Iceberg Ink Awards 2012!

Best Read of 2012

Scott

THE COLDEST WAR – Ian Tregillis

This book, the 2nd in the Milkweed Triptych Series, took the enjoyment I had for BITTER SEEDS, amped it up to eleven, made it grittily real, pushed it past the point of no return, and then beat me in the brain meatz until I submitted. This book was such an amazing accomplishment that I IMMEDIATELY picked up the 1st book again to re-read passages of it (while attending a noisy football game no less!). If the 3rd book (NECESSARY EVIL, coming in April) is even a shadow of this one, then we are in for a serious treat. Tregillis is the 3rd member of George R.R. Martin’s “Wild Cards” writing collective that I have read and adored. Methinks they might be onto something down in New Mexico.

Chris

GUN MACHINE - Warren Ellis

This book technically deserves consideration in next year’s ‘Best of’ post. But seeing as how I finished the book before starting this entry I feel fairly comfortable in being flexible with the rules here. As a writer Ellis has long been a favourite of mine through his comic book leavings. He crafts sardonic, intelligent and flawed characters across a backdrop of near-future science fiction. And while Ellis has been slowly disappearing from comics over the last handful of years, his emergence as a novelist ensures that I’m still able to get my fix of whatever madness is running through his skull. Ellis’ first crack at long form writing, 2008’s CROOKED LITTLE VEIN, read like a who’s who of his personal hobby horses roughly hewn together to create a single narrative line. With GUN MACHINE Ellis has polished his approach creating a more narratively driven story that still manages to reflect his own personal interests. While Ellis’ futurist sci-fi bent is largely absent throughout the story echoes of its passing can still be felt within the book. At times I found that Ellis was tapping into the same vein as William Gibson, offering an otherworldly or alien slant on reality that most people are completely oblivious too. One of the best indicators of what makes a book a best read is how quickly I consume it. Once I started GUN MACHINE I just couldn’t put it down. The story is fascinating and the characters compelling. (GUN MACHINE is populated with heavy living characters, full to the brim with unbridled wit and misery.) I’d give myself one chapter more before turning in for the night and find that each new chapter left me more excited and intrigued than the last. GUN MACHINE should come with a bottle of whiskey and a warning that you’re about to kiss the next few hours of your life goodbye. It’s a book so big that it will simply push everything else in your life to the periphery and demand your complete attention.

Best New Fantasy Novel 2012

Scott

COLD DAYS – Jim Butcher

Of course technically Urban Fantasy, this book was nonetheless the book that left me with the warmest fantasy feeling this year. I’m not going to go on and on about why Dresden Rulez (It does)…but sufficed to say that aside from this book giving me more Dresden goodness, it did a few things to catapult the series into the stratosphere and make my jaw drop and shatter on the ground. Brilliant. Throughout. Seriously, 14 books in and the Series is STILL getting better.

Chris

THE DEATH OF NNANJI - Dave Duncan

Sometimes you do get to go home again. Dave Duncan’s Seventh Sword trilogy (SST) is one of those rare fantasy series that actually had a lasting impact on me as a reader. First published nearly a quarter century ago the trilogy was an epic fantasy story, starring a contemporary hero and containing an almost sci-fi underpinning to the whole narrative. THE DEATH OF NNANJI picks up the story again, roughly 15 years after the SST. More of an extended coda to the original tale than unnecessary add on the story allows readers the opportunity to check in with their favourite characters one final time. There are no sacred cows in this story. Just because a character was ‘big’ in the original series is no guarantee they’ll make it through this final chapter intact. It’s this willingness to mix things up that keeps Duncan’s work so interesting and enjoyable to me. THE DEATH OF NNANJI is a rare opportunity for fans to check in with characters and a world whose canonical appearances had seemingly run their course. If you’ve never checked out the Seventh Sword trilogy now is the perfect time to run out and see what the fuss is all about. Duncan has created strong and moving characters whose fate you can’t get help but get caught up in and a world as rich and layered as our own.

Best New Sci-Fi Novel 2012 

Scott

THE STORIES OF IBIS – Hiroshi Yamamoto 

Released by its North American publisher, Haika Soru, this collection of short fiction connected loosely from tale to tale is nothing short of an emotionally packed, tour-de-force sci-fi that will flip every notion you have of a future where robots or A.I. rule the earth, instead of us, on its ear. I can’t say enough good things about it, and look forward to re-reading it down the line. Wonderful, Whimsical, and utterly engaging.

Chris

THE COLDEST WAR - Ian Tregillis 

I can and do quibble with some of the individual creative choices made by Tregillis in THE COLDEST WAR. But what I can’t do is argue with the overall impact of the finished piece. THE COLDEST WAR takes a hodgepodge of disparate genre motifs mixes them all up in a blender and then creates one of the most captivating pieces of revised historical sci-fi I’ve ever read. This is a generational story told over decades with characters who’s sharply distinct personal struggles will pull you into a ferocious battle for the fate of all humanity. An epic battle between the will of man and the bloodthirstiness of dark Lovecraftian gods WAR enters your brain like a drug and leaves you frantically counting the days until your next ebullient hit.




Best Author 2012

Scott

Ian Tregillis 

Because his second book affected me how it did, this goes to Tregillis again. He wins this for pulling out all the stops, twisting my mind every chance he got, for keeping EVERYTHING straight, and most of all…for making it all look effortless. All new authors should be looking to him for advice. He knows how to weave tales, and I’m in like Flynn.

Chris

Ian Tregillis

BITTER SEEDS and THE COLDEST WAR were two of the best books I read this year.
Period.
End of Sentence.
A future science struggle between the forces of science and magic set in and around the Second World War, what’s not to love? Tregillis spins a complicated cosmic level plot and roots it firmly in the blood and earth and guts of WWII. He gives us deeply flawed characters whose struggles and foibles provide fertile material for absolutely compelling storytelling. And he plays the long game, which is easy to do, but hard to do well. COLDEST WAR starts to reap many of the plot points sewn in SEEDS without telegraphing the coming harvest or connecting the dots for the readers as if they were children. I can’t wait for the closing book to this trilogy and see what else Tregillis has in store for me.

Best Graphic Novel / Comic Book or Series 2012

Scott

THE SIXTH GUN – Cullen Bunn & Brian Hurtt 

I initially got into the first trade and put it down finding it a tad not my bag….but Chris told me to give it another chance and once I did I was not only pleasantly surprised, I found myself snapping up the other existing 3 trades. GREAT weird West stuff! Better than anything the Big 2 are currently putting out.

Chris

THE SIXTH GUN - Cullen Bunn and Brian Hurtt

I’ve got a weakness for genre story telling. When a creator knows what motifs and themes to hit, and more importantly, how they can play about with those themes but still retain the essential character of the genre the ends results can be spectacular. THE SIXTH GUN is that that series. Part western, part old tyme magic costume piece this comic is genre story telling done right. For nearly 30 issues Bunn and Hurt have been note perfect in their story of six unholy handguns with the potential to cause hell on Earth. It’s an epic fantasy tale told through the prism of a grim and gritty western and I am utterly captivated by this comic on a monthly basis. The plotting, story, characters and art are absolutely phenomenal and lend the series a richness and vitality that you simply won’t find in 99.9 % of the other mainstream comic book offerings out there. Don’t be afraid if magic and/or westerns aren’t really your bag. If you enjoy good storytelling then you will enjoy this series.

Best Old Book Read of 2012 

 Scott

THE SILMARILLION – J. R. R. Tolkien 

I had said how I tried to read this a few times before and failed miserably. It isn’t just getting through it that pleased me though, it was achieving a level of understanding of Tolkien’s world that enriches ALL the other works he wrote…that’s why this award goes to Tolkien’s Elvish tome.

Chris

THE KING’S DAGGERS TRILOGY - Dave Duncan 

Although ostensibly billed as a YA companion trilogy to the King’s Blades stories I challenge anyone to read the Daggers’ books and find any appreciable difference in tone or subject matter to Duncan’s adult offerings. The Daggers’ stories should be viewed as a companion piece to the larger, more interconnected Blades’ tales. While the Daggers’ books do have a perfectly serviceable plot all their own, for fans of Duncan’s expanded universe like myself it’s interesting to have these books fill in some of the character beats in the ‘central’ story and poke around a bit in areas of Chivial that are only briefly touched on in the main books.


If you’re already familiar with the Blades books then you’re going to love what Duncan is doing here. If you’re not, don’t worry, the Daggers’ books are completely readable and enjoyable as a standalone tale. You’ll never feel like you’re missing out on a larger story. Once again, another Dave Duncan book I highly recommend. Feel free to slap on your shocked faces.

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And that’s it for this years Awards. I’m actually quite impressed at how may of my picks lined up with Chris’ picks. We normally don’t coincide or agree as much as we have here. I think we can unequivocally say that Ian Tregillis affected us on similar levels in 2012.

Book Review: The Coldest War - Ian Tregillis

Someone is killing Britain's warlocks.

Twenty-two years after the Second World War, a precarious balance of power maintains the peace between Great Britain and the USSR. For decades, the warlocks have been all that stand between the British Empire and the Soviet Union-- a vast domain stretching from the Pacific Ocean to the shores of the English Channel. But now each death is another blow to Britain's security.

Meanwhile, a brother and sister escape from a top-secret research facility deep behind the Iron Curtain. Once subjects of a twisted Nazi experiment to imbue ordinary humans with extraordinary abilities, then prisoners of war in the vast Soviet effort to reverse engineer the Nazi technology, they head for England.

Because that's where former spy Raybould Marsh lives. And Gretel, the mad seer, has plans for him.

As Marsh is drawn back into the world of Milkweed, he discovers that Britain's darkest acts didn't end with the war. And as he strives to protect Queen and country, he's forced to confront his own willingness to accept victory at any cost.

Last week I read what is definitely the best book I read in all of 2012. I thought I’d read something special when devoured Ian Tregillis’s first book in his Milkweed Triptych series BITTER SEEDS. Now, if I thought that was good then the second book, THE COLDEST WAR, showed the first book to be the opening salvo it truly was in what is an ever-twisting, addictive and endlessly readable series.

THE COLDEST WAR is quite an amazing feat. The premise of the first book (Battery-powered Nazi Superpeople going up against British Warlocks who summon Lovecraftian demons/gods in their defense through blood magic) is taken and not only expanded upon, but perfected. Here we have a volume that takes place 22 years after the first book. The Cold War is in full swing and Britain is attempting to find ways to circumvent the Soviet Union’s seemingly unbelievable secrecy and power, while maintaining Milkweed’s secrecy. Unbeknownst to them they have an informational mole and in the first chapter, someone with similar powers to the Nazi Superpeople from the first book is systematically hunting down British Warlocks.

Immediately you will be aware of the “generational” nature of this tale. Here we are dealing with events quite removed from WWII, the protagonists have aged, as have the villains and the world stage growth is also evident. Milkweed itself is no stranger to this growth, but in a way that is not conducive to protection. With 22 years and the deaths of the higher command in Whitehall, Milkweed is now run by those who were just children during the Blitz and there is now a lackadaisical sense about the place. Complacency if you will. Now, while they are still actively doing things to further the cause, it is unavoidable to see the lax nature in comparison to the blacked out windows and hush-hush secrecy of the 40’s. I enjoyed that aspect of the narrative, as it helps you feel the 60’s and how Britain recovered from the War. An interestingly enough the mystery (while a different one from BITTER SEEDS) is still so thick that you can barely see through it with a map. I loved that, as the twists, when the come, are fast, furious and hard to guess at. Tregillis masterly handles his suspense without sacrificing pacing.

Having the protagonists older and showing how their lives carried on after the War is key to the enjoyment to this book, but the biggest part of that is this was never a “Happily Ever After”. Both Marsh and Will carry scars that never healed and in some cases are still festering. Watching them begin to relive their years at Milkweed and the deeds that can be placed at each’s feet is as interesting and compelling to read than any of the mysteries in THE COLDEST WAR. There is a wonderfully bleak realism about the way these characters interact with each other and how the crimes of the past are revisited on them ten fold. Once that Pandora’s Box is opened there is seemingly no stopping it as the hits keep on coming. Marsh and Will’s relationship is developed further, but it’s actually on the tail end of some very serious rifts that began in BITTER SEEDS and bloom into full flower here and again it’s one of the best relationship-goes-sour I’ve seen in print. It all rings incredibly true. Every time one of the two contests something to the other; you can actually take a side without stretching your own beliefs. That in turn creates a number of very creative moral dilemma’s as well which only adds to the narrative.

Another aspect are the things that Marsh and Will don’t know about each other, the biggest thing being that Will has kept secret just how badly things could have gone in the end of the events of BITTER SEEDS had he not done the thing he did. It’s that aspect of his motivations for what he does in the 2nd book that Marsh is unaware of, and the tension that creates as we go along is palpable.

There is some foreshadowing in BITTER SEEDS about a major component of THE COLDEST WAR’s story, but even with that foreshadowing when the revelation came in this book I was taken unawares and the gravity of it made the hair on my arms stand up. It was absolutely chilling and I truly think that it’s probably one of the more creepy things I’ve ever read in a book.

The German’s in BITTER SEEDS, most importantly the men and women of the Reichsbehörde, in that book come across as evil tools of their creators, but it made them no less evil in their actions. But there was always the inkling that Klaus (at the very least) was not inherently bad, but rather just a victim of circumstance. That is developed further here when he and Gretel see London and Klaus becomes obsessed with how free everyone is to just “live their lives”. It’s something that he’s never had, and he wants it. In his past life as a Nazi Super-GhostMan he might have just taken it if he wanted it, but here the growth in him allows for him to accept that it is something he might have to work for. This is most evident in a desire to paint with watercolours, at which he has to start at the beginning and work at it every day to be good. People are kind to him for the first time, and I think especially his relationship with Marsh is specifically emotionally affecting.

Gretel is still utterly FASCINTATING. I could not wait for stuff to do with her on each page. She is an unreadable riddle most of the time. Is she evil? Mad? Good? Benevolent? Driven? Loving? Dismissive? Yes, she is all of these things and none fo them. She is the heart of this entire trilogy and yet she isn’t at the same time. Tregillis has infused Gretel as the blood that feeds his story, but she is not what pumps it. That is Marsh and Will.

The vaguery of the Eidolons themselves is still this omnipresent menace that while somewhat leashed in the first book, spends the first half of THE COLDEST WAR haunting the edges of the reader’s sensibility. The success of them as characters works because of the nature of them in this very oppressive, dark way that will give even the most stalwart reader the willies. I think any time they showed up in the story I had to prepare myself.

Now, the third act of this novel will most likely do to you all what it did to me so I’m not going to spoil it. At all. I’m not even going to give you the slightest hint. What I will say is that the dénouement in THE COLDEST WAR is probably one of the finest, cleanly assembled things I’ve had the pleasure to read. It made my jaw drop and I actually turned to my girlfriend who was sitting across the couch from me and I said aloud “Holy gods. That was phe-no-men-al.” in a very serious voice. Right to the last sentence. Gobsmacked. Impressed. Yes, I’m aware I’m gushing. This is a gush-worthy book. It’s the kind of novel I will tell my friends about and discuss after in hushed whispers so as not to spoil it for others. What’s even better? There’s a 3rd book coming in April called NECESSARY EVIL and will finish out the trilogy. I personally cannot wait for it. I put it on my pre-order list and I will disappear into a book-reading fugue the day it drops.

The best book of 2012. THE COLDEST WAR. I don’t care what you have to do to get your hands on this book. Beg, borrow, buy, read it in snippets over someone’s shoulder. Just go out and grab a copy today. And if you’ve not read BITTER SEEDS yet…what on earth are you waiting for?

Ian Tregillis’ Milkweed Triptych is an enthralling historical epic full of twists, turns, believable characters and stellar set-pieces. It’s got chills, spying and action aplenty, all executed with the type of prose in which you know that not only every sentence, but every word was chosen deliberately and serves a greater purpose.

READ. THIS. SERIES. NOW.

Happy New Years! Welcome 2012!

Hey Icebergians!

Well we are only a few hours off now from the beginning of another year. So from both of us (Chris and Scott) to all of you, we hope you have a safe and happy night!