I don't understand why I don't hear more people talking about A. Lee Martinez. His books are incredibly imaginative, wickedly funny and deeply humanist ...
especially when his characters aren't. Human that is. In the case of Emperor Mollusk versus The Sinister Brain we're talking about a genius mad scientist squid from Neptune and a moralistic bird/lizard soldier from Venus.
Why aren't you reading this book right now? If you're in any way like me, you'd be hooked at "genius mad scientist squid".
In the books of his that I've read Martinez has taken a genre trope and run with it, injecting morality and humanity into places where you don't expect it. In Gil's All-Fright Diner it was urban fantasy with the story being told from the point of view of a werewolf and a vampire on a cross-country drive. In my favorite of his, Chasing the Moon, it's the the Lovecraftian concept of eldritch horror from beyond reality and In the Company of Ogres he skewers fantasy beautifully.
In this one, he takes on classic science fiction pulp. The entire solar system is peopled with intelligent alien species, even including the Sun with intelligent clouds of magnetized helium plasma. The Earth itself has many intelligent species including molemen, the Sasquatch nation, Atlanteans as well as humans. All of which were conquered years ago by Emperor Mollusk, who has since retired.
This book is full of all the accoutrements of mad science, with death rays, robots, time travel, dinosaurs, disembodied brains, exoskeletons and alien invasion, and while that's all great fun, it mostly takes a back seat to the interaction between Mollusk and his bodyguard/archenemy Zala which is just chock full of snark and occasional moments of affection and understanding. Not just beautifully written dialogue, but gleefully written as well.
In the end, I really enjoyed it. I didn't like it quite as much as Chasing the Moon as the bad guys in this one are really just mustache-twirling caricatures (as they have to be, given the genre) and usually the author makes his antagonists much more interesting that that.
Did I mention the giant rampaging radioactive brain of Marie Curie?
Why haven't you read this book yet?!
Currently Reading: I'm getting really behind in my blogging. Since I read this one I've read Faith Hunter's new Jane Yellowrock book Blood Trade (good, but not as good as the previous one) and the first in Ian Douglas's Star Carrier series, Earth Strike (quite good military SF with a very hard SF bent). Next I'm going to read Some Kind of Fairytale by Graham Joyce so I'm ready for the next Writer and the Critic podcast.
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