Frankisstein by the great Jeanette Winterston, is a brilliant reworking of Mary Wolstonecraft Shelley’s Frankenstein, which retains both the gothic horror of the original and adds a wholly modern spin to the tale. Literary, queer, feminist and thought-provoking, Frankisstein was a fabulous read for late nights, while rain slammed against the window.

Jeanette Winterston, stands among the giants of 20th century literature.  Many lesbians of my generation read Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit as one of their very first experiences with “queer literature.” I actually saw the television drama based on the novel first. I didn’t read the book until years later, long after I had become familiar with lesbian writers from an earlier epoch. But when I saw that Winterston had a new novel, one that was an homage to Frankenstein (a novel with which I have a complex history, full of love and hate and irrelevant circumstance that colored my feelings about the book- even writing these sentences has triggered the most extraordinary set of memories and emotions within me,) I immediately put it on my to-read list. Then my dear friend Editor Ed suggested it to me, so I bumped it up the list. I’m so glad I did.

The book tells the same story in two bookend parts: Part one is a rainy sojourn by the shores of Lake Geneva, as Percy Bysshe Shelley and George Gordon, Lord Byon, midwife Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s birth of Frankenstein or, The Modern Prometheus (a subtitle which modern publishers seem to have dropped, which is not only a shame in terms of the novel’s genesis, but also is relevant to Winterston’s book.) The second part of the story takes place in contemporary setting, beginning at a tech Expo where Ry Shelley, a trans man, is involved with AI visionary Victor Stein and meets Ron Lord, a man who makes intelligent sexbots. Other characters are also given 21st century ciphers. Interstitially, we visit Bedlam, the infamous madhouse in London, built in the 13th century, for some fabulous multilayered storytelling.

These varied pieces are sewn together with crude, visible literary stitches – a phrase that took me solid minutes to write, despite its inevitability.  ^_^

My favorite scene is one that I consider the most fictitious – a magnificent scene in which Mary meets Ada Lovelace, the daughter of her old…friend(?)… Byron.  But what captured my heart was a conversation between Victor and Ry, when Victor asks if Ry likes his body and Ry replies, “Yes, very much. I had it custom-made for me.” I swooned.

Ratings:

Overall – 9

This book will appeal to the literary among you, and make you want to (re)read Frankenstein, (and possibly enjoy it this time), the writers among you, as it will inspire you to do literary fanfic, all the queer lit readers and feminists among you, which basically covers all my friends so if this book is not your boom, you’re obviously hate-reading Okazu. ^_^

Baru Cormorant is a savant. Even as a child, she had a brilliant understanding of systems and numbers. The Imperial forces of the Masquerade comes to her island with their Incrastic laws, their insistence that Islander way of life and relationships are unhygienic, demanding adherence to their laws in return for dentists and inoculations from the diseases they brought, Baru is taken to the Imperial school, trained to better her mind, and ignore her unhygienic physical desires.

In The Traitor Baru Cormorant, Baru Cormorant is shaped into a tool of the Emperor by a man, known as Itinerant, who knows exactly what he has in this young woman. What he does not know is that Baru is playing the double-agent. Even as she is sent to far-off Arduwynn as the Imperial accountant, Baru’s long game remains the same – the complete destruction of the Empire.

Baru is herself absolutely, fascinatingly loathesome. At her truest and most heartfelt, she is a young woman falling in love against the general laws of her government and the specific situation in which she finds herself. Alone, because she insists on being alone, honest, because she refuses to fear the truth, Baru is a genius who betrays everything and everyone she knows. There’s a lot to love about the character and a very little to like. And yet, she is sympathetic.

This is a book explicitly about the short- and long-term effects of colonization, of imperialist classicism and, most importantly of how economies look to economists. Baru is an accountant and thinks in the movement of money and we are forced to think that way as well. This is a story of strategy and tactics, one of the very, very few stories in this post Game of Thrones age that actually understands history as a “game” of influence and power. Seth Dickinson does a remarkable job of staying out of the way of his characters, something that is hard to do these days, when readers are groomed to expect every series even remotely like this to end up as a HBO series.

Most importantly, 3/4s of the way through the next book, I have no idea what might happen. That is a high compliment from me.

Ratings:

Characters – 9
Service – 2 Sex and sexuality are bluntly described. But attraction is attraction, love is love, nonetheless.
Violence – 10 There is a lot of violence. Of a lot of kinds, from war to torture to general bloodyminded bullshit
Lesbian – 9 Yes. And No. Then Yes.

Overall – 9

It’s not a 10 because the series has to end perfectly for it to be a 10 and it might not do so. But this could be revised. As an individual book it was damned close.

Thanks to those friends who recommended it to me. You understand me well.

It’s been an unbelievably good era for queer science fiction and fantasy and Tor Books has been absolutely killing it with their offerings.

The hardest thing about reading Tamsyn Muir’s Gideon the Ninth is that it’s going to be a long wait until next summer when the next book comes out.

Gideon Nav has spent her life as the servant of the cult of death known as the Ninth House; locked in battle of body and mind with the daughter of that house, Harrowhark. Despised, outcast, her entire existence is an affront to the Ninth. When circumstances wind her up in a complicated plot to elevate Harrow to God’s side as one of his personal necromancers, Gideon finds herself in the awkward position as Harrow’s protector.

In the depths of a laboratory filled with existential horror (and not-at-all-existential horrors,) Gideon learns the truth about…everything. Gideon and Harrow’s story unfolds in multiple surprising labyrinthine twists and turns for a dark, death-filled story that was a damn funny read.

This book marched forward inexorably, full of violence and death but also full of strength and, ultimately, hope. Muir’s Gideon is a vulgar, straight-talking jerk and I loved her with all my heart. She would have settled in nicely among my friends.

You may see reviews by multiple reviewers saying that this is a story about “lesbian necromancers” or “lesbians in space” but that is like calling Milton’s Paradise Lost about “demons.” It’s not wrong, but it’s so very much aside from any of the points that you kind of had to ignore the entire story to find that description. What it *is* about is a wholly unique set of world-building, new and exciting forms of necromantic magic, (far beyond anything I had ever conceived, for sure,) and a likable asshole of a protagonist whose interest in women is relevant to the plot but not to a review of the plot, for fuck’s sake.

To reiterate, this book is full of violence and death. It is about necromancers. And some of that death is full of gobs.

But above all, amidst the rot and dust of the dead and the blood and phlegm of the living, I want to stress that this was one of the funniest things I have read in a very long time. It is read-out-loud quotable and I repeatedly read chunks out loud to my wife, because it was just that good.

Ratings:

Cover art – 10 Tommy Arnold’s cover is perfect. Muir even wrote a blog post for Tor dissecting it (hurh, hurh) so you can appreciate how good it is
Book design – 10 The font, the color of the pages, the book edged in black, where the color is allowed to bleed onto the page. It’s gorgeous
Story – 10 This is not hyperbole. Well, maybe a little, but only about 4/100ths hyperbole
Characters – 10 This is definitely not hyperbole. They were fanfuckingtastic
Lesbians – Yes, but stfu about it, christ, what a bunch of assholes reviewers are

Overall – 10

This is a really good book. A book so good that I insisted I read only one chapter a day because I didn’t want to blow through it too fast.

If you like scathing vulgarity by angry lesbians, violence and death, you should definitely read Gideon the Ninth. If you don’t like those things, then wtf are you doing reading Okazu, seriously.

(Thanks to Okazu god Ivan for the poke that motivated me to read this!)