Book Review: Railhead

My recent re-engagement with the works of Andre Norton, and something of a re-awakening of an only slightly dormant infatuation with Golden Age Science Fiction couldn’t have come at a better time. My brain was in just the right condition to receive Railhead, the new novel by Philip Reeve. Longtime readers of the blog will know that Reeve is one of my favorite contemporary writers. I first discovered him through his juvenile Jules Verne style romp Larklight, but really came to be a fan with his book Mortal Engines and its follow-ups. With those books, he delved into a lot of the ‘big idea’ Science Fiction spirit I love so much. And he has returned to that with Railhead, a very big idea, Golden Age soaked adventure yarn. A galactic railroad network, threading through stargates, taking humanity from world to world; all under the watchful eyes of ancient AI. Excellent.

What Reeve does that was less common during the era of Asimov, Norton, Heinlein, and others, is populate his wild settings with interesting, nuanced, challenging characters. In Railhead, Zen doesn’t always make great choices. He doesn’t always do the right thing. He’s not a perfect young man. And he’s not alone. Are the villains really villains? Are the heroes heroes? Or are they just people trying to do the best they can with the things they’ve got? Whatever the case, I really like reading about Zen. I love Flex, Gentlemen Take Polaroids, and Nova. I was curious to find out where the Threnody Noon story would go. And the Guardians? The Hive Monks? I want more.

This is the beginning of a longer story; that much is kinda obvious. There are a lot of things introduced, and not all of them are explored to satisfactory degrees. But there is a satisfying story arc to the book. While leaving things in place for events to continue, I like that there is some closure, some resolution. And I’m certainly looking forward to finding out what happens next.

Also, and you’ll know this if you’ve read his other Young Adult novels, Reeve is one of those authors who seems to delight in abusing his characters, and yes, killing them off...especially if they’re one of the ones you really love. This is something that I find thrilling. Knowing that any character, at any time, could get snuffed out makes the reading more intense. And it challenges me, in my own writing, to be more daring; to remember that in life and so in stories, stuff happens. People get hurt, they die, they come into sudden fame or glory or infamy, they fall in love with the wrong person, that make the wrong choice, they find unexpected beauty.

Like Heinlein’s “juvenile” books, and a lot of others from the Golden Age of Science Fiction, Railhead features some young protagonists and there’s no explicit sex. Otherwise, it’s written as though for adults, without condescension or the accepted lowering of writing standards frequently found in young adult fiction. This is a good book. And it happens to be appropriate for teenagers. Sci-fi readers of all ages should check this out. And of course, go back and read Mortal Engines and the other books about the Predator Cities. Great stuff. Hester Shaw, man. One of the great characters.

-Matthew J. Constantine

Book Review: Scrivener’s Moon

    The third book in Philip Reeve’s Fever Crumb trilogy, Scrivener’s Moon, finally takes us through the birth of the Traction Age as Fever returns home to London, nursing her battered heart.  Dr. Crumb, Charley Shallow, and Wavey are all there, for better or worse.  And as unrest builds in the north, London draws in resources at an alarming rate, it’s new towers growing out of the squalor.  Progress chews up and spits out people without much thought, but those who want a return to the ‘good old days’ are making their voice heard.  And among the nomads, a young girl with visions of horror is preaching against the growing monster-city.  Then some carnies show up with hints of a possible game changer laying buried in hostile territory.  This is the set-up for Fever’s journey north where she will face danger, loss, heartbreak, and even personality death as the memories and will of her father resurface once more.

    Fever is competent and smart, but painfully unsure of herself.  Her deep emotional longing and hurting, combined with a fumbling and awkward attempts to properly express herself resonates with this reader.  But while world changing forces push and pull at her, she does all that she can to stand up and forge her own path, which makes her far more compelling than may of the more passive characters so common in teen fiction.  And she is up against an array of colorful characters.  Charley is a dangerous kid, always able to excuse his own bad behavior, always able to adjust his moral compass to fit the situation.  Cluny is a pure soul; but with the danger of Godshawk lurking in her mind, can she be trusted?  And what about those carnies and their history with Wavey?

    The story moves quickly.  As with his other books, you know anyone could die at any time, and nobody is safe.  Danger lurks around every turn, in every shadow, and in every heart.  Reeve is also very good at making characters who are perfectly decent folk, with ways of viewing the world that are dangerously incompatible.  I spent much of the book simultaneously wanting London and its people to triumph and to be destroyed, and the same struggle goes on with the various characters.  Impressive.  There’s plenty of action and thrilling heroics, too.

    This trilogy, begun in Fever Crumb, continued in A Web of Air, and ending here expands on the history of the world created in Mortal Engines and its sequels.  But the story is so removed that one need not have read the original series (though, one should read those books!).  If you have read them, you’ll pick up on some hints and names that resonate into the future.  Overall, the Fever Crumb trilogy doesn’t have the same emotional resonance as the Predator Cities series, but it taps into the same magic.  Considering how blubbery I was at the end of the A Darkling Plain, I was a bit surprised the end of Scrivener’s Moon didn’t leave me feeling especially emotional.  Not to say the ending was bad.  It wasn’t.   Whatever the case, it’s a world I would love to revisit again.  If Reeve never writes another story about it, I think it will stand perfectly well with what he‘s done so far.  But if he does, I’ll be there.

Scrivener's Moon
Author: Philip Reeve
Publisher: Scholastic Press
ISBN: 978-0-545-22218-1

-Matt

Book Review: A Web of Air

    Many years ago, while walking the floor of the book store that employed me, I spotted a kids book with an interesting cover (yes, book covers are important, no matter what proverbs might say; as are the stores in which you find them).  It was Larklight, by Philip Reeve.  Something about its Jules Verne-type 'adventure in space' style grabbed me and I devoured the book with a smile on my face.  A bit of research told me that Reeve had also written a teen-aimed series, so I figured I’d give it a shot.  I started reading Mortal Engines and was swept away.  Here was a book that delved back into so much of the stuff I’d loved about science fiction since I was a kid.  Great machines rolling across the world, ancient tech from a long-gone golden age, airships, dashing adventurers, dangerous women, unexpected twists, and really big ideas.  I was hooked, and in fairly quick succession read the following three books that form Reeve’s epic tale of two broken people trying to find peace in a world shaking to its core.  The ending of the last book actually brought tears to my eyes.  Great stuff.  And I’ve continued to read Reeve’s work, with two follow-ups to Larklight, the Arthurian tale Here Lies Arthur, and finally a couple years ago, a new book set in the world of Mortal Engines, Fever Crumb (I haven’t read No Such Thing as Dragons, yet).

    I’m not generally a big fan of prequels.  I’m not against them, but they seldom do much for me.  The best prequels are removed from the original work by a good deal of time, develop some unknown factors, and while they may deal with similar issues, need to stand well on their own.  Fever Crumb is one such prequel.  The book deals with the days before London was mobile, and with some of the events that led up to that change.  It introduces us to the titular character, a young Engineer discovering the truth about her own ancestry, while dealing with some other, most irrational problems.  Though it pains me to say, I was actually pretty disappointed with the book.  Sure, it was written well, and the pre-mobile London world, still well into the bleak future Reeve has created, is lavishly painted.  But ultimately, I was never fully engaged in the story or the characters.  And when the book was over, I felt more like I’d read the introduction to a novel than the novel itself.  Perhaps I’d loved the four book ‘Predator Cities’ series too much and this prequel couldn’t live up.  I don’t know.  Certainly those books felt denser; packed with more story.  Still, I picked up the following book when it came out, but let it sit on my shelf for more than a year, unread.

    Recently, my ambient desire for more cool science fiction got a bit louder and less ambient.  And, at the same time, the third book in Reeve’s Fever Crumb trilogy hit the stands.  I pick up all of his books, so as I slid it onto the shelf next to A Web of Air, I decided now was the time to read the second book.  I’m so glad I did.  Right off the bat I found myself more engaged with Fever and her life with a traveling theater troupe.  I liked the exotic location of Mayda, built inside a giant bomb crater.  And the mystery of the reclusive inventor and his flying models pulled me in.

    As with the tale of Tom and Hester told in the original four books, this story features several kind of cliché set-ups that prepare you for tried and true story progressions.  Then Reeve cold cocks you, sending the story or character in another direction entirely.  One character might get built up as a major player, only to die an ignominious death.  Another may seem like a friend, only to be as vicious a villain as you could wish for.  Happiness is found, only to be snatched away, making its brief appearance all the more precious.  And unlike several other prequels I’ve read or seen, the knowledge of what will happen in the future doesn’t serve as a block to caring.  It is an ominous dread that lurks in the shadow of events, but not a wall.  It’s not like watching The Clone Wars, where you might think, ‘oh, man, that was awesome,’ only to remember that all these cool things are made moot by the idiocy of Revenge of the Sith.  This book feels more like a pre-WWII tale, where you know war is about to break out, but what these people are doing beforehand still means something; even if their lives are swallowed up in the oncoming storm.

    So, this second book in the Fever Crumb trilogy has reinvigorated my excitement with Philip Reeve’s work.  It’s made me want to sit down and re-read Mortal Engines and its sequels.  And I’m sure as heck interested in reading the third book now.  While it may not be the next book in my rotation, I don’t think I’ll be waiting a year this time around.  And something that struck me about A Web of Air, and Reeve’s more recent writing in general, is a refreshing sense of reality, rationalism, and scientific thinking; getting below the magical thinking of fantasy, religion, mythology, etc. and getting to the heart of the matter.  This is explicitly illustrated in Fever Crumb’s dealings with Orca Mo in this book.  Fever's disgust at the woman’s behavior and the general behavior of her followers, is deep and reasoned.  At one point she says, “If you really want to stop people thinking, you don’t use guns or bombs.  You use religion.”  That is a line I can’t imagine reading in a youth-aimed book twenty years ago, and it made me so happy.  In a time when even adult science fiction is filled with claptrap about how sometimes ‘you just need to believe’ or ‘some things can’t be known’ or are ‘beyond science,’ it’s so, so nice to see someone calling BS and standing up for reason, rationality, and science.  It’s even more important that it be in books aimed at kids, because that’s the age people are most susceptible to and most targeted by religion and purveyors of magical thinking.  My hat is off to Mr. Reeve for that.  Plus, it's a darned entertaining read.

A Web of Air
Author: Philip Reeve
Publisher: Scholastic Press
ISBN: 978-0-545-22216-7

-Matt