Reviews

Star Wars: The Phantom Menace was almost universally panned by fans of the original trilogy, and deservedly so. Hopes, and expectations, were high following the smashing success of the earlier films and the intervening two-decade improvement in technology. What the fans received was not what they had desired: a children’s movie that replaced many of the most popular elements with a cute kid and a racist portrayal of a repulsive amphibian.

Startide Rising picks up about 200 years after Sundiver left off. The first mostly-dolphin starship crew is assembled and sent on a survey mission. Upon finding a huge derelict fleet of unknown origin and sending a message home about it, several hostile races hound the small survey craft until she crashes in the ocean of a metal-rich waterworld. Apparently, the hostiles are all quasi-fanatical races who believe in the eventual return of the Progenitors, the race or races who began the practice of Uplift.

Brandon Sanderson’s excursion into young adult literature, Steelheart (The Reckoners) explores the world of superheroes and supervillains… or more accurately, explores a world where there is a surfeit of supervillains and absolutely no superheroes whatsoever. The world is based roughly on our own present, but with variations ranging from the surreal (supervillains ruling various cities as dictators) to the bizarre (transforming entire cities into steel, with super-moles digging vast tunnels for people to live and work within).

Valentine Michael Smith was the first human born on Mars, and shortly thereafter the crew of the first exploration vessel to Mars died, leaving the infant in the hands of Martians. As a young adult, Michael is discovered, ‘rescued’, and brought back to earth - where he unknowingly causes a storm of political turmoil by being the only living heir of a huge corporation - and the potential ‘owner’ of Mars itself.

Across known space, Humanity is a rare example of a species that achieved sentience and a starfaring civilization without the evident help of a Patron race. In the eyes of some aliens, this makes them unique; in others, it makes them outcasts. Humans have earned themselves a tenuous status in Galactic society, however, as they had already Uplifted two other races - chimpanzees and dolphins - by the time of First Contact.

Sword of Shannara has a well-deserved reputation for being a near-total imitation of Tolkein’s Lord of the Rings, with only the serial numbers filed off to aid the deception. It’s not even told particularly well. Readers are advised to skip it.

This 1990’s cyberpunk story is a victim of time and history. When originally published, nobody really knew what the internet would look like, and people could make up whatever they wanted about humans merging with machines and it would seem at least plausible. Twenty-three years later, people are pretty sure what the Internet looks like and it’s not what you find in Synners. That doesn’t make it any less interesting to consider the implications of merging the human mind with computer-augmented virtual reality.

Take a Thief is a standalone novel that functions as a biography for Skif, one of the supporting characters in Lackey’s Heralds of Valdemar series. It’s a return to a previous time in the Valdemar universe, filling out events and characters previously only hinted at. Both the characters and the events benefit from a fresh look by a writer whose skill has grown substantially since the Arrows of the Queen trilogy, and fans of the series will enjoy a look at Valdemar’s criminal underclass – something which the majority of Lackey’s books mention only in passing.

Have you ever wanted to strap yourself into a starship and light off the thrusters just to see where you would end up? Fight space pirates with your black belt in Karate while climbing the ranks aboard a merchant starship? How about just being an improbably nice fellow with the plot thoroughly on your side? Then this book will satisfy you. Just keep your suspension of disbelief handy, because you’ll need it.

Like the movie Highlander 2, fans consider Tehanu to be a novel that doesn’t exist. The original EarthSea trilogy (A Wizard of EarthSea, The Tombs of Atuan, and The Farthest Shore) represented a glorious and powerful work of fantasy literature, with depth of character and emotion, powerful themes, and a joy in the simple things that are the greatest mysteries. Tehanu is a novel written explicitly to destroy everything that was good about that trilogy.