Life at the Comic-Con

A Hundred Thousand Worlds - Bob Proehl

Those readers among us who prefer that their fiction have a beginning and an end will not particularly like Bob Proehl’s A Hundred Thousand Worlds. I can’t blame them. Oh, sure, the novel has a beginning (around page 1) and an ending (of sorts, slightly before page 368), but the story and the characters seem somehow to aimlessly wander through the interstices of the pages between those two points.

I will say that Proehl has a way with words, as the saying goes, but that's probably the only reason I managed to slog through this entire book. As for a plot, however, let’s just say that the concept at its core was lost on this particular reader. Of course I get it: the novel recounts the westward journey of Valerie Torrey and her nine-year-old son, Alex, as they return to LA from New York City. Exactly why they’re “returning,” however, and why they left in the first place spin out quite slowly (too slowly?) within the pages of the novel.

Val’s an actor, once the female heroine of a long-since cancelled scifi television series, a show that strikingly resembles “Continuum” (no word on whether Val looks like Rachel Nichols, though). Mother and son's westward migration takes place in three steps as she reprises her character at comics conventions in Cleveland, Chicago and LA; with side trips to see her mother and... "The Woman." The road show's cast of characters is padded out with Brett, a comic artist (who, unbeknownst to anyone but the readers, just broke up with a woman who once babysat Alex) and Gail, a lesbian comic writer. A Greek… errr, geek chorus of women in superhero costumes accompanies the little group on their journey. Enormous swaths of the text are given over to the “wonders” (I use the term sarcastically) of comic books, while little or nothing is given over to the motivations of the characters or even scene setting.

Casey Duncan and the Biggest Locked-Room Mystery Ever

City of the Lost: A Thriller - Kelley Armstrong

Meet Casey Duncan, a homicide cop in some random Canadian town who’s hiding a deep, dark secret. A dozen years ago, Casey murdered her sometime boyfriend; she put him down like a rabid dog when she was only eighteen. He may well have deserved it, but…Ever since that day in Calgary, Casey has been pretty much on the run. She must be a bit self-destructive, though, since she likes to tell therapists about killing Brian to see if they’ll turn her in… and this time, the latest one does

That's why Casey's on the run again – except that this time instead of heading for another city, she and her best friend Diana head for a town Diana had heard of in rumors, a place where everyone in town is hiding from something (for a fee, of course).  Diana, who's running from an abusive ex-husband, and Casey join the population of the City of the Lost. That’s how the two end up sequestered in a tiny town deep in the wilds of Canada’s Yukon, among people who are all hiding from someone or something – and a few of whom are also hiding something.

Generation Starship? Or Generation Novel...

Arkwright - Allen Steele

It’s getting harder and harder to be a science fiction fan. For one thing, the library and bookstore shelves that used to be filled with space operas are now jammed with vampire tales. For another, there just don’t seem to be any more Asimovs, Clarkes, Sturgeons or Silverbergs coming down the pike (Charlie Stross, perhaps, excepted). To make matters worse, fans have recently been subjected to a slew of long novels that read more like soap operas than space operas – some fairly good (Neal Stephenson’s Seveneves) and some not quite so good (the John Sandford and Ctein collaboration, Saturn Run). And then there’s the just plain bad: Allen Steele’s Arkwright.

Kadrey's Episodic Fiction Flat

The Everything Box - Richard Kadrey

Imagine, if you will, the angel sent to Earth after the Noahic flood with specific instructions to kill off any unauthorized survivors. Go ahead, imagine him – his name’s Qaphsiel, and this is his first big assignment (normally he’s in charge of office supplies)… and he blows it. Yep, Qaphsiel had The Everything Box in his pocket, but he lost it… “Crap!”

The Fat Twin

Nowhere Girl - Susan Strecker

Do identical twins have a supernatural bond, the ability to communicate across time and space in a way no one else can penetrate? Cady Bernard certainly believes they do – and she should know, since she’s an identical twin. That is, she was: once. Sixteen years ago; half her life; Cady’s twin sister Savannah died…. a homicide… her body found in an abandoned house on the hill behind their high school. Cady knew without being told that her sister was gone.

Time files. After battling self-abuse (cutting, attempted suicide) in the aftermath of her sister’s death, Cady grew up and became a best-selling author… an author who writes what she knows: murder. She’s (unhappily) married to a bassoon-tooting psychiatrist she suspects is 1) ashamed that she makes more money than he does and 2) probably playing hide-the-salami with his waiflike receptionist. Because, although Savannah Martino was gorgeous, luminous, slim and lovely; twin sis Cadence was and remains the “chubby” one. Apparently epigenesis rules…