Slinger Saga by Matt Wallace Review

The SLINGERS SAGA by Matt Wallace is a story set in the distant future about gladiators who battle to the death over a live wormhole for the amusement of the world, and uncover a dark conspiracy behind the scenes of the arena.

For those of you pressed for time, and want to get to the point of this review, here it is: SLINGERS by Matt Wallace is one of the best additions to science fiction in the history of the genre. It will rock not only your socks, but also your face, completely off. Go read the first chapter for free, and then buy it off of Matt Wallace’s website directly, or here’s the link to Amazon.

For those of you with more time on your hands, here’s the rest of the review:

I am notoriously picky when it comes to science fiction. I enjoy a great many of it’s sub-genres (hello, post apocalypse and cyberpunk, you’re looking well this evening), but most hard science fiction does nothing for me as a reader. I like to think about society and people and other Deep Thoughts, but most hard science fiction misses the mark in favor of complex scientific jargon at the expense of plot and characters. I enjoy reading about wormholes and spaceships as much as the next person, but that’s not the only reason why I read science fiction.

So I’m picky. I love science fiction, but prefer a blend of character drama and oh cool science stuff, like the early seasons of Battlestar Galactica and Babylon Five.

I found Matt Wallace through Chuck Wendig’s blog at terribleminds (which is hilarious and awesome if you’ve never stumbled across him before). He linked to one of Matt’s posts, and I started to follow him on Twitter because he says funny/clever things. When he tweeted about his new book series, I checked it out and put it on my wish list. Again, it’s science fiction and I wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. A week later he gave away the first episode for free, and I snatched it up, figuring this was a no-lose situation. I read it a few days later, and I was immediately hooked.

Since reading the first installment, I have jonesed for the latest installment like a crack addict joneses for…well, crack. I’ve gone as far as gently (hopefully) pestering Matt Wallace on Twitter to see when the next episode would be released.

I don’t usually get this excited over a book. I like a lot of books, but there’s very few that I absolutely love, especially the older I get. I’ve been reading voraciously since I was very young; one year in middle school I read the entire library starting from A and working my way to Z. That high I get after reading an amazing book comes less frequently, because as a writer, I can’t help but think about what I wish happened differently.

It’s not usually major problems (if I really don’t like the book I’ll stop reading it. I don’t have time to waste on books I’m not enjoying), but minor details. I wish the magic system was better explained; I wish the main character wasn’t such a chauvinistic pig; I wish the action scenes were better explained; I wish the writing was a little better. Nothing major, but after a while these things add up, and the end feeling is like, not love.

I started to read Slingers and the entire world disappeared. For a little while I was in another place, another time, and nothing made me leave that world until it ended. Everything was perfect. The style in which it’s written is perfect. The bardic voice gives you the POV of most of the characters without ever once sacrificing intimacy of character. It’s even played for laughs a few times, and that deft wit is very hard to do. Matt Wallace is a very talented writer on top of being a great storyteller. The story itself is gripping, moving from exhilaration and heartbreak, and each episode feels complete. I love the characters, and I love how Wallace makes you fall in love with them, and then he breaks your heart by letting them mess up or even die. It’s the very best sort of entertainment, where you get to vicariously live inside someone’s head and feel their joy and pain as your own.

I’ve read several novella series trying to prepare for my own, and most of them leave me wanting. It’s like the authors are holding something back because they know there’s going to be another episode coming up, but SLINGERS never left me feeling like it was just filler. At the end of every episode I desperately wanted to read the next one right then and there.

Wallace held a really cool question and answer session that you can read here. Readers got to submit questions and he answered them, picking his favorites for prizes. I submitted some questions, and was shocked and overjoyed when I got the first prize of having my name in the last volume. It’s not every day you get to step inside your fandom, and I’m still walking on clouds at the thought. Given the body count so far, I wouldn’t be surprised if the character named after me dies a bloody and glorious death.  

This is where I reveal my selfish motives for reviewing this series. If I tell more people about this series, and they discover a new book they love, more people will buy the books. Then Wallace gets to keep writing SLINGERS books, and I get to keep going back to the deadway, living moments of glory above a live wormhole in front of a crowd of billions.

So if this series sounds vaguely interesting to you, go read the first chapter. You can download the first and second episode at an incredible deal for 2 dollars if you download directly from Matt, or you can download the first episode from Amazon for a dollar.

People bandy about the .99 price point saying it’s less than a cup of coffee, and that’s true. But reading takes precious time out of your day; the time I’ve spent reading these books was worth way more than what Matt’s charging for them.

Rating:

I haven’t gone into depth yet about my particular review policy, but basically, I’m not a book blogger and I’m not going to review books I didn’t like. I’m not out to nit-pick every book I read, since a lot of that stuff is subjective anyway.

I just want to talk about books I really love in hopes that maybe some of you will find a wonderful new book, because there’s no better feeling in the world. So there’s no rating system here, but if there were, I’d give SLINGERS Eleventy Billion Slinger stars.

Recommended Reading

By popular request (and by popular, I mean Rena asked), here is a post about all the books I've read recently, and think you should too. Peer pressure! Peer pressure! Peer pressure!

In absolutely no particular order (seriously don't read into this (ha! get it? Read into this? I cracked myself up)):

The Mindspace Investigation series by Alex Hughes. This is a light science fiction series that starts in the near future. It reminds me of X-men in all the most awesome of ways.

Wicked As They Come and Wicked As She Wants by Delilah S. Dawson. Steampunk alternate world romance with an excellent eye for worldbuilding and believable characters. Yes please!

The Space Between by Brenna Yovanoff. Gorgeous prose, haunting eerie story with fresh ideas. I love this book and I plan on checking out Yovanoff's other work.

Geekomany by Michael R. Underwood. Hilarious and fun urban fantasy with more geek references than you can shake a stick at.

The Deacon Chalk Series by James R. Tuck. Gritty urban fantasy with old school magic and vampires. Finally some dark urban fantasy that's actually dark.

Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig. Brutal beautiful prose about a girl who can see how you die by touching you. 

Between Two Thorns by Emma Newman. Split worlds between Earth, Faeryland, and an inbetween place where society resembles Victorian London with it's rigid caste system. There's a gargoyle with a soul, and capricious fey, and feuding families. 

Bloodshot by Cherie Priest. Vampires become awesome again as spies and victims of government experiements. 

Discount Armageddon by Seanan McGuire. Cryptozoologists fight to study and protect creatures we don't acknowledge as real. Midnight Blue Light Special is the next in the series, and why this is on my recently read list, but if you haven't read anything, you should start with the first in the series. :D 

Also by Seanan McGuire is this bit of brilliance: a serial. It's called Indexing, about people who work for a secret government agency protecting the world from...faery tales. Every two weeks your Kindle is updated with a new installment of the story, but McGuire does a good job of wrapping up each episode so you don't feel ripped off.

These last few aren't recent, but since we're listing books I enjoyed, here you go:

She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb. No words can describe this book. It broke me apart inside, and then made me whole.

The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson. Man who gets badly burned is nursed to health by a nurse who claims they were lovers in ancient Germany. Fantastic storytelling.

Shelter by Susan Palwick. Science fiction in the near future, about two women's lives clashing.


Feel free to add your own recommendations in the comments section. 

P.S. For some reason while gathering all these links, I had the urge to Rick-roll you guys. Put Wally Lamb's link with Chuck Wendig's for example. But I resisted, because I'd like for you to actually read some of these books if they catch your interest. You're welcome. 

In Which Neil Gaiman Says Something Meaningful and I Post It For the Eddification of All

The title pretty much sums this post up.

I finished reading "Good Omens" by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett last night, and am left wondering why it took me so long to read it. I suppose the number of the people who haven't yet read this book is down in the single digits, and I urge the rest of you to go read it. 

At the end of the book Neil Gaiman talks about how he met Terry Pratchett and how they wrote the book together (as in, together. Not that one of them wrote one half and the other wrote the rest. They would sort of trade off, and write when they knew what happened next). 

I was struck by what Gaiman said about Terry Pratchett:

"He constructs novels like a guildmaster might build a cathedral arch. There is art, of course, but that's the result of building it well. What there is more of is the pleasure taken in constructing something that does what it's meant to do--to make people read the story, and laugh, and possibly even think."

For a long time I've thought about art versus craft. You hear people talk about the art of writing, the creative energy that goes into a novel. Depending on the person, and whether or not they have an MFA, really big words get thrown around that basically mean "Writing is as nebulous as the clouds, and real writers cannot predict the whims of the muse anymore than we can predict the whims of the weather."

Then there's the other camp, the "storytellers". You know the writers, the ones that claim, "I am not shooting for high art, I just want to tell a good story." They pay special attention to dialogue, and characters, and *gasp* might even plot out their novels in advance.

Obviously I am generalizing. I have met people with MFAs who were down to earth and people who consider themselves "storytellers" but refuse to change one word of their deathless prose.

And all the while I am left wondering, "Can't it be both? Can't a person write a really great genre novel and it still have literary merit?"

The answer, of course, is yes, and authors do it all the time. Gaiman and Pratchett are examples. So is Holly Lisle and Orson Scott Card. Sure, they want to tell a compelling story, but there's usually something deeper going on in the story if you care to think about it. 

It's just that I think we're trained to think of it as being only one way or another. Since I write genre novels, I am excluded from the Deep and Literary table. Likewise for literary authors, your books are treated like children who must eat your veggies: you won't enjoy the actual experience, but it's good for you. Builds characters (pun intended).

Gaiman's statement really hit home for me, because I think that's the key to merging literary merit with an awesome story. Art comes after a certain level of competence is acquired. If you can lay down a seamless structure (whether it's through plotting or pantsing and tidying up afterward) it becomes much easier to focus on excellence in characters, plot, and word choice. 

I think a cathedral arch is an excellent analogy:

Wikicommons allows me to illustrate my point.

See how beautiful the architecture is? There's a quite grace to a cathedral arch. But think about all of the planning that went into the design.

You can have both art and entertainment. It doesn't have to be one side or another. 


What do you think? Do you label yourself as an artist or a craftsman? Do you consciously try to merge literary merit with entertainment, and if so, how?

Book Review: Soulless, by Gail Carriger

Delicious Anachronism

Hello all!

Yes, my wisdom teeth are still bothering me, and yes I am still medicated. You have been warned!

But happy news today! I just read a wonderful new book!

The book itself isn't new, but it's new to me. I randomly picked up the second in the series in BAM, and was so intrigued I located the first book, and bought both of them immediately. 

The book is called Soulless by Gail Carriger



It's a wonderful alternate urban fantasy/Steampunk novel with a strong romance subplot. I finished it all in one day, if that tells you anything.


It's set in Victorian England, in a world where supernatural creatures are not only known about, they work with the Queen of England. Alexia Tarabotti is spinster of good breeding who is "soulless", and therefore able to negate the abilities of supernatural people/creatures when she touches them. It starts when a rouge vampire tries to kill her at a ball, and events spiral out of control from there. Highlights include a comedy of manners, and Alexia's gay vampire best friend, Lord Akeldama. I think he's my favorite actually, and calls her all sorts of funny pet names like, "my dove" and "my squash blossom".


The book is written in a wonderfully light, slightly sarcastic British tone, and from omniscient viewpoint, which works very well despite my initial trepidation. I laughed out loud several times, and couldn't put the book down. Honestly, I have been looking for a book just like this for a while, and am so happy to have actually found it. Ms. Carringer has several sub-genres going in the book; I was really impressed with how well she blended the various elements without it feeling forced.

I really enjoy steampunk, but some novels feel like the main thing going for it is the setting, the book virtually screaming, "Lookit me! I am steampunk and that's why you're reading me! LOOK AT MY DIRIGIBLES!"

"Soulless" manages to not only steer away from this plague, but to also make the steampunk elements work in a logical way in the setting. Even if romance-alternate histories don't seem like they would be up your alley, you might consider reading the book for no other reason that to look at how well Ms. Carriger blends the various pieces of her setting and plot so seamlessly. Ms. Carriger also characterizes very well, with every character feeling living and breathing to me. 

In all, there's really nothing I would say needs to be better. The pacing moves along swiftly, the plots events fresh and original, and the characters realistic and funny. I am half way through the second book in the series, Changeless, and the quality is just as good, so "Soulless" was no one hit wonder. 

Gail Carriger has a third book in the series coming out August 31st called Blameless, which fills me with so much joy I can barely contain myself. 

In short, this book was a breath of fresh air, especially since my own WIP has developed some decidedly steampunk elements. It was wonderful to find a fresh new take on elements of my genre that I have become very familiar with. I would use this book as an "icebreaker" to ease people into fantasy. 

But don't just take my word for it, go check out the series for yourselves! Who doesn't need to read an awesome new book? 

I would love to have this on my wall!

 (thank you Wikicommons for the pictures!)