This book has stayed with me for days. I saw the movie and was so touched I picked up the book. It has several threads: nuclear or other weapons that can destroy humanity, living with nature, women’s issues, and oneness with the universe.
The last point might be one of the most interesting. The character notes several times that entering the universal one in her situation is dangerous. It is because she needs to remain aware of the dangers of her situation as well as the potential for other human survivors to appear and potentially enslave or harm her. This resonates with her former lifestyle where she became enslaved to marriage and all the usual trappings society pegged as good and proper. It also resonates on its own level, because while we often strive to achieve oneness, there is actually danger there because we exist in physical form and need to defend that physical form.
A very thought-provocing novel that reads quickly, is riviting in surprising ways, and should be on the shelves of anyone with an interest in the various threads that appear.
5 stars!
Read more fiction where characters interact with their environments in the two-time award-winning Message Stick and the multi-finalist novel He Drinks Poison.

I gave this a good 30 pages or so before I stopped. It started out well on the ship but once it moved to land to take up the life of the main character, it slowed quite a bit. The first activites of the main chacter were interesting enough but then it settled into a parlor and his fascination with a particular woman. The dialog did me in. It was a gabby kind of dialog intended to reveal the backstories of the main character and what I assumed would be his love interest. It is in my mind a very weak way to introduce backstory. It also was overdone, went on too long, etc. So I stopped reading. I was looking forward to this work very much as it had been recommended to me and I am interested in nautical novels in this historic timeframe but it wasn’t written in a style that I could tolerate.
1 star.

I thought this book was better than many of the one- and two-star reader reviews note. It is about a man’s struggle to find himself, really, and to find his own heart. All of the other things that were used to market this book–the touches of native culture and lifeways, the environmental issues, and even the death of the woman–all feed back into this primary concern.
I feel this utilization of these various threads to enhance and expand the character and to both position him for a change and to push him to accept the change are the mark of a good writer. The prose in this book is slightly more than servicable…it doesn’t exactly sing but it does have its own voice, and that voice is enjoyable enough. I read this quickly and enjoyed it.
3 stars.
Want to read more fiction with Native American lifeways threaded through the narrative? Check out the free release of Break the Bow by Laine Cunningham on Wattpad.

A very dark read and yet you have these moments where you really feel for the main character. He’s not a nice guy but consider the situation under which he grew up and how terribly he was treated. Then, just at the time when you’re feeling compassion, the author kicks in something to remind you how bad a person he really is. And when you’re starting to feel a high ick factor from being in his head, you suddenly read something that enhances your sympathy.
Exceptionally well done all the way through, including with the plot. The end was very different than what I expected, and a masterful performance. I will be looking for more novels by this author. A fantastic read!
5 stars!
Feel like more dark fiction with a unique plot? Try He Drinks Poison.

Really enjoyed this one. It’s a rare find; I don’t care for hard science fiction but the classics I have always enjoyed. So having this author pointed out to me was fantastic.
The story is compelling. Lots of ideas about insiders/outsiders according to cultural and social norms and conventions…very timely for today’s world.
5 stars!

I read this novel in one great big semi-hallucinatory gulp. What a ride!
I can’t encapsulate the story better than the description has, so I won’t try. Instead I’ll focus on what was so interesting about this work.
This follows a man who not only seeks an escape route but who finds it. The drudgery of the workaday world, the annoyances of coworkers, and the feeling that there must be something more are going to be familiar to a lot of people in many different professions. It really doesn’t matter if the character is an engineer or a fast-food worker…the point is that he’s wondering if this is all there is to life.
Then answer, as he discovers, is no. Through spiritual quests and moments of complete awareness, his consciousness launches into that eternal now that provides so much enlightenment. At many points in the novel, I had to wonder if this really was a novel. The scenes he describes while he’s visiting that celestial dimension are so vivid that I felt surely they must be based on the author’s real experiences.
This is not a simple read, despite the fact that I jammed through it in a day. It will challenge readers who aren’t prepared to follow the character into that other realm of light and enlightenment. I call the experience semi-hallucinatory for a reason…and that is clearly one of the reasons to read this book. If you’ve quested before or are interested in what it’s like to have these powerful experiences, read this book. The author takes you there…and yet at the end, he deposits you safely back in your seat.
5 stars!
Interested in fiction that delves into the metaphysical? Try Message Stick, winner of two national awards, and He Drinks Poison, short-listed for several national prizes.

This work wasn’t as compelling as the first book of his that I read. Too much dialog that was really lectures on the state of the world at the time. It would have been better if that information had been conveyed by the inner thoughts of some of the characters. However, I made a lot of exceptions as I went along for the standards and expectations applied to works written during this particular time period and so didn’t find those elements off-putting.
Another thing I wasn’t happy with was the attempts at humor. They were simply too dated to be pleasurable. However, again, I made allowances for that and moved on to the next narrative portion when those cropped up.
Overall, an enjoyable read. Not a particularly satisfying ending but well handled in terms of the society in which the author lived and the time period in which this was written. I would recommend this both as a cultural study and a solid story.
4 stars!

Know before you read this that I am a big Gaiman fan but was disappointed with this work.
This was clearly not up to Gaiman’s usual ability. The first 100 pages were filled with so much that should have been trimmed, it was frustrating. After that, the story picked up well enough. I still wasn’t impressed with how he handled the otherworld elements but it was a nice enough read to fill the time.
2.9 stars.

I read this after reading other works by the same author. I was impressed by his other novels moreso than this one.
I will say, however, that this is a very old book. It is usual to feel like you’re reading things you’ve read before when reaching back in time for classics, and I believe that was a lot of what made me enjoy this book less. Likely at the time it was groundbreaking but now it feels shopworn.
Overall, a good read in terms of looking back at where our dystopian and sci-fi ideas were born. Worth the time.
3 stars.

I picked up this book after seeing a New York Times review that was positive. I’m working on a project where a worldwide pandemic (of a very different sort) sweeps the country, and so am interested in how other authors handle the same situation.
Generally I saw flaws in the work that I noted in her earlier Swamplandia! Generally she isn’t going deeply enough with the language or her style. The most critical flaw was that she switches between two very different styles in the same book, as she did in Swamplandia! At times she’s reaching for higher level narrative writing, then she returns fully to a commercial tone. It’s jarring for readers, and it put me off quite a bit.
This is a better book overall than Swamplandia! though. I also found her treatment of the topic interesting; it’s really just a way to look at one woman’s grief over the death of a sister. The novella form might have been well suited for this but it doesn’t feel like it. There feels like a lack of detail in both the epidemic and the woman’s development.
So, a fun enough read but not one I’d want to repeat.
2 stars.

I’m an old-school sci-fi gal…I grew up reading Asmov and other authors who really created this category. One of the things that really stands out for me with those first pioneers is how they focused on characters as much as any of the science they invented in their worlds.
The Calypsis Project was therefore a true delight. This story has equal parts character and science-based plot elements. Set far in the future, it follows one primary alien character and one important human character as they form an alliance across war lines to save the galaxy from a hideous conspiracy. Their individual motivations are provided in a clear way, and are not lumped into a single segment but are drawn out across the book. This kind of feeding smaller bits to readers really enhances the reading experience.
And the science is also well developed without bogging down in a slew of details that provide too much information, as some other sci-fi writers might do. This author really has a hand in this category, and interweaves character and plot very well.
The only exception I found was that the use of modern slang terms and references to today’s cultural elements felt inaccurate to this world. It was difficult to believe that so far in the future certain slang terms would still be used, so that was a touch distracting. But the other strengths shown by this author will very likely eliminate those kinds of tiny errors with her next book, so I’m looking forward to reading other novels from her.
Overall, this was a great read and one worth the time. Clips along very nicely and provides a lot to think about along the way.
4 stars!

What a delightful read this is! Young adults, preteens and adults will find this novel a must-read.
The story follows a girl who needs to escape an abusive situation. She does so by dressing as a boy so that she can safely move about in society. She ends up being hired as a cabin boy on a ship.
What follows are adventures on the ship as she learns about her duties and a few adventures on land in different ports where they stop. Along the way, she finds friends in the most unlikely places, and some of those friendships promise to last her entire life.
There is also an element of mystery about some of her fellow mates. The secrets and questions keep readers in suspense in a more subtle way than the other, more physical adventures. So this book reads well on the action level as well as the psychological level.
I especially enjoyed the longer ending. Other authors who aren’t as adept might have ended the book when she returns to a life on dry land. Stout, however, goes a step further and follows her new life just enough so readers can see the main character taking another step toward maturity. This along with the strong writing and fresh story proves this author to be very well suited to her career.
Clearly this is a book that will be enjoyed by readers at many stages in their lives. A great story you can’t miss!
5 stars!

Brilliant book. This was a surprise. When I began reading, I thought it would be just another book about Nazi hunters and justice. It turned out to be so much more.
Like the best novels, this one is about the primary characters and how they change in the course of their quest. A woman who accidentally gets wrapped up with an enclave of Nazis in hiding eventually finds a better focus for her life by becoming more mature. A man who survived the camps is given the opportunity to finally triumph in a life filled with failures…failures to bring Nazis to justice, and a deep and abiding failure to live his life for its own value rather than living always in the past pain.
A very subtle yet highly suspenseful read. I couldn’t put this one down. Well worth the time, and I will look for more by this author.
5 stars!
Want to read another novel that focuses on the impact of events on characters and their lives? Try He Drinks Poison, a deeply moving journey with a woman who, as the child of rape, brings the men who perpetuate violence against women to justice.

A very strong finish to the series. I really was gripped and couldn’t wait to get back to reading this every evening. The action was fab, as always, and the character stayed strong, which is very enjoyable with a female lead.
One complaint was that the author sent her to sleep far too often with morphling. This can be used once or perhaps twice in a book but here, the author just seemed to drug Katniss whenever things got too tough. It would have been much better to allow her character to deal with the psychological issues by keeping her awake and allowing her to feel the pain of different events.
The other complaint here was that Katniss’ guilt started to feel overdone. It has been a thread through all three books, but by the third book, her observance of all the people who are dying because of her just felt overused. There wasn’t any real emotion to it, and it would have been better, especially in this third book, to have her really work through that or break down because of it. Instead, we get thoughts that seem blah in their impact and morphling.
I do recommend that you overlook these two flaws and read the book anyway. It’s a lot of fun, and Katniss still exhibits strong traits that make her appealing.
5 stars!