Royce's Random Thoughts

Just some quick, slightly spoilery reviews on three novels by Ryk E. Spoor that I’ve been delaying writing while I Dealt With Things.

Spheres of Influence: The second book in Spoor’s Grand Central Arena series finds our heroine Ariane Austin facing with an enemy she is ill equipped to deal with, government bureaucrats. This book expands on the GCA universe quite a bit, showing the reaction back in Earth’s solar system as humanity finds itself in a first contact situation with the Arena’s many races, which range from hostile to nominally friendly, but all with their own agendas. We also get more details on the Hyperion Project, which produced the series’ literally designated antihero Dr. Marc Duquesne. In this novel we’re also introduced to Sun WuKong, another of Hyperion’s attempts to recreate the heroes of literature and other media, plus one Hyperion’s great failures, Maryanne Suzanna. Yes, “Mary Sue”. Designed to fit that stereotype and… er… less than happy about it.

Actually Suzanna is one of few weaknesses of the book. She’s built up as a major threat by Duquesne and other characters, but when we finally meet her she basically says “Hi” and heads off again. Admittedly this can be put off as Middle Book syndrome, but it was a little disappointing.

Ignoring that, SoI is a pretty fun book, keeping with series’ dedication to high adventure, high stakes, and Sensawunda. I’m looking forward to finally reading the next one.

Phoenix Ascendant: The third and likely final book in Spoor’s Balanced Sword trilogy, sees Kyri Vantage, last true Justiciar of the dying god of Justice and Vengeance, returning to her homeland with her friends to finally clean house of the remaining false Justiciars and defeat the forces evil that threaten to destroy the world.

With one caveat, I’ll say that I enjoyed the book and was satisfied with the ending, since it keeps with the trilogy’s philosophy of forgiveness towards truly repentant enemies. Unfortunately that caveat has to do with the final battle against the true power behind all of Kyri’s enemies, the evil shapeshifting god, Virigar.

Yep, same Virigar from Spoor’s early novel Paradigms Lost, whom Jason Wood nearly took out with a bucket of silver nitrate.

I suppose my problem was that I was listening to this as an audiobook rather than reading it. Throughout the trilogy Spoor made it clear the nominally AD&D based world owed a lot to such anime as DragonBall Z and Saint Seiya, so when the final battle with Virigar begins, it lasts at least five chapters that I recall, with many twists and turns and changes in the tide of battle. Unfortunately as it went on, I was less amazed than shouting “Oh, come ON!” as our heroes lost all of their previous Genre Savvy knowledge and assumed at least three or four times that surely he had to be dead this time. Suffice to say a fight against someone with instantaneous healing abilities and a tendency to gloat gets really, really annoying as it goes on, especially since I couldn’t skim pages.

That said, if you’re into those sort of tremendous battles I suppose you might find it fun, and aside from that the rest of the book was really good.

Boundary: Written with Eric Flint, this novel follows a disparate team of people, coming together to investigate evidence of the remains of an advanced alien base hidden on Mars’ moon Phobos, which is connected to a bizarre fossil find in the American Southwest.

Ugh. This one just left me cold. Nominally it’s a hard science fiction novel, and some bits such as the deciphering of the Bemmy language were well done, but none of the characters grabbed me and the endless Tom Clancy-ish infodumps were tedious to get through.

 

SCENE: We start in medias res inside Lord Dark’s Air Fortress. The animation style looks to be the height of mid-1980’s syndicated cartoons.

Assuming it was done by Filmation.

Towards the end of the season.

When the budget was getting a bit tight.

Two WAZAGANS, NEZ the TECHNOMAGE and CHEEKO the PIRATE-NINJA, run down the hallway, pursued by SIR ANIMOSITY and several ROBO-CRUSADERS. The two wazagans skid to a halt as they reach a dead end.

( From here it gets rough... )

Planning the assault had taken two years, and that was after spending three years carefully examining the transmission patterns of morphs all across the Ring, proving Professor Kurylkin’s theory that the Groupmind had to have a central processor controlling the morphs. From there it had been another year of reconnaissance, finally locating the Central Tower, in the middle of what had been wryly named OZ, for the location was an green oasis surrounded by a hundred kilometers of searing desert.

Getting past the desert had meant infiltrating the high security of the Ring Transit System, then walking that last hundred kilometers in tunnels designed to accommodate morphs, not men. Tyler has lost three of his twelve man team, snatched by morphs or like Jansen just disappearing around a corner, gone in an instant by the time the next man came round.

Then of course they’d had to climb the Tower, a windowless, two kilometer tall structure, encased in black Ring metal ten meters thick. The air had been freezing cold, keeping the computers that lined the tower’s wall functioning. The climb, without elevators, only access ladders and stairwells, had taken nearly a week as they dodged security morphs, or more often didn’t. By the time they’d reached the penultimate floor, Tyler’s team was down to three.

By the time he reached the top, the only one left was himself.

( Sometimes the Groupmind is kind of a dick. )

“The Mother Goddess bless Her children on this day. On this darkest day, Winter begins. On this coldest day the sun hangs low. In the Cold and Dark we tremble, and in the Cold and Dark we see the Mother Goddess’ warming fire, and know that She and it preserve us.” the Countess Matri Darktail intoned, as Melanie watched with her husband Rolas, from the circle of witness standing around her, in Darktail Manor’s holy arbor. As was traditional, the ceremony was held in the pre-dawn twilight, witnesses from the Houses of vassal lords, from the various professions of the Service caste, and Commoners both notable and chosen at random, all watching as the Countess conducted the ceremony in nothing more than the fur she was born with, demonstrating both her piety and that they all appeared the same in the Mother Goddess’ eyes. It made Melanie grateful for the heavy coat she wore, over the curve of her gravid belly.

( A time to forgive. )

The sun was falling into the sea when rescue finally arrived. Rolas remained face down in the sand, exhausted from his ordeal, the remains of the ardalian’s tentacle hanging from his spine like an obscene second tail. Melanie left him briefly to grab the first aid kit and walk up the stairs for the fifth bloody time to check on the wazagan. It was still shuddering and otherwise unresponsive, though it had stopped crying and muttering to herself. Melanie gave it a shot of a universal anti-shock medication, and the poor creature finally fell into an exhausted sleep.

( Letting go of old pain. )

The worst was the bit with the reef. The lifejacket’s little AI was bound and determined to keep her facing tail towards the the water, snout in the air, which made it difficult to watch and time the waves, and start kicking in a one armed backstroke as they crested the reef. She only barely managed it, feeling her tail catch in the sharp coral as she swam clear, managing to avoid by some miracle of the Mother Goddess ripping her back open on it. The retreating waves threatened to carry past the boat itself, but she managed to tangle her arms with the sail’s lines, then wrapped her arms and legs around the mast itself.

And now for the really stupid part. Feeling her fingers already growing stiff in the cold surf, she yanked at the manual release catches for the lifejacket. It let out an electronic wail of protest as she slipped off, its complaints soon carried with it away in the waves.

( Diving for Chekov's Gun )

Well that’s completely non-reassuring, she thought, stifling a sudden urge to giggle in hysteria. The only saving grace they had at the moment was that they were still hidden, and their opponents were both unarmed and sickly looking. Still, it’s two to one, neither of us are in full health either, and even a half-dead wazagan has a significant advantage in strength over either of us. Mother Goddess she wished she still Alinadar. Even unarmed the little bodyguard would have made short work of all these creatures.

She backed up further, rising to a crouch with Rolas as they went deeper into the trees and brush. Melanie gripped his paw tightly, listening as the quartet called out again for their surrender.

“What do we do?” Rolas asked softly, when they were perhaps ten meters distant.

( Good question )

Melanie and Rolas, lacking food, water, and options, start hunting for their mysterious watchers.

Note: After some consideration, I've revised the main manuscript to reinstate Rolas' memory loss, which will be Plot Important later.

* * *

The night wore on interminably. Melanie spent it trading naps with Rolas, though he stayed up far longer than she did. When she did sleep she used Rolas’ lap as a pillow, his tail curling over her chest to ward off  the chill. Even so she still felt exhausted as dawn finally broke, her pelt itching as the seawater dried off from her afternoon swim.

“So do we stay or explore?” Rolas wondered out loud. He grimaced in embarrassment as his stomach let out a loud grumble.

“Explore,” she said reluctantly, probing her lips with her tongue, feeling the dried and cracked surface. “We have to find food and water, especially water, before we’re unable to move.”

( Be careful exploring. You might find something. )