Review of Wake Up and Dream by Ian Macleod

Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, alongside Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-four, Zamyatin's We, and Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, is one of the four horsemen of literary apocalypses. Each depicting a human-capable, dystopian evolution of society, they each extrapolate upon our reality in creating their cautionary visions. Of the four, Huxley's may be the most controversial—at least as of 2023. Highlighting the degree to which technology could penetrate the natural order of life, his book features scary but plausible scenes across the spectrum of society. One seemingly innocuous tidbit underpinning the sexual freedom of his world is the “feelies”. Cinema in which the viewers sense what the actors on screen sense (touch, smell, etc.), our version of pornography in 2023 is nothing in comparison. Grabbing this innocuous tidbit and running with it in an alternate history Los Angeles tale of detective noir is Ian R. Macleod's Wake Up and Dream (2011).

Wake Up and Dream is technically dieselpunk, but in Macleod's sure hands the taxonomy fades to the background. It's more a Los Angeles in which feelies technology has shoved aside the moving pictures industry to form a new cultural phenomenon. Black and white stars whose names we know today have been overwhelmed by celebrities in the new medium. An alternate '40s LA with a big splash of Brave New World cinema, it tells the tale of Clark Gable, private eye at your service. In the opening pages, Gable, as with much noir, has a woman named April Lamotte come knocking at his door requiring services. Married to a successful but alcoholic Hollywood writer named Daniel, she convinces Clark to do what he used to do before becoming an investigator: to act, in this case to pose as Daniel while signing a lucrative script contract. Daniel too drunk to do it himself, Gable agrees to dress and play the part for a tidy fee. One tailored suit, script, and handshake later and the contract is signed. Simple, right? Of course, not. There wouldn't be a book otherwise. And so the skeletons in Hollywood's closet come knocking.

Cardboard Corner: Review of "The Innsmouth Conspiracy" expansion for Arkham Horror: The Card Game

Note: This review covers both the Campaign and Investigator expansions which comprise The Innsmouth Conspiracy experience. It will not contain any spoilers save the roots of story which introduce the campaign as a whole and the new investigators. All other card, scenario, and story details will be untouched.

What a merry, tentacle trip it's been. Jungles and snakes. Small New England towns and ghouls. Excursions into dreamland. Stuck in the middle of warring Masons and witches. And of course, witnessing a theatre production that may not have been theatre. To date, Arkham Horror: The Card Game has delivered a half-a-dozen campaigns that showcase the heights which the base system is capable of achieving. Something fresh, innovative, and new added with each campaign, it's time to see what the latest “The Innsmouth Conspiracy” (2020) has to contribute to the trip.

Unlike all the major campaigns to date, “The Innsmouth Conspiracy” forgoes back story. It throws the players into the frying pan on the first sentence with no preamble. Caught in a rocky basin as tide waters rise, the first scenario asks players to find a way out of their wet predicament before they drown. No time to spin a yarn, the need to escape is imminent. For players who do escape, a window is opened onto the setting, the small town of Innsmouth, Rhode Island. Strange things brewing in the watery underworld, it becomes the investigator's goal to find out how and why they were in the tidal basin before the threat consumes Innsmouth. Once they learn, they may not want to explore further, however. The fire proves to be just beyond the frying pan.

Article: A Spade a Spade: Verifiability in Book Reviews

I recently finished reading Erin Swan's Walk the Vanished Earth (2022), an atypically structured generation novel centered around the idea we are living in a golden age of humanity, i.e. appreciate what you have because it could already be slipping away without you knowing it—and do be wary of people peddling suspect solutions to fix the problems. It's not the greatest novel ever written, nor is it the worst. Swan's structural strategy works well and there is enough uncertainty threaded throughout the plot for the reader to want to press ahead and learn how the loop is closed. However, individual devices and scenes are not always set up well, the prose mostly plods and occasionally excites, and character/character voice sometimes have trouble with singularity. It's a decent read with relevancy—more than most books on the market. As I often do, I looked into other people's thoughts online before writing a review. It's there I encountered Alexis Ong's review for Tor.com (link here). And it's there the straw broke the camel's back. We'll look at the broken animal, but first the straw.

“But the book is also self-aware of the shortcomings of white narratives—for better or for worse, there’s a recurring thread of meta commentary about history, historiography, and mythology that often undercuts the power of Swan’s ambition (herself, a white American author) for the novel. For better or for worse, WTVE is very much a product of its creator in the way it approaches everything from gender to class and race (even the minor Southeast Asian character of Chantrea, particularly, felt a little careless) and at times I felt that it deliberately avoided prodding humanity’s uglier side for the sake of its overall message about self-determination and survival.

Review of The Lies of the Ajungo by Moses Ose Utomi

By definition, meta-modern could be anything. The relatively linear progression of cultural mediums fragmented sometime around the start of the 21st century, meaning such mediums now largely exist in pockets and niches. Fantasy, for example, is no longer dragons and knights, or monsters and horror. It's been deconstructed, and mixed, and matched, and mixed again to the point it's... meta-modern—something you can't put your finger precisely on. Picking up a book or story with the generic label 'fantasy' requires deeper inquiry. Let's take a look at Moses Ose Utomi's fantasy novella The Lies of the Ajungo (2023).

The Lies of the Ajungo is the story of Tutu. A teenage boy, he is raised in a society which, once per year, must pay homage to the neighboring kingdom of Ajungo by handing over all of its adults' tongues. Yes, tongues. Communicating with sign language, they have traded their tongues for water, something their desert home is in precious little supply of. Many people and children have been sent into the desert to look for a steady supply, but none have returned. One day Tutu's mother's thirst becomes so dire she nearly dies. He appeals to the leader of his city to let her have a little extra so she may live, a request that is granted so long as Tutu's goes into the desert for one year to try to find a source of water. Tutu's agrees and heads out into the wilds, there discovering more than he or his society could ever dream.

Review of Talon of Horus by Aaron Dembski-Bowden

And so my exploration of the Warhammer universe of fiction continues. Certain places on the internets seemed to agree that Aaron Dembski-Bowden is one of the better writers in the universe (of Warhammer, that is), thus it seemed appropriate to explore in that direction. Talon of Horus (2014) is likewise something mentioned by several internet voices, and so without any better guide, I jumped in.

Talon of Horus is a post-Heresy novel. Horus' insurrection against the Emperor is over. But the warband he whipped up in mutiny remains convinced of its mission. Enter Iskandar Khayon. Writing from captivity, he starts the tale of how the infamous Black Legion was formed to continue Horus' mission. Khayon a sorcerer with powers derived from Chaos, at his beck and call are demons and dark elves. Beings tethered to his will, he uses his diplomatic skills and outright threats to contact the former leaders of Horus' army in an attempt to rebuild the insurrection. He succeeds to some degree, and to some degree does not, his network of contacts more powerful than he ever thought.

Cardboard Corner: Review of "Labyrinths of Lunacy" expansion for Arkham Horror: The Card Game

Like stop gaps, Arkham Horror: The Card Game standalone releases have curbed players appetite for the game between the larger campaign releases. The standalone releases often coinciding with game expositions and major conventions, designers have shown a penchant in recent years for catering to the multiplayer crowd. Doubling down on this, “Labyrinths of Lunacy” is a standalone scenario playable at small numbers but intended for a large group.

Certainly playable at 1-4, “Labyrinths of Lunacy” nevertheless goes out of its way to make an experience for more. Up to 36 players (emphasis on “up to”), it takes the concept of the Saw movies and puts it into card-game form. Players find themselves in a locked room and must find a way to escape. Or die. An evil maniac monitoring the room, escape only takes the player out of the frying pan and into the fire—water tanks, poison gas, and other surprises await.

Review of North American Lake Monsters by Nathan Ballingrud

It's one of reading's top three joys to discover an excellent new writer. (Don't ask me what the other two are.) It literally opens a world to be explored. The best part may be, however, you don't know the writer is excellent until you are several stories deep. Such is my discovery of Nathan Ballingrud, something which his debut 2013 collection North American Lake Monsters (aka Monsterland, 2020) has hammered home.

Before getting to the stories, it's good to highlight the things they have in common which make the collection excellent. All the stories are hard-hitters examining the darkest recesses of America's poorest, least educated people. More human than victim, Ballingrud has a true knack for presenting the reader with a living, breathing member of the US's lower class haunted by proverbial (and sometimes literal) demons of varying origins. But that is just the beginning. Many a literary writer has successfully gotten into the head of their blue-collar characters. But Ballingrud takes these broken people on atypical journeys. There is not one story in the collection which can be predicted or follows the traditional arc of intro-body-climax-conclusion. Somewhere between vignette and story, there are recognizable beginning and endings to each selection, and upon the conclusion of each the reader feels as though they've been upon a journey. It's only that the traditional landmarks of plot are irregular, leaving the reader feeling surprised and refreshed at such an approach. And lastly is the usage of the fantastic. Every story has splashes to varying proportions, and in every story the fantastic complements and enhances the tale being told without overtaking or interfering—a key facet considering the ultimate goal is realism of character. Like a hat that complements an evening gown, you can't imagine one without the other despite the fact both are successful on their own. I did say this was an excellent collection, yes?

Review of The Carpet People by Terry Pratchett

Terry Pratchett is a household name—at least in Europe, and is yet gaining ground in the US. Millions of his books are still sold despite the near decade since his unfortunate passing. But every cake starts with a mixing bowl, which in Pratchett's case is the 1971 novel The Carpet People. Let's take a look.

The Carpet People tells the story of the Munrungs, a tribe of humans who call a vast carpet home. Led by the strong by stupid Glurk, they thankfully have his rational brother Snibril to help keep the ship afloat. And wise leadership is needed as threats, from monsters hiding in the carpet hairs to the phenomenon of Fray, randomly appear to wreck havoc on the Munrungs. An event of such magnitude transpires, however, which forces the Munrungs out of the established groove of their lives and into the wilds of the carpet, there to meet all manner of people and animals, savage to civilized. Can they co-exist?

Review of Galaxy in Flames by Ben Counter

Galaxy in Flames is my third step into the MASSIVE universe of Warhammer fiction. (Is there a bigger universe?) The first two books in the Horus Heresy series (Horus Rising and False Gods) were shocking surprises for this jaded reader. I'd never encountered franchise fiction of that quality. But a series penned by multiple authors seems to be innately susceptible to dips in quality. Let's see how the third Heresy book penned by a third author, Galaxy in Flames (2006) by Ben Counter, pans out.

As False Gods did for Horus Rising, so too does Galaxy in Flames pick up in the aftermath of its predecessor. Having made a miraculous recovery from being tainted by chaos, Horus is riding high on the power and admiration of his Luna Wolves, now christened the Sons of Horus. A rebellion is brewing on the planet Isstvan III, a rebellion that Horus decides is the perfect place to establish dominance and start a Sons of Horus campaign. Bringing together some of the most violent Imperials the universe knows—Word Eaters, primarchs, the Death Guard, and Emperor's Children, they bring a serious fight to the planet. Trouble is, Horus has much more in plan for Isstvan III.

Cardboard Corner: Review of "The Dream-Eaters" expansion to Arkham Horror: The Card Game

Note: This review covers the deluxe expansion The Dream-Eaters, as well as the six Mythos packs which complete the campaign. It will not contain any spoilers save the roots of story which introduce the campaign as a whole and the new investigators. All other card, scenario, and story details will be untouched.

To date, each of the five Arkham Horror campaigns has given players a fresh take on the game without abandoning its first principles—a wonderful feat. Thus while gathering clues and killing monsters are a given for any scenario, exactly how that happens has always changed itself up in crunchy, wonderful ways. If there is a secret to the game’s success, that might just be it. Those waiting for the shoe to drop and Fantasy Flight Games to release a dud campaign, however, will have to continue waiting with “The Dream-Eaters”.

Rather than an eight-part campaign, “The Dream-Eaters” is actually two four-part campaigns: the dream-side and the waking-side. It's able to be played independently (four in a row for the dream side and four in a row for the waking side) or together (like a ping pong volley of eight between the two sides). As such, designers have taken a step in a new direction to offer players a package somewhere between the standalone scenarios and the longer campaigns—a breath of fresh air for those who thought stories in eight parts were too lengthy but wanted more than stand-alones. The other opportunity it provides is the chance to put all those player cards released to date to good use. Players will need two investigator decks rather than one to tackle the entire campaign. With twenty-six possible investigators (assuming you have all the expansions to this point), it can feel like being in the candy store. Given each campaign is only four parts, there is less room for collecting and spending experience points, however, designers are more generous with victory points, meaning you are able to upgrade faster than normal. Overall matters more dynamic and diverse in this campaign, it’s just what you’d expect from dreams.