Alif the Unseen

Alif the Unseen by G. Willow Wilson.  Alif's comfortable existence, living at home with his mother while spending his time coding protective software to keep his many anonymous, freedom or pornography-loving  hacker clients secure, comes to an abrupt end when his beloved Intisar becomes engaged to a wealthy prince.  Unfortunately, the lucky suitor is also the head of state cyber security forces, which are going to breach all of Alif's carefully coded defenses. What's worse, the Hand, as he is known, has also discovered Alif's latest programming triumph--a keystroke logging program, which has the potential to unmask and destroy all of Alif's unconventional clients as well as Alif himself.  As Alif's friend, Dina, puts it, "We live in a city run by an emir from one of the most inbred families on earth, where a few censors can throw someone in jail for writing things on the Internet and falling in love with the wrong person. . . It [Alif's life]went out of control a long time ago."  (122)

When she decided to leave him, Intisar sent Alif a package containing a book,  The Thousand and One Days.  This ancient tome, the secret book of the jinn, is believed to contain the key to creating a quantum-bit-powered supercomputer. With the help of Dina and a deadly jinn named Vikram, Alif struggles to keep the Hand from finding the book while he uses fleeting wifi connections to do some manic programming aimed at destroying the Hand's power.

The book is replete with  fascinating characters who offer different takes on Islam and spirituality, on tensions between the haves and have-nots in an unnamed Arab country, on the differences between Arabs and half-castes (Alif is half-Arab, half-Indian), and on two worlds--of the jinn and of the Internet,  that operate out of sight of ordinary lives.  Fascinating, fast paced and totally satisfying. Don't miss this one!!

The Katyn Order

The Katyn Order by Doublas W. Jacobson is a wild swing through the history of World War II as it plays out in the fall of Warsaw and the subsequent invasion by Russian troops.  The fate of Poland as a country lies in the balance.  A Soviet-controlled communist government is ready to take over and the only possible way to prevent this is to reveal to the world the Soviet order to murder over 27,000 Polish officers, revolutionaries and nationalists in the Katyn Forest in 1940.  The German army discovered evidence of the massacre in 1943 and the controversy about who was responsible began with accusations and counter accusations between them and the Russians.  Jacobson brings alive the unspeakably horrific and hopeless conditions of the Warsaw uprising, telling the story of a small group of dedicated Polish nationalists fighting with the Armia Krajowa  against vastly superior and ruthless German forces.  A small group of survivors is forced underground but they continue their resistance against the Red Army and security forces.  Adam Nowak is a Polish-speaking American trained as an assassin who the British Intelligence sends into Poland to work with the resistance movement. After the uprising fails,  his objective is to find a copy of Stalin's order to execute the Poles.  Trying to stop him is NKVD agent Tarnov, who has a personal interest in destroying any record of the massacre--he was responsible for carrying it out.  The story is filled with tales of violence, treachery and heroism.  It is also the story of a Polish resistance fighter who falls in love with Adam Nowak and struggles to both help him and stay alive in post-war Krakow.  Heavy, compelling stuff.

Shadows on the Moon

Shadows on the Moon by Zoë Marriott. On what should have been a celebration of her fourteenth birthday, Hoshima Suzume witnesses the murder of her beloved father, who has been accused of treason. Suzume miraculously manages to elude the pursuing soldiers although her cousin is killed while fleeing right next to her. She hides in the family kitchens with the help of an aged servant. Eventually the soldiers leave and Suzume's mother and a family friend find her. It is soon apparent that Suzume's mother and Terayama-san are lovers who plan to marry and erase all memories of the Hoshima family. Suzume also discovers that Terayama betrayed her father. In her grief and anger, Suzume starts to harm herself. Her only friend is the kitchen servant who hid her, Youta, who also tells her that she is a shadow weaver; this is how she was able to escape from the soldiers. He begins to work with her to develop her gift. Despite his concern and support, Suzume realizes that eventually Terayama-san will kill her. Her mother, now preoccupied with the birth of twins, either doesn't notice the threat or doesn't care. Suzume's story becomes one of assuming various identities to hide from Terayama while she plans her revenge. These plans are complicated by the distracting presence of Otieno, a foreign visitor who is also a shadow weaver. Suzume is eventually confronted with an agonizing choice--continue to plot to avenge her family by training to become the chief courtesan of the Moon Prince or travel to Athazie, the home of the man she loves. Suzume is a resilient and talented heroine. The setting reflects the author's research on ancient Japan, with detailed descriptions of dress, language and culture. Elements of romance, psychological pain, superhuman talents and moral dilemmas combine to make this a very satisfying read.

A Confusion of Princes

A Confusion of Princes by Garth Nix. Prince Khemri is born into a system where all Imperial Princes are treated as presumptive heirs to the Empire. Their natural abilities are enhanced psychically, mechanically, and biologically with the core elements of Imperial technology: Psitek, Mektek, and Bitek. Princes can read and communicate through thoughts; they also possess superhuman strength and can repair their own injuries. They need all of these capabilities to stay alive, because although any prince can theoretically become Emperor, all princes are also vulnerable to attack from their fellow princes (there are ten million of them) who are competing for the highest honors and powers when the current Emperor abdicates. Princes can and do die, and many are reborn if deemed worthy by the Imperial Mind. Princes never know their parents and [should] trust no one. A Confusion of Princes is Khemri's story of being thrown into this life and death struggle of princes after 16 years of being told he is special and deserves to be Emperor. He must draw on all of his training and powers to outwit and outfight other candidates, priests, assassins, and mysterious challenges devised by the current Imperial government. In the midst of this chaos he must also examine who he is, where he comes from, and what he believes. Loads of fun-recommended.

Don't Cry Tai Lake

Don't Cry Tai Lake: an Inspector Chen Novel by Qiu Xiaolong is both an absorbing detective story and an environmental expose of the dark side of industrial growth in China. Chief Inspector Chen of the Shanghai Police Department finds himself on an unscheduled vacation, as a senior party official insists that Chen take his place at a luxury resort on the shores of Tai Lake. It isn't long before Chen becomes involved in a murder investigation. The director of one of the major chemical factories that dumps pollutants into the lake is murdered. A local environmental activist is being held for the crime, but Chen, attracted to a beautiful environmental engineer named Shanshan, who is also fighting the factory's deceptive polluting practices, decides to do his own private investigation. The more he learns about the destruction of the once beautiful lake, the more determined Chen is to find the murderer and to expose the corruption that is destroying Tai Lake. Chen has no authority in Wuxi, but Sergeant Huang of the local police and a big fan of Chen's agrees to "play Dr. Watson to Chen's Sherlock Holmes." Don't Cry Tai Lake is the most recent of a series of Inspector Chen mysteries. The author has also written two books of translations of traditional Chinese poetry as well as one book of his own poems. Poetry appears throughout the book, adding beautiful interludes as Chan both woos Shanshan and describes the struggle over the lake's future through verse. Recommended.

The Diviners

The Diviners by Libba Bray is both an entertaining and annoying book. It is entertaining because it is suspenseful; an assorted cast of characters, many with special psychic gifts, become involved in the imminent appearance of the Beast. There are only a few weeks, then days, then hours before the depraved actions of [presumably long dead] Naughty John lead to his transformation into something far worse than a serial killer. Bray sets the story in New York in 1926. Transportation, clothing, parties and the theater are all depicted with realistic historical detail. Sometimes Bray tries too hard to recapture the era. Her main character, youthful teen flapper Evie, fresh from Ohio and now staying with her Uncle Will, talks constantly in cliches. "She is the elephant's eyebrows," "Must be the duck's quack to be famous," and so on. Over 500 pages of such dialog is definitely tiresome. Each character also has a back story that relates somehow to the psychic world. Evie desperately misses her older brother, killed in Europe in WWI, and dreams about him constantly. Streetwise Sam, who flirts with Evie and picks pockets, has a more serious side--he is trying to trace his mother who disappeared when he was a child. Uncle Will has own secrets, as do numbers runner Memphis and his true love, Theta. The narration jumps around from one character to another and threatens at times to leave the reader behind. That said, The Diviners a very compelling story and worth the effort. Paramount has purchased the movie rights, so get ready for a thriller.

Code Name Verity

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein is a suspenseful story of two young women involved in British spying during World War II. One of the women, Queenie, is captured by the Gestapo after parachuting into occupied France. In order to avoid further torture by her captors, she must write up an account of her experiences in special operations, identifying airfields, airplanes, secret codes and anything else that SS Hauptsturmfuhrer von Linden might find useful. If she hesitates, she is burned and threatened with even more grisly tortures. As she writes, Queenie agonizes over the decision she has made to betray her country. She compares her own cowardice with the screams of a young Frenchwoman, also held at Gestapo Headquarters, who will not break and inform on her co-conspirators in the French underground. She also grieves for her dearest friend, Maddie, who was piloting the plane that ferried Queenie into France and who [she believes] died when the plane crashed. The suspense builds as Queenie eventually reveals to von Linden that she is an interrogator herself. We also learn that Maddie is still alive and hiding with French commandos. Can Queenie stay alive long enough to be rescued? Will Maddie find her friend before she is either executed or sent to a concentration camp? How can either bear the loss of the other? This is a compelling tale of courage and friendship set in the larger story of the power and evil of the Nazi war machine and of the largely unheralded but critical efforts of female civilian pilots, commandos and spies to fight back.