Present Entanglement: Brent Weeks

I solemnly do swear that next time I buy a book (or books), I shall be very, very careful in picking. The reason? Every book I pick off the shelf in a shopping whim (yes, I do shop in a whim, but more of that later) I find myself uncannily stuck inside it.

The first book was Gail Carriger's Soulless. The main attraction was the rather unmissable title and the model on the cover. Both encouraged me to pick it up and start for the counter line. For the next three hours, I found myself inevitably stuck to the pages, tearing through the paragraphs. I sealed my own fate by doing something so impulsive, and liking every second of it.

A few weeks ago I went to a bookstore. It was past closing time, and I have yet to select a title. I wanted something that I could read for leisure. And there they were, two books with a very sleek assassin standing within both of its cover. Then the closing announcement began. Throwing caution to the wind, I picked up book 1 and 2, and made it to the counter, trying to ignore that spiraling feeling inside my stomach.

The next day, I began reading. And reading. And was unable to stop reading.

Were the books a good choice? No. Why?

Because they made me want more! Oh, Brent Weeks, I am begging you to write more! Please!!!

Review: Blameless - Book the 3rd of the Parasol Protectorate

Good stories make me love good books. That’s the long and short of it when it comes to reading for most people, and I am part of most people. I rarely stick around with serial books, simply because they lose their pull after the second or third book.

So what’s with Gail Carriger’s third instalment in the Parasol Protectorate Series that’s making me wanting more? Besides a scandalously pregnant, half-British, half-Italian woman and a cross-dressing French woman who has a thing for fake moustache and hidden artilleries, and also let’s not forget a frighteningly efficient butler?

I implore those who picked up this book without reading the first two, please get the two books. You’d be doing yourself a lot of favours because you’ll be exploring a whole new world, where everything is made out of ether and machines rule the day, with cogs and steams and, yes, tea. Proper loose-leaf tea, made in freshly boiling water. The supernaturals – ghosts, vampires and oh yes, werewolves – have come out of their darkened closets, and are hailed as the epitome of the cultured class in the British Empire. Flying is also possible with dirigibles, and the only thing you need to fear is the food.

In this third instalment, I am happy to report a resounding success for both the characters and the author. Opening with a dismal breakfast over at the Loontwills, the scandalous matter of Alexia’s self-ejection from his husband’s mansion causes the females of the Loontwills to break out in fits and swoons, before declaring Alexia fit for a bout of the European continental travels. Meantime, Professor Lyall is handling Alexia’s sudden exodus rather difficultly, because his Alpha resorts to a Bacchanalian manner of dealing matters. Werewolves digest alcohol better than humans, so Lord Maccon switches to formaldehyde and has some rather crunchy snacks. But enough of that.

Lady Maccon’s tour of the Europe is constantly interrupted by deadly ladybugs, a spite of vampires bent on her death and doom, and a very irritating German who keeps addressing her as ‘Specimen’ rather than her name. She also meets some men wearing ‘nightgowns’ that keeps away from her but keeps her close by, if that makes any sense. (Of course it makes sense after reading it, though...) Lady Maccon’s father’s past also comes unravelling, albeit slowly.

This instalment is brilliant. I found myself reading it again and again just for the sheer delight across the pages, and this time there are a lot of action scenes, and none of the characters are limpid or weak-kneed here. Everybody pulls their collective weights and it makes the book simply sparkles with the rare infusion of wit and brawn. Even the little-present Lord Akeldama makes his presence count by giving a very important piece of information. It’s all a very robust-smelling Darjeeling tea. Four cups out of five.

A quote:

Alexia: "I read somewhere that the Templars have an initiation ritual involving a dead cat and a duck made from a rubber tree. Is that true?"

Templar: "We do not discuss the secrets of the brotherhood with outsiders. Certainly not with a soulless."

Alexia: "Well, certainly, you would like to keep that a secret."

Get the book here.

Let Me Tell You About: Gail Carriger's Changeless

Late last week, I finally got my copy of Gail Carriger's second book of The Parasol Protectorate Series. I denied myself the pleasure of devouring the book until yesterday, when I finally plunged right in, with a tall glass of cool iced lemon tea and some peanuts. How un-British.

I am happy to say that the wit I often associate with the classics of the English literature is still there, if not even sharper. By now, Ms Carriger has nearly dropped all efforts of descriptions on her heroine and hero, and the same goes for the surroundings. She has instead focused on the story, which is a very delightful change of pace. The only moments where descriptions really matter are when she inserts new characters and puts the reader within the dirigible. Marvelous things, those dirigibles.

The second book reveals what really drove Lord Maccon to leave his homeland. A new character is put forth: a French inventor who sells hats as a cover. (Hmm, there is a pun somewhere there, but it is lost to me at the moment.) Needless to say, Ms Hisselpenny is always choosing the worst kind, but Lady Maccon's introduction to the Frenchwoman is nothing short of explosive. She is also eccentric.I do, however, miss Lord Akeldama. The wonderful vampire has less space, now that the entire story is moved to Scotland, Lord Maccon's homeland. Oh, bother! But that only shows how far his network goes all around jolly ole British. The few times he comes up are really precious.

New steamworks are also put to fore, with me devouring the descriptions all the way. (What do you mean, the telegraph failed?!) I do so love secret weapons, and parasols, for me at least, is the ultimate secret weapon. Those reading the first book remember that Alexia's parasol was taken by a certain American scientist as a token.

With that, I leave the second book and await for the third, coming later this year. Till then, I shall look out for sudden changes in the air, or more explicitly, a repulsive sensation around me. Who knows, I might be also a curse-breaker.

Let me tell you about: Richard Preston's The Cobra Event

Are you kidding? 1998?

That was a lifetime ago. I could not even remember where in the world I bought the book. Maybe, it seemed my affair with books began in a secondhand bookstore. This was no exception.

This book was published in 1998, and it caused quite a stir in White House back then. A lone terrorist could unleash terror upon the unsuspecting world, it seemed, and within the pages of this novel, the plan seemed infallible.

The book began with a typical girl's waking hours before going to a school in New York with a terminal difference: she had a cold. As the chapter progresses, her cold turns into something more sinister, life-threatening, cannibalistic. It ends with her dying in the arms of her arts teacher, who, by no long stretch of imagination, must have been infected by whatever that kills her just now.

Enter Alice Austen, an adept forensic pathologist, and Will Hopkins, a Special Agent of the FBI. Both have their own issues, but that matters little, because their paths are about to converge in the heart of the malice known as Cobra. As they watch people they like (and don't like) self-cannibalise and die (in that order), they must race against a lone terrorist whose idea of changing the world does not involve the man in the mirror, but the world as a whole.

This book came out before the CSI was even on TV, and yet the details in there (whenever Austen goes to the morgue and starts cutting on the bodies) are as tantalising as they are repelling. I was always looking forward to the next possibility of another body spread out under the white light while Austen picks and prods her way in it, looking for answers. Hopkins was the masculine side of the story, putting into action what Austen has in words.

This was no literature feat by any means, but in the end, one cannot help but wonder the next time a bulb breaks in the subway train whether it contained nadir gases or something else more deadly...

Let me tell you about: James Rollins's The Doomsday Key

For a yarn that often polarises old and obscure wisdom upon the height of scientific discoveries of modern age, James Rollins’s SIGMA Force series has never lost its momentum. From the first book to the sixth, action and history never looked so good together. His latest offering, The Doomsday Key, is no exception.

Slightly breaking away from his norm, the story began in the spring of 1086, in England. Men were travelling on lands that were devastated by a deadly pestilence.  They noted down everything they saw in a book named Domesday Book, written for William the Conqueror who wanted to know everything that he owned and how much it all was worth. (Trivia: the Domesday Book was slowly known as the Doomsday Book because what the book contains is final and unchangeable.) The pestilence is then updated to the modern century as it became clear throughout the novel that someone is pulling at the strings so that the world leaders, meeting at a summit in Norway, would inevitably arrive at a single terrible decision.  And throughout the novel, too, Sigma Force will find ways and means to avert that finality, even if it means pulling down stars from the sky, among other things.

I am always fascinated by the depth of details Mr Rollins manage to squeeze in his novels. All the fancy-schmancy science talk is rendered simple and tight. The action sequences are written out in such a manner that I could clearly see them in front of my eyes, especially that last bit where things started to fall out of the sky. (No spoilers here, don’t worry.)

This time, Mr Rollins’s subject is as diverse as life itself. Genome manipulation and its negative side effects, Black Madonna, ancient repopulation, overpopulation, and depopulation, world famine – the problems in the book reads like everyday headlines mixed with religious scholar paper. What if humanity has really come to a saturation point? How would we face it? Would we turn in and destroy ourselves, or would we rise above our current stagnation?

That aside, I finally got my secret wish – seeing the two women of Agent Pierce Gray’s life in action, and in the same page. The two could not be more different and yet, similar. Maybe the women are a reflection of the man himself. And Monk Kokkalis (thank you for resurrecting him!) returns in grand form. With a baby and a wife, he finally relearns who he is (after his resurrection in The Last Oracle). Seichan is also taking up most of the scene (book?) time, as she struggles between the two sides that have her.

All in all, it’s a wonderful romp through several continents, science, ancient history and modern calamities. Just remember to love the bees, because they are very important (hint hint).

4 out of 5 stars.

Let me tell you about: The Name of the Rose

I have heard of this book for some time. When Mr Brown's The da Vinci Code came out, most of the reviewers compared him with Umberto Eco's later novel, Foucault's Pendulum. I however chose to read this book first.

As I've mentioned earlier, I was in luck to find a secondhand book with this title. What surprised me at first was the fact that the book was actually written in Italian. William Weaver took great pains to translate it into English, and I must say that he did a very good job at it, considering nobody has tried to re-translate it after all these years. 

I was, at first, appalled by the voluminous descriptions found within the book. At times, the narrator seems to abandon the whodunit yarn and debate about the human logic, money and the Church, different orders of monkshood, and the uncertainties created by Christians themselves. For example, the debate between William and the elderly, blind Benedictine monk, Jorge, was about whether Christ ever laughed during his lifetime. Both sides had so much evidence to prove and disprove the question that I had to decide for myself whose side shall I root for. Then, sneaky as a black cat, the narrative would smoothly swing back to the detective yarn again. 

William of Baskerville is a Franciscan monk with a novice traveling along. (Ring any bells?) He's invited by a Benedictine order to their monastery for a discussion on religious matters. However, their arrival is marred by a death that seemed to defy any explanation except for demonic possession. As the monastery is  thrown further into chaos by further murders, William finally arrives at the solution by going into the labyrinthine library that seems to open its arms to everyone, but lets out only dead monks.

Like any good whodunit, the story itself was flawless, an Agatha Christie, and I'm not going to spill more of the beans. But there is more to this book than 'just a whodunit'. For within, I found out that the medieval monks were actually the first scholars, regarded higher than the lords whose lands they live upon. Monasteries also function as universities and libraries, where both the works of the 'heretics' and the Christians were collected, studied and cared for. Countless other historical facts, like a painting of Christ hanging on the cross with a hand pointing to a purse, was shocking. It's something that I would never learn from other books. This goes to show what anybody would do to 'legalise' their actions, and it mirrors what I see everyday in the newspapers.

Be prepared to spend a long time with this book, preferably on a long weekend.

My Panacea to Erudite Readership

I must confess, my affair with Mr Rollins began in an unpromising manner. I bought a secondhand copy of Map of Bones in a Pay Less bookstore. I think one reason I grabbed the book was because it was mistakenly placed next to Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose, and that day the bookstore had a Two for Ten promotion. So, I bought it and read Eco's novel first (that review will come next) and neglected Map.

One week later, I decided that I need to take a moment away from books. Rose had to be read during a long break: I finally conceded to a friend's advice. But my mind still craved for words and adventure. Map was there, and I reached out to read it.

Three hours later, by golly, I finished it. By the end of the three hours, however, I know I was hooked with the world of Sigma Team, DARPA, the Dragon Court, and the world of the hidden histories. Map of Bones was, surprisingly, regarding one of the most iconic and enduring figures in Christianity who confirmed the divinity of Christ: the Wise Men from the East, or simply The Magi. The men appeared out of the east, saw a star, freaked out Herod -who in turn massacred babies (known as Massacre of the Innocents) - found Jesus, gave him the three presents, then simply vanished out of history. Their bones, however, were scattered across the Christendom, one of them being kept in a church in Germany. Here the story really begins rather gruesomely.

How Mr Rollins connected the yarns between the Magi and the dark world of bio-terrorism was like going through an old documentary programs called Connections. He finds connections in the unlikeliest of places, but eerily they make enough sense, you sometimes have to re-think your view on the world.

The latest book of his that I have finished, The Last Oracle deals with the concept of genetically engineered prophets who would either bring about the end of humanity or lifts it up from its current stagnation. By now, I have come to expect the action coming from any of Mr Rollins's books, but here was what I had been waiting for: the resurrection of a very dear character. I don't know whether Mr Rollins was pressured to revive this particular character or otherwise, but I am thankful that he did. Without this character, Pierce Gray would have been a Rambo with brains and no sense of humour.

So, with that aside, I'm going to read both The Doomsday Key and Altar of Eden. Mr Rollins finally settles into the world he knows best in the latest book by crafting a story around a veterinarian. We'll see how both books pan out. Until then, wish me well!

World Drug Campaign

Something for the mind, body and soul. Go to the World Drug Day page here.

We have suffered enough without drugs, why let it control our daily lives? Fight temptation and embrace life.