The last few weeks have been pretty full. We spent much of the month of May travelling, and then we spent the last few weeks packing up our winter apartment in Brisbane and flying back home to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. So, for reading material this past week I was looking for something short and light to keep me entertained while we were in airplanes and airports making our way back home. I picked two short fantasy stories.

I just finished and reviewed James S. A. Corey’s latest full length book The Mercy of Gods a few weeks ago. Corey, as I noted in that review, is the pen name for a pair of authors most famous for writing the series The Expanse, which went on to become one of the most successful space operas of the last decade - both the books and the TV series it spawned.

The Mercy of Gods is set in a completely different reality from The Expanse books. And Livesuit is an ebook-only novella set in that reality. In Mercy of Gods a society of humans have lived on a planet called Anjin for so long they have forgotten how and why they came there. This society is conquered in a swift and brutal alien attack. Some of the survivors are brought to the attacker’s (called the Carryx) home world where they struggle to survive and adapt alongside other conquered species. They are assisted by a spy, an envoy from a species that has long fought the Carryx.

In Livesuit we are taken into the battlefield with that species as they wage war across galaxies against the Carryx. Turns out that “that species” is us - humans.

Livesuits are a technology that envelopes human soldiers in the war with the Carryx. A soldier’s livesuit includes a helmet that completely encloses his or her head. The suit and its helmet protect the soldier on the battlefield and also have the ability to heal wounds, provide nutrition and otherwise care for the soldier’s body. A livesuit melds directly with the human body so that once it’s put on a soldier cannot remove it. It must be worn until the soldier’s term of service is over.

The novella follows a group of soldiers in battle, and one soldier in particular, in his slow realization that the livesuits are doing more than the soldiers inside them know.

This was a quick and satisfying read, and I think I actually liked this short story a bit more than The Mercy of Gods. The pacing of the story, the action scenes and the story arc itself were all first rate.

RATING: Three and a Half Stars ⭐⭐⭐⭐

RATING COMMENTS: A short and satisfying read that I actually liked a bit more than Mercy of Gods, the first full length book in the new series The Captive’s War.

WHERE I GOT MY COPY: I checked out the ebook from my library on the Libby app.

I’ve read a couple of Tchaikovsky’s books. One was a space opera and the other a fantasy novella. He’s won numerous awards and is one of the UK’s best known modern science fiction and fantasy authors.

Spiderlight is a (relatively) short fantasy novel. It’s 288 pages in the paperback and about 8 and a half hours for the audiobook. I listened to the audiobook. With most audiobooks I listen at between 1.5- and 2-times speed. (Audiobooks played at “normal” speed actually sound purposefully slowed down to me, so that listening at “normal” speed would make most any book about as exciting as watching paint dry.)

This book was slow to start, and for the first half of the book seemed to be a typical “hero’s quest” book, and perhaps a not-very-well-done one at that. A pale imitation of Lord of the Rings perhaps. Tchaikovsky’s only innovation in the first half of the book seemed to be the introduction of giant spiders, one of whom (named Nth) becomes integral to the quest. In order to make the spider a better traveling companion to the humans he accompanies, their wizard conjures him into a man-like shape, not quite human but no longer spider.

But midway through the book the whole premise of this story begins to go through a metamorphosis similar to Nth’s until eventually it is completely flipped on its head. If you read this book my advice is to stick with it through the slow start as the end will more than make up for it.

Tchaikovsky narrates the audiobook himself, and he has different voices he uses for the different characters. I usually find that a bit off-putting. But here it added to the story, having the author voicing his interpretation of how the characters would present themselves.

RATING: Three and a Half Stars ⭐⭐⭐🌠

RATING COMMENTS: Slow to start, this book turns the whole “hero’s quest” story arc completely on its head. The second half of the book more than makes up for the slow start.

WHERE I GOT MY COPY: I received a reviewer’s copy of the audiobook courtesy of Macmillan Digital Audio, the publisher, and Netgalley. The audiobook was released on November 12, 2024.