"Best Served Cold" by Joe Abercrombie (Orbit)

Best Served Cold
Joe Abercrombie
640 pp. Orbit. $24.99
Pub. Date: 7/29/2009
ISBN-13: 978-0316044967

There is a commercial featuring a little boy, baseball hat sitting backwards on his head, bat across his shoulder, baseball in his hand, loudly proclaiming himself the greatest hitter in the world. Then he tosses the ball into the air, winds up, and takes a mighty hack at the ball that would make Casey proud. And misses. Strike one. Not deterred, he tries again. Same routine. Proclaims himself the greatest hitter in the world, tosses up the ball, swings. And misses. Strike two. Can you see where this going?

On to the third try, he pauses, lowers the bat, spits into his hands and rubs them together, turns his hat around, before yodeling his mantra of being the greatest hitter in the world. Another toss, another big swing. And another miss. Strike three. Mighty Casey has struck out. He pauses, looking down at the ball, a cowhide-covered reminder of his batting ineptitude. Then, an epiphany; his face brightens. There is joy in Mudville. He’s not the greatest hitter in the world; he’s the greatest pitcher in the world. A fact he now loudly trumpets to an empty baseball diamond, birds trilling a happy song in the background. End scene. Fade to black.

And the point of this commercial? It’s summarized by the tagline that follows, Optimism: Pass It On! Really, I’m not joking. It’s an unusual pitch (pun totally intended), because commercials normally sell cars, and radios, and Bagel Bites. Not optimism.

So if we need commercials promoting optimism, what’s that say about our world? Maybe that reality is mostly Hobbesian—nasty, ugly and pessimistic. Anyone who watches the parade of evil featured on the evening news will reaffirm that conclusion. People can try to sell optimism, but there aren’t a whole lot of people buying. (Bagel Bites are another story; stores can’t keep those stocked.)

Which leaves us with a world with little optimism, where hope’s as rare as a wet mummy fart, and promise comes before the knife in the back. What kind of world is that? Well, that’s Joe Abercrombie’s world. Thankfully, he’s kind enough to let us visit. Just don’t touch anything.

Calling Abercrombie’s latest novel Best Served Cold pessimistic totally understates the brutality and depravity found within, the evil that lurks in its literary heart. The novel goes beyond pessimism, this is nihilistic fantasy. And by being nihilistic, it seems closer to our reality than other epic fantasies, a truer reflection of the ugly emotions and attitudes found in everyday life. Life in Best Served Cold isn’t simple; it isn’t good versus evil. Life here is shades of psychotic and indifferent gray fighting each other for immoral supremacy, and no side appears to be winning.

Sociopaths run rampant in Abercrombie’s world, killing, backstabbing, and destroying anything even remotely honorable. Emotional connections are rare, and trust is generally non-existent. Having these social misfits get together like a misguided Marvel superhero team-up comic is a huge part of the novel’s delicious fun. It’s guaranteed that if you put sociopaths together and make them interact with each other, mayhem and crazy things will happen. And by mayhem and crazy things, I mean massive amounts of murder, betrayal and wanton destruction. So it should be no surprise that mayhem and crazy things do happen in Best Served Cold. Lots of crazy things.

Revenge. Monza Murcatto wants it. And for good reason: she’s not a big fan of being betrayed; it ranks high on her That Sucks meter. Seven men tried to kill her, tossing her down a mountain, leaving her for dead. Those seven men failed. Now seven men must die. No matter what the situation. No matter what the circumstances. Determination, thy name is Monza; she’s more pugnacious than an amphetamine popping bulldog. And colder than the Angel of Death eating a popsicle.

Following up on his wonderful First Law trilogy, Abercrombie proves two things with Best Served Cold. One: that he has cut out his own unique niche in the genre, namely dark, nihilistic fantasy that loves itself some gratuitous sex and violence. And two: he’s only capable of writing incredibly entertaining books that are so enjoyable they snuggly dwell in the realm of awesomeness. If he’s written a bad book, Best Served Cold ain’t it. Better luck next time Joe.

Abercrombie steadily matured as a writer during the First Law trilogy, and Best Served Cold represents another jump in his maturation process. His characterizations, which have always been incredible, have significantly improved. Characters feel emotionally fuller, something necessary if you are going to believe in the entire revenge angle. I wouldn’t care about Monza lopping heads off, if I didn’t buy her burning desire to have her revenge. The chapters, which play out much like film scenes, are tighter and more focused than previous novels, to the point of being nearly self-contained. And that’s important since Best Served Cold resembles a film more than an epic fantasy, a spiritual sibling to Charles Bronson or Quentin Tarantino movies. It’s a posturing, sneering, murderous book with only wickedness on its mind that struts around like a serial killer through Gen Pop. You don’t know whether to read it, or to stay away, worried that if you don’t it’ll shiv you in the shower.

Occasionally the book drags, as it struggles with the simplicity of its story. Keeping a plot line centered around revenge fresh and interesting for over six hundred pages is a mighty task, one which Abercrombie mostly succeeds at, but there were times when I wished the pace would quicken.

Every one of Joe Abercrombie’s books I’ve read, I’ve loved. The darkest of the subject matter greatly appeals to me. See, gratuitous sex, violence and pessimism is my cap nip, which then has not surprisingly placed Joe in the upper echelon of my favorite fantasy writers. So I’m incredibly biased. But I’m also optimistic. Optimistic that, given the chance, you will love this book. Now isn’t optimism grand?

Optimism: Pass It On!

Final Grade: 8.5 out of 10

Collector's Corner - Carrie Vaughn

Now I'm not a big fan of urban fantasy, most of it even gives me hives. And I've only read one book in Carrie Vaughn's Kitty Norville series, but I found it quite enjoyable (it almost feels shameful to admit this). Enjoyable enough that I've always planned to tackle more in the series. Of course, new books arrive, and mess up these well laid plans. Darn pesky new books.

Carrie has also done some incredible work on the new generation of Wild Cards novels. If you haven't had the chance to check out her ensemble work, I highly recommend it.

"Expiration Date" by Duane Swierczynski (Minotaur Books)

Expiration Date
Duane Swierczynski
256 pp. Minotaur Books. $13.99
Pub. Date: 3/30/2010
ISBN-13: 978-0312363406

Time traveling. It sneaks up on you in odd and unexpected ways. Like a fungus in a public restroom. One moment, you’re driving a Delorean, pushing the needle north of sensible, being chased by terrorists, and the next, you’re trying to convince your lovestruck teenage mother-to-be that your name isn’t Calvin Klein, and that she should go to the Enchantment Under the Sea dance with your luckless father-to-be. Which confirms both Newton’s second and third law of interspatial travel, namely you can’t travel back in time without bumping into your parents. And you can’t do it without turning into your mother’s pimp. Which is grossly unsettling. Damn you Sir Isaac.

But time traveling isn’t all about pandering, wild-eyed scientists and Bob Zemeckis films (though that would be quite wonderful). Sometimes it’s about life gone wild, about life gone wrong. About when reality embraces its inner drunken sorority sister on a bender in Cabo, flashing its goodies to every appreciative camera, only to awaken the next morning with a massive headache, next to a dead man, a saddle, and an expired jar of Grey Poupon. Time travel can fix this; it’s the official designated driver for life’s little drunken episodes. The rewind button on the DVD player. A mulligan.

Case in point. You just lost your job writing investigative articles for the local weekly. Really hard hitting exposés, not that cat-found-in-tree stuff. But with that pesky InterWebs, print journalism is dying quicker than David Hasselhoff’s singing career. So you’re suddenly unemployed. You have no money, no prospects, no place to live. Your last few dollars are spent on beer and sugary snack foods.

Your family looks out for you. Kind of. Seems grandpa recently fell ill and found himself at the intersection of Comatose and Non-Responsive, freeing up his place now that he’s warming a catheter at the local hospital. So you squat there with your mother’s blessing, hopefully just long enough to get yourself back on your feet. But the stress is killing you, giving you a headache which feels like an elephant is trying to mate with your cranium. So you ransack grandpa’s medicine cabinet, searching for a pain reliever, something to chemically castrate that amorous elephant. Bingo. A bottle of Tylenol. Bottle looks old, but the pills look okay. You wash down four with a swig of beer.

Suddenly you feel sleepy, as if your eyes are being massaged by cotton balls. A nap—what a brilliant idea. You don’t fall asleep as much as pass out. Only to wake up instantly in the year you were born. As Doc Brown would say, Great Scott! Now there’s one side effect not listed on the Tylenol label. Being the inquisitive sort—I mean, you are a journalist—you start exploring your new surroundings. This is the neighborhood where you grew up. Your parents live right over…there. You sneak up on the porch and take a peek through the front window. Your mother looks so young, newborn you warming her arms. And your father is…alive. Great Scott!

For the most part, time traveling in science fiction is a bankrupt idea, often nothing more than lame wish fulfillment, an idea which indulges everyone’s secret hope for a second chance to right wrongs. Mostly it’s after school special territory; a deus ex machina that allows Hannah Montana to travel back two days earlier in order to put some preventative Clearasil on a lurking future pimple. It’s a second chance, for clear skin.

Unless you write about time travel like Duane Swierczynski does in his novel Expiration Date, and then traveling back to your birth year is just utterly kick-ass. Like a delicious meal capped off with a belch that registers 7.5 on the diaphragm earthquake scale, being both incredibly fulfilling and immensely enjoyable. Swierczynski writes like a man possessed, with a fervor and intense imagination that immediately grabs your attention before pulling you along on an exhilarating ride.

And what a ride it is. Exciting. Poignant. Suspenseful. Joyous. Expiration Date features the wide and wonderful range of human emotions, from cheering to crying, laughing to catharsis. People often talk about novels being like a rollercoaster ride, filled with hair-raising twists and turns. What is typically overlooked is that a rollercoaster is often singular in nature; it’s a cohesive loop in which the beginning and end are generally in the same place, linked together. Which is not unlike the concept of time. Swierczynski’s novel has this singular nature, this cohesion. Expiration Date is not a novel about time travel; it’s a novel about time. About the importance of time, about the interconnection of time, and about how beginnings and endings are relative.

This is a time travel novel done intelligently. It doesn’t feel like a gimmick, like some cheap thrill. The characters resonate, their nostalgia is easily relatable to the reader. There is often a loneliness and sadness when confronting the past, of despairing when you see where things went wrong, and Swierczynski really highlights these feelings, infusing the narrative with a surprising poignancy.

Exaggeration comes naturally to me. Like a clown with balloon animals. But I could never exaggerate how utterly enjoyable Expiration Date was, nor could I exaggerate just how talented Swierczynski is. Let’s just sum it up this way: one of the best books of 2010. And you don’t even need a Delorean to enjoy it.

Final Grade: 9 out of 10

On the Road - An Apology to the Author (or) Jim, Butchered (Reviewed by Matthew Berger)

Paul's Note - Plenty of things get reviewed. Films. Books. Music. Ice dancing. Hit and run driving. But not book signings. No one reviews book signings. Why? Well, because evolution takes time, the monkeys would tell you that (if they could speak). We, as a society, clearly weren't ready for a critical examination of an author's event. Until now. So rejoice that your knuckles no longer drag, hair has migrated away from your back, and we can chat in polite company about the dark side of book publishing: book tours. So with great glee I present On the Road, a review of a book signing, filled with big words, and even bigger ideas.


Dear James (your real name is James, right?),

It is with a heavy heart I write this letter to you that you will never read.

It would seem you are on a book tour promoting the release of your newest book in the Dresden Files, Changes, and the cruel tapestry that Fate has woven for your life features my string, which is why I saw you this afternoon at Huntington Beach Barnes & Noble. But Fate is a funny thing, far less so than me, but I digress, let’s talk about Changes. Right, well, I haven’t read it. Haven’t read a single thing of yours, actually. Not even a dust jacket. Still, that did not stop me from losing myself among four hundred much-more adoring fans on that second floor landing, my arms laden with so many books I was sure I had been lured into some nefarious activity by those with me who have actually read your stuff, (I blame Paul, his wife and my Dad). Rest assured, lying, finagling and haberdashery (a fantastic word the English language has created a horrible definition for, so I choose to redefine it here and now) ensued. To that mis-made point: if you are a book store, and you wish to have a book signing, clearly the idea is to attract a successful author who will call upon his legions to meet and make feast of words with them at the store, with the end goal being capital gains for both the store and author. I respect that; go-go economic recovery. But come on, B&N, the last bastion of the written word! You of all establishments should understand the inherent idiocy in asking a legion of diehard fans to purchase a book they most certainly already have purchased within 30 seconds of its purchasable existence. They don’t want two copies, and by the tappity-tap-tweet-tweet I hear throughout the store, I would say all of Twitterverse knows of your transgressions as well.

I apologize Jim, that wasn’t meant for you. Back to changes, the verb/noun/book. You look different, sir, less potential wizard and more slightly-crazed-college-professor. Good changes, according to my sister. I don’t judge men’s looks. Not even Justin Beiber's, because I think that would constitute statutory rape. Also, you handle your whole-group discussions with the grace and power of a slightly bored viper, deftly deflecting the ridiculous, and latching on to the fascinating, drawing the audience down the rabbit hole with your words until you have the prey in your fangs (us!). Really, what that horrible metaphor meant to say was I think you’re a good public speaker. Very funny.

I continue to elocute where I should be apologizing. But where we had to wait for half of the alphabet to pass us by, so must you wait for half the dictionary to pass you by. Three hours of waiting and finally we got to see your less shaggy face up close, and eighteen signed books later the four of us were out of your life. But still I feel the need to apologize and say: clearly, your wizard Harry did not defeat Voldemort. I was facetious. I was sarcastic. I was wrong. It’s one of my more attractive qualities. And although I am at least 26 books behind, I declare, after having listened to your humble wit and acrid humor, that I will read your books, and find out what makes this Harry tick.

Your Newest Fan,

Matt

Photos courtesy of Larry Berger

"Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter" by Seth Grahame-Smith (Grand Central Publishing)

Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter
Seth Grahame-Smith
352 pp. Grand Central Publishing. $21.99
Pub. Date: 3/2/2010
ISBN-13: 978-0446563086

Abraham Lincoln: the man. Born into humble means, lost his mother at nine, almost completely self-educated, buried his first love Ann Rutledge and two sons, Edward and William, eventually murdered. A life filled with great tragedy.

Abraham Lincoln: the politician. A self-made man, an honest country lawyer, great orator and renown debater, the sixteenth President of the United States, the protector of the Union, the Great Emancipator, eventually assassinated. A life filled with hope, resolve and great courage.

Abraham Lincoln: the vampire hunter. Driven by an unquenchable anger and fury to hunt and destroy vampires, strong, athletic, and extraordinarily skilled with an axe, a slayer of many demons without the tutelage of a Watcher with a funny British accent, no fan of Stephenie Meyer, but will admit Rob Pattinson has nice hair, eventually killed. A life filled with brutality and yucky blood spurting neck stumps.

Like one of those insidious SAT questions, one of these things is unlike the other. Can you guess which one? Put down the #2 pencil, and just guess; there are no answer bubbles here to color in. If you answered Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter (and who wouldn’t answer this, if only for the fact it’s so fun to say. C’mon say it with me now, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter. Sounds so mellifluous, doesn’t it?), then see the lady at the door for your cookie.

Now it’s completely incongruous—bordering on whimsical silliness—to equate Abraham Lincoln with vampire slaying. Like equating deep thoughts to Mickey Mouse, it’s totally beyond reasonable comprehension. (Besides Donald Duck is clearly the metaphysician of the Disney bunch, because no one can understand what he’s saying.) Actually, it’s utterly silly to equate anyone with vampire slaying, but having Honest Abe staking the fanged buggers really stretches credulity. (Now mummy slaying is a different set of bones. I totally see Abe kicking some Tutankhamen heinie.)

But being so seemingly incongruous is part of the fun—and most of the joke in Seth Grahame-Smith’s horror/historical mash-up Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter. (Doesn’t that just sound like something fresh from the mind of Mel Brooks?) Written in the style of a stuffy historical biography, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter reveals the secret life of the sixteenth President: the one that has him hunting the Midwest prairies at night for Kentucky-Fried Draculas. Extra-crispy style.

Grahame-Smith cleverly works the vampire hunting bits into Lincoln’s life story, re-interpreting pivotal events in Abe’s life to provide motivation and drama to the novel. Though Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter is essentially a one-joke book, Grahame-Smith is smart enough to keep the narrative quickly moving along before the novelty exhausts itself. While it reads like a historical biography, the novel sacrifices much of its historical detail for pace. Most of the novel focuses on events early in Lincoln’s life, an area ripe for Grahame-Smith’s fabrications. Lincoln’s presidency and role in the American Civil War is surprisingly understated in the book, most likely because this time in Lincoln’s life is so well-documented, it’s harder to add fictional vampire hunting escapades.

Abe’s vampire hunting is rather straightforward and only moderately engaging; the more interesting aspect is how Grahame-Smith interweaves Abe’s fictional battles with his real life. Anyone anticipating heart-pounding action sequences in which Abe goes mano e mano with vampires will be seriously disappointed. This isn’t Abe re-imagined as Buffy the Vampire Slayer. See, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter is primarily a historical biography misinterpreted. Like you decided to take a real biography of Lincoln, and write your own vampire bits in the margins. It’s history meets fan fiction; it’s what Twilight-obsessed girls daydream about in AP American History. Forget Team Jacob or Team Edward; this is Team Abraham. If you find historical biographies boring and dull, you’ll want to pass this one by, because no matter how much vampire hunting you add to a biography, it’s still a biography. (Unless you are talking about Gandhi’s biography; he was twice the vampire hunter Lincoln was.)

Judge me if you wish, but I enjoy studying history. It’s shameful, but it’s a shame I can proudly call my own. The more I read of Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter, the more I wanted to read a real biography of the man. That’s a good thing. (It means some historian is about to make some cheddar.) If Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter can motivate readers to discover, and maybe enjoy history, that’s a serious positive in its favor. Whether that will happen, I have serious doubts. But if the most interesting aspect of reading Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter is reading about Abe’s true life story, what’s that say about the horror element to this mash-up? Maybe that it’s underwhelming, or dare I mock—I dare, I dare—a tad bit toothless.

Don’t get me wrong, Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter is a solid novel; I enjoyed the experience. I just wouldn’t venture into a burning building to save it. It’s a great idea, just a bit flawed in reality.

Final Grade: 6.5 out of 10