Catherine Fisher

Incarceron is one of the most beautifully written and descriptive books I have had the opportunity to read this year. The story is woven in a way that pulls you in so deeply, that even if you don't always grasp exactly what's going on at the moment, you still feel like you NEED to know what happens. In a world filled with so many predictable plots, Incarceron really glowed for me!

First off, I was enamored with the thought of a sentient prison. A prison that has a personality, one that can show more modify itself at a whim to keep its prisoners in check, what could be more horrifying? One of the things I love most about the genre of Speculative Fiction is the innate fear of technology that pervades it. Authors share with us worlds where technology is given so much leeway, that it ends up ruling us all. This prison is encompasses everything I love about the world of Speculative Fiction.

We follow Finn, a prisoner in this high tech prison, through his daily life and his plans for escape. I loved Finn. I felt so much more him throughout the entire story. A character capable of deep thought, constantly at war within himself to remember a life he may have had. A character who knows who he wants to be as a person, but is forced to mold himself differently in order to survive. Finn was the type of character that made me want to finish this story. I was invested in his fight, and I wanted him to succeed!

Completely different, but also so interesting, was the world of Claudia and Jared. "Protocol" brought an interesting spin to their world, trapping it forever in the Victorian Era. It was fascinating watching them play through this time period over and over each day, while around them technology was ever present in odd and hidden places. That, and I adore Claudia deeply! Her stubborn, stoic and intelligent demeanor really helped drive me through confusing parts of the book. I was always anxious to see what she would do next, since Claudia gets what Claudia wants.

Overall I think Incarceron is a fabulously written story! I admit at times it does get a bit heavy on description, and perhaps a little confusing, but in the long run the read is completely worth it. I found myself so immersed in vastly different worlds of Claudia and Finn that I was sad when the book ended. Long story short? I cannot wait for Sappique! show less

Sometimes, it’s all about an escape from reality. A good book, like a good movie, does not need to have a deeper purpose or meaning. It does not need to bring up questions about life and existence and our purpose here.

Sometimes it can just be a fun ride through the tunnels of imagination.

And that is what I think of when I reflect on Relic Master, Part 1, which is actually two books combined into one volume: The Dark City and The Lost Heiress. Now, if you take a look at titles like The show more Dark City and The Lost Heiress, and you think you’re going to be diving into something with the depth of Schindler’s List, well … I don’t know what to tell you.

As for me, I did not expect much. And I got a fun ride out of it. Relic Master is the first in at least a 2-volume series about Galen Harn, a relic master, or keeper of ancient artifacts that hold extraordinary powers, and his 16-year-old pupil and apprentice, Raffi. In their world, Galen and Raffi used to be part of The Order, a type of government that has been destroyed and replaced by The Watch, evil warlords and soldiers who definitely form your prototypical military society. Galen and Raffi, always on the run from The Watch, whose main purpose seems to be destroying any remnants of the old Order, are searching for a way to restore Galen’s powers to him – powers he lost in an accident before the book’s opening – and, along the way, assimilate a crew of unusual sidekicks: first, the Sekoi, a cat-like creature with a penchant for gold and immersive storytelling, and second, Carys Arrin, a Watch soldier in training who was sent by her superiors to capture Galen.

Adventures abound as this unusual cotillion of heroes works their way towards the ancient city of Tasceron, where their world was founded and many relics belonging to their deities are rumored to lie hidden. And among the usual arrows, swords, and ambushes, the heroes have to fight against their own personal issues with trust, loyalty, and faith along the way.

As I said, a fun ride. I was especially impressed with Fisher’s imagination and her use of mystery. It is pretty obvious from the get-go that these relics Galen and Raffi are charged with protecting are old pieces of technology – at one point she describes a “device” that is surely a digital wrist watch – so while the premise of the story sounds like fantasy, there is a question: is this science fiction? Is Anara, the world in which Galen, Raffi, the Sekoi, and Carys inhabit, an off-shoot of Earth? And if so, what happened here? The characters refer to their gods as The Makers, and they believe the Makers created Anara and then left, taking the knowledge of creation with them. Hence the question of faith the characters all face in their own way: what do you believe about the reality of your world? Galen and Raffi believe the Makers are gods; Carys believes it’s all hogwash. And there are just enough crumbs dropped in this first volume to let you, as the reader know, the truth is somewhere in the middle.

If, as I suspect is the case, Anara is a colony established by humans in the years of super-advanced technology (in a time when chips and machines can be implanted in your brain that enhance your abilities and give you “powers”), then Fisher has done a superb job setting that up as the big reveal. And I think it is highly creative as well. Not a world that coincides alongside our own, as in the Harry Potter novels, but a world that exists long after our own and in such a way as to form its own mythology and reality around itself.

I love it! show less

Catherine Fisher on top form, technically, gives us a story about a bargain for a teenaged girl's soul. Inspired by Dr. Faustus and the alchemical quest to create gold from base metal, this story's primary strength is its characters. They are flawed, sympathetic, real. Indeed I think this is Fisher's great strength as a writer; her protagonists are completely convincing human beings. (Fisher has used all sorts of mythic and religious inspirations; classical Greek, ancient Egyptian, Celtic, show more Arthurian and Norse for example and has generally come up with an interesting twist or interpretation - this is no exception.)

The ending became predictable too early but you certainly wouldn't have guessed it at the halfway point where everything takes a surprising turn for the more interesting.

I met Catherine Fisher once and she told me that she chose the name Lord Azrael for a character in this book, only to read Northern Lights and find Pullman was slightly ahead of her in using the name - it was too late to change it, though, and it does suit the character. show less

I really need to read this more often because my God, I forgot how awesome this book can be. With the current influx of dystopias and romances and steam-cyber-punk in YA right now, it’s refreshing to find a book that has all of these elements and manages to be refreshing and interesting and damn enjoyable.

A lot of people are quick to label this a steampunk book, and while there are steampunk elements (specifically in the Incarceron scenes), it’s really…not. There’s elements of show more dystopia with the Protocol in Claudia’s world wherein the surviving population is forced to live in a Renaissance-inspired culture while keeping certain elements of technology to the side. (Although while I was reading it, I kept imaging the Protocol-culture to be more along the lines of pre-Revolutionary War France, especially given some of Queen Sia’s outfit descriptions and the general unrest with the rest of the population.) There’s cyberpunk, whenever Claudia and her mentor Jared have to figure out where the location of Incarceron is in their world and use holograms, as well as Incarceron itself being an shining example of ‘A.I. is a Crapshoot.’ The world-building is a little loose at times, mostly with the set-up of how this world came to be and how everything works with the Protocol and the original intent of Incarceron. Every chapter heading does fall under this, as it alternates between writings of the original Protocol outlines, the songs and legend of Sapphique, and how the prison changed over the years, but there’s very little info that we can glean from this. I would have really liked more information on Sapphique—we get a lot of his stories through the stories that GIldas relates, but I wanted to know more about how widespread these stories are. That said, the setting of Incarceron is very well done—one of the features of the prison is that it’s continually changing, and it comes across very well. Both settings are elaborately detailed, and Fisher really brings across the nature of both worlds in her writing. I like how Incarceron starts off as the dark, dank prison of eviiiiiiil, but as Finn and his group travel throughout the prison, there’s such a different atmosphere as they get closer to the supposed exit.

Finn’s not the most engaging character, as he’s kind of passive. He does have goals to figure out who he really is, but a lot of his actions are determined by “Well, this happened, so I’d better go and do this.” He is a very loyal character, but he’s not perfect. He can be manipulative to his own ends—not to the extent of Keiro, but the scenes with the Maestra does show that Finn has to think on his feet a little bit. I do wish there could have been more to him, especially with his relationship to Keiro and why he’s a Starseer. Keiro’s pretty much Finn’s polar opposite—he’s narcissist prick, but is still loyal to Finn and keeps an out for him. Attia was also a really good character, but of the four prisoners, she’s the second-least developed character. There’s definitely more to her character that doesn’t get explored (and I have a theory that she’s the Maestra’s daughter; I need to reread Sapphique in the near future).

I freaking love Claudia. She’s very much set up to be the spoiled brat (to the point where Keiro and Attia refer to her as ‘Princess’), especially with her motivations for finding Giles/Finn and releasing him from Incarceron. But I like that she does also think of what having the real heir on the throne means for the rest of the kingdom. She’s intelligent without being a know-it-all; like Finn, she’s manipulative, but uses it to her own ends; she has moments of badassery, and she’s knows whenever she could be wrong. One of the big plot threads is the idea that maybe Finn really isn’t Giles, and Claudia acknowledges this fact that, yeah, she could be wrong, but she doesn’t know and it’s worth taking a chance. Toward the end of the book, her obsession gets a little too much, but I really do like her character. Also, she has fantastic chemistry with her mentor Jared; not a romantic one (which is brought up in text by Caspar), but they have a great surrogate parent-child relationship.

The other secondary characters aren’t as well-developed characteristically as the main cast, but they’re still surprising and rounded. Claudia’s fiancé, Caspar, is the spoiled prince who drinks and gambles and sleeps with anything, but he realizes this and lives it, just because he can. The Court feels restrictive and backstabbing. Also, no one is stupid, and if they are, most of the time, they’re just acting stupid for the later reveal of “Yeah, I know what’s going on.” (Claudia has a great ‘oh crap’ moment when her father reveals that he knows she’s been in his Observation Room.)

Aside from a fairly rushed ending and a cliff-hanger ending, I love this book. It’s so much fun to read, and keep guessing with the different turns of the plot. Some of it’s a little predictable at times, but there’s enough doubt and herrings thrown in to keep you guessing. It is a fantastic read that needs more love. show less