Virtual Mount TBR Challenge 2022 discussion

Back to the fun with reading stuff I don’t own. Once again starting low and seeing how far I go.

Good luck, Steven!!

Bev wrote: "Good luck, Steven!!"

Thank you!

#1 - Red Sonja & Vampirella Meet Betty & Veronica by Amy Chu & Maria Sanapo

While this features a vampire and a time-traveling barbarian assassin in a scalemail bikini chasing a Chaos cult to Riverdale where serial murders have just started up (possibly AGAIN) it’s not as though it’s being treated with deadly seriousness. Vampi and Sonja go undercover as exchange students, aided by Betty and Veronica, and both mayhem and hilarity ensue. The thing’s full of cheesecake, of course, and the various alternate covers are a riot.

This collects the first 6 of 12 issues.

ComiXology Unlimited

#2 - In the Heart of the Fire by Dean Koontz

Part one of a series that’s also a serial story. It’s an interesting take on the Mission: Impossible trope, with a shadowy non-governmental organization sending forth a nameless, memoryless man to bring justice to those who are owed it. While this opening installment has Nameless dealing with predators of children, it also hints at a much larger plan to correct a society foundering under injustice and evil.

The biggest issue — the writing is solid, the plotting perfunctory — is that Nameless is never really challenged at any point, and he’s never alone and unsupported. He arrives equipped as an avenging angel, he leaves for his next task, and between he’s brought a little light and hope to a few. All the same, there’s never a sense that things have gone awry and he might be in trouble (the one incident is minor enough, and solved easily because the Sheriff’s dog is trained to pen, not savage — given how police use K9s, this is unrealistic. Ah well.)

I’ll keep reading the series out of curiosity about the overall saga, but I doubt I’ll be overly excited.

Kindle Unlimited.

#3 - The Show That Never Ends: The Rise and Fall of Prog Rock by David Weigel

This should have been much better. Instead, it gets trapped into specific areas and performers, missing a lot of others. It likely needed to be at least two books, given the resurgence of progressive rock.

Read in audiobook form. Sadly, Rudy Surda isn’t very good.

Borrowed from Scribd.

#4 - Big Bad Ironclad! by Nathan Hale

The framing conceit is amusing — American spy Nathan Hale is about to be hanged, and is telling stories, Scheherazade-like, about the future (he was swallowed by a mysterious giant history book, you see…) to stay alive.

This time he tells the story of the ironclads of the Civil War — the Virginia (née the Merrimack) and the Monitor — which leads to other tales, including the story of one William Cushing, a prankster of a Naval Cadet. Cushing managed to get himself thrown out of the Union Navy a couple of times, until he made himself vital by essentially becoming the prototype SEAL.

Highly entertaining book.

Via ComiXology Unlimited.

#5 - Star Trek: Moments Asunder by Dayton Ward

Part one of a trilogy that closes off the Star Trek litverse that was created post-Nemesis. The decision was taken to do this to more closely align the tie-in books to the current TV shows. Unlike the Star Wars EU, this was always an alternate continuity, one of several in Star Trek.

The story, meanwhile, us suitably apocalyptic — Wesley, now a full-fledged Traveler and much older due to time travel, has his attention attracted by an anomaly…which turns out to be the Guardian Of Forever under attack. By the end of the book they know what’s happening, and who’s behind it, but stopping it is the hard part.

Scribd.

#6 - James Bond: My Long And Eventful Search For His Father by Len Deighton

About Deighton’s connections to Fleming, the Bond films, and producer Kevin McClory, whose actions likely sped up the death of Ian Fleming, and plagued the Bind producers for decades. It’s a perspective from a man who was sometimes in the room, though Deighton’s conclusions are vague indeed.

Kindle Unlimited

#7 - Once & Future, Vol. 3: The Parliament of Magpies by Kieran Gillen, Dan Mora

Duncan, Rose, and Bridgette face the increasing ferocity of Merlin’s search for the Grail, with their search taking them to a deep rural pub full of English nationalists…and the Green Knight. As Bridgette takes the search for anime in ever darker directions, her government liaison puts in an appearance. Then, just as they seem to have things sorted, the Prime Minister makes a grandiose mistake….

It’s middling stuff, really, but improving again. It does get a bit confusing at times, mind you, but it does take unexpected turns here and there.

Hoopla.

#8 - Once & Future, Vol. 4: Monarchies in the UK by Kieron Gillen, Dan Mora

This is where everything gets way more complicated, thanks to the late PM’s absolutely catastrophic attempt at a power grab. The core trio gather up the residents of Bridgette’s rest home, gather weapons, and rescue Rose’s parents.

Oh, and there’s a second Arthur now. There may be more to come. Britain has been plunged into Hell and getting it back out will be a trick.

Hoopla.

#9 - The List by Mick Herron

The first of a series of interstitial entries in the Slow Horses series. Low-level MI5 agent John Batchelor is assigned to do the rounds of retired MI5 assets. One dies quietly, which seems fine…until a secret bank account and a list of encrypted names are discovered, and Batchelor has to try to sort out the truth before his mediocre but long career abruptly ends.

Scribd.

#10 - Please Like Me by Mindy Kaling

Kaling uses the story of a couple of traumatic parties as the core of discussing introversion, Light, but charming stuff.

Kindle Unlimited

#11 - Searching for Coach Taylor by Mindy Kaling

Kindle Unlimited

#12 - Slow Horses by Mick Herron

The denizens of Slough House are the unwanted people of MI5, Britain’s security service. Perhaps they’re just unimpressive. Perhaps they slept with the wrong person. Maybe they screwed up a mission. They all come into the care of the gross, cynical Jackson Lamb, whose own history is mysterious and whose present is disgusting, disguising his ruthless brilliance.

When an MI5 op, designed to repair the Service’s reputation after a string of disasters, goes horribly wrong, newly added Slow Horse River Cartwright gets wind of it, which sets the Slow Horses into unaccustomed action but sets Lamb and his misfits against the Service itself, whose personnel are desperately trying to contain the impending damage…even if it means destroying Slough House.

Often hilarious, definitely biting, this takes an acerbic look at the Security Service, as well as at populist politicians and the brain dead shambling extremist right in Britain.

Hoopla, audiobook

#13 - The Marylebone Drop by Mick Herron

An interstitial story centered around John Bachelor, an old MI5 operative relegated to “milkman” duty — doing welfare checks on a dwindling number of retired MI5 assets living in London. One of those assets, Sol, an East German defector, sees an old-fashioned “drop” happen in a cafe, and alerts Bachelor, who, realizing who the woman involved was, races to look into this, setting off a cascade that ends in death and disgrace.

It’s a Slough House story, though the Slow Horses don’t show up for this one by more than implication.

Scribd.

#14 - Joe Golem: Occult Detective, Vol. 3: The Drowning City by Mike Mignola, Christopher Golden, others

Part one of the adaptation of the Mignola/Golden novel. Unfortunately, I started here so was a bit confused at first — this is an alternate world where New York was inundated after an earthquake, and suffers from all manner of occult weirdness. Joe Golem is a hard-boiled detective working for a former consulting detective and occult specialist — Joe himself has memory issues and special abilities. In this he’s called upon to deal with a world-ending occult plot, as well as a feisty fourteen year old girl.

It’s interesting and reasonably well done, but I think I’ll check out the novel.

Hoopla

#15 - Joe Golem: Occult Detective, Vol. 1: The Rat Catcher and the Sunken Dead by Mike Mignola, Christopher Golden, others

Going back to the beginning. Simon Church, old, and ailing, is trying to figure out how to keep fighting the occult forces in sunken New York City when an errant lightning strike brings an artifact to life: a hulking golem…one that somehow assumes human form. Ten years later Joe is an investigator, working with Church, who works to suppress Joe’s memories of his life in 1400s Slavonia.

This volume rather throws ideas at the wall, from a fish-man kidnapping kids to an inadvertent zombie invasion triggered by a grieving occultist. The latter serves to introduce the evil Dr. Cocteau as well.

Hoopla

#16 - Dead Lions by Mick Herron

The second in the “Slough House” series started with the death of a Cold War era spy and a clue that causes the gross Jackson Lamb to think that he was murdered. Meanwhile, a couple of the Slow Horses are seconded by the ambitious James “Spyder” Webb to assist in bringing a Russian oligarch onside. The complex but slow first half of the novel chases disparate threads, including a planned protest march in London, while the second half sets all the dominoes falling and reveals how *everybody* got it wrong in the end — bad guys included. It’s solid, often funny, often tragic, work.

Hoopla.

#17 - Moon Knight, Vol. 1: Lunatic by Jeff Lemire, Greg Smallwood

The beginning of a transformative arc for Moon Knight, as Marc Spector finds himself trapped in an asylum, being brutalized. It’s a fascinating take, as the situation keeps changing throughout and the truth is elusive, even when it seems to be clear.

ComiXology Unlimited

#18 - Moon Knight by Lemire & Smallwood by Jeff Lemire, others

Marc Spector, Moon Knight…Jake Lockley, Moon Knight…Steven Grant, Moon Knight. One and the same, three identities in one severely mentally ill man. A man determined to find his way out of the DID maze, despite the unique encumbrances of his situation. It’ll mean facing down Khonshu, the deity who controls him, and he already knows his own issue is forever with him even if he breaks away from the manipulative god.

It’s a great attempt to deal with mental illness in super heroic form, though I don’t think Lemire quite gets it across (not his fault, really, as DID is a tough one to depict, and easy to use as a gimmick, especially when the setting is outside of reality.)

Hoopla

#19 - Real Tigers by Mick Herron

A year after the chaos of Dead Lions the Slough House group has expanded again. This time they’re dragged out of their drudgery and torpor when Catherine Standish is kidnapped and River Cartwright conned into stealing a file from Regent’s Park in exchange for her release. After River is viciously interrogated and mysteriously released, the layers start to peel away and an increasingly unhinged series of events follow. The novel becomes increasingly compelling as it rolls onward to its catastrophic climax and sneaky end.

Hoopla.

#20 - Spook Street by Mick Herron

I swear, these are the Pringles of spy books. This time Jackson Lamb’s misfit bunch at Slough House are dragged into a confusing mystery when someone attempts to murder David Cartwright, the grandfather of wanna-be action hero River Cartwright (he’s pretty bad at it, though he keeps escaping death) and former secret service legend. Meanwhile, MI5’s main operation is tied up with a new First Desk and the aftermath of a horrific bombing incident. Then both of these lines start to draw together into one horrific realization that goes far into the past….

This is actually a grimmer Slough House novel than usual, though no less complicated or propulsive. Nobody comes out of this undamaged, not even the resilient (or resistant) Jackson Lamb, who’s still recovering from the madness of the previous book.

Scribd.

#21 - London Rules by Mick Herron
#22 - Joe Country by Mick Herron

Books 5 and 6 in Herron’s savagely sarcastic look at the British Security Service, MI5, from both its main operation and the corner known as Slough House, where service rejects go to die of boredom under the acerbic watch of one Jackson Lamb, former super spy.

In this pair, which gel into a story that seems likely to continue through to whatever end point Herron has in mind, the sins of the past again come to haunt the present, and sins of the present come to grow like Topsy because of the sins of the past. As always where Slough House is involved the catastrophes are often pathetic and the chaos exponentially worse because these characters are at best half-arsed.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, the main MI5 operation has found it’s way into the hands of the ambitious Diana Taverner, whose frustration with bureaucratic obstruction is heading down a very bad path….

Via Scribd, but also available on Hoopla.

#23 - Slough House by Mick Herron

Oh, that was a grueling read. The hits just kept coming, and it’s left everybody in bad places (except Lamb, who started there.)

The ending…ouch, damn. Poor Sid — I hope we find out what happened to her. River, too, as the narrative is, well, bleak. Taverner is once again screwed, and this time she knows it. Peter Judd, too, that highly competent mirror of Boris Johnson, is in for it…but he has no idea yet. Taverner is a tragedy, though…she really does want to make MI5 fit for purpose, but people like Judd want it for power and control and money. This time it’s led to multiple murders and Russia turning up the heat. Meanwhile Judd is fomenting chaos in the streets. This won’t end well.

Can Lamb use his surviving crew to put things right again, before he has to pay the Piper? I’m pretty sure Herron’s going to make somebody pay…in blood.

Interesting to me: Herron seems to have merged the Services in this series — he has MI5 doing Ops outside of the Kingdom. Foreign operations and spies are MI6’s remit, generally. It’s curious indeed. I don’t think Herron has even referenced MI6 more than once.

Scribd but also on Hoopla

#24 - Bad Actors by Mick Herron

Oh man, this series just keeps getting better and better. Yes, there are quibbles — the series timeline is a sliding scale, Herron is fond of takeouts, and he loves his coincidences — but overall this is not only the most intricate book in the series, it’s probably the funniest (there’s a running gag around Boris Johnson), most insightful, and most interesting from a character perspective. We certainly get a much deeper look into Lamb and Taverner’s twisted relationship, and development of some recent characters that I suspect will be key players as the series turns towards the odious Peter Judd.

But do I *really* have to wait a year-plus?

Scribd, also Hoopla

On to the next rock.