"Tome of the Undergates" by Sam Sykes (Gollancz)

Tome of the Undergates
Sam Sykes
704 pp. Gollancz. £18.99
Pub. Date: 4/15/2010
ISBN-13: 9780575090286

Reviewed by Paul Stotts

Publisher Blurb: Adventurers. Long loathed for their knowledge of nothing beyond murder and thievery, they are the savages, zealots, heathens, monsters; the thugs of society. And Lenk, a young man with a sword in his hand and a voice in his head, counts them all as his sole and most hated of companions.

His otherwise trivial employment under an esteemed clergyman is interrupted when bloodthirsty and eloquent pirates, led by an ageless demon risen from the depths of the ocean, pilfer the object of their protection: the Tome of the Undergates, the key to opening a door that guards the mouths of hell. A hell the demons want out of.

Against titanic horrors from the deep, psychotic warrior women, and creatures forgotten by mankind, Lenk has only two weapons: a piece of steel and five companions who are as eager to kill each other as they are to retrieve the book.

Adolescent males. It's a group not known for their common sense or maturity. Someone pissing themselves is their idea of highbrow humor, and the butt equals comedic gold. Life for the high school boy is groin-centric. Every guy has gone through it. Most survive it and mature, looking back on those years with a mixture of regret and embarassment. Some remain stuck there forever, playing their Xbox 360 in the basement, hoping for a glimpse of pixellated boobie.

Tome of the Undergates by Sam Sykes is definitely written for the basement dweller. Sophomoric and scatological, Sykes' debut novel would have a proctologist screaming: Too much! Its immaturity hinders it. This isn't adult fantasy; this is the whiny rumblings of adolescence. Full of posturing and cluelessness. The proverbial rebel without a clue. The novel wants to be edgy, but in a PG-13 kind of way. All the good parts are clearly still in the R-rated material provided by George R.R. Martin and Joe Abercrombie.

Lenk and his crew of adventurers are essentially adolescents posing as adults. They are shallow emotionally. Their interactions are nothing more than juvenile bickering. The big idea is that Lenk and his companions hate each other. With the way they acted toward each other, I hated them way before the end of the novel, too. I found myself cheering for their demise.

The storyline is bookended by two battles with a small transition between them. It is a novella length plot stretched into a five hundred page novel. I like extended battle scenes, but not if it means sacrificing all of the story. What is left here is: boy loses item, boy fights to regain item. It is two action scenes done in a John Woo-style slo-mo. Except there are no white doves. Or Chow Yun-Fat.

Let's keep this short, because I hate not having anything good to say about a book. Tome of the Undergates is terrible. About the only good thing I can say about it is: it ends. Just not soon enough.