The urban illusion genre is n’t just set in cities — it ’s one of the chief places that genre fiction engages with our urbanised macrocosm , foot up the baton dropped by hacker . But you do n’t often see cities portray the way Daniel José Older does in his novel novel Half - Resurrection Blues .
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Some spoilers ahead …
honest-to-god , co - editor in chief of the anthology Long Hidden : Speculative Fiction from the Margins of story , has an interest group in mass who get left out of the usual fantasy tales — and that show through in this Koran , mostly set in a fantasy version of Brooklyn and its surround . But in improver to including a lot of characters of color and magical traditions that do n’t usually ferment up in fantasy , this book also has a profuseness in how it depicts city as live place with deep root , where ancient spectre ( literally and figuratively ) have long since taken up mansion house .
InHalf - Resurrection Blues , there ’s an organization called the Council of the Dead , made up of , basically , ghost cops who keep the utter from overwhelming the public of the living . But the novel ’s main eccentric , Carlos Delacruz , is n’t exactly a wraith — he ’s half idle , half animated , still in his physical body but kind of zombified . Carlos believes he ’s the only “ halfie ” active , until he converge ( and kills ) Trevor , another halfie who ’s lead a mathematical group of hipster tourer through an initiative into the land of the dead .
Soon , Carlos is devolve for Trevor ’s sister Sasha ( also a halfie ) , and uncovering a plot to break down the barrier between life sentence and decease . He has to stop an invasion of ghosts and queer the scheme of an ancient immortal necromancer , all while dole out with the unintelligent bureaucracy and micromanaging from his bosses at the Council . And he has to cypher out how to tell Sasha he killed her brother .
Carlos is an engaging booster , with more or less the right mixture of snarky humour and inner pain . But a lot of the juice in this leger come from the somewhat large supporting cast and all of the universe - building that Older form in , which depict the city as an ecosystem where various magical entities play their own part . We meet a nearly endless assemblage of ghosts and sorcerous healer , and the city tardily build up as a credible place , full of left over corners and unknown introduction .
Most urban fantasy books spend their time poke into grungy corners of their cities — you ’ll see L.A. and San Francisco a whole new mode after spending time with Sandman Slim or October Daye — but what ’s expectant about Older ’s version of New York is how quick and foreign it is , and how intertwined the warmth and strangeness are . This is a Brooklyn that resists gentrification and sanitation .
And the deeper you get into Half - Resurrection Blues , the more significant Carlos ’ condition as someone halfway live and midway bushed come to seem . At first , it ’s just sort of an oddity , but it really begin to take over the playscript , thematically , about halfway through . Probably the well aspect in the whole book is a random conversation between Carlos and a aboriginal American gay man who sometimes passes as white and straight , and they talk about the benefits and cost of move between two globe and come out to be something you ’re not .
That ’s when the book really click for me , and the fun city stuff started to experience more attached to Carlos ’ beingness . ( If I have a complaint about this book , it ’s that the first half find a bit too thread , and the breezy tone does n’t add quite enough danger or intensity to the action . The book to the full reach its pace in the 2d half . ) As Carlos starts to learn more about his own stemma and discovers the truth about others like himself , he discovers the real substance of being catch between two worlds — and maybe , why he ’ll always have separate loyalties .
And that ’s really what ’s howling about the version of the city that Daniel Jose elder conjures here — it ’s not just a richly detailed and various place , but a place where human race clash , and the great unwashed who are catch up with in the middle can meet up and have a beer , and chance on how to make the best of not quite fitting in .
book reviewBooksDaniel José OlderRichard KadreySeanan McGuire
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