Perdition by Ann Aguirre - review

Perdition
Ann Aguirre
Dred Chronicles #1
SciFi/2013

***** (five out of six)


cover - I don't see any of the tattoos described in the book, or the braids in her hair- though I do see a few of the beads mentioned...  Still.  Let's make the cover resemble the characters please.  On the other hand, it is kind of a cool cover.  She looks badass, and she does use her chains....  


I have been in an awful reading slump, and besides the Steampunk Trails mag, haven't been able to finish a book.  The last book I did finish took me over four weeks to read.   Perdition is the first book in over two months that I've been able to read in a matter of days.  I started it two days ago, and finished reading it last night.  (Yeay!!!!!)  seriously, I thought I was never going to finish reading another book (que dramatica)

So.  Based on my absolute love for the Sirantha Jax series, I picked this up because it's set in the same universe.  I thought it was going to feature a woman that Jax had met while she was in prison, but I was wrong.  Perdition is set at least forty years (turns?) in the future, and while the woman is different from who I thought, there is a character from the past Jax years.  Jael, who I had a hard time remembering....He turned on Sirantha and co. way back on Ithiss Tor  and he's still alive because he's hard to kill, for reasons you will discover if you read this.

Basic story - Dred is the Queen Dread or Dread Queen of ....yes, Queensland.  She's been assisted to the dubious throne by Tam, a spymaster who is serving time on Perdition.  Perdition is a prison ship that is inescapable - if one is sentenced to Perdition, you're basically sentenced to life imprisonment and to die there.  She's a hard woman, who has murdered and is serving her time.

Jael is an incoming prisoner - who has abilities and issues.  He's been sentenced to Perdition to keep him out of the way and accessible - though I don't know how accessible one can be on a prison ship where prisoners and supplies are simply dropped off, seemingly automatically.  Anyway, he's recruited by Dred.  On Perdition when prisoners are dropped off they are recruited by one of many sectors of prisoners, some are way worse than others.

Perdition - while populated with crazed murderers, political prisoners and many characters - none of whom are nice people - still reads a bit like a romance story.  Two people meet, bad backgrounds, baggage and history that makes them wary of others must learn to trust each other and accept love.... sound familiar?  yes.  A romance with (thankfully) a very different background and none of those misunderstood faux-criminals.  All these people have really done bad things.  Still....Romance.  with a bit of a romance formula.  

Even so, the story was intresting, the background and setting interesting and the characters were very interesting.

So - even though I feel like I could have picked up a romance and gotten the same basic plot, the details are what made it good enough for me to end up reading this one straight through.  So, good book, even though it was basically a romance with a SciFi criminal twist.

Even though Dred is the Dread Queen of Queensland, it's a constant struggle to hold on to control - takes a lot of planning, watching and discipline.  One of the problems Dred faces is two other sectors have decided to attack her's for more territory.  So a mini war must be waged, and Dred has to decide who to trust, who to ally with and which moves to make.  This is what makes for a good story.

Dialog was good, narration was interesting - Aguirre knows how to write a story.  Only thing....(and this is a minor complaint) I was expecting a voice kind of like Jax's - present first person, but Perdition is written in regular third person - still a good book.

Endgame by Ann Aguirre - review

Endgame
Ann Aguirre
Jax #6 {final}
SciFi/2012

Cover - just like the covers of the other novels, this one looks gritty and totally appropriate for the novel.  Except that Jax's scars kind of look like artwork curlicues. 


ahhhh - sigh.  The very last novel of a series.  Always a bittersweet read, especially when the author has kept the series interesting and decides to end it while people are still enjoying...

There's no doubt that Ann Aguirre has put Sirantha Jax through the wringer in the series.  Starting with Jax being held in a hospital and being "treated" for post traumatic stress - but really being brainwashed and used as a patsy, going through a war, being an ambassador and having to help create an entire fleet to fight those pesky yet extremely dangerous Morgut - Jax has had to fight for every bit of happiness that she experiences.  Aguirre does not write Happy Ever After Endings for her characters - but she writes the possibility of a future for her characters.

In Endgame, Jax finally gets to try to fullfill a promise she made to Lorass long ago - to help free his people from being helplessly compliant slaves to their protector/oppressors.  If you've read the previous novels, then you know the history of the L'Heng planet and people.  Artificially made into compliant people, they've had their most basic rights stripped away and are at the mercy of others.  Sirantha has promised to come up with a cure, and at the end of book #5 a cure had been obtained.  It wasn't perfect, but it was the best available.  Only the keepers of the L'Heng won't let Sirantha and her allies even approach the people within legal channels to offer the cure.

But while she's been keeping busy with filing appeals and requests and more appeals, Lorass - who has taken the cure - has been busy gathering a core resistance group, starting the beginnings of a revolution.

Endgame is the story of the revolution of the L'Heng and the story of Jax and March's struggles to come to terms with their relationships, their hurts, their angers and jealousies.  Vel and Jax also have their own relationship to acknowledge; Jax has been treated for her J-gene side affects with nanobots that keep her healthy and as a result has changed her lifespan more in tune with the extremely long lifespan of Vel's people.  If you haven't read any of these novels, you're not going to know what I'm talking about.  I strongly recommend this series to anyone who enjoys SciFi with strong female characters who are a little flawed and yet keep ticking out of sheer tenacity.

Endgame seems to have an oddly fun mixture of angst, relationship issues, science, war and effects that I enjoy from Aguirre.  There are references to previous events from previous novels that I didn't quite remember, so I might eventually re-read the whole series just for fun.  Happily, there aren't long drawn out references to the past - just short quickies.  And as with the previous novels, the tone is a touch dark with threads of hopefulness weaved in.  The inner narration is pure Jax - enjoyable for me to read.  The dialogue between characters remains just as readable as ever; her characters SOUND like they should.  Vel is a bit formal, Sasha is a teen complete with perverse and changeable moods; March is jealous and martyrlike (his personality) and there's the ribbing from the soldiers Jax is fighting with that shows venting and acceptance of each other as well as anger from newly freed populace.

The novel covers a span of a few years - they're fighting a revolution after all.  And not all actions by the revolutionary freedom fighters are palatable, but as in any war the wrong people get hurt in the name of progress and change.  All in all, Endgame was a good ending, a natural ending to an interesting series with some unforgettable characters.

While I'm a little sad to see a series I love to read end, I'm happy to find out that there will be more novels in the same universe.  The Dread Queen series starts out on a prison in the universe of Jax and I'm looking forward to finding out who the main character is, and reading about new adventures.  It's bound to be interesting.

Aftermath by Ann Aguirre - review

Aftermath

Ann Aguirre

cover - I'm not always crazy about these covers, but they do seem to try with the scars on her arm (though the scars do seem to follow a pattern rather than a random shards of shrapnel kind of scars you'd think to find from a crash victim) and I've found that all of the covers seem dramatic and cool in their own way. To be honest though, if I weren't already on the look out for this series, I'm not sure the the covers would have pulled me in - and yet I did pick up the first in the series oh so long ago...

Ann Aguirre has done it yet again. She's managed to write another damn good book in a damned good series. I have yet to be disappointed in any Jax novel. This is no exception, although I did find myself a bit frustrated with all Jax's thoughts about not being able to be with March with the new complication in his life. I would be just a frustrated with any person who seemed to be thinking repetitively like this though, so it must be my own issue.

I don't know why, but I didn't see a trial coming at the end of the last book. In fact, I'm not sure what I was expecting when Hit and Jax went off - possibly to be lost in grimspace. Some sort of disaster, but I didn't expect what they found when they came back, or what Jax went through after being rescued.

For those who haven't read the various shorts that Aguirre makes available on her website, there's an interesting insertion of an online piece that has to do with Vel and the history that he has with an old friend of Jax's. The online piece was on Aguirre's website a while ago, but I don't think it's up anymore.

There were also some sections that were from previous novels, flashbacks of Jax's and I'm not sure how I feel about those. Whenever any author does this, it tends to pull me out of the story, and yet I can see why they do it. Better a word for word flashback than a process where a detail gets changed, or the tone is different.

All things considered, I enjoyed reading Aftermath immensely and the knowledge that there's another book to follow (Endgame) is at once good news and bittersweet because Endgame will be the last novel of the series. No telling what's going to be happen for Jax. Is she going to be alone? Have March with her? Have only Vel with her? Have both men part of her life? Both men are very important to her in different ways, yet with seemingly equal importance. Will she finally have some HAPPINESS?

Because of the focus of this novel, some of my favorite side characters have very minor roles. I missed them. There are some that leave for good. I hope to read more of my favorites in final novel - Dina and Hit. Vel has always been one of my favorite characters, I definitely got my fix of Vel, he's in a large part of this novel.

Aftermath was a great addition to the series, and of course left me wanting more the minute I finished reading it. This is a series that is definitely worth keeping on the shelf to re-read every once in a while. So now I wait with mixed feelings for the final installment of this series, hoping that Ann Aguirre will consider writing another SciFi series - I enjoyed this one so very much.