Rescued By Nerds

I had seen The Strain in bookstores with no idea it was written in part by acclaimed filmmaker Guillermo Del Toro. When I saw that I ran out to grab a copy and promptly devoured it. It’s smart, well written(with a co writer Chuck Hogan) and delivering fully on an idea Del Toro began in Blade 2. His vampires are predators pure and simple. Controlled in part by a demonic, ageless creature wearing the deformed body of a European noble named Josef Sardu.

What Del Toro and Hogan do really well is do their best to root their story in a sense of reality. Our hero, Dr. Eph Goodweather is a divorced father fighting for custody of his son, who happens to head the Canary Team for the CDC. A jumbo jet from Berlin is cleared to land at New York’s JFK and then the tower loses all contact. Eph is called in and in a masterful series of chapters we see the response to the dark airliner. It’s really pretty eerie. Eph and his partner board the plane and begin to make sense of it.

With the help of an aging vampire hunter, a pest control specialist and his partner and sometime love interest the team starts tracking down the threat. The book gets a bit repetitive towards the end where it’s one scene of vampire mayhem after another. But it’s a small portion of an otherwise very enjoyable book. Overall it’s a great first chapter in a planned trilogy. Here’s hoping part two and three are worth the wait.

This summer’s reading has already started off with a bang. From Dave Williams’ rollercoaster ride “The Burning Skies” to China Mieville’s wondrous “The City and the City” I’ve been spoiled. Here’s what I’m reading now and what I’m looking forward to…

Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan’s “The Strain” has one of the creepiest openings I’ve read in a while. A 747 jumbo jet from Berlin lands at JFK Airport in NYC and then goes dark. All but four of the passengers and crew die. No one knows why. Enter Dr. Eph Goodweather, leader of the CDC’s Canary team whose mission is to figure out what’s going on. The story is part CSI and part vampire legend as the book picks up steam. I’m only a little less than one hundred pages in but I’m hooked. It’s nothing wildly original, but a well written and interesting story.

Next on my list is David Gunn, who may or may not be Richard Morgan according to some insider chatter. David’s latest in his insanely violent “Death’s Head” series debuts, titled “Day of the Damned”. The series follows soldier Sven, all seven feet of him with a bionic arm and a sentient gun who is generally the comic relief across a far future setting where three races fight it out. The books are fun, loud and violent reading. Gunn isn’t trying to do anything more than entertain you. I have no idea what this next book is about but I don’t care. It’s David Gunn and Sven. If it’s possible the Death’s Head books are even more gleefully violent and foulmouthed than Richard Morgan. If that sounds like fun to you I suggest you grab yourself a copy. Day of the Damned hits the UK later this month and the US in late July.

“Retribution Falls – Tales of the Ketty Jay” by Chris Wooding has been described in advance reviews as “Firefly meets Steampunk”. The story follows a captain and his crew on the run in a world where airships are the primary means of travel, people carry firearms and swords and lots of mayhem ensues. Most of the advanced reviews I;ve read call the book a fun read. Good enough for me. Look for this one late June.

Later this summer, Karl Schroeder’s fourth Virga novel “The Sunless Countries” debuts. Virga is a world that exists inside a large bubble being policed by posthumans from the outside. It’s full of airships, steampunk castles, dogfights and adventure. It’s a really original world Karl has created and a lot of fun to read. Look for this one in August.

Metatroplis is a shared world taking place after the collapse of US society as we know it. It features stories by the aforementioned Karl Schroeder as well as Tobias Buckell and John Scalzi. It began it’s life as an audiobook but sees print late this summer. Certainly sounds promising enough for a look.

Last but by no means least is Jeff Somers third Avery Cates adventure “The Eternal Prison”. Avery Cates is a hitman in a bleak future. Somers work is fast paced and action packed. Cates is a great character, he truly will not put anyone before himself and finds himself in dire straits in what is the final part of a trilogy. If the first two are any indication this should be a great way to finish off what looks to be a fantastic summer reading season.

On Monday, at the E3 convention, Microsoft unveiled their newest Xbox 360 add-on, something they call Project Natal. It’s a stop-motion camera that allows you to play games with your body as a remote! Fascinating, you say? Give me one now, please? But has anyone really thought this through?

In the demo that I downloaded on my currently cameraless Xbox 360 last night, they show “Happy Family #1″ playing their new video games by standing in front of the camera and acting out, kind of like some “Charades for 1″ event. It looked weird. Have you ever taken a step back and looked at people playing charades? They’re crazy folk! Arms akimbo, flailing wildly like in some kind of drug-induced seizure.

And let’s think about why people play video games in the first place. To do things they can’t already do in real life. If I could do crazy karate moves like the video games, I’d be doing that for a living (as a cool karate expert bodyguard). Let’s assume there’s some futuristic Soul Caliber 5 that we play with the Natal. How in the world am I expected to give Sophitia a flying kick to the back of the head? Years of working on a computer have left me in no shape to be even lifting my legs off the floor for more than a second. And sports games? How am I going to play hockey in my 6×10 living room?

Thirdly, what about the crazy Minority Report aspect of this whole deal? Grabbing movies from my Netflix list seems like an awful waste. And don’t get me started on trying on fake dresses my Xbox friends say I would like. So in short, America is not ready for this. It will only add to our embarassment. And YouTube is already filled to the brim with vidoes of people acting like morons.

China Mieville is an author I’ve admired more than I’ve enjoyed. I like the ideas behind his books, but his baroque style of writing has always been a little too much for me. I think conceptually his Bas Lag books with their melding of horror and steampunk are pretty fascinating but they feel too much like work for me to really enjoy.

I found his last book, Un Lun Dun, written primarily for young adults about an entire other fantastical city of London to be much more entertaining. And when I saw the advanced press for his latest, The City and the City I was very curious.

Reading China’s editor speak about how and why the book was written, specifically for his ailing mother, and that it was unlike anything else that he had written previously I found myself an advanced review copy. While I was not asked as others with advancers not to spoil the central conceit of the book I will honor China’s wishes as well. Mostly because I think this story is one that’s best revealed through our narrator’s eyes.

We begin at the scene of a murder for a young woman who police think may be a prostitute, her body dropped at the scene of a decrepit skate park. We meet Extreme Crime unit Detective Tyador Borlu. As Borlu begins to look into this case we begin to learn more about the victim, an American exchange student as well as the duality of Borlu’s city Beszel and it’s uncomfortable neighbor, the much more modern Ul Qoma. We begin to learn how these cities are linked and how they are segregated.

Mieville drops in comments and hints about the dual cities from jump and it’s fascinating to see him create this world with all of it’s history and little secrets. We learn about an ultra secret organization that punishes breaches between the cities called accurately enough Breach. These agents are urban boogeymen who seemingly appear from the shadows and disappear people who have breached.

Borlu follows this investigation to his neighboring city og Ul Quoma where he teams with a local cop. There is a fair amount of political intriguw, some interesting detective work and some far out conspiracies taking hold. The book takes a dazzling turn into the slightly fantastical as Borlu begins to piece what really happened to the murdered American and follows the case to it’s not surprising, but really enjoyable conclusion.

The ending was exactly what I hoped for and really opens up the possibility for Mieville to revisit Bezel and Ul Qoma again. Mieville seems like a different writer here. The writing is stripped down and much more direct than his normal works. It feels like we’ve been following Borlu forever after a few short chapters. If you like cop stories, mysteries or literary fantasy this is a book for you.

I think you might see this be the book that makes China mainstream.

Dave’s first novel, “The Mirrored Heavens” seemingly came out of nowhere last year. I had heard nothing about the book. A friend who knows my taste suggested I take a look at it suggesting since I love Richard Morgan and David Gunn this might be right up my alley.

It was love at first read. Dave created a post cyberpunk world with a lots of political machinations, thrilling action and some wildly creative technology. He also introduced two characters who quickly became favorites of mine. In short it was easily my favorite book last year.

In the process of writing this blog I’ve gotten to know Dave a bit and can say he’s easily as nice a guy as he is talented a writer. So what’s my verdict on “The Burning Skies”? I can say without any hesitation that it wipes the floor with “The Mirrored Heavens”. This is Dave on steroids. The action is bigger, the conspiracies are deeper and the stakes are through the roof.

We begin with one of our heroes from part one, Claire Haskell, confronting the commander who may have set her down the destructive path she now finds herself on. More than human but not total machine. Claire still desperately wants to believe in what she served that she continues to put herself in danger to support a president who likely only views her as a tool. Strom Carson, the Operative, is back as well. He’s commanding a triad assault team striking at what is believed to be Autumn Rain, who in turn is making a last ditch attempt to take out President Andrew Harrison. Harrison himself puts in quite a performance as the most ass kicking President since Harrison Ford in Air Force One.

Most of the book takes place on the fantastically conceived Europa Platform where we go from one wild action scene to the next. The pace is absolutely relentless and thrilling all the while. We learn bits of relevant information in the course of all the action. It reads fast, but it’s not lacking in depth. It builds to a conclusion that I certainly didn’t expect. One character makes a reveal that changes everything you’ve though to that point and Dave ends with the boldest cliffhanger I’ve read in a long, long time. This is like Darth Vader revealing he’s Luke Skywalker’s father big. It’s a stunning conclusion.

I can’t imagine what Dave has in store for part three, the fantastically titled “Machinery of Light”. He’s promised it’s worth the wait and after his first two books I’m inclined to believe him. After Mirrored Heavens I thought Dave was very much a writer in the vein of Richard Morgan. Bombastic action scenes and a tough edge. After Burning Skies I think Dave is standing toe to toe with Morgan at his best. I can’t pay him a higher compliment than that.

We continue our interview with Dave Williams on the release of his sophomore work “The Burning Skies”.

RBN: Would you consider your characters post human?

Dave: It’s a great question.

I like to play with that ambiguity, that’s for sure.

At the end of the day, though, the line is very tough to draw. These characters are clearly right on the threshold of it, but all of them–except perhaps for Haskell–still think like humans do.

RBN: And that’s why I think it’s so interesting. You’ve got these characters who are completely powerful and wired to the gills, yet they still act and behave like you would expect a normal person to do. using these enhancements is like second nature to all of these agents…

Dave: Deliberately so. Our whole challenge right now as a species is that there’s no sign that all this technology is changing the fundamental nature of the human animal.

And it makes them even more paranoid than they already were!

RBN: When you write these things how do you see them in your head? I picture something like the HUD in the Iron Man movie.

Dave: Yes, that’s the right direction.

The other thing to note is that there’s a lot of the interface that’s not visual–one’s tongue would be hitting levers on one’s teeth, there’d be a lot of tactile sensors too.

And it’s also a lot like the thought-controlled interface in that old Clint Eastwood movie FIREFOX. . .

RBN: That makes sense since these are instantaneous commands and controls…

Aside from the internal gear you’ve also introduced some wild new bots. Can you talk a little bit about the crawlers and the Remoraz specifically?

It’s like we saw a little taste of this world in Mirrored Heavens and then we get to see the heavy guns come out in Burning Skies.

Dave: Yeah, and that was part of my strategy for “escalation of the trilogy.”

We saw some crawlers running escort duty on Claire in Book One, but we never saw them in action.These are souped-up crawlers, aka Earthshakers. Think of a cross between a tank and a bus, and then strap on some jets and treads and a ton of armor.

As to the Remoraz, that’s an experimental crawler, fresh off the R&D racks. The idea is that it’s super-stealthy, designed for infiltration rather than assault.

Which proves useful when the characters are really up against it. .

RBN: In the thick of things, you’ve got gunfights, space platforms being bombarded and even a character tossed into space without a suit. How did you manage to continue to up the ante for the action scenes?

Dave: Two keys.

One, topography. As cool as the underground maglev train and the double-decker spaceplane were in MIRRORED HEAVENS, they can’t hold a candle to the Europa Platform.

Two, the stakes. In BURNING SKIES, the characters are battling alongside the president, fighting to save him from the Rain. So literally everything’s at stake.

RBN: When things settle down after the main battle, the plot really gains momentum. We start to see the conspiracy and we learn even more about the Rain. How do you decide just how much to give the reader and how much to hold back?

Dave: I call it the “calibration of revelation.” When I outline, I’m very specific with myself as to not only what’s going to happen, but what are we going to learn.

Since I’m also working against the Master Document of everything we’re going to learn across the entire trilogy, it makes the process of choosing which insights/hints to deploy when much easier.

RBN: How would one get a copy of this “master doument” you speak of?

Dave: You have to fight Carson. : )

RBN: uh oh

Dave: Actually, “master document” is more like an unending series of notes/outlines that I’ve been keeping since 2000/2001, when all this madness started. . .

RBN: Your editor must have a love/hate relationship with you. At the close of Burning Skies you drop a revelation about a major character that changes nearly everything you know about them, and then you end the book on one of the most jaw dropping cliff hangers ever…

Dave: I honestly think it’s one of the biggest cliffhangers to hit science fiction in years. It certainly sets up a crazy ride for the last book.

RBN: That cliffhanger takes some big balls. Were you worried that some readers might really get thrown by having to wait for Machinery of Light for the resolution?

Dave: My view of a trilogy is that you’d be pushing it to end the first book on a cliffhanger–that would be unfair. But by the end of the second book, I feel I’ve earned the right.

And I can assure people the wait will be worth it. .

RBN: We can’t really discuss the conclusion of Burning Skies without spoiling what is really one of the most fun final acts that I can recall, so tell me what you hope readers take away from part two?

Dave: My first hope is that readers will regard the showdown on the Europa Platform as a contender for the Most Insane Space Battle they’ve seen in a while.

My second hope, though, is that these books will be perceived as more than “just” military science fiction–that readers will appreciate the combination of espionage and power-politics, as well as the fact that this isn’t just Good Guys vs. Bad Guys. Everyone sees themselves as a Good Guy, ultimately, but not everyone can win!

And my third is that we will learn a lot more about the enigma that is Claire Haskell . ..

RBN: With that said, what can you tease about the conclusion of the trilogy, Machinery of Light?

Dave: That it will set the standard for how to end a science-fiction trilogy. I don’t believe there’s any shame in swinging for the fence. . .

RBN: When is Machinery of Light expected to hit?

Dave: May 2010. Which, ironically enough, is the hundred year “reverse anniversary” of when the trilogy takes place. . .2110, baby!

RBN: So summer season is upon us. Rumor has it you will be attending San Diego Comicon?

Dave: Yup, for sure. Can’t wait. Particularly as I’m gearing up to pitch the Autumn Rain trilogy as a graphic novel. . .

RBN: Do you have any interest in writing comics?

Dave: I’d be open to/interested in, yeah. That and screenwriting are both avenues I’d like to explore.

RBN: What’s it like meeting fans of your work in person? I would think you’ll find quite a few of them out in San Diego.

Dave: It’s always very surreal–having someone write and say they love the book is great, but having them tell you that in person is even better.

One of my favorite new authors is David J. Williams author of The Mirrored Heavens and it’s brand new sequel The Burning Skies which hit stores Tuesday. Dave has been a longtime supporter of The Nerds so it’s great to have him back as our first interview which we’ll post in two parts. We’ll post part two tomorrow as well as a review of The Burning Skies on Friday.

RBN: First off, can you offer a quick recap of your first book, The Mirrored Heavens for people who might not have read it or need a refresher?

Dave: Sure, no problem. The book centers on the hunt for the mysterious terrorist group Autumn Rain, which destroys the world’s space elevator and promises further strikes.
Our saga centers in particular on Claire Haskell . . . the tormented/genius netrunner who can’t even trust her own memories, but is the key to stopping the Rain and uncovering the deeper mystery behind them.

RBN: When The Burning Skies opens up we meet a very different Claire.
It’s only been four days but she seems to have increased her control over her abilities immensely. What’s happened in those four days?

Dave: She’s been on–and continues to be throughout BURNING SKIES–a very steep learning curve.

In a sense, you can think of Claire as a weapon that’s off the leash and out of control.
The paradox of Claire is that even as she gains in power, she can’t be sure that others don’t have the back door to her own mind.

So you can think of BURNING SKIES as her struggle for self-ascendancy. It’s a rocky road!

RBN: Claire is desperately trying to find out what happened to her, what’s real and what isn’t. It’s a fine line in how you portray that. How hard is it to structure a story around a central character who at times can’t tell what’s real and what isn’t?

Dave: There’s definitely an Unreliable Narrator Problem, that’s for sure.

For me the key here is the ensemble cast. The fact that we have multiple characters/POVs means that the reader has at least some opportunity to calibrate their various stories. Also, by keeping the main thread so kinetic/action-oriented, the overall saga becomes a lot more tangible.

But I will also note that these books are definitely riffs on knowability/subjectivity. Haskell’s wrestling with the Real, two other characters (Lynx and Linehan) are on some rather heavyweight drugs, and all the characters are being thrust into a situation (the Europa Platform) that is easily the craziest thing they’ve ever seen.

RBN: Speaking of the ensemble cast, catch us up on who exactly returns for part two and where they are when we meet up with them…

Dave: Sure. Strom Carson (aka the Operative), Stefan Lynx and Leo Sarmax are doing some heavy-duty special-ops as the book opens. They’re down on the Europa Platform, the giant O’Neill space station, looking for evidence of Autumn Rain infiltration.

What’s also interesting in this book is that there’s a lot of “career mobility”: all the (surviving) characters got various promotions after their heroics at the end of MIRRORED HEAVENS. . . but the higher up the ladder you go, the more dangerous it gets!

RBN: Absolutely. The stakes ended high in part one and we enter an all out battle that takes up the majority of part two. How hard is it structuring a story that relies on nearly non stop action?

Dave: The key is to not rely exclusively on the action to escalate the story. Ironically, despite the fight on the O’Neill cylinders that occupies part two, the revelations that occur subsequently serve to propel the drama even higher as the characters struggle to deal with their implications.

RBN: What I find really entertaining in both books is that you are constantly questioning what you think you know. And each time you get close, there’s another layer.
How deeply have you plotted the trilogy?

Dave: All the way to the end. I know exactly where it’s all going, and I hereby promise to resolve all mysteries in the finale, THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT (out next year!).

RBN: Let’s get into the actual storyline in Burning Skies if we can.

Dave: for sure

RBN: We open with Claire seeking information from her former boss Matthew Sinclair who begins to peel back some of the conspiracy…on what Autumn Rain might actually be, who’s pulling the strings and who knew what…which leads us to the central setting for a large part of the book, the Europa Platform.

Can you go into what the Europa Platform is and how you envisioned it?

Dave: For sure.

First, probably worth noting that the initial conversation–between Claire and her imprisoned/disgraced spymaster, Matthew Sinclair–serves a dual purpose.

It’s intended both to provide anyone who (however inexplicably!) DIDN’T read MIRRORED HEAVENS all they need to know going into BURNING SKIES. It also provides us with invaluable info about what was REALLY going on in that book . . and some surprises are in store.

As to the Europa Platform: this is a “standard” O’Neill space station . . .two thirty kilometer long rotating cylinders, with valleys and windows running along their length. The idea is that you can stand in one valley and look up and see two more overhead.

Very trippy.

My Europa Platform also has a twist, in that each cylinder has an asteroid “stapled” onto one end. The asteroid being the strongholds of the Euro Magnates, who are the leaders of the neutral powers, unaligned with either East or West. Of course, what’s really going on is that the Europa Platform is the location of the secret summit conference between the U.S. president and the Eurasian leadership in the wake of the chaos that ended MIRRORED HEAVENS.

Though (to your point about multiple layers), even THAT ‘s a cover story, in that what’s really going on is that President Harrison is trying to lure Autumn Rain into a trap. Of course, they’re trying to do the exact same thing, so we are on the road to some serious mayhem.

RBN: One thing that I found really interesting is how the cast refer to the US President as “The Throne”, who is protected by Praetorians…

Even Claire talks about putting her sword into service to the throne.

For such a high tech story how did you come about that sort of terminology?

Dave: I wanted to give the reader a view into the “colloquial-speak” of the agents who serve the president. It also provides insight into who the president is–this is America under the Reformed Constitution, and the prez governs with “permanent” emergency powers.. . so he essentially has monarchical status. The Praetorians who serve him dub him the Throne as a result, in the same way that those who serve (or used to serve) Sinclair dub him the Old Man.

It’s also worth noting that President Harrison doesn’t exist as a character in MIRRORED HEAVENS. He’s an off-screen, shadowy figure, and by the time we actually see him “on camera” in BURNING SKIES, you really start to feel like that’s the president, and it increases dramatic tension accordingly.

And re “Praetorians”–that was the term for the emperor’s bodyguard in ancient Rome, and that’s kinda the vibe I was going for here. . .

RBN: It works really well. Especially when you apply it to a character like Carson who’s 100
percent pure badass. How much fun is Carson to write?

Dave: Carson is a blast to write, in that he has a very dry sense of humor, and a lot of what he’s saying can be read as comedy, frankly. Though he doesn’t intend it that way . . .

RBN: All of your characters are augmented in some way. Did you put research into how these things might actually work or just go for the cool factor?

Also, regarding Carson…there’s a whole lot more to him than what we’ve seen so far I’m guessing?

Dave: Like everyone else, Carson has his layers/secrets. He’s unlike a lot of the characters, though, in that he’s pretty aware of them. . .

As to the research . . I go for what’s cool, of course, but I also have to make sure I can back it up.

Vis-a-vis the power suits, the main problem that they’re trying to solve in the here and now is the power source. Seems reasonable enough they’ll lick that in the next hundred years.

RBN: I think the power suits are great, but I’m fascinated by all the hardware the characters have internally…

Dave: . . whereas you can clearly see a trend right now with all our wireless devices. . pretty soon they’ll literally be inside our heads.. . which of course is a double-edged sword.

The Good News: you’ve got mega-enhancements.

The Bad News: some pesky razor could be hacking them right #$# now!

Come back tomorrow for part two of our interview with Dave. In the meantime head out to your local bookseller and grab a copy of “The Burning Skies” which is on sale now.

Welcome to the new home of Rescued By Nerds. Some of us remain the same and there will be some new faces. To call what we will be bringing you eclectic would be an understatement but you still can expect to see interviews with comics creators and novelists, music and book reviews and some general commentary.

We’re still getting the place set up so pardon the dust.

We’re happy to be back and look forward to hearing from you!