Warchild | ||||||||
Karin Lowachee | ||||||||
Warner Aspect, 451 pages | ||||||||
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A review by Donna McMahon
Jos Musey is only eight years old when his world implodes around him. Pirates attack the merchant ship Mukidori, killing his family
and taking the children to sell as slaves. Jos's good looks attract the abusive attention of the pirate captain, Falcone, who takes
Jos as his personal slave. A year later, Jos seizes his first chance to escape, only to flee into the clutches of enemy
aliens -- the striviirc-na, who are at war with EarthHub.
Jos is afraid of the striviirc-na because they're evil enemies... or are they? As he grows familiar with the aliens and their
culture, Jos discovers that nothing about the war is straightforward and nobody is what they seem, including him. By the age of
fourteen when he signs onto a Hub warship, his loyalties are hopelessly conflicted, but he does know one thing. He hates the pirate,
Falcone, and he wants revenge at any cost.
Since I don't generally read war stories, I won't try to comment on the military aspects of this book, except that they all seemed
reasonably credible to an inexpert reader such as me. Certainly, I liked the scenario itself -- an aggressive empire dragged by
economics and posturing into a costly conflict whose only real beneficiaries are the pirates who prey on both sides. I was not enthused
by the alien society which seemed derivative of Japan, and I found Jos a little too capable to be convincing as a fourteen year old,
but these niggles did not distract me from the suspenseful story.
Warchild is an exceptional first novel and an excellent read.
Donna McMahon discovered science fiction in high school and fandom in 1977, and never recovered. Dance of Knives, her first novel, was published by Tor in May, 2001, and her book reviews won an Aurora Award the same month. She likes to review books first as a reader (Was this a Good Read? Did I get my money's worth?) and second as a writer (What makes this book succeed/fail as a genre novel?). You can visit her website at http://www.donna-mcmahon.com/. |
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