Chuck Palahnuik's Tell All: Not Really Worth Telling

The problem with having an author that I admire, is that I tend to hold their novels to a higher standard than might be fair. Chuck Palahnuik is one such author. He is definitely in my top five, and both Fight Club and Survivor make my top ten list. This is probably why I thought that Tell-All was only okay. Had I not been comparing it to his other novels, I would have enjoyed it more, but alas it does not hold up to the majority of books Palahnuik has written.

Tell All is written in the form of a movie script and chronicles the final days of famous actress Katherine Kenton and her doting assistant Hazel Coogan. Hazel has spent her life trying to keep Katherine’s reputation perfect and preserve her legacy, often lying and keeping would-be suitors away by any means possible. Everything begins to unravel for both women when a man named Webster Carlton Westward III appears in Katherine’s life. In her own words Hazel says, "My purpose is to impose order on Miss Kathie's chaos … to instill discipline in her legendary artistic caprice. I am the person Lolly Parsons once referred to as a 'surrogate spine.' "

Appearing to love and care for Katherine, she ignores all of Hazel’s warnings, even making accusations that Hazel is working against her. That is, until the two women discover that Webster has written a tell all book to be published after Katherine’s death. It details intimate moments of their time together, and downright lies about things they did together. In fact, the end of the book even details how Katherine is going to die!

But more is going on behind the scenes of Katherine’s life, and Hazel might not just be looking out for her mistress, but for herself. With echoes of Alfred Hitchcock’s Rebecca and Hollywood life in the 1950s, the potential of a novel of worth and merit was there, especially with a writer like Palahnuik creating the world, but it fell short. Very Short. 

The Sacrifice (Enemy #4) Review

Trying to review a book in the middle of a series can be difficult. I want to talk about how characters have changed, but trying to give the backstory to all the characters would be a novella in itself. But lets give it a shot. The Sacrifice is the fourth novel in Charlie Higson’s best selling The Enemy series. Set in London in the not so distant future, a sickness wiped out everyone over the age of fourteen. It has been a year since all the adults got sick, most of them died. A few however, lived if you can call it that. They are diseased, crazy animals without thoughts except to eat the flesh of all the children still alive. At least that’s how it was for the past year. Shadowman (Dylan) has been following them, observing them and they are starting to change. They are growing smarter, working together, communication to one another and the kids are not safe. Groups have banded together all over London, in the Tower, the Palace, the Cathedral, and in Parliament. But the sickos, or adults, are smarter now. They are finding ways into the fortified buildings, communicating and working together. Those children who are left, are even more unsafe than they were before.

            This novel brings together all of the different pieces, places, and people that Higson has introduced his readers to over the past few books. Brothers and sisters are trying to cross London to reunite, no matter how many sickos might be between them. Sam and The Kid in trying to find their friends have been captured by more different groups believing them to by spies, or in Mad Matt’s opinion the Lamb and the Goat, the devil and the savior. Those children in power in their “strongholds” are starting to are irrational moves.

            Maybe there is hope. Wormwood, an adult and a sicko might not be as sick as the others. He can still talk, and while he craves the taste of human flesh like the rest, his nonsense talk is starting to make scene. He mumbles about the experiments and the mistakes in-between calling for flesh and turning from the light that burns his skin. Given enough time and darkness he might be able to help those who are left stop the disease and save the children.

            But for every yin there is a yang, and while Wormwood is doing his best to fight the cravings and help, St. George has given in completely to the ravaging and chaos in his mind. He leads the newly ordered and strong group of diseased adults, and they are intent on satisfying their craving for the flesh of children.

            I thought that this book was absolutely amazing and I cannot wait for the series to continue. The first three books focused on just one, maybe two groups of kids, but this novel is bringing them all together, and setting the story up for the final battle where I am assuming all the children will band together under Wormwood’s guidance to fight off the last of the sickness and begin to rebuild humanity.

            I give this novel 4.5/5 stars and wood recommend it for anyone who likes zombie books, post apocalyptic novels, books the feature strong children facing and fighting adversary, and novels like World War Z, Gone, the Killing Floor, and the Quarantine series.

Earth Afire (book two in the First Formatic War): a Review

Ender’s Game has been my favorite book for years now, and I think that everything that Orson Scott Card has written for the Enderverse series has been amazing, and Earth Afire is no different. It is the second book in a trilogy that details the original attack by the Formatics on Earth and the initial battles that took place. This second installment follows the path of multiple characters, all whom are in different places when the Formatics arrive at Earth.

Victor was one of the first to spot the Formatics while working in space, once back on Earth he tries desperately to get the video feeds he recorded onto the nets, but very few people believe him. Only Imala believes him, and risks her job and reputation to try and help him. Knowing his family died trying to stop the Formatics from invading Earth, Victor refuses to give up, eventually teaming up with Lem Jukes, the man who killed his uncle.

Lem Jukes was in space heading one of his father’s new mining vessels when the Formatics first entered the Solar System. Rich, snobby, and overly self assured, it is only in the midst of the inevitable destruction of Earth that Lem goes against his father, and his upbringing supporting Victor as they try and find a way to blow up the seemingly impenetrable alien space ship.

            Rena was once apart of Victor’s family, back before he fled to Earth with the video feeds and nearly all of the space miners were killed. Her part of the story is little, and bears nearly no importance to this third installment. My guess is that Rena and the remaining women will have more involvement in the third book since they are far out in space, and will probably have an active role in attacking the incoming Formatics. Although, that is just my opinion.

            Those are the main characters who were in space, seeing the Formatics first, warning Earth, and trying to stop incoming ships. Earth is a totally different story. The Formatics have landed, and bug-like creatures have poured out of the Lander in the hundreds, possibly the thousands. The Formatics begins spraying some sort of chemical over all the plants and waters of Earth, killing everything it touches, including melting the skin off od any person who is in the vicinity and has exposed skin.

            Bingwen is a young Chinese boy who believed the videos of incoming aliens and took precautions when the vidfeed from space first came via satellite. It was good that he did, because the Formatics landed near his home village, and Bingwen is the only member of his village and the surrounding area that manages to make it though to the end of the book. Although, part of that is because he is rescued by Mazor Rackham.

            Yes, Mazor Rackham who is credited as defeating the buggers during the first invasion of Earth in Ender’s Game, makes his appearance in this novel. Mazor was deployed as a pilot, and hired by the Chinese government to teach their soldiers how to fly the new aircrafts being built by Juke Limited (the same Juke family that Lem is from). While the Chinese don’t want him to help, he happens to be in the right place at the right time when the aliens attack.

            The last of the characters is Captain DeWitt Clinton O'Toole, commander of the Mobile Operations Police. He disobeys all orders from the UN and the Chinese government and enters the country in an attempt to put humanity and the stopping of the alien attack ahead of petty earthly disputes. He eventually teams up with Mazor, and together they begin a gorilla attack on the Formatics, the only attacks that seem to hurt the Formatics in any way.

            I thought that this was an absolutely amazing book. I couldn’t put it down, there were a couple of moments on the airplane when I laughed or gasped aloud and the people looked at me like I was crazy. It wasn’t quite as well written as many of the other books, but that is often what happens with a co-author. I loved how all the stories paralleled each other (the character stories that is), and then ended up together in various places trying to save Earth from the Formatics. I would give this book 4.5/5 stars. Cannot wait for the final installment in this pre-Trilogy to Ender’s Game.

Arclight by Josin McQuein REVIEW

The world has changed, taken over by creatures called the Fade. Though they were once human, their bodies have been taken over by parasites and now control all but one small compound of Earth, The Arclight. Light is the only thing that that the Fade are afraid of, allergic to even as anytime they enter the light they seem to decompose and turn to ash. That is what the Arclight is, walls of light. Lights shine up from the ground, and down from streetlights in a blinding wall of light that encircles the remains of humanity. No one ventures out past the light, until a blip on the radar shows human activity in the Gray, an area between the light and the dark. A group of men sets out to try and save her, nearly all of them losing their lives to the Fade, but the human girl is saved. Marina wakes up in the Arclight hospital, no memory of who she is, who where she came from, but a girl who survived the Dark and wasn’t killed by the Fade must be someone special. Many believe that she holds the key to taking back the world and restoring her humanity, but others mistrust her. The Fade begin trying to attack the Arclight with renewed frenzy, and people whisper that Marina must be working with them helping them to take down the last of the humans.

It is in one of these attacks that a Fade actually breaks into the Arclight. No one can understand how he manages it, but Marina can hear his thoughts and feel his feelings. When she is in the room he stops trying to fight, and simply looks at her. Marina knows that she should remember something, but she doesn’t know what or how she is connected to the Fade. All she knows is that the friends she has made since coming to the Arclight are in danger as long as she stays there. When the Fade breaks out, she agrees to leave with him and go into the Dark as long as no one from the Arclight is hurt. What she didn’t expect was her friends to come into the Dark after her, or what the dark has of her memories.

I enjoyed this book quite a bit. It was a mix of Andrew Fukuda’s The Hunt and David Simpson’s Post-Human trilogy. So often post-apocalyptic sci-fi books make little to no scene on how the world became what it is, but this book leaves little to no wholes. The story flows well, and my friends and I had a great time predicting what we thought would happen next and making up theories along the way (I am happy to say I was correct on all accounts). While it seems that this book is going to be a series, it can also stay on its own. I am satisfied with the ending, and while I liked this book, I liked the ending enough that I don’t plan on reading anything else. I would probably give it 4.5 stars only because I was bugged by the main characters best friend, other than that it is a great novel.

River's Edge (Book One) REVIEW

This has been one of the worst books I have read, ever. So many things were wrong with it, where should I start? Whoever her editor and fact checkers are needs to be fired and blacklisted for ever having let this book get through. References are made to how hot Josh Hartnet is, I am so sorry but he is not relevant at this point in time. The main character still has a flip phone, and her plan only allows free minutes on Sunday. I don’t think I have heard anyone mention being worried about minutes in over three years. For a book that was published in Spring 2013, it reads almost like one that was written in 2002 for parts of it.

The main character jumps to a million conclusions and is completely hypocritical most of the time. She not only makes bad choices, but stupid ones and then blames everyone else for her problems.

The plot: After her mother abandons her on her 18^th birthday, Kasia gets a job working as a biologist’s assistant in Iowa. While studying turtle’s, she falls into the River, only to find that she can see, breath and glow. The book followers her as she learns to accept the fact that she is part demon, and what side of the demonic River power struggle she wants to be on. There is a love interests as well.

I will NOT be reading any future books in the series. It was horrible and I give it 1 out of five stars.