The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more

TV Review: Hawkeye, season 1

TV #89 of 2021:

Hawkeye, season 1

The latest Marvel show on Disney+ is a flawed but fun action-comedy, taking full advantage of the Christmas setting for a festive buddy romp as Clint Barton reluctantly accepts an eager new junior partner. He’s trying to shut down a mob investigation into the Ronin, his blood-soaked alter ego from Avengers: Endgame, when he crosses paths with young archer Kate Bishop, who’s idolized him since childhood and is now in trouble with those gangsters herself. Their very different energies alternately clash and mesh nicely together, and the two exhibit hilarious verbal sparring as well a few delightful combat scenes with the help of Hawkeye’s trick arrows.

This series teases certain dramatic questions that don’t get particularly satisfying payoff, but it’s overall a good time with some surprising connections across the MCU. It’s way more of a sequel to the Black Widow movie and ode to her character than I would have predicted, for instance, and the whole venture carries the small-stakes vibe of the old ‘Defenders’ shows on Netflix, where a neighborhood or family could be threatened without placing the entire world in peril. A late crossover appearance even helps cement that yes, those stories are still canonical to the franchise, and I’m looking forward to seeing other figures pop up again, now that the contractual limits have lapsed and the floodgates are open.

The disability representation is great too, finally depicting Clint’s hearing loss from the comics in the form of a new hearing aid and use of sign language, and introducing a villain (slash antihero?) Maya Lopez who is deaf and wears a prosthetic foot and now has a spinoff of her own in development. Ultimately this is not as mindbendingly imaginative as most of the recent streaming Marvel titles have been, but its holiday spirit is certainly a big step up from the often-dreary The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.

[Content warning for gun violence.]

★★★★☆

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Book Review: The Separation by K. A. Applegate

Book #367 of 2021:

The Separation by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #32)

I realize suspension of disbelief is an odd criterion for a series about middle-schoolers changing into animals to fight aliens, but I find this book with the two Rachels particularly hard to swallow. I actually dig the initial premise: the protagonist is injured while in starfish morph — literally ripped in half, which that species can survive — and somehow both parts demorph back into her human form. There’s potential to the idea of a sudden exact duplicate on the scene, with both girls having a reasonable claim to their life and the affection of their friends, but this tale goes a different route of dividing elements of Rachel’s nature between the pair. Thus one version is insecure and ditzy, yet able to construct long-term plans, while the other is overly aggressive and incapable of thinking beyond the present at all. They are swiftly dubbed Nice Rachel and Mean Rachel respectively (by the chapter headers as well as the characters), which feels a bit harsh, but okay.

It’s a riff on the old Star Trek episode “The Enemy Within” where a transporter malfunction creates split-personality Kirks, and I believe I get what author K. A. Applegate is going for here, similarly dramatizing the conflict inside the heroine by externalizing it in this fashion, but the result struggles to locate the emotional truth of either side. They’re both so over-the-top, and not remotely like the figure we’re more familiar with. “Nice” Rachel in particular rings false to me, given her extreme cowardice, childish giggling, and focus on how cute all the boys are — is the proposition really that there’s an airhead quality like that within our regular Rachel? Only the feelings for Marco which are normally repressed into subtext seem legitimate, in my opinion. The “Mean” doppelganger is absurd too, with her megalomania verging on psychopathy, but I think she could have worked with a better-written counterbalance opposing her.

As is, each twin is pretty goofy, and neither makes for an engaging narrator over the rest of the novel. Then the plot is basically resolved via deus ex machina at the end, although I appreciate the two halves learning to accept that they need one another before that point. And the story outside of their drama is a bit of a wash, with the mission to destroy the Yeerks’ new Anti-Morphing Ray not coming to anything, merely functioning to set up the following volume and provide a backdrop to the main event here. As usual for the Animorphs, there are enough interesting details and moments of alternating comedy and pathos to keep me turning the pages, but this adventure just never provides a reason to take its ridiculous concept seriously. I’m surprised that it’s not one of the ghostwritten entries, to be honest.

[Content warning for body horror and gore.]

★★★☆☆

Book Review: The Excalibur Curse by Kiersten White

Book #366 of 2021:

The Excalibur Curse by Kiersten White (Camelot Rising #3)

The beginning of this YA fantasy trilogy held a frisson of excitement in the way it reinterpreted the familiar Arthurian mythos that its sequels have unfortunately never matched. This final volume furthermore takes a few odd detours, like keeping its protagonist a prisoner for the opening third of the text and then sending her through a poorly-motivated existential crisis over whether she has a right to her own body or not. The plot is wrapped up satisfactorily — although the love quadrangle among Guinevere, Arthur, Lancelot, and Mordred isn’t really — and I’d say it’s generally worth reading if you’ve enjoyed the first two novels. But too many characters that we’ve previously seen in meaningful relationships stay apart for too long, which robs the conclusion of its full impact and represents diminishing returns for the series as a whole.

This volume: ★★★☆☆

Overall series: ★★★☆☆

Volumes ranked: 1 > 2 > 3

Book Review: Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang

Book #365 of 2021:

Beautiful Country by Qian Julie Wang

A fairly poignant account of a brief but formative period in author Qian Julie Wang’s life, spanning from 1994 when she left China for America with her family at age seven through when they moved again to Canada five years later. This sort of childhood memoir is tricky; although the writer ably captures the feeling of the experience, the details that an adult would know are sometimes absent, and those that we do get can often read as tenuous. For instance, it seems clear that the Wangs immigrated legally and then overstayed their visas, but the text doesn’t identify when that change in status would have occurred or distinguish between their documented and undocumented existence. The young girl was taught from the start to avoid cops, not go to licensed doctors, and lie to teachers about where she lived, yet I can’t tell how much of that was misguided overprotection as opposed to early good advice.

Similarly, there are sections in here when the parents act in ways that their daughter doesn’t understand — only some of which she appears to grasp better now as a grown-up herself reflecting on the events — and I’m genuinely unsure as to the intended takeaway. The general impression of poverty is certainly affecting, as is the depiction of witnessing loved ones who were well-off professors back home being forced to endure racist treatment while scrambling for the most menial of jobs in New York. But on a micro level, I think I want more clarity and mature perspective from a work that deliberately sets this narrow a scope.

[Content warning for racial slurs, sexual assault, domestic abuse, and fatphobia.]

★★★☆☆

Book Review: A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers

Book #364 of 2021:

A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers (Monk and Robot #1)

As with most titles from author Becky Chambers, this novella reads like a warm hug of hopepunk goodness. Although I wouldn’t say it’s quite on the level of her Wayfarers series, it shares with that space opera of the Galactic Commons an approach to science-fiction rooted in empathetic respect and curiosity toward different cultures. Thus in this tale, a nonbinary monk on a far-future colony planet encounters a robot, centuries after such inventions have become self-aware and retreated peacefully into the woods, amid humanity’s apologies and commitment to abandoning that technological path that has inadvertently given rise to slavery. It’s the first subsequent meeting between their peoples, but there is no conflict or tension in the interaction, just a mutual fascination with how the other one views the world and a gradual bonding over tea.

Some critics might complain that such a story is missing stakes or a plot, but our viewpoint human is trying to make their way to a remote hermitage, which presents logistical challenges even before they cross paths with the machine. And over the course of the ensuing conversation, they reveal a deep depression that has prompted the excursion, a growing sense of emptiness that is making it difficult for this protagonist to see a reason to get up each day and go about their regular tasks. (The idea of suicide isn’t mentioned explicitly, but it’s lurking there in the subtext.) That’s as serious an obstacle as any, and a new friendship and perspective on life isn’t enough to defeat the feeling, only maybe push it back a spell. Still, I think most readers will find the same measure of comfort in the exchange that the characters do, and join me in wondering what the sequel will bring.

★★★★☆

Book Review: Sparkling Cyanide by Agatha Christie

Book #363 of 2021:

Sparkling Cyanide by Agatha Christie (Colonel Race #4)

This 1945 novel, also published under the name Remembered Death, is the fourth and final appearance of Colonel Race, after a previous book where he stands alone like this and two that he shares with his friend Hercule Poirot. As a character he’s never made much of an impression on me, and so his stories tend to succeed or fail more by the current plot around him. In this case, I’d say the effect is mixed — a slow start of everyone’s reflections about a woman who died of poisoning last year in an apparent suicide at the dinner table, which picks up in excitement when her widower who suspects foul play is killed himself in the same fashion, but then trickles back away due to some silliness at the end.

(Spoilers: it turns out all the guests at the second party got up to dance, and took the wrong chair upon return due to someone’s bag being inadvertently moved down a spot. So the victim wasn’t the intended target that time, which ultimately leads to the identification of the culprit. But the deductive insight that’s supposed to dazzle us there just doesn’t ring true for me at all. I feel like most people in that circumstance would notice their seating position had changed, especially if it preceded a shocking death!)

As with the rest of his series, this book is fine overall. Author Agatha Christie has certainly written worse mysteries for us, and I do appreciate whenever she tries to tweak her usual formulas into slightly different configurations, even if not every experiment results in a winner. But I can understand why we don’t ever hear from this particular protagonist again.

[Content warning for racism and sexism.]

This volume: ★★★☆☆

Overall series: ★★★☆☆

Volumes ranked: Death on the Nile > The Man in the Brown Suit > Sparkling Cyanide > Cards on the Table

Book Review: Matrix by Lauren Groff

Book #362 of 2021:

Matrix by Lauren Groff

This title is an interesting exploration of a woman fiercely marshaling what power she can as a nun in 12th-century England, at a cost of forgoing any real hope at emotional intimacy with anyone around her. It’s a fictionalized treatment of the life of the anonymous poet Marie de France, and specifically the theory that identifies her as Mary of Shaftesbury, illegitimate half-sister to King Henry II. Because I am not otherwise familiar with either of these figures, I can’t speak to how accurately they have been represented here or how author Lauren Groff has interpreted the available records, although I imagine she’s exercised a degree of artistic license.

Overall, I’m sort of lukewarm on this text. The characters are far less off-putting than those in the writer’s earlier novel Fates and Furies, yet I likewise haven’t found them to be as immediately engaging as the protagonists in her collection of short fiction, Florida. I do appreciate the window into how things like menopause or same-sex attraction might have been conceptualized by the medieval mind — there’s a lot of queer love here, presented in surprisingly nonjudgmental fashion — but I just don’t feel as though the heroine ever comes alive for me.

Part of the problem is that the narrative generally skims through time, offering surface-level summaries of events and only occasionally pausing for a longer anecdote or two before jumping forward a few more years. The ensuing tale ultimately spans over half a century in this way, but in the process it’s difficult to legibly track the abbess’s motivations or understanding of herself. For a plot that largely reduces to ‘a person grows older,’ it would be nice to get further insight into that particular soul. But in exploring the theoretical details to this historical mystery, I fear Groff has merely substituted one cipher for another.

[Content warning for gore, childbirth complications, and mention of rape.]

★★★☆☆

Book Review: The Conspiracy by K. A. Applegate

Book #361 of 2021:

The Conspiracy by K. A. Applegate (Animorphs #31)

Kudos to Laura Battyanyi-Wiess, our first repeat ghostwriter: this Animorphs novel is possibly Jake’s strongest outing as narrator yet, and I love that it springs from such a simple premise. The hero’s great-grandfather has died, and his dad is insisting the family take a four-day trip for the funeral. That’s a problem for the Yeerk infesting Jake’s brother Tom, who wouldn’t be able to survive that long away from the local Kandrona rays, but their father refuses to let him stay behind. As the younger boy realizes, there are only two options for the enemy lurking in his home: he will need to either enslave the person standing in his way with a parasite of his own, or else murder him outright. And the Animorphs can’t intervene directly, lest the aliens start to wonder why they’ve taken an interest in some random human civilian.

It’s a highly charged situation, and a great followup to Marco’s plotline of the book before, struggling with the decision to kill his mother who’s a high-ranking Controller herself. Despite how he faltered a bit in the pivotal moment there, he is clear-eyed about his friend’s dilemma now, standing up to Jake when he’s preparing to rush in and get them all killed by revealing his morphing ability and finding clever ways to delay the danger, like using his gorilla morph to set off car alarms outside the Sharing meeting where Tom has brought his target. The team’s usual leader, meanwhile, is frozen in panic, unable to think of a plan or call the shots on the mission with a parent’s life on the line. It’s a good reminder of how these kids are deeply traumatized by their experiences and still so, so painfully young.

The tension increases as their scheduled departure approaches, with the desperate foe arranging a drive-by shooting of the house while the man who’s an unwitting threat to him is out watering the grass (prevented in the nick of time by Jake “accidentally” spraying the car with the hose and calling out in recognition to the Controller driver, his assistant principal Chapman). Even the protagonist’s inspired strategy to then divert attention from Tom’s plight by kidnapping that important Yeerk figure is simply a temporary solution at best, as the slug in his brother’s head is hardly going to meekly starve to death and let his host body escape with information on the invasion just because he’s been forced to leave town. Later Jake sees him with a knife and understands his father likely has scant moments left to live.

The crisis is ultimately averted and the status quo restored. Tom remains a helpless captive in his own mind, the group’s identities are protected, and Jake’s dad stays free for now, although he still can’t be told the truth about either of his sons. But it’s been an emotional wringer and fierce effort merely to maintain that equilibrium, which has had no impact whatsoever on the wider guerilla war against earth’s invaders. Just another day in the life of an Animorph.

[Content warning for body horror, gore, and gun violence.]

★★★★☆

TV Review: Fringe, season 3

TV #88 of 2021:

Fringe, season 3

This is my favorite era of Fringe, and I am so tempted to give it a full five stars. Picking up on the cliffhanger escape from the parallel world, this run starts with our Olivia Dunham trapped over there, being brainwashed to believe she’s her doppelgänger, while that other woman impersonates her on our side for intelligence and sabotage, including embarking on a new relationship with Peter (which has elements of both those aims, combined with the impostor’s unexpected development of real feelings). For a while each subsequent hour alternates between the one universe and its pair, developing these storylines and exploring the fun advanced-tech near-dystopia of the alternate dimension. There are cool cases that couldn’t be told with the familiar Fringe team yet slot in perfectly with their opposites. It’s so good it practically feels like the writers are showing off at this point.

Even once the agents return to their respective homes, the repercussions linger and contribute to further evocative character-driven storytelling, all in service to the program’s trademark ludicrous mad science. My favorite fringe event may be the discovery of “soul magnets” that cause the protagonist to be possessed by the spirit of William Bell, after original performer Leonard Nimoy announced his retirement from acting. Because, you know… why not? It’s another flex, and Anna Torv is certainly up to the challenge, given how she’s already constructed such distinctive ways of embodying the two Olivias. Witnessing her performance this season is almost like seeing a proto-Orphan Black, and constitutes a thorough rebuke to every critic who called her wooden at the start of the show.

On the downside, this year is also concerned with a complex piece of machinery left by the “first people” whose civilization predated humanity, and which Peter is apparently predestined to operate. It’s hokey and vague and boring, but it ends up playing a major role in the endgame here despite having the null appeal of a text-adventure fetch quest. (OLIVIA must break into a MUSEUM to find a KEY to open a BOX containing a CROWBAR, and so on — except the CROWBAR turns out to be an ancient DRAWING of her own FACE!) It reminds me of all the reasons I never watched Lost, to be honest, and the fact that it’s later retconned as a gift from the heroes in the future sent back via wormhole isn’t much better. I’m happier ignoring that nonsense and focusing on all the wicked smart things I genuinely love about this moment in the series, but unlike the occasional wobbly episode, this thread is pervasive enough that in fairness I really do have to temper my rating.

So it isn’t all top-notch, and it leaves on a weaker note than it arrives. Peak Fringe is probably something like the span from 2×15 “Jacksonville” through 3×15 “Subject 13” or thereabouts, with generally solid material before and after but only delivering an all-time great piece of serial science-fiction in that particular window. And although most of it overlaps with the duration of this third season, I just wish that absurd machine wasn’t around to foul everything up.

[Content warning for torture, gaslighting, biomedical experimentation, gun violence, suicide, domestic abuse, insect parasites, and gore.]

★★★★☆

Book Review: This Poison Heart by Kalynn Bayron

Book #360 of 2021:

This Poison Heart by Kalynn Bayron (This Poison Heart #1)

This YA fantasy novel is a breath of fresh air, especially after I wasn’t entirely sold on author Kalynn Bayron’s previous offering Cinderella Is Dead. The plot is a little slow, but in that hopepunk, Maggie Stiefvater way that focuses on the characters and their emotional experiences over major developments per se. There’s not even an explicit villain on the scene until fairly late in the text, just our teen heroine looking for answers regarding the rural estate she’s inherited out of the blue from an unknown relative of her birth mother. I like this character a lot — a black, bisexual New Yorker with two adoptive moms and a magical talent for growing plants — and it’s a pleasure simply to watch her interacting with the world around her as she learns about the curious family she was born into (and their surprising connection to Greek mythology). I also enjoy the energy that comes from the protagonist starting the story already aware of her powers, skipping past the breathless discovery phase that’s often standard in this genre.

As a side note, this is the first book I’ve read that includes a jurisdiction defunding the police in favor of social worker emergency responders, so that was a neat detail to encounter as well. I could stand to see more of that, in fiction and reality alike.

[Content warning for death of a parent and massive age-gap romance.]

★★★★☆