Alex Wells (1)Rezensionen

Bikers in space. Union revolution on a mining planet. Witches with planetary powers. Hard-bitten heroine with a heart of gold... no actual wolves.

I think it's a space opera, and it's full of grit. I liked it, I'm not sure I want to look for the sequel yet because it was a bit of a commitment to read, and i have a strong suspicion that some of the characters I like are going to perish. Merde.

Gritty and funny and weird with really fantastic characters and fascinating world building. Will definitely read more of the series, and I recommend it if you've read/liked the short story And You Shall Know Her by the Trail of Dead by Brooke Bolander. Also if you're a fan of Gideon the Ninth, I think you'd like Hob a lot.

I love this series. I read this on the treadmill and it was perfect for losing track of time. The characters are fantastic, and the winding way the plot spills out from their different perspectives was really satisfying. It's bloody and suspenseful, and the countdown worked super well as a framing device, while still letting moments of love and family shine through the gritty bits. UGH. It is so my jam. I would read a zillion more books in this series/by this author.

While still solid, the flow of this sequel just didn't pull me through. Also, my next-to-least favorite conflict is people against the company. Too close to real life these days, except the people aren't fighting. The setting was unpleasant but well invoked and the character remained the strength of the story.

A great read, an intriguing world and characters who I hope to see again!

Give me union politics in a corporate dystopia and set it on a low-tech planet with conflicted fire witches and you're off to a good start. Add in found family, with a focus on healing an estranged sisterly relationship and I've poured a cuppa and settled in for the ride.

And what a ride it is. Because space westerns are fun, dammit. It’s a joy to see familiar Wild West tropes repackaged and served up as the plot careers from one set piece to the next: expect a doctor to be snatched (bonus: he’s actually a trainee horse doctor vet), a train job to be staged, and lawmen with a secret agenda. About the only thing that was missing was a high-stakes card game (but hey, I’ve not read the sequel yet).

This could be a pitch black tale – not least because our protagonists are anti-heroes at best, who aren’t above doing objectively terrible things – but it’s told with such panache it feels more like a romp.

Full review

THIS BOOK IS SO GOOD I WANNA SCREAM

Seriously. SERIOUSLY! My 2018 reading has started with a GIANT AMAZING BANG.

I picked this book up on a whim and I'm so glad I did. This book is EVERYTHING I LOVE all at once, a SciFi/Western/Fantasy romp through a strange and fascinating world where labor, politics, bandits, technology, and found family all intersect.

Hob, the MC, is AMAZING. She is a powerful, reckless woman who never once demeans other women. She has a deep and abiding friendship with another woman, Mag, who is also powerful in a different but no less important way. There's very little (almost no) romance. Violence against women is threatened but it's never graphic, never violent-just-for-shock-value. The characters are all treated with an immense respect by the author; they act in ways that make sense, and even when they screw up it's real and you understand why. There's grittiness here but it's balanced by a tough, deep-running love for family, friends, fellow workers, and the planet itself.

I can't recommend this book enough. If you like westerns, sci-fi, weird worlds and weirder magic, found family, complex and compelling women characters, and a galaxy of mysteries and conspiracies, this book is for you.

NOW I NEED THE SEQUEL

Here are things I look for in books

-Good queer rep
-Diverse characters who aren't tokens or stereotypes
-A well-built, carefully-thought-out world that walks that fine edge between too much info and not enough
-Characters who are friends, who have real connections with each other, who have different but equally important relationships with different characters
-No all-consuming romance
-Romance that ISN'T the usual cis straight girl-meets-boy story
-Characters acting the way real people act
-Girl characters who are allowed to be wrong, who are allowed to be messy without being condemned for it
-FOUND FAMILY
-No gratutious, Game-of-Thrones-esque torture porn violence for violence's sake. No worrying constantly about character deaths that exist only to SHOCK READERS
-An author who cares about their characters and trusts their readers


"Blood Binds the Pack" fulfills my wishlist.

"Hunger Makes the Wolf" was an amazing, amazing book filled with lovable messy characters. "Blood Binds the Pack" takes you right back to those lovable messy characters AND MAKES YOU LOVE THEM EVEN HARDER.

Hob is amazing. Mag is amazing. They are both amazing in different ways and they are presented as equal, their different strengths and skills and weaknesses presented without judgement. They are allowed to mess up and make things right. They are allowed to get angry and to be forgiven. And "Blood Binds the Pack" gives you more of an insight into secondary characters who become more important to the story--especially Anabi, who I loved so frigging hard.

My one critique is that I feel like the end leaves a lot of loose plot strands dangling but I hope that just means we're going to get another book, and another trip into Hob and Mag's world. I for one would even sit next to a Weatherman if it meant I could return, although I'd be sure NEVER to look him in the eye.

I really loved Alex Well’s space punk, biker, science fantasy novel Hunger Makes the Wolf. It was truly one of a kind, involving so many different elements yet forming a seamless whole. I’m happy to say that Blood Binds the Pack is a fitting sequel.

Note before I dive into the review — this will contain spoilers for Hunger Makes the Wolf. Also, the books are best read in order and I don’t recommend reading Blood Binds the Pack first.

Hob and Mags have dealt a blow to TransRift, destroying one of their Weatherman. Of course, the next one is now bound for Tanegawa’s World along with orders from corporate HQ to throw everything they have at obtaining more of that strange blue mineral found by Mags’s father. And as always, TransRift sees the miners as tools to be used and disposed of in pursuit of the profit margin. Hob and Mags may have won the last battle, but the war is just beginning.

However, they may have some possible help. Shige’s received word that a government inspector is being sent to Tanegawa’s World for the first time ever. His orders are to make this as bad as possible for TransRift… of course, Shige’s general approach is “the ends justify the means,” so it’s questionable whether or not he’ll be helping or making things a heck of a lot worse for Hob, Mags, and the workers.

At the beginning of each chapter is a number counting down how many days until the inspector is supposed to arrive on the planet. As the number drops, tensions rise. About half way through the book, I was having serious trouble putting it down. Mags and the miners start organizing a strike and TransRift is NOT taking it well.

Labor rights is an issue threaded through the book. While science fiction takes place in the future, it of course tends to reflect the problems of our present and past. The dire future laden with corporate abuse Wells creates is hardly unimaginable (or even that original when it comes to sci-fi futures), but Wells gives it an unique flavor. For one, mercenary bikers! Hob’s biker crew is pretty great, ya’ll.

I want to reiterate how much I love Hobs and Mags. Hobs is that tough-to-the bone sort of female protagonist, no nonsense, a straight forward badass. It’d be easy for her to be a stereotypical Strong Female Character, but Wells gave her enough development to be well rounded and distinct. It helps that Hobs (and the other characters) all have such distinctive voices. Mags is a quieter sort of character but no less memorable or powerful. Something happened to her in the TransRift labs last book, and she’s beginning to experiment with her own witchiness. Also, I was totally right! Mags gets a romantic subplot with another female character. I was thinking it would happen, and I’m so glad Wells proved me correct.

I don’t think I talked about it enough in my review of the first book, but I love the strength of Hobs and Mags’s friendship. It’s undoubtedly the most important relationship in a book, which makes a nice change from the preponderance of romance being put on a pedestal about friendship. It’s unfortunate that female friendship is so rare in science fiction and fantasy, but I’m planning to recommend Hunger Makes the Wolf to counteract that.

Blood Binds the Pack is a fantastic follow up to Hunger Makes the Wolf. I think there’s room for a third book if Wells ever wants to write one, but the two books could also stand alone as a duology. Regardless, I’m going to read whatever Alex Wells writes next.

Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.

I received an ARC in exchange for a free and honest review.

Fun. An interesting blend of science fiction and fantasy. Future fantasy maybe?

Humanity expanded slowly using generation ships, and the lag is such that each colony was independent. However on one planet Tanegawa's World (history not given) Transrifts Inc discovered/made/patented technology that allows travel through "rifts" by skilled "Weatherman" pilots. So now there is a human system government and life is generally easier all around. However back on Tanegawa life is still very harsh. Transrift have managed to evade compliance with any government employment laws and have absolute control over their workforce living in small mining and farming communities. The threat of 'blacklisting' someone so that they can't earn a living sufficient to keep everyone in line.

Or nearly everyone anyway. There are always rebels on the outskirts, and in this case the current largest group are the semi-honorable mercenary Ghost Wolves, an electric motorbike gang living out in the dust. They eke out a living doing odd jobs for the towns, and a bit of raiding against the company. Their leader is the cantankerous 'Old' Nick Ravani, and the one thing shared between him and our protagonist is 'witchiness' or what the company terms, unacceptable biological contamination - an ability if manipulate elements, both can control fire to a limited amount.

The book opens when his youngest protege Hob, finds the corpse of Nick's brother Phil attracting eagles out in the desert. Hob know that Nick will want revenge and goes searching for clues as to why he'd managed to come to the company's attention. It happens that's Phil's daughter, Hob's estranged ersatz sister Mag, had been planning to escape Tanegawa and start a new life outside of company control, but she'd tripped the 'contamination' detection at the spaceport, which meant all of her family were suspect too. Hob contact's The Bone Man - a more native and witchy person than usual - and attempts to rescue Mag leading to a greater than usual degree of hostility between the company and the natives. The rebels also learn more about the company's alternative to the natives - the Weathermen, who are the sole source of pilots and interact with the world in an unexpected manner.

It's all quite clever. The opening is a bit jerky as we jump between a few characters and a few flashbacks and cryptic hints setting the backstory, but once action settles down to Hob it's good fun. Fast moving, a good banter between the rebels, and reasonable actions from the company who aren't just evil. Interesting to see where the story will be going in the next installment.

I’m not sure how I found this book, but I’m so glad that I did. It’s a kick ass science fiction story with a great world and two female leads who are both strong in their own way.

Tanegawa’s World is a company planet, controlled by TransRifts Inc, which has a monopoly on interstellar travel. Those blacklisted by the corporation tend to wind up dead. Yet some resist the might of TransRifts. Hob’s a Ghost Wolf, a mercenary biker troop that does what TransRifts won’t. They’ve run under the radar of the corporation, never directly challenging them. Then Hob finds the body of her adopted uncle out in the desert, shot in the back. The reasons are unknown, but the culprit is clear. And worse than that, his daughter and Hob’s best friend, Mags, is missing.

I’m going to start with my favorite thing about Hunger Makes the Wolf: the ladies. I live for SFF books where there’s multiple, well rounded female characters who work together. Mags and Hob give me all this and more. They’re best friends and sort of adopted sisters, but their relationship has been strained the last few years, with Hob refusing to talk to Mags. Despite that, Hob immediately leaps to rescue Mags when she discovers she’s missing. And while Mags may start out as a damsel in distress, she quickly proves she’s much more, all without picking up a weapon.

I love Mags’s characterization so much, and I’m so happy that Hunger Makes the Wolf shows that there’s multiple ways for a woman to be important and interesting besides the mold of Hollywood’s Strong Female Character. She succeeds based on grit, intelligence, and empathy, not based on physical prowess. While I love a good Action Girl, I love it even more when we get a diversity in roles for female characters. Plus, I get the feeling Mags might be queer! I’m not willing to call it canon quite yet, but I sense romantic potential between her and another female character…

As it currently stands, there’s no romance in this series. However, I’m betting that both Mags and Hob will gain romantic plot lines in the sequel (tends to be true for most books). I already talked about Mags, but I also get the feeling that Wells is building up to something between Hob and a character called the Bone Collector. Which brings me to another point…

Hunger Makes the Wolf might be most accurately described as science fiction fantasy. You see, it’s got magic. Or, well, witchiness as it’s called in the book. Over the years that TransRifts has controlled Tanegawa’s World, they’ve periodically instituted witch hunts, and they continue to turn the residents against anyone who shows signs of being a “witch.” Hob knows she’s a witch — she can make fire burn from her hands, and she’s had visions of a phoenix. But what does being a witch mean? What can she do with her power? And what’s so special about Tanegawa’s World that makes people develop witchiness?

There’s clearly something special about Tanegawa’s World, something that makes TransRift care a whole heck of a lot about keeping it under tight control. As a setting, it worked wonderfully. So vivid that I was immediately transported and with plenty of mysteries to keep me reading. I really enjoyed the feel of the gritty, corporate run mining towns, which had more than a little Western vibe to them. Western/Fantasy/Science Fiction mashup would be an apt description of Hunger Makes the Wolf! Putting it like that, it sounds like the book could be clunky or overwhelming, but it never was. Hunger Makes the Wolf is a seamless whole.

I had a hard time putting this book down, and it made me stay up later than I’d intended! At heart, this book was just a ton of fun, and I can’t wait to read the sequel. I’ve already started recommending it to friends, and I’m sure that I’ll continue to do so. This series needs more love!

Originally posted on The Illustrated Page.