To The Last Page

When the Bough Breaks opens like a slowly unfolding explosion that leaves a heck of a mess to be cleared up. Characteristically for David Mark - especially if you are familiar with his DS McAvoy series - that literary detonation unfolds upon a scene of horror, blood, murder, mutilation, pain and suffering, but also incorporates the author's characteristic dark humour, littered with northern expressions, wit and cynicism. Mark can't help himself. He's not a show off, just a brilliant writer with an affection or perhaps affliction for delving into the darkest corners of the human psyche and expressing it in all its gory detail with the sensitivity and creativity of a poet. But you shouldn't let that out you off (not least because Mark can write better than I can find a way to express it), because there is a lot more to When the Bough Breaks when the dust settles and the blood coagulates. To set the scene for what is to come, Mark describes the abstract regaining of con...

I've been reading Bob Shaw on and off for decades, but at the moment reading his books again serves as a kind of antidote for Cixin Liu . While there is no denying that exploring future science, technology and progress (or extinction) of humanity with a speculative hard science foundation is fascinating and relevant, Shaw isn't so rigorous about what science and physics is capable of, or indeed what is desirable. That's not to diminish Shaw’s writing as fanciful or pulp SF. Even his most outlandish ideas have a firm basis in reality or can be applied as being fairly accurate representations of the world we are beginning to see around us today. Most importantly, he considers the reasons why humanity can be pushed to develop dangerous technologies and considers the consequences. Even more importantly, he makes it thoroughly entertaining. First published in 1969, there are any number of recognisable contemporary world situations you could apply to the subjects he writes about ...

The Dark Forest , the second part of an ambitious science-fiction trilogy that commenced with Three-Body Problem , doesn't yet make the huge leap 450 years into the future that humanity is facing with mounting trepidation at the end of book one. That trepidation for the future is understandable when you consider that this is the length of time that it will take the recently discovered extraterrestrial race the Trisolarians to cover the four light years from the Alpha Centauri system and arrive to carry out their stated aim - one instigated with just such intent by some groups on Earth - to wipe out humanity as if they were mere bugs. That's the situation that humanity is preparing for at the start of The Dark Forest , and the dilemma is worse than you might think. The technology is just not there to protect them from an advanced alien race that can cover such distances, nor is the ability there to escape from planet Earth, but considering the huge advances in recent history, wh...

The path of travel of a robot gaining AI intelligence had already been intimated in the first part of My Name is Shingo . Although not yet named as such, the implication is that Shingo started out “life” as 'Monroe', a construction robot at the factory where Konma’s dad works. Since the workers there know little about computer technology, Konma has helped Monroe develop self-learning capabilities. Perhaps not as much as he thinks when he starts playing with the programming, but at the same time although those changes are taking place gradually at the start of this second Perfect Collection of the series, there is clearly a long way to self-awareness yet. Funnily enough - though not if you are familiar with Umezz - his young children protagonists are embarking on a similar journey. There is a bit of a setback for Konma at the start of Volume 2, when Marin's diplomat father takes the family to England. Monroe is also behaving erratically and the factory, as might have been f...

Before you even start it, you can tell that The Cautious Traveller's Guide to the Wastelands is going to take you to strange places. The title alone is promising enough, but the basic outline premise is even more intriguing. It involves a long train journey from Beijing to Moscow in 1899, the service provided by the the Trans-Siberia Company. It's back up and running again, reportedly stronger than ever after the mysterious circumstances of the last journey across the stricken Wastelands that caused the crew and passengers to lose their memory of the journey. As you are introduced to the passengers however, you soon begin however to wonder where the real danger is; whether it will come from the blight that has made the land outside uninhabitable and still carries strange sickness or whether it will come from the odd assembly of passengers on board, each taking the journey for private reasons, some clearly for different reasons than those they make public to the others. There i...

Fred Vargas is a unique voice in French crime fiction, one of the very best in any language in fact. Although translated in English, she doesn't seem to have made the same impression in the UK or at least hasn't received the attention her works deserve. I don't know whether her 'unique voice' translates well, as I haven't read any of the translations, but it's entirely fitting that her work at least has been translated where other fine French crime writers have been neglected. Even so there are two notable omissions (three if you count her original graphic novel with Baudoin  Les Quatre Fleuves ), one of them the excellent Ceux qui vont mourir te saluent , the other being the short story collection Coule la Seine . Although part of the Adamsberg series, the three brief stories here are admittedly minor pieces, but being Vargas of course they are still a little bit special. Salut et liberté (1997) Vargas can do serious and quirky even in the short story forma...