C.D. Covington

Book review: The Hunger Games

Conni — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 13:00:00 +0000

The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay, by Suzanne Collins

I love dystopic fiction. I've always found stories about societal breakdown and how people cope with it fascinating, not least because they reflect the failings of modern society, magnified to an extreme.

The former United States, years after an unspecified disaster, likely some combination of war and rising oceans, is known as Panem. The Capitol (in former Colorado) controls twelve districts, each with a specific product: technology, textiles, food, fish, etc. District Twelve, where the story begins, produces coal.

Seventy-four years before this story, the districts, then numbering thirteen, rose up against the Capitol to fight their oppressive hand. The Capitol won, obliterating District Thirteen, and continued to oppress the districts. They added a punishment in the Treaty of the Treason: every year, one boy and one girl, between the ages of 12 and 18 inclusive, from each district are selected in a Reaping as Tributes to fight in a battle to the death: the Hunger Games.

Katniss Everdeen (16), the narrator, lost her father in a mining disaster, and since then, she's been hunting (illegally) to help feed her mother and sister. She's hard and determined, and she's willing to sacrifice everything to protect her 12-year-old sister Primrose. Her best friend, Gale, an older boy who lost his father in the same mining accident, goes hunting with her.

The day of the Reaping, Prim's name is pulled from the fishbowl. Katniss volunteers to go in her place: that's legal in the Games' rules. Her co-Tribute, baker's son Peeta Mellark, joins her on stage, and she remembers him as the boy with the bread: he tossed her a loaf of bread when she was starving.

They go to the Capitol, where they're prepared for the Games, fed and bathed and cleaned and trained. They're interviewed on TV to try to get sponsors interested in them. Sponsors can send them gifts during the Games, like food or medicine or weapons, and the more sponsors a Tribute has, the greater chance they have of survival.

Katniss is determined to win the Games, because she'll be able to take care of Prim. (A Games Victor receives extra food and money for life.) Peeta, in a conversation the night before the Games, says he doesn't want the Capitol to change him in the Games, and if he's going to die, he'll do it on his own terms, as himself.

Katniss' slow rebellion of the mind begins there, and it continues throughout the Games, as she plays the role she thinks will draw more Sponsors then, over time, comes to understand what Peeta meant. I wish I could go into further detail, but that would be too many spoilers.

The Hunger Games trilogy is dark, brutal, heart-rending, and, ultimately, hopeful. It's a compelling read, as Katniss, a survivor, does her best to survive in the Games, then cope with her PTSD in the second and third books as the world she's known her whole life changes around her.

On top of Katniss' story, Collins paints a target on reality-show culture and the massive divide between haves and have-nots. The movie version does a brilliant job of the reality-show aspect and questioning our own complicity in the Games.

I highly recommend both.

Book review: Leviathan trilogy

Conni — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Leviathan, Behemoth, and Goliath, by Scott Westerfeld.

Leviathan opens in an alternate late-July 1914, with Prince Aleksandr, son of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary, being spirited away by his fencing tutor and the master of mechaniks late at night. They climb into their Stormwalker and head for Switzerland. Anyone passingly familiar with real-world history may recall that Franz Ferdinand's assassination in late July 1914 was the spark in the tinderbox that led to the First World War, and if you made that connection, you would be correct.

Up in England, a girl named Deryn Sharp is taking the midshipman's exam for the British Navy (Air Navy? I forget what he called it, exactly.) The thing is, only boys are allowed to be middies, because it's 1914 and the military is a bit sexist like that. So Deryn calls herself Dylan, cuts her hair short, and dresses like a boy. Because of a storm during the first test flight using a Huxley (a jellyfish-hot air balloon), she ends up on the great airbeast Leviathan, a zeppelin-whale.)

The alternate part of Westerfeld's 1914 is that the world is divided between Darwinists and Clankers. The Darwinists have figured out how to take the "life strands" of creatures and fiddle with them in the lab, thus creating living airships and beast weapons, like strafing hawks and bats who eat razor blades stuck inside fruit then poop them onto their target. The living airships are an ecosystem, and it requires a delicate balance.

Clankers use mechaniks, or diesel-powered robots of a sort. The Stormwalker moves on legs, and the land ships are sort of like tanks on legs. Pretty straightforward.

Except, because the world in 1914 was pretty complicated, Alek's escape isn't so easy. They have enemies not just in the Darwinists, but among their own theoretical allies, the fellow Clankers in Germany. Deryn is always in danger of being discovered as a girl and kicked out of the service.

Through a series of events, Alek ends up on Leviathan with Deryn, and they become friends and have adventures while saving the world. (This book is targeted to a teenaged/young adult audience.) It's a great, fun read, and the story ends up taking them literally around the world, to Turkey (the Ottoman Empire), Russia, Japan, the US, and Mexico.

One thing I enjoyed were Westerfeld's endnotes on each book, explaining briefly what the real history was and how he changed it. I'm more than passingly familiar with the beginning of the Great War, and I enjoyed noticing things that I knew were the same (or close) and finding things he'd changed.

I purchased this for my kobo e-reader, and the only complaint I have is that it's hard to see the illustrations on the e-ink screen.

If you like adventures with mostly-happy endings, you'll enjoy this series.

I need to update more often.

Conni — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 13:50:00 +0000

I have a stack of books I've read and need to review here, a smaller stack I need to review for money, and a very-slowly-shrinking stack of books I'm reading. I also have a few ideas for posts that aren't book reviews (shocker) and an announcement that I'm waiting on until I can link you to it. (I sold a story!)

To review here:
- Scott Westerfeld, Leviathan trilogy
- Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games trilogy
- Jo Walton, Among Others
- CJ Cherryh, Regenesis
- Georgette Heyer, Devil's Cub

To review elsewhere:
- Natania Barron, Pilgrim of the Sky
- TC McCarthy, Exogene

Currently reading:
- Elif Shafak, The Flea Palace
- Uli Hesse, TOR! The Story of German Football
- Walter Moers, Die Stadt der Träumenden Bücher

TBR:
- Kürshat Bashar, Music by my Bedside
- Bilge Karasu, The Garden of Departed Cats
- Oliver Plaschka, Die Magier von Montparnasse
- Frank Schätzing, Limit
- Jack Turner, Spice: the History of a Temptation
- Mary Robinette Kowal, Glamour in Glass
- Jonathan Wilson, Behind the Curtain: Travels in Eastern European Football

Book review: the Gil Trilogy

Conni — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 19:30:00 +0000

Lady in Gil, Scion's Lady, and Lady Pain by Rebecca Bradley.

I'm not sure how these books ended up in my collection. They have used book store price markings inside the covers, so they came used. Possibly as a gift, I don't know.

The first two books follow Tigrallef, Scion of Oballef, who is supposed to go back to the island his people were driven out of by the Sherank, a vulgar people who mainly enjoy killing other people and being slovenly. Tig is a librarian and scholar, not the Trained Hero (tm) who has the Heroic Image, etc. But his older brother (the Hero) was injured, so he can't make it.

Tig gets back to Gil and gets taken under the wing of a rebel movement, who help him break into Gilgard (the castle) and steal the Lady (the MacGuffin). The Lady is a powerful magical object that is said to have built the nation of Gil from nothing, and the Sherank want it so they can continue to dominate the rest of the world.

One of the rebels is a young woman named Calla, with whom Tig falls in love.

The third book follows Tig and his family as they try to figure out the secret of where the Lady came from and how to send her back to the void. The Lady has taken residence inside Tig's head, see, and he wants her gone. She's quite vicious and shows no qualms about destroying an entire nation of people.

According to her bio, Bradley is an archaeologist. When Tig's family searches the ruins of ancient civilizations for hints of where the Lady came from, it's done with a careful attention to detail, reflected from her experience.

I'm of two minds on these books. They're well-written, and the story compels you to turn page after page. I loved the subversion of the usual Hero tropes and how Tig really just wanted to hole up in his archive and read his precious books. At the same time, Tig was a dumbass and I wanted to kick him quite frequently. I didn't like him much as a person, while as a character he was well-drawn. The third book, narrated by a character who wasn't Tig, was my favorite.

There were a lot of things I enjoyed about these books, and if you can get over an annoying first-person lead character, you might enjoy them, too. Or you might not find Tig particularly annoying.

Book list

Conni — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 19:02:00 +0000

Because I'm building up quite a backlog, I'll make a list.

Books to review:
- Scott Westerfeld's Leviathan trilogy
- Rebecca Bradley's Gil trilogy
- Natania Barron's Pilgrim of the Sky (for Bull Spec?)

Books to read and review:
- TC McCarthy's Exogene (SO EXCITED) (for Bull Spec?)
- Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games trilogy

Is that all? Doesn't seem like that much... though I'm in the middle of re-reading CJ Cherryh's Foreigner series. I'm on book 7 right now. (Book 12 comes out in paperback next month, and I haven't read any of the 4th trilogy at all yet. Waiting for cliffhanger resolution isn't my strong point.)

Free fiction!

Conni — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 14:51:00 +0000

It's really hard to place a reprint of flash fiction. Not many markets want pieces that short, and not many want reprints, anyway. So I've put U8: Alexanderplatz (1989) up on my website. It's got a little paypal button at the bottom, if you want to drop some money my way.

(I tried to figure out the Amazon Payments system, but I couldn't get past the business information part.)

Free fiction!

CD Covington — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 14:51:00 +0000

It’s really hard to place a reprint of flash fiction. Not many markets want pieces that short, and not many want reprints, anyway. So I’ve put U8: Alexanderplatz (1989) up on my website. It’s got a little paypal button at the bottom, if you want to drop some money my way.

(I tried to figure out the Amazon Payments system, but I couldn’t get past the business information part.)

Book review: Fly Into Fire

Conni — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 17:00:00 +0000

Fly Into Fire, by Susan Jane Bigelow. 2012, Candlemark and Gleam

Fly Into Fire picks up three years after Broken left off. Be forewarned that this review contains a few spoilers for the ending of Broken.

Sky Ranger has spent the last three years hiding from and fighting the Confederation government, which he had helped to uphold. He believed them to be honorable. He was wrong. He's bought passage on a refugee ship bound for Räton space.

When the ship crash lands on a desert planet which the Rätons had given to the Confederation, Sky Ranger and the handful of survivors build a small tent city while they figure out a way off of the planet before the Confederation finds them.

He befriends Renna, and he tries to take care of Dee, a young girl who was orphaned in the crash. Dee runs off one afternoon, and when he goes looking for her, he finds a massive sandstorm coming in. The survivors take refuge in an abandoned Räton house, except Sky Ranger, who searches futilely for the last two members of the search party for Dee. They're captured separately.

Sky Ranger finds unexpected friends and allies in his captivity: remnants of the Extrahuman Union. He also finds unspeakably cruel captors in his former employers, the Confederation.

Fly Into Fire is just as compelling as Broken. It's a fast-paced adventure story, where well-drawn characters have to figure out how to survive the government that oppresses them long enough to escape.

Another aspect of this book that may appeal to some readers is that Renna is a trans woman. It's not a book about transitioning or being trans*; Renna's just this woman who's a refugee, who falls in love, who makes friends, who fights for her friends...and she's trans. Granted, being trans is the reason she's a refugee, but that's still not the main point of the story.

Fly Into Fire comes out January 24. If you want to whet your appetite and you haven't read it yet, you can pick up Broken here.

Book review: Fly Into Fire

CD Covington — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 17:00:00 +0000

Fly Into Fire, by Susan Jane Bigelow. 2012, Candlemark and Gleam

Fly Into Fire picks up three years after Broken left off. Be forewarned that this review contains a few spoilers for the ending of Broken.

Sky Ranger has spent the last three years hiding from and fighting the Confederation government, which he had helped to uphold. He believed them to be honorable. He was wrong. He’s bought passage on a refugee ship bound for Räton space.

When the ship crash lands on a desert planet which the Rätons had given to the Confederation, Sky Ranger and the handful of survivors build a small tent city while they figure out a way off of the planet before the Confederation finds them.

He befriends Renna, and he tries to take care of Dee, a young girl who was orphaned in the crash. Dee runs off one afternoon, and when he goes looking for her, he finds a massive sandstorm coming in. The survivors take refuge in an abandoned Räton house, except Sky Ranger, who searches futilely for the last two members of the search party for Dee. They’re captured separately.

Sky Ranger finds unexpected friends and allies in his captivity: remnants of the Extrahuman Union. He also finds unspeakably cruel captors in his former employers, the Confederation.

Fly Into Fire is just as compelling as Broken. It’s a fast-paced adventure story, where well-drawn characters have to figure out how to survive the government that oppresses them long enough to escape.

Another aspect of this book that may appeal to some readers is that Renna is a trans woman. It’s not a book about transitioning or being trans*; Renna’s just this woman who’s a refugee, who falls in love, who makes friends, who fights for her friends…and she’s trans. Granted, being trans is the reason she’s a refugee, but that’s still not the main point of the story.

Fly Into Fire comes out January 24. If you want to whet your appetite and you haven’t read it yet, you can pick up Broken here.

Book review: No god but God

Conni — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 18:40:00 +0000

No god but God: The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam by Reza Aslan. updated edition, 2011.

Reza Aslan was born in Iran, and his parents fled to America with him and his younger sister in 1979, during the revolution. He's a scholar of Islam and its history. When Aslan originally published this book in 2005, it was in response to the growing Islamophobia in the United States and the western world. He wanted to show that Muslims are no different than any other residents on this planet, and that, in the US and other (theoretically) secular western democracies, they are as deserving of religious freedom as Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, Jains, Sikhs, atheists, and everyone else.

The book that resulted does this very well. He begins with the Arab tribes in what is now Saudi Arabia, where Mohammed lived, and he describes Arab polytheism and their tribal traditions. The origin of Islam that he describes, when Mohammed moved to Medina (then called Yathrib), is one of equality for all.

Aslan spends a good half of the book on Mohammed, his life, and the internecine, often literal, warfare that occurred after his death. He also describes the two main minority sects, Shi'ism and Sufism, each in their own chapter. Then he skips forward to the mid-1800s, when Muslims yearned to throw off the yoke of colonialism in India and Egypt, touching on the effects colonialism had on Islam and its evolution, including the beginnings of the Taliban.

There's a chapter set in the Islamic Republic of Iran, beginning with a description of his trip back to Tehran as an adult after the travel ban was lifted, which leads into a reminiscence of his family's run, hand gripped firmly in hand, through the airport to catch a plane out.

This same chapter ends in India, with the British partitioning of it into Pakistan and India. He says that pluralism and secularization, not secularism, are the key to democracy in the Muslim world, declaring

Finally, neither human rights nor pluralism is the result of secularization, they are its root cause, meaning that any democratic society--Islamic or otherwise--dedicated to the principles of pluralism and human rights must dedicate itself to following the unavoidable path toward political secularization.

Because, in Islam, only the Prophet held both secular and religious authority, and he is no longer here, so the leaders in an Islamic democracy can only be in charge of civil things (like, for example, traffic laws, business regulations, etc).

The final chapter is dedicated to the Islamic reformation. Aslan compares the internet age to Gutenberg's printing press and Luther's translation of the Bible from Latin into German. (In an echo of this concept, The Economist wrote how Martin Luther went viral.) He discusses the various movements in Islam right now and what some of them could result in.

He glosses over the Crusades, unfortunately, and any chapter could easily be twice as long. He gives an extensive bibliography and very detailed end notes, which someone who wants more detail can turn to.

It's very well-written, not dry or tedious, but still with a turn toward the academic at times. It's a very accessible history of Islam, and I highly recommend it.