Review Summaries

• Readers who enjoy idea-driven settings and large-scale combat respond strongly to the book. Its dialogue and action-driven momentum are also often appreciated.

Reviews

• not for statists

  More than a reboot of Heinlein. Fun anarchocapitalist twist. Unlikely to be enjoyed by fans of big government … .

• A great new young writer.

  Wow! Just wow! Loved both books. Great story, interesting political and moral philosophy discussions. Now about Book 3 Mr Corcoran......... Please get busy.

• Loved it

  Just as good as the first , now it says a third is in the works . Looking forward to it

• What SF should aspire to.

  My purchase of the first book in the Aristillus series (The Powers of the Earth) came after seeing it rechirped by another author on some birdwatching site. The description was appealing and the calculation was, "Eh, if nothing else, I'm supporting an artist attempting something interesting and ambitious." I did not have overly high expectations; such is the state of my relationship with much of written SF. Outside of rereads of the PKD, the cyberpunks, and a selection of the past masters/ancients of SF craft, the past few decades have left me relatively unenthused. To my surprise, I was enthralled from the outset with that first volume. Having finished the second a week or so ago, I remain completely enamored of both and await future stories from the universe "TJIC" has wrought. Let me tell you right from the start, and despite the author's labeling to the contrary: THE ARISTILLUS BOOKS ARE NOT "LIBERTARIAN SCIENCE FICTION" Corcoran has presented us with, in these two volumes, SF that doesn't need to be ghetto-ized under a political label. (Yeah, yeah, marketing blah blah.) The novels clearly have a point of view, but that pov wrestles with itself in a most satisfying way. This isn't polemic, it's strong-willed literature that asks and tries to answer questions...couched in a good old fashioned fighting-for-our-lives adventure. If *forced* to qualify them, I'd describe the pair of books as: Hard, cyber, fast-paced fiction of a satisfyingly speculative and retrospeculative bent. Strengths/Notes: As mentioned above, it is fast-paced. Corcoran manages the rhythm and tension deftly, never letting the pace get out of control. He pulls the reader through meaty interchanges, to reasonably subtle exposition, and through intense action throughout. Thinking back, I'm struck by the cinematic feel that is evoked by the attention to detail. The human characters are familiar archetypes but never simplistic, other than where that's the bottom line (Looking at you, Louisa.) Mike Martin is recognizable to anyone who has worked with a high-achieving metamath engineer. If you have not, imagine Elon recast into more of a classic hero than supervillain waiting to happen. Give him a good woman with skills, a couple of good friends, no other option than to get off the earth, and access to a game-changing technology. He's often impulsive and is not always right. The true outsiders, the Uplifted Dogs and another player, are reasoned (thus reasonable even if not probable) extrapolations of current technology. The AG drive is not a character, but its move from game-changer to game-leveler functions as another excellent archetype, that of a disruptive technology. I'll let the prospective reader meet the rest of the cast on their own. Entertaining and self-aware, with nods to our shared history and literary heritage, Corcoran's world *IS* our world plus a few decades. This includes our catalogue of science fiction and the current trends in politics and sociopolitical awareness. The obvious hurdle of approaching the sacred territory of RAH is tackled head-on and successfully. The rest of the nods to shared literary and historical landscape are equally satisfying, beginning with the opening words of the first book and carrying through to the final image in this, the second book in the series. Lest someone think I had no critical thoughts whatsoever while reading these: There was one place in each of the books, perhaps two, where a short bit, usually internal dialogue, rings a little hollow. It was with minor antagonist characters in each instance and felt like a shortcut through necessary exposition without waste. In another medium, I suspect that some video/visual device would be used to communicate that interstitial background info in shorthand. These in no way detracted from my enjoyment of the novels and it would not take much to convince me that the stylistic shift resonates in some way that escaped me at the time. So, to wrap up: Book(s) good, go read. .mpa

• Great read

  I Absolutely loved it. A really good yarn. Am ooking forward to further instalments in the near futures. I hope.

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