Title: THE GOOD GUY
Publisher: Harper
Author: Dean Koontz
Edition released: 2007
ISBN: 978-0-00-722660-3
456 pages
Reviewed by: Adam Donnison

Sitting in your favourite bar, trading sarcastic commentaries on life with the barman, you don't expect to find yourself being mistaken first for a hired killer and in a matter of minutes for the killer's client. Tim Carrier was just having a bit of a lark when the odd man started chatting, but by the time he realised that the man had mistaken him for a killer, he had left with Tim holding an envelope with $10,000 and a picture of the mark. Minutes later the killer then mistakes Tim for his client, and Tim tries to persuade him that the job is off - even giving the killer the money as compensation for wasted time.

Tim then finds Linda Paquette, the intended victim, and tries to warn her, only to find that the killer doesn't take no for an answer and Tim and Linda are set on the run from a man who has far too much information at his fingertips than is healthy.

Koontz does action well. Which is just as well. THE GOOD GUY could use a believable story line as well. Or maybe even just a little less of the formulaic elements like pretty girl in distress, "ah shucks" quiet hero with a history, jingoism, conspiracy lurking in the background, and what is it with American thrillers and cars? Why does the girl have to have a memorable car?

The start is unbelievable. The villain is unbelievable. The ending is painful. The plot predictable. But for all that if you lose yourself in the action it can be a bit of fun.

Title: HUNTER'S MOON
Publisher: Gollancz
Author: David Devereaux
Edition released: 2007
ISBN: 978-0-5750-7985-5
231 pages
Reviewed by: Adam Donnison

Jack is as good a name as any for the central character of HUNTER'S MOON. By his own admission a "bastard by disposition", Jack is a member of a secret government organisation who fight against the forces of dark using magic and violence.

Jack is given the brief to "close down" the Enlightened Sisterhood, a group of women who have been co-opted into a clandestine attack on the government. Jack takes up a job as a musician in a local bar and builds himself a cover story while liaising (in more ways than one) with Annie, who is in deep cover in the Sisterhood.

The Sisterhood use brainwashing and sex to control their group and Annie eventually succumbs to their tactics - resulting in Jack going in to try and rescue her and bring the Sisterhood to justice.

HUNTER'S MOON is pretty much black and white with no shades of grey. Jack is a hit man with no conscience nor qualms and relishes in his role. The evil Sisterhood is comprised of women who are essentially cast as man-haters. There was never any real doubt how this book would end, except perhaps the body count.

Title: END OF THE WORLD BLUES
Publisher: Gollancz
Author: Jon Courtenay Grimwood
Edition released: 2006
ISBN: 978-0-5750-7953-3
342 pages
Reviewed by: Adam Donnison

Neiji is a young schoolgirl who has $15 million in stolen currency locked in a railway locker, and Neiji needs to hide herself. Neiji takes on the role of a cosplay - a costumed play gang member, and becomes Lady Neku. Neku is sleeping rough in the Roppongi district and takes a liking to Kit Nouveau - a British army deserter that has made a life for himself in Tokyo running a flea-bit bar. Mind you, Kit just sees her as a kid in trouble who needs a coffee.

Kit is married to a sado-masochistic ceramic artist, and is having an affair with the wife of a local Yakuza crime lord, while ostensibly teaching her English. When the affair is discovered the already tattered fragments of Kit's life start to blow apart.

Neku manages to save Kit's life twice in quick succession, once when a Yakuza hit man takes action into his own hands and another when Kit's bar is blown apart, killing his wife Yoshi.

Kit is persuaded to return the England to find the truth about his former girlfriend's death, and Neku follows along. Kit falls into a maelstrom of intrigue and danger, and Neku gets caught up as well.

Neku however, is not your average schoolgirl. Coming from the far future where the world has dropped into decay and tribalism, Neku is linked to the past and Kit by a simple object that may contain the key to her own problems.

END OF THE WORLD BLUES is a finely crafted thriller with a fantastic twist. In some ways the addition of the visitor from the far-flung future is almost a distraction from the main game, although it starts to make sense towards the end of the book.

Jon Courtenay Grimwood has managed to achieve a balance between action and plot that is very satisfying. The threads that tie the characters are pulled together with finesse.

There is no doubt about the the eligibility of END OF THE WORLD BLUES to win the 2007 British Science Fiction Awards Best Novel.

Title: RESPLENDENT
Publisher: Gollancz
Author: Stephen Baxter
Edition released: 2006
ISBN: 978-0-5750-7983-0
544 pages
Reviewed by: Adam Donnison

RESPLENDENT is book four of the DESTINY'S CHILDREN series and is a collection of short stories around the same theme, sorted into a timeline order. Each story stands on its own and has a short link paragraph added at the end to tie the book together into a novel-length anthology.

Starting around AD 5,300 and ending at AD 1,000,000 RESPLENDENT covers the period of humanity after the Qax have left, freeing humanity to begin rebuilding a society and expanding their frontiers.

Each story is eminently readable, although trying to read the entire anthology in a single session shows quite clearly that this is a collection of parts rather than an integrated whole. This is not to take away from the work in any way, and like all Baxter's work, this is great science fiction. Having the stories in the time order rather than published order also provides a continuing narrative that gives this a novel-like feeling, despite the occasional jumps in the story. The link pieces do well to cover the gaps.

Some stories could have been left out without affecting the story, indeed, may well have had a positive effect given the similarity that some of the clustered pieces show. If you are a Stephen Baxter fan, then RESPLENDENT is a convenient and effective collection of his shorter works published over the period 2000 to 2006, ending with a previously unpublished piece to bring the final threads together.

Title: PIRATES OF THE RELENTLESS DESERT
Publisher: Gollancz
Author: Jay Amory
Edition released: 2008
ISBN: 978-0-575-08032-4
420 pages
Reviewed by: Adam Donnison

PIRATES OF THE RELENTLESS DESERT is book two of the CLOUDED WORLD series, in which there are two races separated by, well, clouds. The Groundlings live on the surface of the planet, but there is another race, the winged Airborn, who live in floating cities. The two races were introduced to one another in the first book, as were the wingless Airborn hero Az Gabrielson and the Groundling Cassie Grubdollar. Far from being the Ascended Ones of myth, the Airborn proved to be far more tangible and the relationship was always going to be fractious.

PIRATES OF THE RELENTLESS DESERT starts with a rogue Airborn airship stealing barrels of oil from a remote oilfield in the Relentless Desert. In the Silver Sanctum - the centre of government of the Airborn - heated discussions as to how to deal with the pirates ensues. A plan is hatched to track down, and if necessary destroy the airship Behemoth and its pirates to ensure the stability of the alliance between Airborn and Groundling.

In the meantime, Cassie Grubdollar has her own problems, with business being slim, and her father being of no use since the death of his eldest son. Trying to keep the family together Cassie doesn't need her father disappearing on her, and she must start out on a potentially dangerous search.

Az needs to sort out his own issues. He hasn't seen Cassie for over six weeks and the relationship seems on the rocks. He is hoping the Grubdollars will come to his brother's wedding, but 3 kilometres is a big gap to get over.

PIRATES OF THE RELENTLESS DESERT was obviously written for a young adult audience, although the story and characters hold up well even for someone who remembers youth through the veil of decades. The story is well paced and the events of the first book are referred to in just enough detail so that you aren't lost reading the books out of sequence. The friction between the two groups provides endless possibilities for plot elements, and the obvious jealousies that exist on either side fuel the bad feelings.

There are numerous themes explored by Jay Amory in PIRATES OF THE RELENTLESS DESERT, including teenage angst, racial prejudice, drug abuse, religious intolerance, jealousy and class warfare. Yet all of this doesn't make a heavy book, rather they are used to tell a highly entertaining and engaging tale. There is plenty of action and the characters, while a little on the underdeveloped side, are easy to identify with. Well worth a look.