George by Alex Gino - Book Review

 

'When people look at George, they think they see a boy. But she knows she's not a boy. She knows she's a girl.

'George thinks she'll have to keep this a secret forever. Then her teacher announces that their class play is going to be Charlotte's Web. George really, really, REALLY wants to play Charlotte. But the teacher says she can't even try out for the part . . . because she's a boy.

'With the help of her best friend, Kelly, George comes up with a plan. Not just so she can be Charlotte -- but so everyone can know who she is, once and for all.'

I've had George sitting on my shelf for about five years. I picked it up as soon as I saw what the story was about because I knew it was a topic that was going to appeal to me, but just never found the time to actually read it (I feel bad that so many of the books I own have yet to be read but I'm working on it). I honestly don't know when I was going to read it, but when I heard someone gushing over how good they found the book on a podcast I knew I had to find the time; so I cleared aside a couple of hours and sat down with the book. And I didn't regret it at all.

George tells the story of a girl in the fourth grade called George. George has some issues to deal with though, a bully at school who likes to pick on her, her changing relationship with her teenage brother, and the fact that when people look at her they see a boy. You see, when she was born people thought that she was a boy, and ever since people have expected her to be one. They make her line up with the boys at school, she has to use the men's bathrooms, and people tell her that she's going to grow up to be a fine man. All of this causes her pain and distress.

However, when her class learns that they're going to be putting on a performance of Charlotte's Web George finds herself really wanting to play Charlotte. George feels a strong connection to the character, and with the help of her best friend Kelly she practices and practices the lines until she's perfect. Unfortunately, her teacher tells her that she can't be Charlotte because she's a boy. But George isn't a boy, she's a girl, and she just wants everyone to understand that so that she can be herself.

George tries to get her mother to understand, to see her for who she really is, but she doesn't seem to want to George. After coming out to her friend Kelly the two of them hatch a plan to show George's mum, and everyone else, who George really is, and decide that George is going to play Charlotte after all.

George wasn't an easy read at times. I don't mean that it was a complex book, if anything it was very easy to understand and I finished the whole thing in one sitting. It was the content that was sometimes hard to get through. George was a character that made my heart break more than once. Her desperation to be herself, for others to see who she really is and accept her, and her struggle to find the bravery to do so were some of the more emotional things I've read in a book in a long while.

There are more and more books dealing with trans character and the struggles they face, and whilst most are handled with a great degree of sensitivity you can always tell which ones are written by trans writers, because they're able to put so much more emotion and pathos into the book. Whilst Alex Gino isn't a binary trans woman, they do fall under the trans umbrella, and you can tell that they've put a lot of them-self into George. There are small moments, things that George says and does that reminded me of my own journey growing up trans and coming to terms with my situation. These are tiny things that cis authors could include sure, but I don't think they'd hit the same way they do here; there's something so true and honest to the trans experience in this book that makes it hit all the harder.

More than once I found myself fighting back tears as George has to listen to people tell her she has to do certain things because they see her as a boy, or when she wishes desperately to be able to change and be who she really is, or the horror she feels when she thinks about her oncoming puberty. These moments were hard to read for me. They made it clear the kind of pain that George, and other trans people, go through before they're able to come out.

The book also covers some of the different ways that people can handle learning someone is trans, from thinking it's just a 'different' kind of gay, to denying it all together, to being supportive. One of the moments that got me the most was when Kelly learns that George is really a girl, and after taking some time to process the information accepts her friend for who she is. When she uses the name that George has been holding inside herself all that time, Melissa, the sheer joy it bring to George is so overwhelmingly beautiful that I had to put the book down for a second.

Whilst I don't normally like spoiling books, or talking about their endings, I'm going to with this review, because I want people to know that this isn't a sad book. Things ultimately go well for George, and it ends on a note of hopefulness. She shows her mother who she really is by being Charlotte on stage, and her mother seems to accept her for who she is. But the best part is when Kelly takes her to the zoo for the day with her uncle. Kelly's uncle has never met George before, so Kelly tells her that she should go as who she really is. The two of them go through Kelly's clothes and George picks out an outfit, does her hair and make-up, and finally gets to see herself as the girl she knows she is.

It's during this part of the book that George's name changes to Melissa in the text. I don't even know if the first time I realised I'd read her real name was the first time it was used, and I didn't go back to check. In that moment I just realised that she was finally getting to be who she was, and it was so beautiful. After she gets to spend the day being herself Kelly falls asleep in the car on the way home, but Melissa doesn't; to quote the book 'Melissa didn't nod off for a moment. She couldn't. She was too busy remembering the best week of her life. So far.' The story end on such a wonderfully happy note that it made all those moments of heartbreak and pain before it all worthwhile, because I knew Melissa was going to be okay. And now I'm crying again thinking about this book.

George could have just been a story about a trans kid learning to come out and be themselves, but it was so much more than that. It was filled with so much heart and honesty that it became something beautiful. It might be written for children, but it's a book that people of all ages should read. With so many people attacking the trans community, fighting to take our rights and freedoms away from us people need to realise that we're just people. People who want to be who we are and live our lives in peace. George shows that. It shows the pain and suffering that trans people can feel when we're not able to be seen for who we are, and the sheer euphoria of something as simple as people treating us like human beings. 

Whether you're trans or not, whether you're the intended audience for this book or not, please do yourself a favour and read it. If you're on the fence about how you feel about trans people, if you're not sure about the topic give this book a chance, because it can show you a small part of our struggles, and how even the simple kindness of seeing us for who we really are can save a life.

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5 Musicals Based On Books

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

We all know about books being adapted into film or television, but one area that people sometimes forget that adaptations happen is on the stage. Plays and musicals are often inspired by books. Here are five that you might not be aware of…

Cats

One of the biggest musicals of all time, running for 21 years and 8,949 performances in London alone, it was adapted from a collection of poetry: Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats by T.S. Eliot. Originally published in 1939, the book was written by Eliot during the 1930s, and contains a number of whimsical poems and illustrations.

Unlike other entries on this list, the book has no narrative through-line, and as such was a difficult project to adapt for Lloyd Webber. He originally began composing the songs that would be in the show during the 1970s as a songwriting exercise, to see if he could write music to predetermined lyrics.

He chose the book because it was a childhood favourite of his. He put on a show using these songs, called Practical Cats, at the 1980 Sydmonton Festival, and it was well received, resulting in Eliot’s widow giving him a number of unpublished poems, which would go on to be included in the final show.

The original London production of the final show received rave reviews, and many claim it changed the face of musical theatre. The show received dozens of awards, made Andrew Lloyd Webber a household name, and made ‘Memory’ one of the most well known and successful musical songs in history. In 2019, Cats was released as a live action film.

The King and I

The fifth musical written by Rodgers and Hammerstein, The King and I was incredibly well received, becoming the fourth longest running musical ever at the time. The show was based upon the book Anna and the King of Siam, a semi-fictionalised biographical novel by Margaret Landon, which took the personal accounts of Anna Leonowens, a British governess who travelled to Siam to teach the children of King Mongkut.

To begin with Rodgers and Hammerstein didn’t want to adapt the book into a play, having found the lack of structure and narrative through-line difficult to turn into a cohesive story.

However, the pair saw the 1946 film adaptation staring Irene Dunne and Rex Harrison, and changed their minds on the matter, and the stage show premiered on Broadway in 1951 and was a hit with both the public and the press.

The show received worldwide fame when it was adapted to film in 1956, starring Yul Brynner (reprising his stage role as the King) and Debora Kerr as Anna Leonowens. The film was a massive success, and won several Oscars. The play has had several revivals over the years, including one in the 70s where Brynner played the king again. The most recent revival, in 2015, starred Ken Watanabe as King Mongkut.

Les Miserables

Premiering in 1980, Les Miserables is considered one of the greatest musicals of all time, and has been produced in more than forty countries and twenty one languages. Based upon the 1862 novel of the same name by Victor Hugo, the story follows the journey of an escaped prisoner and group of young revolutionaries who attempt to overthrow the government in Paris.

Adapted from the (depending on which edition you have) several hundred page long book by Claude-Michel Schönberg, Alain Boublil, and Annie Chourau, the play was initially met with negative reception from critics.

Despite this, it received record ticket sales. Over time critical opinion changed, and Les Miserables would go on to be performed in the West End from 1985 to 2019, playing more than 13,000 performances.

Despite its shaky beginnings, the show has become one of the longest running musicals in history, and has had a number of tours, regional performances, and concerts. It was also made into a live action film in 2012 starring Hugh Jackman, Anne Hathaway, and Russell Crowe.

Hamilton

Despite being based upon historic events, Hamilton is not simply based upon the life story of Alexander Hamilton, but the 2004 book Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow.

Lin-Manuel Miranda, the man behind the show, has said that he was inspired to write the show after reading the book whilst on holiday in Mexico, and many of the focal points of the story were covered in great detail in the book, with Chernow working as historical consultant on the early production in 2015.

In 2009 Miranda was invited to perform music from his show In The Heights at the White House, but chose to feature the first song from Hamilton. Despite receiving laughter during his performance he stuck with with his project, and it opened off Broadway in 2015. The musical was an instant hit, and had a multi-million dollar advance in ticket sales, making more than $30 million before the first show even opened.

Hamilton has gone on to have numerous sell-out performances, and has earned dozens of awards. In 2020 a filmed version of the stage show featuring the 2016 cast was released on Disney+, where it received even more praise from the public.

The Phantom of the Opera

Another hit show from Andrew Lloyd Webber, The Phantom of the Opera was adapted from the 1910 French Gothic Horror novel by Gaston Leroux.

Originally opening on the West End in 1986, starring Michael Crawford in the title role, the play won a number of awards and received critical acclaim. The show was an instant hit, and would go on to be one of the longest running musicals in history, continuing on from its original release until theatres shut down last year due to Covid-19.

Over that time it has had a number of productions around the world, including on Broadway, and touring productions, as well as a 25th anniversary stage performance at the Royal Albert Hall in 2011, which was transmitted live to cinemas around the world.

The Phantom of the Opera has become one of the most instantly recognisable musical shows of all time, and has even received a sequel show, Love Never Dies.

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Fear of Rain – Film Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

The trailer for Fear of Rain makes the new Castille Landon written and directed film look like a horror movie, but really it’s a tense, engaging, and constantly challenging thriller film that will have you second guessing everything you’re seeing right up to the final moments.

The film follows Rain (Madison Iseman), a teenage girl with schizophrenia. Opening with shocking images of her being chased through a dark forest by a mystery figure before being buried alive, we quickly learn that this was the latest episode, and she wakes in hospital. On the verge of being sent to an institution, her mother (Katherine Heigl) and father (Harry Connick Jr.) stress upon her the need to try to manage her symptoms the best she can.

Returning to school, Rain finds herself isolated and alone, her former friends having shunned her because of her mental illness. The only person who seems to want to give her any time of day is Caleb (Israel Broussard), a new student in the school. Unfortunately, Rain isn’t entirely sure that he’s real, and starts to think that this kind young man might be a figment of her mind. Things get further complicated for her when she sees her neighbour, her English teacher Mrs McConnell (Eugenie Bondurant), in her attic window with a small girl. Rain becomes convinced that her neighbour has kidnapped the girl, and is desperate to prove to everyone that it’s not another of her hallucinations.

Fear of Rain makes a lot of use of Rain’s mental health issues, and you’ll spend a good portion of the film questioning what you’re seeing. Rain has a checklist of things she goes through to try and figure out if things are real or not, and you’ll soon find yourself doing the same things; looking for clues to see if what we’re seeing is actually happening. This is one of the main ways that the film manages to keep the pressure on across the run time, and there are times where you’ll find what should be normal moments having an edge to them, as you’re desperately trying to figure out if it’s actually happening.

There are moments where I was yelling at Rain to do things a little differently, such as taking photos of what she was seeing to prove to people it was real, but considering the girl was struggling with her mental health so much it’s easy to forgive her not doing these things as she wasn’t thinking logically; plus it kept the mystery going for longer..

This isn’t just used to good effect with the whole plot around her neighbour, but with small things too. You’ll be looking at characters that Rain’s talking to and trying to see if other people are interacting with that character too. You’ll be looking for clues that answer your questions. There were times where I’d thought I’d figured things out, but then began to doubt them again, and you’ll go back and forth between thinking something’s real or not right up to the final moments of the film. It really does put you in Rain’s shoes.

Whilst I do suffer from some mental health issues I don’t have schizophrenia, and I don’t know anyone who does; so I can’t really speak to how well the film portrays or handles this issue. However, it seems to be at least trying to do good with it. It never tries to demonise Rain or her health issues, and the character of Caleb looks at her schizophrenia as just something that makes Rain who she is, that everyone is different and it’s not something to be ashamed of (a moment in the film where I said out loud that he better not be imaginary because such a sweet and wholesome boy needs to be real). There are always challenges when portraying mental health on film, especially when using it as an important plot point like this, something that drives the entire story, but Castille Landon at least seems to be trying to do the right thing here, and I think it’s one of the better depictions of mental health struggles I’ve seen on film.

A large part of that is down to the cast though. Madison Iseman is phenomenal in this film, and brings a level of energy to the role that it incredibly impressive for such a young actress. You can really feel the struggle that Rain is going through, her questioning what’s real, her fight to be seen as healthy, and the desperation to prove that she’s right about her neighbour. Some of the most powerful moments in the film are where she’s acting her heart out, and they hit hard. The same can be said for Katherine Heigl and Harry Connick JR., who excel as parents struggling to do the best for their daughter. You can see the desperation in them to keep her safe, to help her get better, but also how it’s wearing them to breaking point.

Fear of Rain kept me on the edge of my seat right up to the end. I was constantly questioning what I was watching, looking for small clues, and wishing I knew what was going on. Because of that, the superb acting from the cast, and the focus on the characters and their struggles over what could have been a very cliched plot, I’m struggling to think of any part of the film that I disliked. A hugely impressive film.

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Arks #1 – Comic Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

Arks is a new Kickstarter-funded independent comic that tells the story of two interplanetary explorers and engineers, Lilith and Joseph, and their attempts to settle on a new world.

One of the things that makes the story of Arks immediately stand out as different is the method of space travel used in this book. So many times in science fiction writers get around the issues of massive distance by having ships able to travel faster than light, or having their crews in suspended animation for long periods. Whilst these methods have become commonly accepted it also means that they’re a little boring, a little normal. R.J. Collins seems to have come up with something very different though.

In Arks people have managed to travel into deep space and terraform new worlds by sending small canisters filled with bacteria into deep space. These canisters fall into the primordial oceans of these worlds and begin the process of reshaping things, the genetic material in the bacteria recreating Earth flora and fauna, including two human ‘crew members’, who are recreated whole with their old memories. This is how we meet our protagonists, Joseph and Lilith.

Joseph was awoken before Lilith, however, and has been trying to survive on a somewhat hostile planet alone. He’s been surviving by capturing animals and crafting traps and weapons, but thanks to several injuries and allergic reactions isn’t doing too well. But when Lilith is recreated the two of them are reunited, and are able to set out to find help for Joseph deep in the forest.

The plot of Arks is more expanded on the Kickstarter, and hints at bigger things to come in the story as the two engineers make some startling discoveries regarding their new home. On its own, however, the first issue ignores the larger story and focuses instead on the characters, making sure that the reader gets a chance to know our leads before things expand further in future issues.

Collins lets the reader learn things slowly, revealing small parts of the backstory for the most part, before filling in a lot of the answers towards the end when the two are finally reunited. It’s a decent way of bringing readers in, and you spend the first half of the book wondering what’s going on before getting most of these answers. I liked that there was a sense of mystery, but that answers weren’t held back until later issues, as that would have impacted the enjoyment of issue one.

The book has some interesting art too, and it looks to have been created digitally, or at least coloured that way. It has a mixture of art where some of it looks very crisp and clear, whilst other parts have a much messier and busy feel to it. These parts usually differ between the more advanced technology we briefly see and the wildness of the planet and the animals that inhabit it, and it makes for a stark contrast between the two different worlds that we’re seeing.

There’s a lot of promise in Arks, and clearly a lot more that the creator wants to do with the project. Hopefully their Kickstarter continues to do well, and we’ll be able to see more of how this story unfolds as time goes on.

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Portal – Film Review

Originally published on Set The Tape 

Portal, also being called Doors in other countries, is a science fiction film that’s a bit different from your average movie. When mysterious portals start to appear across the Earth, causing people to disappear, people try to investigate this strange new phenomenon, and we get four seemingly unconnected stories showing us small parts of this larger mystery.

The film is split into four sections, each with its own set of characters, own director, and their own story to tell; though they all go towards the bigger story of these strange ‘doors’ that appear one day. As such, it’s a film that can sometimes feel a little disjointed, and it can be hard to connect to some of the characters, but it’s a film that I still enjoyed.

The first segment of the film, ‘Lockdown’, follows a group of four teens who are in school detention when things start to go wrong. Their phones begin to go crazy with incoming alerts and calls, and when their teacher leaves the room in a panic after getting a call on his own phone the kids are left to fend for themselves. A lockdown is soon announced, and the kids try to figure out what’s going on. They come out with multiple scenarios about what’s happening until they find this strange mass filling one of the halls, a mass that reacts to them, and seems to be communicating with one of them.

The second segment, ‘Knockers’, is set a few weeks after the first appearance of the doors, and we learn that governments around the world are trying to send groups into these portals to try and find some answers. These explorers, or Knockers as they’re called, only have a few minutes to get in, find some answers, and get out before psychosis affects them. We get to follow three knockers as they enter a door, and see the bizarre, mind altering things they find within.

The third part, ‘Lamaj’, is centred on a scientist living deep in the woods months into the mystery. Having been laughed out of academia the man has cobbled together his own equipment and has been trying to find a way of communicating with the door that he has hidden near his home. When it responds to him he calls in one of his former colleagues to help try and get some answers as to what’s going on.

The final segment of the film, kind of an epilogue, is an internet call between a scientist and a podcaster, the podcaster being someone we’ve gotten small parts of throughout the rest of the movie. When questioning the scientist as to what he thinks the doors are things start to get seriously bizarre.

Even though it has different directors for three parts, Jeff Desom, Saman Kesh, and Dugan O’Neal, the film feels very similar, and it looks and feels like one coherent piece. It has a very good visual quality to it, with some genuinely gorgeous shots (particularly in the ‘Knockers’ segment). The only part that feels really different is the final segment with the podcaster, and I’d say the film would have been fine without this section, even though it does add some more possible answers into the mix. It gives you small hints across its entire run time; little answers that when added together seem to spell out what’s really going on: you just have to be paying attention to see them. It’s a film that doesn’t want to spell everything out, and wants you to come to your own conclusions.

After watching the movie I had to go online to see if it was an original screenplay or if it was based on a book, as it reminded me of some of the more unusual and ‘trippy’ science fiction novels I’ve read. The structure of the story, the use of unspoken captions to deliver information, and the sheer oddness of the project felt more like a novel come to life than a film, and I really enjoyed that quality of it. But, it’s not an adaptation of anything, and is its own original thing, which if anything impressed me even more.

I can see why this will be a divisive film, because it is definitely not for everyone. It’s not a film you can put on and switch your mind off to because you need to be paying attention. It doesn’t tell a straight forward narrative, it does odd things, and it wants the audience to do some of the work. But in doing that it’s one of the more ambitious films I’ve seen in a while, one that I think could struggle to find an audience, but those who do like it will definitely be thinking about it long after it’s over.

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Aliens: Infiltrator by Weston Ochse - Book Review

 

'The official prequel to the huge new Alien video game from Cold Iron Studios, as a Weyland-Yutani scientist arrives at Pala Station and finds the researchers there courting disaster... of the Xenomorph kind.

'Dr. Timothy Hoenikker arrives on Pala Station, a Weyland-Yutani facility. Lured there by the promise of alien artefacts, instead he finds a warped bureaucracy and staff of misfits testing the effects of Xenomorph bio-materials on living creatures. Unbeknownst to the personnel, however, there is an infiltrator among them whose actions could spell disaster. Also on staff is Victor Rawlings, a former marine who gathers together other veterans to prepare for the worst. As the personnel receive a delivery of alien eggs, the experiments spin out of control, and only the former Colonial Marines can stand between the humans and certain death.'

Aliens: Infiltrator is billed as the prequel novel to the upcoming video game Aliens: Fire Team, but it's still very much a stand-alone adventure that's sure to satisfy any fan of the Alien franchise.

The story follows a few characters, but the main lead is Dr. Timothy Hoenikker, a xeno archaeologist for Weyland-Yutani, who's just been assigned to the remote Pala Station. Having been promised the opportunity to work with alien artefacts he's surprised to find that no such research is actually taking place on Pala, and is assigned to assist some of the other scientist with their biological experiments.

The other scientists at Pala Station are working with different alien organisms to try and create new defensive technology for the Colonial Marines; injecting this mutagenic black goo into various creatures to enhance their natural abilities. Already a dangerous enough, these experiments become even more hazardous when the station receives a shipment of Xenomorph eggs, and prisoners that are to be hosts to their deadly embryo's. Now Hoenikker faces the moral dilemma of having to engage in experiments that will result in the deaths of people, despite being for the greater good. Unfortunately, the deadly new versions of the Xenomorphs they create prove to be too hard to contain, and soon everyone of Pala Station finds themselves fighting for their lives.

Like many of the other entries in the Alien saga Aliens: Infiltrator sees the duplicitous Weyland-Yutani corporation wanting to use the Xenomorphs for their own ends. However, unlike most of the other stories that involves facilities where the Xeno's eventually break out, this book actually sees the scientists achieving some of their goals, and developing some pretty useful technology from the creatures. It makes the book feel different from similar stories, mainly because most of the times when the Xeno's are being experimented on they break out and cause chaos before anything can really be done with them.

In this book we actually see a somewhat competent lab, one where the scientists seem to understand the deadly nature of the alien creatures, and aren't trying to weaponize them. Instead of turning the Xenomorphs into biological weapons to be unleashed upon the battlefield they're trying to find ways to combat them; to protect people from them. These are things that I wouldn't be surprised to see appear in the upcoming game, things such as acid resistant armour, or pheromones that hide you from the creatures for a while. They're the kinds of things that work well in this story, and that I can also see being used as items in a game, allowing players to survive a bit longer, or going on frightening stealth missions. I'm not sure how much of the book is going to be tying into the game, but I hope that the things developed on Pala make an appearance.

Unfortunately, not everything developed on Pala Station is something that can be used for good. Using the strange mutagen (which is heavily hinted at to be the black goo from Prometheus and Alien: Covenant) the scientists at Pala are able to create some shocking new lifeforms; and not just Xenomorphs. This means that when things inevitably go wrong the people on Pala not only have to deal with enhanced versions of the Xenos, but other strange new creatures too. There's a degree of body horror involved in these new creatures too, which is no surprise given how closely the franchise is connected with body horror, but it's used in ways that feel new and more twisted than we've seen in other entries in the Titan Alien books.

The book isn't all about new alien creatures though, as there's a collection of really compelling characters for readers to get invested in. I've already mentioned Dr. Hoenikker, who we go through some interesting moral ups and downs with, but there's a lot more on offer too. There's Cruz, one of the scientists on Pala who used to be in the Colonial Marines. At first he's presented as a cold, almost sadistic man who enjoys hurting the creatures he's experimenting on; but over the course of the book we get to discover that he's a very damaged man, dealing with a lot of PTSD from his time in combat, and becomes a character who you're never sure how to feel about.

Similarly, there's also Rawling, another former Colonial Marine who's become something of 'friend' to everyone on Pala, making connections with people and doing little favours. This has led him into a position where he's able to go most everywhere on the station, able to chat with anyone and accrue good will and hidden items of contraband. He very much seems to be something of a future version of one of those people who collects weapons and supplies for what they see as an inveitable disaster, drawing up plans for what to do when the shit hits the fan. Whilst in most situations these kinds of people prove to be wrong, it makes Rawlings one of the people on Pala that you definitely want around when the Xenomorphs escape.

There are other interesting characters, who like those already mentioned tend to be quite complex, with evolving motivations and slowly revealed backstories. People such as Fairbanks, a man being blackmailed into corporate espionage, Dr. Kash, a medical scientist with some skeletons in her closet, and Etienne, a man who becomes so obsessed with his work that it seems to wear away at his mind. None of the human characters in Alien: Infiltrator ever felt dull. Everyone seemed to have complex motivations, and the central characters would have you questioning how you felt about them, and changing your opinions on them more than once. For a franchise that can sometimes fail to create compelling human characters this book really excelled.

Weston Ochse isn't just a writer who's able to create interesting characters though, he's also able to write some tense action and creepy horror. Considering that he's written military action horror in the past I can see why he was allowed to play in the Aliens sandbox, as he feels like a perfect fit for this kind of story. What could have been uninteresting or lacklustre scenes of people sneaking through dark hallways in the hands of another writer became tense moments where the reader is left constantly on the edge of their seat. There was never a moment where you feel bored, or where things seem to just be going through the motions. Ochse was able to take a formula we've seen before in this franchise and make it tense ans frightening and exciting all at the same time. 

Aliens: Infiltrator might get overlooked by some because of it's connection to the upcoming game; there may be some readers who might be reluctant to pick it up because they're not gamers, or because they're worried that the book won't satisfy on it's own. But this is a book that very much can. It stands on its own as a compelling read, one filled with interesting characters and nail-biting horror. If you've read any of the Alien books before, or watched any of the films and enjoyed them this book will definitely be one that you'll want to check out. A great addition to the franchise.

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The Reckoning – Film Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

The Reckoning is the latest film from writer/director Neil Marshall, who shot to fame with his first feature length film, Dog Soldiers, in 2002 and has been a staple of British horror ever since, having gone on to work on big name projects like Hellboy, Lost In Space, and Game of Thrones.

The Reckoning sees Marshall returning to his horror roots after his work on the recent Hellboy remake, and it definitely feels like this is the place where he’s at his strongest. The story, set during the Great Plague of 1665, follows Grace Haverstock (Charlotte Kirk), a woman whose husband takes his own life after contracting the plague so as to not infect his wife and baby daughter.

Unfortunately, this puts Grace in conflict with Squire Pendleton (Steven Waddington), who tries to exert his position as the landowner to force Grace into his bed. When Grace refuses Pendleton he begins to lay the seeds of doubt about her in the local population, and Grace is quickly accused of witchcraft. This brings the Witchfinder John Moorcroft (Sean Pertwee) to town, and pits him against Grace in a battle of wills.

Those expecting overt horror from The Reckoning might be in for a bit of a surprise, as it’s not an exploration of historical supernatural and magic like The Witch or Hagazussa. Despite having veteran suit actor Ian Whyte in the cast as Lucifer, the film steers pretty clear of the supernatural and witchcraft, with the main ‘horror’ elements being in Grace’s dreams and hallucinations as torture and sleep deprivation begin to play with her mind.

What the film is really about, however, is the evil that men do. It doesn’t shy away from the level of hate that women of this time and place had to live with, and shows how abused they were. It’s about the horror of being in a situation where the fervent belief of a man gave him the right to torture innocent women, and how helpless those victims were to do anything about it.

The film focuses on Grace, and the amount of strength and belief in herself that helps her to overcome the brutal things she’s going through. Whilst this does mean that there is a sense of female power at times, especially when those who have been abusing the women in their lives finally get what’s coming to them, it sometimes feels a little off, mainly due to how well Grace is able to hold herself together after extreme torture. At times she’s able to run around and fight back, even after we’ve just seen her experience some pretty brutal and debilitating torture.

Despite these flaws, the film manages to be entertaining for a number of reasons. The level of discomfort you feel as Grace is trapped in this hopeless situation, of watching her being tortured over and over is pretty effective. It’s not in-your-face horror, it doesn’t rely on jump scares, but it builds a constant sense of dread that becomes almost oppressive. This also benefits from the knowledge that the things we see here happened to real people, innocent women who were tortured and killed simply for being different. It makes it a pretty hard film to watch at times, though this does go a long way towards the feeling of fun when Grace finally starts to fight back and get her revenge (I found myself cheering a few times as her torturers got their comeuppance).

The film looks very good too, and you can see why Marshall was picked to direct some key episodes of Game of Thrones. Marshall is able to make the setting feel well lived in, and whilst the film doesn’t have a massive budget the sets and the costumes have a look and feel to them that makes them seem authentic.

The best part though, has to be Sean Pertwee, someone who’s been in a number of Marshall’s films. Pertwee brings the character of Moorcroft to life, and takes what could have been a one-dimensional character and gives him a lot of depth. This religious fanatic who tortures and kills women is utterly disgusting, and you hate him, but Pertwee also makes him feel kind and earnest in some moments. You believe him when he’s telling Grace he’ll grant her mercy if she confesses. You doubt he gets any gratification from what he does when he’s so believable saying it brings him no pleasure to torture people. He makes Moorcroft into a character I wanted to see more of; which was something I wasn’t expecting.

Thanks to an interesting script, some great visual moments, and absolutely brilliant acting from the principal cast, The Reckoning is a film that, whilst it might not reach the levels of love that Marshall’s other works do, is one that is definitely worth watching.

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The Cottingley Cuckoo by A.J. Elwood – Book Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

'Captivated by books and stories, Rose dreams of a life away from the confines of the Sunnyside Care Home she works in, until elderly resident Charlotte Favell offers an unexpected glimpse of enchantment. She keeps an aged stack of letters about the Cottingley Fairies, the photographs made famous by Arthur Conan Doyle, but later dismissed as a hoax. The letters insist there is proof that the fairies existed. Rose is eager to learn more, but Charlotte allows her to read only a piece at a time, drawing Rose into her web.

'As the letters’ content grows more menacing, Rose discovers she is unexpectedly pregnant, and feels another door to the future has slammed. Her obsession with what really happened in Cottingley all those years ago spirals; as inexplicable events begin to occur inside her home, she begins to entertain dark thoughts about her baby and its origins.'

The Cottingley Cuckoo is the latest novel from Alison Littlewood, writing here under the pen-name A.J. Elwood, and much like some of her previous works it deals with fairies, and the events that occurred in the village of Cottingley in the early 1900s.

The story takes place in the modern day, where we follow Rose, a young woman who’s just started working at the Sunnyside residential home as a carer. Rose describes herself as a ‘believer’ and through her narration we learn that care work isn’t really a calling for her, and is simply a job to help her on her way to bigger and better things. She’s had to put some of her ambitions on hold due to the loss of her mother, and supporting her unemployed boyfriend as the sole earner, but is determined that Sunnyside is going to be nothing more than a stop along the way for her.

On her first day there she’s sent to attend to Mrs Favell, one of the residents at the home. Unlike the others, Mrs Favell seems incredibly independent; she’s in apparently good health and doesn’t seem to have any mental health issues. She’s definitely out of place. She’s also cold, stern, and incredibly incisive. She very quickly gets under Rose’s skin, especially when she reveals a stack of old letters that seem to hint that the famous fairy hoax might have had some truth to it.

Rose is slowly drip fed the letters by the older woman, who seemingly starts to manipulate Rose. When Rose discovers she’s pregnant her dreams of being able to move on from her work as a carer begin to evaporate before her eyes, especially when her partner is unable to find work. The letters that Rose lets her read begin to convince Rose that there may be more going on that she first suspects, and when strange things start to happen around her baby she comes to believe that not only might the fairy world be real, but that it has her family in its sights.

I had a lot of fun reading The Cottingley Cuckoo, due in large part to how the story was teased out. The two narratives, the one of Rose in the modern day and the letters regarding a fairy encounter in the 1920s, intertwined really well, and the old letters always impact Rose’s story whenever they appear. The content of the letters could have easily been a story themselves, and it’s a narrative that’s at times more intriguing than the rest of the book. This was in part down to Rose.

I liked Rose, she seemed like a nice person, though one who never really felt truly in control. She seems content to go through her life allowing things to happen to her, despite having desires to go on to do other things with her life. She wants to leave care work, but she never makes it clear what she’d prefer to do instead. She doesn’t want to live in her town all her life, yet never really makes a point of where she’d want to be instead. She had vague ambitions, but does nothing to achieve them, and this is made even worse by her seeming willingness to allow others to push her around.

There are times in the book where Rose very much feels like a victim. Her colleagues at work don’t show any interest in her, and some are even hostile towards her. She doesn’t seem to have much say in her home life either, and after her child is born she quickly caves into her partner’s desire for her to go back to work and be the sole wage earner whilst he gets to be a stay at home father, simply because he doesn’t seem to want to try finding work. That in itself isn’t a bad thing, but when she’s coming home from a long day’s work and having to clear up his mess from the day because he hasn’t done anything, or is having the baby left with her because he wants to go to the pub it does become quite irritating. I wanted Rose to stand up for herself, to take charge of her life, but she never seemed to have the self respect to do that.

Mrs Favell proved to be a much more interesting character by far, and there were times during the book that I wanted to spend longer with her, to see how she interacted with people. I wanted to know if she was the way she was with everyone, or if she was making a thing of tormenting this one woman. Unfortunately, you don’t get a lot of answers, but coming to your own conclusions is a big part of the fun of this book.

The Cottingley Cuckoo isn’t perfect, but there are a lot of good things in this book, a lot of mystery and atmosphere, and a lot of possibility. If you’re a fan of fairies and their world it’s definitely a story you should give a try.

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Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures #3 – Comic Review

 

Originally published on Set The Tape

The third issue of Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures makes it pretty clear from early on that it’s going to be spending its time showing the contrast between the Jedi and the Nihil, putting Zeen Mrala and Krix Kamerat front and centre.

We’re told that it’s been a week since the events of the last issue, and during that time the two young friends have found themselves on very different paths. Zeen has been taken to the Starlight Beacon along with the young Jedi who came to protect her home. The Starlight Beacon is making its first appearance in Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures, but has been previously shown as a literal beacon of hope in the Outer Rim; a place where Jedi are able to come and spread their light into the darker parts of the galaxy.

Zeen finds herself making a lot of new friends on Starlight, whilst Krix is very much isolated on board the Nihil ship Gave Electric. Zeen is made to feel like one of the Padawans, is accepted as part of their group, whilst Krix is pushed around and abused by the Nihil. Despite being treated badly by them we get to see how the Nihil are able to get inside Krix’s head, to turn him even more against his friend, whilst the Jedi try to encourage Zeen not to give up on Krix.

There’s definitely a dark mirror thing going on here, as we see the two kids being put on very similar paths, though one is filled with hope whilst the other with hate. We see that the two of them are going to be heading towards some kind of conflict eventually, something that was set up in the first issue but is even more obvious here. I honestly don’t know if Krix is going to be a character that can be saved or redeemed (and after something he does in this issue he will need a bit of redeeming) but I do know that Zeen is the kind of character that isn’t going to give up on him, and that she seems to be a good fit for the Jedi, even if they think she’s too old to begin the training (where have I heard that before?).

Despite being aimed at younger readers Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures is doing a good job at expanding the High Republic era, and I think a large part of that is due to them focusing on a younger viewpoint. Writer Daniel Jose Older isn’t putting older Jedi like Avar Kriss or Yoda at the centre of things, where it might feel like a story is being ‘dumbed down’ or tailored towards children in a way that alters the story. Instead it’s a story being told by children, by people who are the same age as the target audience. As such the book does feel like it’s for a younger reader, but not at the expense of any kind of quality, and it certainly doesn’t feel like anyone’s out of character like in some of the other ‘kid’ versions of Star Wars stories.

The story of Star Wars: The High Republic Adventures continues to build in interesting ways, and puts its characters at the forefront. It’s managed to give readers a good insight into the inner workings of the Nihil, and I’ve already become enamoured with Zeen, and I’m hoping she might end up becoming a favourite character or mine as she keeps growing.

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Godzilla Vs. Kong: The Official Movie Novelisation by Greg Keyes - Book Review

 

'The official novelisation of the biggest battle in movie history: Godzilla vs Kong, the latest film in the Monsterverse franchise, starring Alexander Skarsgard, Millie Bobby Brown, Rebecca Hall, Kyle Chandler and Zhang Ziyi.

'Humanity fights for its future as Godzilla and Kong embark on a path of destruction that will see the two most powerful forces of nature on the planet collide in an all-out war!

'Writer Greg Keyes returns once again to the Monsterverse and takes readers deeper into the worlds of Monarch, the Titans, and so much more.'

One of the best things about movie novelisations is being able to expand upon big screen stories in ways that the filmmakers weren't able to, often including concepts from earlier stages in production, or scenes that end up on the cutting room floor. Whilst Godzilla Vs. Kong doesn't have a huge amount of removed scenes in the book, it does add a lot of background information that explains a lot of the inner workings of the film; and answers some of the questions I've seen people asking online.

The plot is largely the same as the movie. When Godzilla reappears after a three year absence and attacks a tech facility in Florida the world fears that their giant protector may have finally turned against humanity. As such, the tech company in question, Apex, joins forces with the Titan research and containment group Monarch to find a way of combating Godzilla.

Picking up on research and theories that were hinted at in Kong: Skull Island and Godzilla: King of the Monsters Apex finds a way to map out the Hollow Earth, the vast caverns and tunnels that exist below the surface of the planet that may have been the origin point for all of the Titans. They discover that there's an energy source deep inside the Earth that matches the radiation that Godzilla puts out, and they set out to get hold of it. To this end they recruit scientist Nathan Lind, who previously tried to enter the Hollow Earth in an expedition that cost the life of his brother.

Nathan believes that Kong may possess the genetic memory of how to get to Hollow Earth safely, and the location of this power source, so recruits Ilene Andrews, the woman looking after Kong, to join him. Together with Jia, the last surviving member of the Iwi people, they set out to take Kong deep into the Hollow Earth; a mission that puts Kong on Godzilla's radar, and brings the two alpha Titans into conflict.

The biggest differences between the book and the film that eagle eyed fans will notice is that we get a lot more about Lind and the Hollow Earth than the film provided, and we actually get to see the failed expedition that cost the life of his brother. Whilst the film did talk about this event we actually get to see it here, and it definitely makes the entire expedition feel more dangerous than the film did, and it lets readers get into Lind's head and see why his failure haunts him so much.

We also get to learn more about Skull Island, and how it went from the lush paradise we saw in Kong's film to the storm wracked place it becomes in Godzilla Vs. Kong. We get none of these answers in the film, but Greg Keyes makes a point of explaining it here, and we actually discover that the island's entire ecosystem has been destroyed following the appearance of the giant bat Titan Camazotz. Camazotz, and his battle with Kong, was the main plot of the comic series Kingdom Kong, which also featured the first appearance of Jia, so it's good to see that whilst the films may not be acknowledging everything the books are trying to bring all the parts of the Monsterverse together into one coheive whole.

This is something we see a few times across the book as Keyes will also make mention of Godzilla fighting other creatures such a Scylla, an event that happened in the comic Godzilla Dominion. It not only makes everything feel bigger, and widens the universe, but adds a cohesion that sometimes feels lacking in the movies. We have mentions of human characters that don't appear in every film, learn what they're up to, and get to know what's been going on between the films.

It's not just background information that Keyes expands upon, however, as he goes into more detail in key moments in the film, offering insight that is never clearly stated in the film and are things that viewers are left to try and figure out on their own. Things such as the huge temple Kong finding in the Hollow Earth having been built by his ancestors rather than humans, or that Apex has not just one but two of the Ghidora skulls, and that one is inside Mechagodzilla itself. It's hinted at in the film that Mechagodzilla goes out of control because of the latent personality of King Ghidora, but the book explicitly confirms it. It also makes the story feel somewhat closer to Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla from 2002, in which Mechagodzilla was also built using organic components from defeated monsters.

The expansions the book makes really make it a good read, and it's stuff that I wished was in the film. Tell me more about the inner workings of Mechagodzilla, explain why Ren Serizawa wants to kill Godzilla, tell me why Skull Island is wrecked. Greg Keyes gave me all the action of the film but also all of the background info I wanted to, making it more than just a film adaptation, but an expansion that made it just as entertaining.

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The Safe Return by Ashley Wheelock and Arwen Evans - Blog Tour

 

'★ Face masks on or off? This book flips to be read either way. It's two books in one. ★

'It’s a topsy-turvy world that children live in today, but the adventures must safely return. Face masks on or face masks off, this fast-paced, two-sided book takes kids through the ups and downs of a balance bike ride with friends. A stuffed bunny is temporarily lost, but a community is found.

'No matter which way you read it, the book reinforces the joys and freedoms of childhood and advocates for a safe return to fun. Perfect for Covid-19 and to normalise the wearing of masks. Yet, this book will remain in your collection when the crisis has ended.'

The world is a weird place right now, especially for kids. Some have grown up knowing the pre-Covid world and have found their entire life thrown out of whack, whilst for some this is the only thing they've know. Whilst adults are suffering, I think it's fair to say that the kids are hurting too, and as such books that try to normalise some of what's going on right now are definitely going to help children navigate the world.

The Safe Return is trying to do this, but isn't just relying on the Covid world to do so. The book tells the story of a group of friends who head out for a bike ride, accompanied by one of their father's, who's jogging along with them. On the trip one of the kids loses his stuffed rabbit toy, and so the kids set out to find it for him and reunite the two of them.

The story doesn't rely on anything Covid related in it's story, and is a fairly normal tale of a group of friends just being together. What makes it stand out as being set during this time is that everyone is wearing masks. But that's it, there's no mention of the virus, and the kids still get to be together and enjoy themselves. 

This is one of the best ways to go about setting a story during Covid, to show it as part of everyday life, but also that it isn't defining everything. It's important that kids see that you can take precautions, such as wearing a mask, but you can still live your life. I think it's taking something really big and really scary and taking some of that fear out of things.

However, like I said before, this book isn't relying on being a Covid related book to get noticed; and clearly wants to exist after the pandemic. So, you can flip the book over and you get the same experience without the masks. The artwork is of mask-less people going about their lives and not having to worry. It means that once this has passed, once things are better, kids can still read and enjoy this book without having to be reminded of what could potentially be a very frightening period.

It's clear that the creators put some thought into this, and wanted to create something that felt relevant and more than just a story, something that children could look at and find something hopeful and good in; but at the same time didn't want that to define the book. so, whether you read it during the pandemic or not, this seems like a book that kids will be able to carry with them.

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Victories Greater Than Death by Charlie Jane Anders - Book Review

 

'Tina never worries about being ‘ordinary’—she doesn’t have to, since she’s known practically forever that she’s not just Tina Mains, average teenager and beloved daughter. She’s also the keeper of an interplanetary rescue beacon, and one day soon, it’s going to activate, and then her dreams of saving all the worlds and adventuring among the stars will finally be possible. Tina’s legacy, after all, is intergalactic—she is the hidden clone of a famed alien hero, left on Earth disguised as a human to give the universe another chance to defeat a terrible evil.

'But when the beacon activates, it turns out that Tina’s destiny isn’t quite what she expected. Things are far more dangerous than she ever assumed. Luckily, Tina is surrounded by a crew she can trust, and her best friend Rachel, and she is still determined to save all the worlds. But first she’ll have to save herself.'

Victories Greater Than Death is a science fiction story that embraces the weirder and more outlandish areas of the genre, a book that isn't afraid to throw readers into huge interplanetary conflict between dozens of species with little to no context, and allows the fast moving pace to sweep you up into things.

The story is centred on Tina, a teenage girl who has grown up knowing a huge secret, that aliens are real, and she's one of them. Tina has been raised with the knowledge that she's the clone of an important captain from some huge interstellar alliance, and that one day something inside her is going to activate and call the aliens down to take her away. Despite this, Tina seems to have grown into a pretty well rounded and adjusted young woman. She doesn't have many friends, but one few she does have she cares for deeply, and she's always driven to try and do good and call out injustice where she sees it.

Instead of having fears of being an impostor, or worrying that her life is just some kind of cover for another person she's looking forward to eventually being taken off into space, and the first few chapters deal with her trying to get the beacon inside her to activate. Once it does, however, she finds herself being swept up in an adventure she never anticipated.

Much like Tina, the readers are dropped into things with very little knowledge, and are having to play a little bit of catch up to begin with. We learn that there is a peacekeeping group, the Royal Fleet, and that Tina is a part of this, thanks to the woman she was cloned from being a captain in it. Unfortunately, there are bad guys out there too. The Compassion are a group of former Royal Fleet members and various villains who've come together to impose their twisted order on the galaxy.

When the Royal Fleet picks up Tina, and her best friend Rachel, she expects Captain Argentian's memories to be unlocked, but things don't go according to plan and Tina gains access to some information but no memories, making her a walking space Wiki. Now she's stuck in the middle of a war where she's struggling to catch up. To try and help out the Royal Fleet recruits a handful of the best and brightest teens from Earth before they have to leave the planet and set out on their mission to stop the Compassion, leaving Tina and her new friends joining the fight as cadets.

Victories Greater Than Death has a lot of cool stuff going on, and there's a lot to discover over the course of this book. Charlie Jane Anders really populated this galaxy, and there are dozens of strange aliens to encounter. Some, like those of the species Tina belongs to, are very human-like, whilst others are odd and interesting humanoids, and others are so different and so alien that they're almost impossible to describe.

Whilst I had a lot of fun discovering much of this there is a lot thrown at the readers, and we get alien names, alien species, alien food, the names of planets, and alien greetings that differ every time and have very specific meanings and responses. This led to me feeling a bit lost at times, and there was more than one occasion where I'd wished I'd made notes of who characters were as I got them confused every now and then. I'd definitely be making a spreadsheet the next time I read through this.

Despite this small issue, the book was really entertaining, and had a lot of very cool things going for it. The aliens that Anders comes up with, and their respective worlds, are all really fascinating, and I always wanted to learn more about everything the characters came across. Not only that, but the human characters were a really interesting an varied group too. There were people of colour, queer people, trans people, people from rich backgrounds and poor ones, people who'd been victims of bullying and abuse. The six human characters (if you count Tina) were a great cross section of diversity and experience, and whilst I'm sure there'll be people complaining about the amount of diversity it was something that I thought made the book a much more enjoyable read.

The book's been described as a Young Adult book, and whilst I can certainly see where that's true I thought the type of YA audience it was being aimed at seemed to vary from time to time. There were moments where the book felt like it was aimed at a younger audience, possibly even getting close to being a Middle Grade book, whilst there were other times it dealt with some quite adult themes. As such, I think it's one of those YA books that's going to appeal to a lot of different people, and will find a wide audience. 

Victories Greater Than Death is a big space opera, a book that takes big, wild concepts and allows them to play out, not necessarily worrying that the audience is going to keep up. It moves with a brisk pace and goes to some interesting and intense places. A book that will definitely appeal to sci-fi fans, but wider audiences too. I'm looking forward to seeing what the next book has in store.

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Birds of Paradise - Oliver K. Langmead Interview

 

After reading the new novel Birds of Paradise I spoke to author Oliver K. Langmead and asked him a few questions about the project. The full review for Birds of Paradise can be found here.

Birds of Paradise could probably fall into the Urban Fantasy genre, as it sees readers discovering a world of magic or the fantastical inserted into our own, but it feels very different to that, as it seems to be a story where these immortal beings who have had to deal with humanity taking over their world. Did it ever feel like you were creating something unique when you were writing it, that you were going to be challenging expectations and conventions?

A few folk have described Birds of Paradise as “mythical fantasy”, and I think it would probably be intrusive fantasy under Mendelsohn's classifications, as well – but I always feel as if genre is more for publishers, critics and readers than writers. There are genre conventions to play with, certainly – but more often than not, I think that writers just want to be able to tell the stories they want to tell without worrying about where it fits into the broader literary world.

Still - no book is written in a vacuum, and all books are written in conversation with other books, which is probably where the emergence of genre comes from. I think Birds is in conversation with the likes of American Gods, and The Chronicles of Narnia, and the Vorrh trilogy – and if there's anything in it that challenges genre, then it comes from the way that it thinks about the themes those books address.

The book chiefly follows Adam, the First Man, a character that has been depicted a lot in various incarnations. Despite this your Adam felt incredibly fresh and original. I felt this was in part down to the way that he seemed to walk a fine line between incredibly violent and destructive and deeply sensitive and caring. Was this a difficult character to balance?

That's very kind of you! Adam was difficult to write because he is the sum of his experiences – all the things he must have seen and done over thousands of years of existence. He's effectively lived hundreds of different lives, through so many different eras in so many different cultures. If he succeeds at all, it's because I wrote him largely at the scene level – making sure that the character felt right in each interaction he had – instead of thinking about him from a broad perspective (which would, I think, have been overwhelming and unworkable).

Most depictions of Adam and Eve are shaped by Western Christianity, and they’re often portrayed as white, yet you chose to have them be Black people, a decision that I thought was the most realistic way for the characters to be depicted. What was your reasoning for breaking from conventional depictions of them, and have you experienced any pushback on that?

Birds of Paradise is an exercise in literalising a myth. As a part of that process, I had to address the fact that white skin only became a dominant feature in Europe at around 3000B.C. Obviously, there were thousands upon thousands of years of human history before then, which Adam will have been a part of. It felt absolutely right to give him dark skin, and I like that it challenges conventional ideas about what the first man should look like, especially when those conventions come from institutions that have a history of racial oppression. So far, I haven't experienced any pushback.

Oliver's Dark Star was amongst the Guardian’s
Best Books of 2015

The book features several characters other than Adam and Eve who were present in Eden, as you’ve given human form to the various animals that lived there. Were there any of these animal beings you were interesting in using who didn’t quite make the cut, or ideas of interesting character that you never got to use?

Absolutely! In early drafts, Butterfly had a sister – gentle, near-sighted Moth. And I did, at one point, script a spin-off comic about Barracuda – sharp, quick and cold. I had a lot of fun with Barracuda. The script was called Barracuda Smile, and it was about his poor attempts at setting up a private detective agency (with the help of Rook, of course). It's something I hope to revisit some day. There's something really fun about the idea of an immortal fish private investigator.

You’ve mentioned in the past, with your work like Dark Star and Metronome, that you like writing broken people, was it always your intention to make Adam such a broken man or was it something that happened naturally as you were developing things?

When I start writing a book, I begin by writing a keystone scene – a scene that will inform the rest of the book with its style and form and pacing and character. It's always a scene I can return to when I'm feeling a bit lost, to tell me what the book should be. For Birds of Paradise, that scene is the opening to the first chapter, and it took a couple of months to emerge. But as soon as it did, I knew that that was what I wanted the book to be – I knew that that was what I wanted Adam to be. In that scene, Adam has trouble connecting with the world he finds himself in, and he's clearly disconnected from his descendants. I wanted to explore that disconnection, discover the reasons behind it, and find out what Adam was still connected to.

Metronome is available from
Unsung Stories.

Adam goes through a journey of healing over the course of the book, after going through some incredibly traumatic and harmful things. Do you see this as the beginning of a happy ending for him, or do you think he would end up going through similar cycles of apathy and the finding of small comforts in the rest of his life?

I'm not sure that a happy ending would ever have worked for Birds of Paradise. I like a good happy ending – don't get me wrong – but I'm not sure that happy endings are quite reflective of the reality we live in, and it was important to me that Adam feels as if he lives in our world. I think that a core part of the human experience is the way that everything is fleeting – the good and bad both – and it's easy to imagine Adam continuing much along the same lines. Good days and bad days, good months and bad months, good years and bad years, just like his descendants.

At the end of the book you say that it took you a decade to write it, what was it about this story that kept you going on it for so long, that you felt you needed to come back to over such a long period and finish?

The book comes from a short story I wrote in about 2005, about a man who sells his soul to the devil for a flower from Eden. Since then, the idea stuck with me and developed, producing some really wonderful characters. The problem, since I started writing the first version of Birds back in 2009, was that I just wasn't doing justice to the idea behind the book. The idea was great – what if the first man was still alive today? What if pieces of Eden were scattered all across the world? How far would Adam go to recover them? But it would take another decade before I was skilled enough to produce a book worthy of it. The Birds of Paradise out today was a labour of love, and I can tell you that it was worth every second of work I put into it – I am proud of what it is.

The book has a strong message about environmentalism in it, as you depict a Britain where massive floods and extreme weather affect the country. I know you’ve studied terraforming and ecological philosophy in the past, as well as working with the European Space Agency. Is environmentalism and the preservation of the planet something that you feel informs your work?

Birds of Paradise was definitely written in part to express how I've been feeling about the climate crisis. We're at the point, as a species, where we really need be rethinking our place in the world. My villains may feel a little bold in their assertions of dominion and dominance over non-humans, but this is exactly how we're still acting as a species; as if all the world is ours to plunder, instead of care for. Anthropocentrism is ruining our planet, and destroying so many beautiful things, and it is rooted in religious ideas about the world being created for us to rule over. It felt good to have Adam, the first man, summarily reject that notion.

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