Books: The Fall of Io by Wesley Chu (2019)

"When Ella Patel's mind was invaded by the Quasing alien, Io, she was dragged into the raging Prophus versus Genjix war. Despite her reservations, and Io's incompetence, the Prophus were determined to train her as an agent. It didn't go well. Expelled after just two years, Ella happily returned to con artistry, and bank robberies. But the Quasing war isn't done with them yet. The Genjix's plan to contact their homeworld has reached a critical stage, threatening all life on Earth. To complete the project they need Io's knowledge - and he's in Ella's head - so now they're both being hunted, again."

Much like the The Rise of Io, The Fall of Io is grand, goofy, action-adventure book that blends science fiction with thrills of old-fashion spies vs spies, with quick escapes and people doing sort-of magical things in pursuant of the goals of the plot (the mobilization of men and equipment seems to come together very fast here).

Wesley Chu remains great at creating interesting characters, with Ella being a wonderfully designed, complex, yet dumb heroine. A lot of her adventures seem overtly contradictory to survival when she is being perused both Genjix and the Prophus, but sometimes just watching blunder into her own issues is amusing.  Nice to see Roen back in action as well, as he remains my favorite character.

The further development of Io and her actions gets a back seat here, and the fighting between the alien and Ella becomes a bit repetitious and the book goes on way too long (both Shura and Roen’s team can’t seem to keep a handle on Ella, which seems rather odd considering the power both seem to have), but there is still plenty of humor and a lot of violence to get through to distract you from that fact.

While I faced walking pneumonia for the last week or so, I did complete this book in the last day, so it does have some great pacing. Which is good, because I’m so far behind in reading already for 2019.

Books: The Rise of Io By Wesley Chu (2016)

“Ella Patel – thief, con-artist and smuggler – is in the wrong place at the wrong time. One night, on the border of a demilitarized zone run by the body-swapping alien invaders, she happens upon a man and woman being chased by a group of assailants. The man freezes, leaving the woman to fight off five attackers at once, before succumbing. As she dies, to both Ella and the man’s surprise, the sparkling light that rises from the woman enters Ella, instead of the man. She soon realizes she’s been inhabited by Io, a low-ranking Quasing who was involved in some of the worst decisions in history. Now Ella must now help the alien presence to complete her mission and investigate a rash of murders in the border states that maintain the frail peace. With the Prophus assigned to help her seemingly wanting to stab her in the back, and the enemy Genjix hunting her, Ella must also deal with Io’s annoying inferiority complex. To top it all off, Ella thinks the damn alien voice in her head is trying to get her killed. And if you can’t trust the voices in your head, who can you trust?”

I will admit that I was hesitant at first to delve into The Rise of Io. I really enjoyed Wesley Chu’s Tao trilogy and I was worried that all he was going to do was reboot his series by just adding a female protagonist set in India. While I did find some of the early plotting of the story to be very similar his first trilogy, eventually the author won me over with Ella, a feisty, street-smart heroine. Her snarky attitude and just as often, her bullheadedness became the high-point of this new series. 

And Io is a complex Quasing who has made more mistakes in her long-time on Earth. In some ways, she reflects humans whom seem to make one misstep after another and thus begin to have conflicted loyalties. You root for her, and Ella, but as the story progresses you see that like many of us, she is the author of her problems. 

What I liked was Ella, a well conceived character who is flawed, but can take care of herself. She belongs to the new reality of modern science fiction writing where a diverse cast is all on equal footing. But while Ella does not really need anyone, including Io, she is still a human being. So under that tough exterior, that snarky dark humor, is a girl who has taken care of herself most of her life, who really does not care about the alien conflict going on around her, but who shines with pride when someone acknowledges that she is not helpless. 

A nice start, The Rise of Io is.

Books: Time Salvager by Wesley Chu (2015)

After three “urban” style fantasy slash science fiction novels that made up his Tao series, Wesely Chu gives us a science fiction novel about the future with time travel elements in Time Salvager.

And while Chu is very good at world building, there is a sense that this book covers too of the same tropes in science fiction we've seen so many times before.

Much like The Expanse series by James S. A. Corey (and many recent novels depicting Earths future) our planet of the 26^th Century is a mess, as Earth is dying, having been devastated by war, plague, and corporate tyranny. The planets and moons of our solar system is where many live now, and humans have encountered aliens. ChronoCom is a company that uses chronmen –essentially convicted criminals who pay off their debt to society by traveling back in time to recover resources and financial treasures from the past. If they survive long enough –too much time travel can kill you- you are set free. James Griffin-Mars is one such chronman. 

There are rules, of course. Every trip back must coincide with an end event, sort of like going back and “stealing” things that would’ve been destroyed anyways -so you can’t change history another words. And you definitely, most assuredly, cannot bring someone from the past into the future. But a trip to 2097 changes everything for James. There he meets Elise Kim, a scientist working on a scientific base that is about to be destroyed. While it’s destruction proved to be the catalyst for Earth’s dystopian fall, no one in the 26^th Century is actually sure how and why this place blew up. But in a brief moment of humanity (or that old trope of falling in love at first sight), James brings Elise into his world of mid-26^th Century. And while the media and his bosses are astounded at James breaking the number one law of time travel, this one action sets up a chain of events that puts the chronman and Elise on the run. For someone is willing to go to great strides to get Elise back. And it’s not because she holds the livability of Earth’s future in her hands. Okay, maybe just that.

While I love time travel stories and love Chu’s world building skills and his sense of humor, with Time Salvager (a start of new series it appears) I quickly realized that the book has major problems, not only with paradoxes that time travel incontrovertibly creates, but with the sense of déjà vu –we’ve seen this all before. What we get is a bunch of cobbled together set pieces that time travel and science fiction dystopian stories have a tendency to do these days, which is trying to out ape Philip K. Dicks Blade Runner type future, along with trips back to Nazi Germany (why the Nazi's?), descriptions of world events like the Big Brother Era, or the Artificial Intelligence Era (hello, Skynet) that all lead to Earth’s end. Chu also borrows a bit of themes from The Expanse series as well, with the Valta folks and their cartoon like villain Kuo. While I liked James, there was never a moment where I thought his desire to protect Elise did not have shades of creepiness to them. And Elise, whom I suspect was designed as kick-ass heroine, comes off less three dimensional than I would’ve liked. There were times I felt she was nothing more a fanboys wet dream. Meh.

Then, as the book unwinds, we discover all the lies of time travel (which is given its magical candy-like description) and the One Huge Time Travel Paradox that goes unexplained (perhaps in another book?).

I have to admit, it was a struggle to get through the book. Yes, his future is a bit unsettling. But we’ve seen it all before. I mean, if you’re going to write a tale that has been done a thousand times, at least add something new to it. Time Salvager just isn’t that.

Books: The Rebirths of Tao By Wesley Chu (2015)

When Wesley Chu's first book in this series, The Lives of Tao, proved to be a huge success in early 2013, publisher Angry Robot released the second book, The Deaths of Tao, in the fall of that year instead of early 2014, meaning that it would take book three, The Rebirths of Tao, a whole year and half before seeing publication. I noted that in my review back then that a delay may mean moving on. Not because I did not like Chu or this series, but because I would probably forget all that happened in book two. 

Which proved to be true. But since I was not going to go back and re-read the previous two books (listen, l want to read a lot of books and re-reading anything means it has to be special) I just plodded along until the author got me somewhat caught up in the timeline. 

"Many years have passed since the events in The Deaths of Tao: the world is split into pro-Prophus and pro-Genjix factions, and is poised on the edge of a devastating new World War; the Prophus are hiding; and Roen has a family to take care of. A Genjix scientist who defects to the other side holds the key to preventing bloodshed on an almost unimaginable scale. With the might of the Genjix in active pursuit, Roen is the only person who can help him save the world, and the Quasing race, too. And you thought you were having a stressful day."

The concluding arc to this series is well handled and Chu -very good at pacing and creating a believable world- also has a way with character interaction and dialogue. Tan Roen was always a great character, but with added bonus of a time-jump (right about a decade) we get a Roen and Jill's 16 year-old son Cameron and Marco, a British fighter who seems to have had too many adventures with Roen over the years, and they are always bickering. This, of course, leads to some great conversations. We also get a sweet potential relationship with Cameron and the daughter of the Genjix scientist whom is defecting. There is some great interaction here between her, Cam and Tao (who was once in Roen's body, but now resides in Cameron. Long story. Read the other two books).

Another good aspect of the time-jump is to add the geo-political aspects that come into play now that the world knows of the aliens. It's a fun James Bondian style adventure with megalomaniacs trying to end the world (and while that aspect is not very original, all can be forgiven due to other positive things about the this book and the series as a whole). I'm unsure if this series could be called "urban fantasy", which seems to me a new sub-genre that includes the works of Jim Butcher's (Dresdin Files) and Tad Williams (Bobby Dollar). Part of me hates this, because it clearly means that to find new readers of science fiction and fantasy, authors can no longer write the traditional ways of fantasy -no magical worlds- that it has to be set in our own reality so to speak. That this is the only way today's readers can accept a fantasy world is that it has to be set in the present. Then again, there is some truth to the notion fantasy and science fiction became to formulaic in the late 80s and 90s that lead to this current trend (though I think TimPowers has been doing this for years). 

In the end, The Rebirths of Tao brings it all to a satisfying end and yet I know Chu is setting up for another round -which I read begins next year, a stand-alone trilogy that begins with The Rise of Io. In the meantime, Chu returns to the bookstores this July with Time Salvager. 

And as I've mentioned before, I love time travel stories. 

Books: The Deaths of Tao by Wesley Chu (2013)

The Prophus and the Genjix are at war. For centuries they have sought a way off-planet, guiding humanity’s social and technological development to the stage where space travel is possible. The end is now in sight, and both factions have plans to leave the Earth, but the Genjix method will mean the destruction of the human race.

That’s a price they’re willing to pay. 

It’s up to Roen and Tao to save the world.

By far, The Deaths of Tao outshines its predecessor. Partly because most of the World Building that author Chu need setting up took place in the first book; this enables the story to hit the ground running.  Also, this is a deeper realized book, even though at times I felt there was too much downtime between the action set pieces. 

Chu has also created a good villain in the form of Enzo (with his Zoras Genjix). He’s basically every James Bond body guard to main Bad Guy–big, muscled, blond (or as they’re called Adonis Vessels) - but with a brain. And the human character is so arrogant and so consumed with what he’s trained to be since birth, you often times just wanted to slap the SOB for being so rash (which is a nice departure from fictional villains –he acts more than talks).

Unlike the first book, where we basically got only Roen and Tao’s point of view, this book opened the world to other viewpoints (plus, three years have passed since The Lives of Tao, which was a very interesting and creative way of setting up the back-story of Roen’s domestic issues coming into conflict with his duties to Prophus). But by doing this, we get a deeper and better view of how the Quasing’s have been influencing Earth’s past since the dawn of time. 

As noted, I do believe the book could’ve been whittled down a bit. Chu’s desire to show everything in great detail reminds me why I’ve put aside the George R.R. Martin Game of Thrones books –I get bored with all this ennui. I’m sure it’s important to the writer to show –in book form- how long training takes, but too much can slow down the book (even though I read this quicker than the first –but I admit I jumped around the page, finding stuff that I felt moved the story along).

Though, I’m guess, some find this detailed look into various martial arts history fascinating, I thought a time jump here and there would’ve made the story move even faster.

Finally, according to the author’s acknowledgements at the end of this book, The Death of Tao was moved from summer 2014 release to fall of 2013 due to the success of the first book. Which was great, because I could read them back-to-back, but does that mean book three will be out next summer or out in 2015? For me, such long delay between releases gives me a chance to move on to something else. And while I’m not the only reader on the planet, I am aging like an over ripe banana. I don’t have the time to wait and build that anticipation anymore. Next summer would be fine, but beyond that I may never want to read a book three if Angry Robot delays it until 2015.

Books: The Lives of Tao by Wesley Chu (2013)

“When out-of-shape IT technician Roen Tan woke up and started hearing voices in his head, he naturally assumed he was losing it. He wasn’t. He now has a passenger in his brain – an ancient alien life-form called Tao, whose race crash-landed on Earth before the first fish crawled out of the oceans. Now split into two opposing factions – the peace-loving, but under-represented Prophus, and the savage, powerful Genjix – the aliens have been in a state of civil war for centuries. Both sides are searching for a way off-planet, and the Genjix will sacrifice the entire human race, if that’s what it takes. Meanwhile, Roen is having to train to be the ultimate secret agent. Like that’s going to end up well…”

Tan is the heart of The Lives of Tao; he’s tubby, socially awkward to the nth degree, and unmotivated to change it. Roen, like many of us, is dissatisfied with being a cog in the machine that runs corporate America. But now that Tao is residing within him, the Chicagoian now sees an opportunity to change his destiny. 

But, as the saying goes, be careful what you wish for. Author Chu sort of forgoes the easy route of having Tan be a natural at his training. Instead, the young man gets beat up by all sorts people, including a senior citizen and a few women. His training takes up a good percentage of the book, even as Tao hands out the history of the ongoing civil war. There is a lot of humor here, as both Tao and Tan get off some great one-liners, but the author treats the women here –at times- by their looks. While the novel is geared toward men, I think women would get a bang out of it, but my be put-off somewhat by the fact that the women are defined first by their looks and then by their skill.

Also, the whole host thingy reminded me too much of the Trill on Star Trek, but nothing is new in science fiction. The books holds together fairly well for a debut and beyond a rushed ending, I enjoyed it.