

What I expected:

Sharp satire and/or witticisms couched in brilliant prose, dark examinations of modern society with a slight absurdist flair.

What I got:

A near shaggy-dog story with tones of a Noir as it could be written as a carrier turned long-term clerk, with honestly enjoyable prose and a flippant, dissolute voice.

Not bad by a long shot, but my expectations sure as hell didn't match its execution. Of course, that's all on me.

Will I try more from this esteemed "master" of modern lit? Sure. It was, after all, pretty fun even if it turned expectations on its head. Perhaps BECAUSE it turned expectations on MY head.

This book's synesthesia is the scent of horses and booze to wash down the pain of life's many papercuts.


Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to requests. Just direct message me in goodreads or email me on my site. I'd love to get some eyes on my novels.

Arctunn.com

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Beyond Armageddon: Twenty-One Sermons to the Dead by Walter M. Miller Jr.
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I'm only reviewing "The Feast of Saint Janis" by Swanwick from this collection.

Well now. I'm filled with a bit of awe, a queasy stomach, and no little spark of rage after reading this.

But not because I hated the story. Indeed, I thought it was a true fish-out-of-water, observing another's culture in its true self-destruct mode, reflecting it right back upon us, queasy.

In that respect, it did its job perfectly.

But to see such implants, personality or otherwise, used for such a means of suicide--well, I'm shivering. Not because it's unrealistic, but because I know people living today that would LOVE a chance to go out this way, with eyes wide open.

I mean, it sure beats the hell out of a quiet death pod, right? Um... right?

I feel a bit disturbed now.

Great story, though.

This book's synesthesia is a wild scream from a good friend, a torn mask in the middle of a ball.


Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to requests. Just direct message me in goodreads or email me on my site. I'd love to get some eyes on my novels.

Arctunn.com

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Vacuum Flowers by Michael Swanwick
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I don't know whether it's Michael Swanwick or 80's lush SF in general, but this novel was a real treat. Visually and imaginatively dense, involved, and deep, it gives us a taste of living in a future that includes mini Dyson Spheres, a vast ecology of AIs (even more delicious in today's climate), and a clear Cyberpunk ethos that doesn't so much lean on punk as in its bio-social-technological implications. I always preferred that spin.

But more importantly, the novel gives us a great thread of themes based on integrity and desire--and it doesn't let us down in the slightest. You know, all those 'be careful what you wish for' threads.

I personally wish we could have more modern takes in the current SF trends that pull off worlds as rich as this, building ever more on the core themes while blowing us away with as rich SFnal worlds.

I feel blessed.

Sure, the focus on sex is, as always, a sign of the times, though less weird than the '70s breed of novels. But my honest opinion? It's mild. Certainly little in the way of chauvinism--and more in the spirit of the sexes finding their balance and/or moving on.

Either way, this novel was still a wonder to behold for anyone wanting to fall deep into their imaginations.

This book's synesthesia is a synthesis of hothouse plants and honest sweat, oddly enough.


Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to requests. Just direct message me in goodreads or email me on my site. I'd love to get some eyes on my novels.

Arctunn.com

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Ashes of Man by Christopher Ruocchio
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I don't think I'll ever get over how much I got annoyed by the first book in this series. All the name-swiping and nods to other big SF properties simply drove me OUT of the enjoyment of what, in the end, IS a proper good SF in its own right.

Fast forward to book 5, a good 3 books in where I've been grooving to the tale and characters, and I can hardly believe how much I love it NOW versus THEN.

Yes, I love it now. The pain, the reluctant heroism, the sheer scope of DUTY, memory, and loss, just makes this tale shine. I may have even teared up a little.

And the wonderful collection of baddies, of alien or mechanoid races or even proto-gods, also makes this SF shine in a different way. The action sequences are top-notch, but that's like icing to the delicious cake that carries the epic space-opera scope. Oh, the sorrow...

So yeah, I recommend. Wholeheartedly--with that other caveat.

This book's synesthesia is the sense of a deep void filled with awe and tiny pieces of cake.


Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to requests. Just direct message me in goodreads or email me on my site. I'd love to get some eyes on my novels.

Arctunn.com

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The Unmapping by Denise S. Robbins
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I honestly want to like this book more than I did. I think it was the core concept of moving buildings, always at 4 am, hopping from one location to another in the NYC (and other places), just causing a shoehorned chaos every day.

Sure, it doesn't make any sense, but that's the SURREAL for you.

So, I kinda went in thinking about having such a thing just LEAN into the surreal, think about The City and the City, or Invisible Cities, or even a bit of Borges. It could have been deep and weird and impressionistic and sometimes even a little wild--but instead we got something that went hard on the Literary SF angle, about personal lives rather going down the toilet, or just being uprooted and always just teetering on the edge of dissolution.

I frankly didn't really like any of the characters. They were either too cringey or dissolute EVEN IF I actually like long stream of consciousness writing in general. Especially when it goes deep into the woods. But, unfortunately, the novel kept trying to go in different directions.

It even attempted to nudge us toward a SF reason, and then to a mystical reason, before going the Literary Fiction direction--and all the while, all these pieces just felt SHOEHORNED in. I mean... sure, such an event would definitely call for a serious renewable energy push, would absolutely necessitate grass-roots real-people aid, but to reverse cause and effect, saying ECOLOGICAL DAMAGE would have caused the unmapping of buildings, popping up all over the place like a dream, just felt like an enormous stretch. And no, it wasn't ever confirmed in the novel, thank god, but it coming up multiple times was multiple times too many. I would have bought it if we were to just read the novel as an ALLEGORY... but the allegory stuff, if it was there, was all lost in a morass of anxiety meds and loss of selfhood.

So, great potential idea, but everything else just felt too... shoehorned, try-hard. Alas.

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