Midnight Taxi Tango

by Daniel José Older

It's official: Daniel José Older is now on my authors-to-watch list. I first encountered Older through his YA book, Shadowshaper. While Shadowshaper is a rich, vibrant story, Bone Street Rumba is right down my alley. I love urban fantasy, underpowered protagonists, and political skirmishes in the magical world. Add to that a set of complex, interesting characters, a gritty plot, and some seriously creepy roach dudes, and I was sold.  TL;DR: Half-Resurrection Blues (Bone Street Rumba#1) just became my first book purchase of the year.

The story is narrated by Carlos, a half-dead agent for the Council for the Dead and the protagonist of the previous book, Reza, a driver/hitter for a local gang, and Kia, a mischievous teenager who works at a botánica and finds herself pulled inextricably into the center of events. There's a reason why Kia is on the front of the cover (and have I mentioned i loved the cover?) instead of Carlos, who is pretty much worse than useless for the whole book. One of the reasons I picked up the first book is that I'm rather interested to see what Carlos was like when he was actually effective and didn't just spend all his time angsting and moping. Kia, on the other hand, is a lot of fun. I loved her constant banter with Carlos:

"I smile. “Things will go much easier for you when you realize that I know everything.”

"We’ve been through this already, C, and we don’t have time to go through it again. If you leave me behind, I’ll do something stupid like follow you all by myself and get killed and then you’ll feel guilty. Let’s save ourselves an argument we both already know I’m gonna win.”

She has some interesting depths as a character, from a traumatic childhood experience to her insight while navigating a biased world.

The politics of Midnight Taxi Tango are less overt and more nuanced than Shadowshaper, but all the more interesting and effective for it. One of the subplots involves Capoeira, which, as the instructor notes,

"Is how my people survived European domination in Brazil [...] It is a martial art disguised as a dance, but it is also a dance disguised as a martial art. Why? Because we were not allowed to train to fight. We had to disguise our training as dancing, yes? We had to become clandestine warriors in a system that did not believe we are human, yes? Maybe this is something you can understand today, or maybe not."

Kia's perspective illuminates the pervasive racism she experiences:

"I’d never been to this neighborhood before. Maybe driven past once or twice with my dad, but it was all white folks, and the feeling of don’t belong, don’t belong hung heavy in the air, like all the molecules wanted me to leave too."

She perceives, and is angered by, the constant assaults on diversity surrounding her, from the white policeman who feels it is acceptable to harass her on the street to her realization that she, as a black woman, can get shot for carrying a sandwich, let alone a ghost-killing knife. One of my favourite moments was her reaction to a conversation between a group of white teenagers in the botánica:

"Kenny, what’s this mean, a love potion?”

“Yeah, that’s supposed to be bring the ladies right to you, man.”

“Let’s get it for Bill. Maybe Christine will stop friend zoning his ass.”

Wild laughter. Because really, what’s funnier than other people’s cultures and sexual coercion?"

Another aspect where I felt this book improved upon Shadowshaper was the humor. Midnight Taxi Tango was constantly, quotably funny. Carlos, Reza, and Tia each have their own unique narrative flair, and while I loved them all, the dialogue and situational humor tickled me to death; for example:

“So you brought the demon-child assassin to my house and locked him into the bathroom across from the girl he’s trying to kill?” My whisper is more like a strained cough.

“The fuck else was I sposta do with him, man?"

I feel like I've been saying this a lot lately, but while I felt like the plot was a bit of a mess, I just didn't care.

Like Shadowshaper, Midnight Taxi Tango is a complex, vibrant, refreshing change from cookie-cutter urban fantasy. Add to that a set of villainous magical roaches--and who doesn't find roaches creepy, particularly when they crawl into your mouth or peel off your skin-- and a constant barrage of banter and situational comedy and I was utterly sold. Count me in for the sequel. And the prequel. And anything else Older has in store.

~~I received this book through Netgalley from the publisher, Berkeley Group Publishing, in exchange for my honest review. Quotes are taken from an advanced reader copy and while they may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the spirit of the novel as a whole.~~

Shadowshaper

by Daniel José Older

Shadowshaper brings richer cadences to a familiar tune. Many aspects are familiar to readers of urban fantasy and young adult: a secret world of magic, a naive heroine who discovers her own unique powers, and burgeoning romance. However, Older describes a fuller, more vibrant city than the standard cookie-cutter urban fantasy fare: the mixing and clash of cultures, mutual distrust with interloping police, stark contrasts in race and socioeconomic status huddled side by side, and deepening tensions over gentrification. One of the central themes of the story is the line between respect for other cultures and appropriation.

Cultural heritage pervades the very magic of Shadowshaper: while the mechanism may be newer, the magic itself embraces tradition. With the magic of a shadowshaper, street art can literally come to life. Shadowshapers can paint forms that spirits--ghosts of the departed as well as other more elemental forces-- can inhabit. But recently, something has been going wrong: shadowshapers are disappearing or losing their minds, murals are losing their vibrancy, and haints are stalking the streets. Sierra Santiago may be new to the world of shadowshapers, but she soon finds herself an integral part in the race to save them. Somehow, her hunt hinges upon finding a white academic who disappeared while studying the shadowshapers and their traditions. And this itself becomes one of the key questions of the book. As one character puts it,

"Who gets to study and who gets studied, and why? Who makes the decisions, you know?"

In one of my favourite discussions of the issue, Sierra's friend decides to turn the tables:

"If this Wick cat do all this research about Sierra's grandpa and all his Puerto Rican spirits, I don't see why I can't write a book about his people. Imma call it Hipster vs. Yuppie: A Culturalpological Study."

Sierra is Puerto Rican, and much of her own teenage angst deals with her discomfort over societal stereotypes, racism, and sexism, even from her own family. Her aunt, in particular, criticizes her "nappy" hair and her interest in a Cuban boy, warning her to stay away from boys who are "Darker than the bottom of your foot." From one of my favourite scenes:

"Once when she was chatting with some stupid boy online, she described herself as the color of coffee with not enough milk. [...] The worst part about it, the part she couldn’t let go of, was that the thought came from her. Not from one of the teachers or guidance counselors whose eyes said it again and again over sticky-sweet smiles. Not from some cop on Marcy Avenue or Tía Rosa. It came from somewhere deep inside her. And that meant that for all the times she’d shrugged off one of those slurs, some little tentacle of them still crawled its way toward her heart. Not enough milk. Not light enough. Morena. Negra. No matter what she did, that little voice came creeping back, persistent and unsatisfied.
Not enough."

Racism isn't simply something Sierra experiences from her family; it's all around her, accosting her from the media, from her family, from the second looks she gets walking in the "gentrified" parts of town, from her own eyes when she looks in a mirror. And her journey towards self-acceptance is learning to push back against those who wish to mold her into their ideal, to see herself as enough. As she tells her aunt:

I don’t care about your stupid neighborhood gossip or your damn opinions about everyone around you and how dark they are or how kinky their hair is. You ever look in the mirror, Tia? "
You ever look at those old family albums Mom keeps around?” Sierra went on. “We ain’t white. And you shaming everyone and looking down your nose because you can’t even look in the mirror isn’t gonna change that. And neither is me marrying someone paler than me. And I’m glad. I love my hair. I love my skin.”

Shadowshaper is easily one of the most interesting and meaningful YA books I've read in years. If you're a fan of urban fantasy, young adult fiction, or simply books that embrace vibrant diversity, Shadowshaper is well worth a look.

The Annihilation Score (Laundry #6)

by Charles Stross

"Please allow me to introduce myself…

No. Strike that. Period stop backspace backspace bloody computer no stop that stop listening stop dictating end end oh I give up.

Will you stop doing that?"

Meet Mo, a.k.a. Dominique, employee of the UK's super-secret black-ops magic organisation (they call it the Laundry), wife of Bob Howard (a.k.a. The Eater of Souls), bearer of a psychotically evil soul-sucking bone violin, and combat epistemologist. When Mo takes a trip to do a little glad-handing with the Deep Ones (aka BLUE HADES), she thinks she's finally going to get a bit of well-deserved R&R. But before she knows it, a tiny mistake has landed her neck-deep in trouble, and even worse, in bureaucratic paperwork. In Mo's world, the end is nigh, and all hell is beginning to break loose. As the barriers between our world and the Elder Ones of the Dungeon Dimensions break down, more and more people are gaining magical abilities. Magic is rationalized in the context of culture, and given the superhero craze, suddenly there are a disturbing number of people running (or flying) around in Lycra suits that may not precisely flatter them. And a series of mistakes leave Mo in charge of a brand-new superhero ops organization tasked with stopping the superhero singularity. To make things worse, there's a new supervillain Mad Scientist on the loose, and he he's leaving behind messages of the "Tremble, Fools, Before It is Too Late!" variety, and worst of all, the messages are printed in Comic Sans.

I suspect that the most divisive part of the book will be the change in narrators from Bob to Mo. Personally, I strongly preferred Mo to Bob. She's introduced to us in the midst of an unjustified attack of jealousy, but once she gets past that, I really warmed to her. I've grown a bit tired of Bob, and Mo's spiky, sarcastic, vibrant personality revived the series for me. I also wasn't too surprised by their marital issues; intentional or not on Stross's part, I've never sensed any chemistry between Bob and Mo. (Since much of the series is a Bond spoof, there are quite a few obligatory Bond girls, and Bob doesn't really think of Mo when she's not around.) While the previous books in the series don't really defy their Bond roots in the sexism department, I thought Stross did a pretty good job with his female characters here. He even has a wonderful riff on the Invisible Middle-Aged Woman syndrome. (Sure, there's the obsession on Bob's past partners, but Mo's Bechdel test failure moment is actually called out in-book.) The plot itself is rather measured, dealing mostly with Mo's struggles to get her fledgling superhero team going. I'm pretty sure anyone who has dealt with bureaucracy will find it amusing. For me, however, the ending was a bit of an off note.

As always, Stross is absolutely hilarious, and this time, you don't need a computer science degree to get in on the jokes. Some of my favourite quotes:

"Yes, she's a blood-sucking fiend. But she's also a superbly competent administrator and has an MBA which I think you'll agree makes up for a lot of sins."

"Scientific research is a bottomless money pit. You can approximate Doing Science to standing on the Crack of Doom throwing banknotes down it by the double-handful, in the hope that if you choke the volcano with enough paper it will cough up the One Ring."

"Despair, dismay, disorientation, and delusion: the four horsemen of the bureaucratic apocalypse."

 Unfortunately, though, I don't really think it's possible to read this without the context of the previous books. I skipped only one (#5, The Rhesus Chart) and found myself quite bewildered by the references to recent events. I can't imagine how hard it would be to read this without some knowledge of the Laundry, the Eater of Souls, and CASE NIGHTMARE GREEN. However, if you're looking to give the series a try, I think you can start with #2 (The Jennifer Morgue) or #3(The Fuller Memorandum)--I did.

**Note: quotes were taken from an uncorrected advanced reader copy of this ebook and may not reflect the final version. However, I believe they speak to the spirit of the book.

~~I received an advanced reader copy of this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Ace Books, a Penguin Random House imprint, in exchange for my honest review. Thank you!~~

Deadeye

by William C. Dietz

I’ve been procrastinating on this review, not because I have nothing to say, but because I’m not going to particularly enjoy saying it. This book did not work for me, to the extent that if it had not been from Netgalley, I would not have finished it. So while this review is going to be negative--perhaps vehemently so--I think it’s important to explain my reasons. After all, an aspect that drives me to distraction may be a draw for another reader.

The basic plot: Cassandra “Deadeye” Lee is a member of the LAPD in the semi-post-apocalyptic country of Pacifica. In 2038, a Muslim extremist (wince) turned the bioengineered Bacillus nosilla loose upon the unbelievers. (Really? You had to go there?) B. nosilla rapidly transformed the U.S., slaying a quarter of its citizens and turning many more into bizarre mutants. In the resulting turmoil, the U.S. broke into the non-mutant countries Pacifica, Atlantica, and the Commonwealth, and the mutants established the Republic of Texas and the New Confederacy. Nowadays, people wander the streets in disposable masks to avoid exposure to the airborne bacteria that the mutants still carry, and some women wear burqas (argh) to modestly cover their mutilated forms. Detective Lee finds herself thrown into mutant politics when the daughter of a bishop of an anti-mutant religion is kidnapped, apparently to act as a “surrogate” for mutants. Forced to work with a mutant partner, she must also stop the serial killer who murdered her father--before she becomes his next victim.

The basic plot aims straight at some of my favourite themes. Police procedural in semi-post-apocalyptic LA? How could you lose?

Quite easily, as it turns out. I’m primarily a reader of detective fiction, particularly detective fiction that bleeds into other genres. I read books with great attention to detail (“the smallest point may be the most essential”), which in turn means that I am extremely sensitive to inconsistencies. And this book is loaded with them. Let’s start with the disease. I’m not going to go into the whole “single bacteria causes lots of coherent animal mashup mutations” bit, because that’s pretty standard and can be seen as artistic license. But what I really couldn’t cope with was the treatment of the disease within the book. Apparently, mutants are carriers, and while they do tend to get segregated, moving back and forth between zones is acceptable without any quarantine or even any attempts at decontamination. If it was me, everyone in or out would be drenched in antiseptic and germicides, then quarantined until they were known to be free of disease.

Even in the mutant zones, normals can apparently take off their masks to shower, brush their teeth, or sleep. Dietz airily explains that drinking water and eating food “was safe because B. nosilla was an airborne disease.” The hell? Airborne diseases are the most contagious category because they do not require contact for infection. What does Dietz think “airborne” means? Even if the bacteria spontaneously combust when they hit a surface, said surfaces aren’t safe because the disease is airborne; they’re safe because the disease is magical. Plus, how does Lee manage to drink out of a straw whilst wearing a mask, or talk without breathing air whilst not wearing one? On a more personal level, apparently sexual contact is just fine, to the point that mutant men capture normal women to have their babies. So what, the only orifices the bacteria can enter through are the nose and mouth? Then how does the baby get it from a mutant mother? As I said, perhaps I’m a pedant, but that level of inconsistency drove me nuts. I’m not even going to talk about the bit with the Muslim extremists, or the Aztec Empire, or the Native Americans (no tribe mentioned) who shoot with bows and arrows rather than guns (because that's what they do, right? Argh). My blood pressure doesn’t need it. I was reminded, inevitably, of Mitchell and Webb’s doctor drama.

While fantastic characters and writing can enliven even the most absurd worldbuilding, unfortunately, I found the prose to be jerky, with lots of awkward phrasing, incomplete sentences, and stilted dialogue. Dietz also had a tendency to rely upon informed attributes and emotions rather than trying to convey them through the conversation or the character’s body language. Because of this, I felt distanced from the characters, and their personalities remained static, superficial, and unsympathetic. The plot, too, tended to utilize rather a lot of exposition and side-notes to the reader. One of the most irritating forms of this was Dietz’s insistence upon explaining, in parentheses, what various terms meant, from “BOLO (be on the lookout)” to “TA (transit area)” to Spanish phrases such as “hijo de puta (son of a whore)” and “cara mierda (shit face)”. Personally, I feel that authors need to either trust their readers’ intelligence or work the terms’ meanings into the characters’ conversations. The parentheses are distracting, especially when they’re inserted into dialogue. I suspect the baddie using “cara mierda” didn’t helpfully translate the term in an aside, even though the parentheses are in the middle of his comment. There is a lot of action, with quite a few shootouts, and I can see the book being made into a successful TV show. However, because I didn’t care for the characters, I didn’t care about their troubles, and I had to force myself to plow onwards.

In retrospect, maybe this just wasn’t the book for me. Even beyond the Critical Research Failure aspect, most of the plot involves the protagonist chasing kidnappers who sell young girls into slavery where they’ll be impregnated by the mutant men who buy them, and that’s just not precisely my favourite plotline. Not even the attempt at a cliffhanger piqued my interest in the next book. So while I can imagine it as a TV show, and can see how it might appeal to less persnickety readers than me, this book was most definitely not my cup of tea.

**Note: this review is of an uncorrected advanced reader copy. While the included quotes may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the nature of the novel as a whole.**

~~I received an advanced reader copy of this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Ace, in exchange for my (depressingly) honest review.~~

“I have a strict policy. No magic, no monsters, no supernatural clients. Ever.”

So says Owl, ex-archaeologist and thief extraordinaire. Still trying to avoid the vampires that she managed to rile in a previous escapade, Owl is in no mood for a new job. However, she soon discovers that it’s really, really hard to say no to a dragon. It isn’t long before Owl is trying to navigate the tricky waters of supernatural politics while avoiding vampires, angry nagas, and a confusing romantic relationship. Without the help of her friends and allies, she’s all set to crash and burn.

I have such mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, I loved the Indiana-Jones-With-Extra-Magic-On-The-Side vibe. I loved Owl’s vampire-killing cat, Captain. I loved Owl’s snarky, quip-filled narration:

“You know your sanity is in question when you find yourself in a two-way conversation with a cat.”

Charish put together a fun world, an entertaining story, and an intriguing villain, and I absolutely adored the ending--specifically, the last sentence of the book.

But certain aspects just drove me nuts. Like trying to enjoy a concert while the guy behind you is whistling “This is the song that never ends,” I found it really, really hard to concentrate on the fun parts.

First, I can’t buy the worldbuilding. The basic idea is that even though the clues of magic are everywhere, the world hasn’t caught on because the International Archaeology Association (IAA) has carefully hidden the truth from the world. How, you might ask? Well, apparently they’re a paramilitary organization with spies and influence everywhere and the ability to reach any archaeological crime scene before the police. Why are they hiding the truth from the world? Well, apparently No One Can Handle the Truth-- well, no-one other than the IAA, and the site guards who are trained to deal with the monsters, and the people funding the IAA, and the universities that the IAA is “strangling”, and the archaeology students, the antiquity experts, and whoever else is needed to provide logistics of all of that.

I don’t know about you, but in my experience, any secret kept by more than two or three people leaks pretty darned fast. Masquerade worlds usually function via society’s unwillingness to accept the strange, but in this case, (a) there’s actual hard archaeological evidence of the weirdness, and (b) somehow there’s a vast organisation whose entire purpose is hiding magic, which leaves me with (c) absolutely no idea why anyone would bother, other than plot convenience. Not even the conspiracy itself is consistent; for example, the postdoc Owl worked with“had been falsifying data to hide a supernatural mummy from our supervisor,” who must have been as well aware of it all as the archaeologists themselves.

The other thing that drove me up the wall was Owl herself. Where to begin? As one might expect of an archaeology thief, Owl is not a good person. However, she combines duplicitous bitchery with an absolutely staggering measure of self-righteousness.

Let’s start with her backstory, which Owl seems unable to keep straight. Owl sold her principles for a promise of funding and a cushy post, but since she was too stupid to get any guarantees, the university promptly reneged on its promises. For most of the book, Owl keeps harping on and on about how she left because“My conscience had gotten me thrown out of the university.”Uh, no. She sold her integrity--twice, by my count--and felt betrayed when she discovered it wasn’t as valuable as she had thought.

So much for her honesty. Let’s consider her good nature. When Owl helps out a fellow grad student in desperate straits, she not only feels entitled to some quid pro quo and when he refuses her request, she starts threatening him. When Owl is double-crossed by one of her victims, she feels hurt and betrayed, whining that

“Funny how when people’s lives are in ruins, they’re more than happy to associate with the likes of me. It’s after I fix everything that they suddenly recall I’m treacherous, unconscionable me. [...] No good deed goes unpunished.”

That’s not precisely accurate. They remember she’s a treacherous, vindictive creep when she starts blackmailing them and/or setting up her little revenge schemes.

Now let’s consider her skills. Throughout the book, there’s an assumption that Owl’s talents make her irreplaceable, but I’m not entirely sure what those talents actually are. Owl’s “train wreck” logistics, her tendency to mouth off to everyone she meets, and her inability to “plan her way out of a lit and unlocked chest” become a running gag throughout the book. According to one of her friends,

“You can’t help but do stupid things. It’s in your nature. It’s also what makes you the best at what you do.”

Which makes me think that her valuable skill must actually be for fucking up. Admittedly, she’s absolutely spectacular at that, as well as roping in others to take her knocks for her.

The book showed so much promise. I loved the writing style. I loved the ideas. I'm well aware that the issue is just me Taking It Too Seriously. I really, really regret that I couldn’t enjoy it to the full. I can still heartily recommend it to anyone of a more forgiving and tolerant disposition.

**Note: this review is of an uncorrected advanced reader copy. While the included quotes may not reflect the final phrasing, I believe they speak to the nature of the novel as a whole.**

~~I received this ebook through Netgalley from the publisher, Gallery, Threshold, Pocket Books, in exchange for my honest review.