Suicide Kings

Suicide Kings is the 20^th book in the Wild Cards universe. As one might imagine, there is a ton of baggage associated with being a part of long-running series. Fortunately, it is only the third book in the "reboot" of the series by Tor. Frankly, few of the characters in the new books can live up to the older ones, the ones who rarely appear in the current stories. Nonetheless, Suicide Kings is the final book in the first arc, a sound conclusion to a trilogy that make the shared universe accessible to readers who don't have the time or interest for the other 18 books.

One of the more fascinating aspects of the Wild Cards universe was that it did not start out contemporary with our own—books published in the 80s were about an alternate universe set in the 40s. This allowed the writers to expand on the alternity of the setting and the readers to revel in the historic changes: Castro pitching in major league baseball instead of ruling Cuba, for instance. But with the reboot, the books are firmly placed in the present, giving the writers a soap box from which to preach to their audience. And Suicide Kings is the most preachy of the Wild Cards books, dealing as it does with the horrors of children soldiers in Africa, including a postscript by editor George R. R. Martin rallying the readers generically to the cause. Fortunately, the preachiness mostly lurks in the background until that postscript, allowing the general strengths of the Wild Cards books to come to the fore—the characters.

(A quick background for those unfamiliar with the Wild Cards—in the 1930s, an alien race uses the Earth as a proving ground for a virus that has devastating effects upon those that are exposed to it. 99% of those affects draw the "Black Queen" and die immediately in horrific ways as their bodies undergo instantaneous transformation. 90% of those that survive draw the "Joker" and survive their transformations, becoming Escher-like manifestations of randomness: from transparent skin to having a squid's head for one's own to just about anything you could imagine. The remaining survivors draw an "Ace" as their transformations bring them superheroic powers. This setting allows a viable background in which superheroes can exist while also creating tensions that have driven the stories for decades.)

In Suicide Kings, the United Nations has sanctioned an international group of heroes known as The Committee to act in their behalf. The current hot spot is in Africa, where the People's Paradise has garnered support from the descendants of victims of colonization and are expanding across the sub-Sahara and towards what we know as Saudi Arabia. The Middle East is mostly controlled by a Muslim government called the Caliphate who feel they must protect the Muslims in the area that the People's Paradise are moving towards. The People's Paradise is supported by many aces, including The Radical, believed to be the most powerful superhero alive, someone with the powers of Superman and more. And while the People's Paradise espouses goals of equality and modernism for the formerly oppressed, The Radical is becoming unhinged because of a mystery that goes back to the 60s. His actions are becoming more and more violent, and the United Nations is trying to broker a peace agreement between the two sides in part to contain the ravages of the Radical. In an earlier novel, the Committee confronted The Radical and won a minor victory, but the cost of the lead-up to that confrontation and its aftermath was too much, and the Committee has become fractured.

The story follows individual members of The Committee—Wally Gunderson, Rustbelt, and Jerusha Carter, The Gardener—as they try to track down Rustbelt's lost pen pal in the People's Republic. The two make an unlikely team; Wally is a young man from Minnesota, not at all worldly and Jerusha is a savvy young woman of color that is looking for something to set her soul at ease. Wally has no idea of the peril he is walking into, his sole experience of Africa being the Tarzan movies he watched as a child, while Jerusha is all too aware as she takes on the leadership role in their partnership. The Gardener's power to control the growth cycle of all plant life is useful in Africa, while Rustbelt, a huge man with steel for skin and the power to rust any ferrous metals he comes in contact with, generally slows them down.

When they get to the People's Paradise, they find that the supposedly benign president is actually injecting children with the Wild Card virus in order to create his own ace army, thereby killing 99% of those given the virus and then also murdering any child who draws the Joker. The few resulting aces are then indoctrinated into his beliefs and led by The Radical, becoming violent and monstrous killers, weapons whose reach is usually greater than the target they are aimed at. Appalled at what they find and enraged by the discovery that Ally's friend is dead, they begin a crusade across the People's Paradise to put a stop to the slaughter.

Other threads wind about his central plot: an ace detective trying to figure out the mystery of The Radical, another ace having visions of a young child pleading for help in the People's Paradise, and a third ace using his special abilities to plot the downfall of the People's Paradise. As one might expect, all of these threads get wound together by the end of Suicide Kings, and a good bit of the draw of the story is how they are all brought together. Each character's story has been written by a different author, but Martin's firm hand as an editor makes the transitions between the segments fairly painless-it would be easy to imagine them all being written by the same author.

The Wild Cards books do not pretend to any sort of literary greatness, but their strength truly is in the characters and their interaction. Suicide Kings is no exception, featuring interesting studies in the humanity of those with great power, as well as those who have been abused by man and nature in truly horrific ways. The story is also a fun adventure yarn, denser than what might expect from stories based on comic book fare but not so deep as to lose readers. In other words, it's popcorn fare, escapism ratcheted up to superhero proportions. Suicide Kings may be penetrable if you've not read any of the other books, but it really does act as the third part of an arc and I would recommend starting with those first. And remember, the Wild Cards are soon to be a major motion picture, so you could impress your friends with inordinate geeky knowledge when the movie comes out.

Inside Straight

Last week I ordered and received nine new books from Amazon, with authors including Jay Lake and Iain Banks. It seems fairly indicative that of the nine, the one I first chose to read is the latest in George R. R. Martin's Wild Card universe. Originally begun in 1987, this shared universe captured (and captures) my imagination for a number of reasons. First, it offers an interesting science-fictional origin for superpowers. The Earth has been used as a test bed for an alien virus: 90% of those infected die immediately, 90% of the survivors become horribly mutated (a squid head or invisible skin, for some of the less disgusting examples), and the remaining 1% of the affected population become aces—exhibiting what we think of as superpowers. The second reason, closely tied to the first, is the extremely powerful and rigorous story-telling taking place in the series. I'm not sure how much oversight Martin himself has over the series, but someone has been guiding it with a steady hand for over two decades. The stable of writers has been awesome, including Roger Zelazny, and the characters and adventures in this alternate Earth (where Castro left Cuba and played baseball for the Dodgers, who never left Brooklyn, for example) are fully realized. And the third reason, again apparently closely tied to the first two, is that this series arose as an act of affection between players of an role-playing game. The camaraderie that the writers shared pervades the series; these people thoroughly enjoy their characters and stories. Nothing ever seems workmanlike and the books fly by, sometimes much to this reader's chagrin.

The books spent a great deal of time trying to catch up to their contemporary history, but Inside Straight finds the series in all-too-familiar alternative Earth. America seems totally infatuated with reality television, such that a new show, American Hero, is about to air, pitting 28 aces against one another to determine who…well, who does whatever it takes to win a reality show the best. The anthology of short stories moves back and forth among the contestants on the show, using their points of view to describe the challenges and voting processes. We find that the reasons for being on the show roughly parallel the reasons one might expect for any reality television, except that it is clear that some of these heroes want to make a difference in their world and the show is a first step to make it happen. There are, of course, a lot of folks on the show who only want the title "hero" to advance their personal goals, whether it be fame or fortune. Implicitly, this division of intent powers the action of the book, and only rarely does the difference come to a head. And when it does, it is often in reality show mode, in the form of a confession after a challenge has been completed and someone voted off the show. It's all a fascinating study of the nature of being a hero—something the series has long excelled at—taking up the same themes and examining them under a contemporary prism.

At the same time, in the background, a radical Muslim leader has decided to wage war against Egypt's jokers, in part because they just appear different and thus must be accursed by Allah and in part because a number of them worship "the Old Gods," jokers and aces who have taken on the aspect and some of the powers of the Egyptian pantheon. The Old Gods apparently never intended to be worshipped, but provided aid and succor to the jokers of the Middle East, such that those jokers' admirations crossed the line. The Old Gods also don't take advantage of this worship, at least not obviously, setting up camps and caring for those in need. But it is all too much for the Caliph, who also seeks to consolidate his new position after a murder within his ranks.

As should be obvious with this set-up, those two plotlines collide violently when the contestants in American Hero who believe in the power of heroism go to Egypt to try to put a stop to the government-supported massacre of the helpless jokers. And as in earlier books, no ace is immune to death, a distinct departure from the comic book genre from which the stories find their origin. Characters sacrifice themselves or even die stupidly, as one would expect humans to do—in distinct counterpoint to the comic clichés where most heroes that attempt to sacrifice survive and stupidity has no long-lasting repercussions. But what makes the series distinct is the voices of the characters involved in the stories, adding layers of perspective to the action taking place, and sometimes taking side-trips to unexpected places. The characters are individuals, no two completely alike, and we see them from the perspective of other characters as the various stories unwind. There are a few moments of disconcert where a character appears innocuous in some hands and inept in others. It's easy to pass this off as varying perspective, and when the conflicted character takes on the role of protagonist, those inconsistencies are fleshed out nicely.

Also part of the joy of the Wild Cards books is the imaginative powers the aces have. The primary narrator is Jonathan Hive, who has the power to dissolve his body into a swarm of wasps, all of whose perceptions become his own. The stunts that Hive performs reflects some of the best gaming scenarios I have ever been a part of, ones in which we drove the GM to distraction by completely thinking outside the box and ruining his well-laid plans with original solutions. Another interesting character is Drummer Boy, who is basically a walking drum set, complete with six arms to play himself. For most of Inside Straight, Drummer Boy is an ass, a stereotypical contestant on game shows. But when he takes over the storytelling, at the climax of the action, we get to see the confusion that drives the character such that the miserable situation he puts himself in is somewhat ameliorated.

The good news is that Inside Straight is the first of new cycle of Wild Cards book such that no previous knowledge of the Wild Cards is required. Some history is given in the backgrounds of the characters, but it isn't necessary to enjoy the stories. There are a few familiar faces, just enough to make me want to go back and reread all the books to greet old friends, but the new heroes offer something to look forward to as the series progresses. The writing remains crisp, even with some new writers taking on the challenge of their predecessors, and the characters are fascinating. I really look forward to the rest of the books in the cycle.

(Just one little complaint—the press information on the back of the book, that usually self-serving précis of the plot and quotes from admiring authors and critics, appears to be about a different book. The background established in the synopsis are only formed in the last few pages of the book, and some of the events described don't happen at all….)