Standalone Novels
Carnival cover art by Steve Stone
Undertow cover art by Cliff Nielson
Carnival
Undertow
Oh boy. The redheaded stepchildren, without even a series title to hide behind. Carnival and Undertow are very different books. Carnival is a novel of intrigue, spies, ancient alien technology, and what happens when a trio of borderline personalities decide to save the universe. Undertow is a novel of intrigue, assasins, ancient alien technology, and what happens when a trio of borderline personalities decide to save the universe.
Er.
No, really, they're quite different. Carnival is about what happens when a couple of diplomats who also happen to be ex-lovers are sent to subvert the government of a rogue colony world, except unbeknownst to everybody, everybody is double-crossing everybody else. And Undertow is a novel about a hit-man who wants to grow up to be a real boy, and possibly win the love of a not-so-good woman. Also, it has frog people. And a two-page-long lecture on quantum uncertainty.
Oh, and you probably wouldn't notice from the cover copy, but both books have female protagonists in addition to the male ones.
You know, I'm really not very good at this. I think I'll just give you the cover copy. (I gotta say though, I thought the frog people were totally cool while I was writing them.)
The Carnival cover copy looks like this:
In Old Earth’s clandestine world of ambassador-spies, Michelangelo Kusanagi-Jones and Vincent Katherinessen were once a starring team. But ever since a disastrous mission, they have been living separate lives in a universe dominated by a ruthless Coalition—one that is about to reunite them.
The pair are dispatched to New Amazonia as diplomatic agents Allegedly, they are to return priceless art. Covertly, they seek to tap its energy supply. But in reality, one has his mind set on treason. And among the extraordinary women of New Amazonia, in a season of festival, betrayal, and disguise, he will find a new ally—and a force beyond any that humans have known….
And here's what Publishers Weekly had to say:
In this enjoyable, thought-provoking science fiction adventure, interspace ambassadors Vincent Katherinessen and Michelangelo Kusanagi-Jones have been sent by the Old Earth Colonial Coalition to the renegade planet of New Amazonia, a planet where women rule and men are kept as worker bees and house breeders. Because Old Earth treats its women as subservient, they have no female ambassadors, but Angelo and Vincent are gay—or "gentle"—and though they are shunned by the dictatorial government they serve, they're the only negotiators acceptable to the Amazonian rulers. The two men arrive ostensibly to return stolen art, a show of goodwill that will hopefully reopen long-stalled diplomacy between the two governments. In truth, they have been sent in an effort to secure, by any means necessary, the secret to the mysterious power source that runs Amazonia. Playing the deceitful powers against each other, however, Angelo and Vincent are really working toward an agenda of their own, one that will decide the fate of humanity itself. Like the best of speculative fiction, Bear has created a fascinating and complete universe that blends high-tech gadgetry with Old World adventure and political collusion. (Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)
And here's a starred review from Booklist:
Despite the scandal that clouded their last job together, AIs [they're not AI's--Bear] Michelangelo Kusanagi-Jones and Vincent Katherinessen have been reunited for a diplomatic mission to New Amazonia. Their ostensibly peaceful mission involves returning priceless art to previous owners, but they've also been sent to find out the secret of New Amazonia's seemingly inexhaustible supply of energy. One of them is planning to ensure failure, which will be a blow to the Coalition and also the terrible assessments of the AI governors. New Amazonia challenges them, for while its gynocentric society, though not completely beloved by all, makes their maleness a handicap, their relationship, which is illegal back on Earth, is the only thing that allows them to be diplomats on New Amazonia. More than human politics are in play here, though, for the city, which was left behind by an unknown nonhuman intelligence, has secrets to hide. Bear's exploration of gender stereotypes and the characters' reactions to the rigid expectations of a world of strict gender roles proves fascinating, as does her exploration of political systems gone too far in more than one direction. Her sense of pacing and skill with multifaceted characters prone to all sorts of confused motivations and actions also enrich this action-packed, thought-provoking story. Regina Schroeder (Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved)
And here's some random praise:
"Bear has a gift for capturing both the pleasure and pain involved in loving someone else, particularly in the acid love story between Kusanagi-Jones and Katherinessen. While these double-crossed lovers bring the novel to a nail-biting conclusion, it is the complex interplay of political motives and personal desires that lends the novel its real substance." — Washington Post Book World
"Another great adventure of ideals, prejudices and consequences by one of the brightest new minds in speculative fiction." — Mysterious Galaxy
"Fans of C.J. Cherryh, Liz Williams and Karin Lowachee will find much to admire in this mix of space opera, feminist utopia, spy thriller and yaoi tale. It’s a unique blend from a young writer who seems determined to extend her limits with every new book...The Machiavellian back-and-forth, plotting and counterplotting, is unpredictable and exciting, and we get a rich diet of ambushes, duels, kidnappings, escapes and poisonings." — SciFi.com (Yaoi!?! Oh, heck, at least they liked it.)
"Carnival will appeal to those who like hard science fiction, and are willing to invest some time and brainpower into learning what makes these characters tick ... along with their machinery." — The Davis Enterprise
"Beautifully designed... one has to stop and admire the sheer scope of creativity evidenced here...I look forward to seeing where Elizabeth Bear will take us next." — SFSite.com
The Undertow cover copy looks like this:
A frontier world on the back end of nowhere is the sort of place people go to get lost. And some of those people have secrets worth hiding, secrets that can change the future–assuming there is one....
André Deschênes is a hired assassin, but he wants to be so much more. If only he can find a teacher who will forgive his murderous past–and train him to manipulate odds and control probability. It’s called the art of conjuring, and it’s André’s only route to freedom. For the world he lives on is run by the ruthless Charter Trade Company, and his floating city, Novo Haven, is little more than a company town where humans and aliens alike either work for one tyrannical family–or are destroyed by it. But beneath Novo Haven’s murky waters, within its tangled bayous, reedy banks, and back alleys, revolution is stirring. And one more death may be all it takes to shift the balance....
And I finally have some reviews to excerpt!
Booklist says:
Novo Haven, a floating city on Greene's World, is a place people go to to escape. Andre Deschenes is a very good assassin but wants to branch out into conjuring, manipulating probability, and changing odds, if he can find someone willing to teach him. The world is controlled by the ruthless Charter Trade Company, which knows of more undercurrents flowing in this backwater than it wants to acknowledge: mining is eroding the native population, the ranids; the material being mined is no ordinary substance; and mining operations are destroying the planet. No one in the company wants to admit that the ranids constitute a civilization, though there are those who want the ranids freed of their servitude to the Company. One such is Lucienne Spivak. When Andre kills her to fulfill a contract, the gears of revolution start turning. Bear's perfectly paced story features fascinating characters, complex plotting, and brilliantly imagined aliens. Thought-provoking as well as entertaining, it further demonstrates the strength of Bear's storytelling. Schroeder, Regina.
Paul Di Filippo, at SCIFI.COM, says:
Bear's very neatly configured, compact and entertaining novel reminds me of the early novels of George R.R. Martin, back in the days when he used to write science fiction. Or, in a closer approximation to this book's exact blend of readability, action, speculation and characterization, let me cite the prime mid-career work of Poul Anderson. Excluding its postmodern trappings of wiredness (a trope that's well done, actually, convincingly showing us people who are used to being always online), this book might have come from the pen of Anderson during, say, the time he was writing The People of the Wind (1973).
Bear's ranids could stand in for Anderson's winged aliens. She digs into their culture—with several sections written from ranid point of view—with anthropological care and gusto. Her human characters are all proactive doers in the Anderson mode, not given over to angst or anomie. [spoiler redacted] But they're not insensitive dullards, either. It's just that Bear's concerned with keeping all her plates spinning in a surprising, vibrant manner, not with any kind of Weltschermz. And at this she succeeds admirably.
Which is seriously high praise. (Hi, I love Poul Anderson.) And Carolyn Frank, for SFRevu, says:
The biological/ecological perspective is addressed in detail, with in-depth descriptions of the watery world and the native ranids, a highly credible extrapolation of known environments and associated fauna. The space travel and interplanetary communications are the more typical science fiction forms, needed for the plot and accepted on their own terms. The two areas of science combine to form a rich palette, with which the author paints an intricate tale, weaving the paths of the major actors into a truly enthralling story.
I love good reviews. I love bad reviews, too, as long as they're smart.
Meanwhile, Alma Hromic, at SF Site, liked it a great deal:
This one's a doozy.
Elizabeth Bear does an extraordinary job of juggling a dozen balls -- political mayhem, exotic tech, ethical dilemmas, probability magic, cultural milieu, social interactions between both HUMAN friends, enemies and rivals and ALIEN ones. She creates a beautifully coherent world, and exhibits the true storyteller's gift of creating truly alien aliens -- because she understands humans so well.
Finally, NPR's Rick Kleffel, reviewing Undertow for the Agony Column (scroll down for the review), says:
As much as we may like labels and similarities, genres and movements, the best stuff falls right between the cracks and often lands on the paperback racks. There's something about that little mass-market paperback original that can really spark your interest. It's a nostalgia thing, to be sure. Most of us start our book buying days at the paperback racks, because a kid selling ice cream floats to people who walk down the street on a hot summer day isn’t pulling in the kind of money required to buy hardcovers. If you want to read, then at the outset, at least, reading comes first. Format comes later, when income becomes disposable and you've got shelves to put all those books on. But first, you just want the pages, and in a form you can shove in a pocket, purse, or backpack easily. Bantam Dell has been doing this for decades, and they've not stopped yet. So when you see a copy of the new novel by Elizabeth Bear, 'Undertow' (Bantam Dell ; August 7, 2007 ; $6.99), you can ask yourself how you might have felt back in the day, seeing say, 'Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?' by Philip K. Dick on the racks. Might have looked a bit trashy. And it might one day be collected in the American Library as a literary classic.