Will Sargent reviewed Banner of souls by Liz Williams (Bantam Spectra science fiction)
Review of 'Banner of souls' on 'Storygraph'
1 star
I had a hard time reading this book. It's one of the few science fiction books where I couldn't hold my suspension of disbelief.
Forget the haunt-tech bringing the spirits of the underworld back to life to serve in machinery. I'll buy that, I'll buy a time travelling 9 year old, I'll buy that all the males are dead and that people on Mars believe that they colonized Earth rather than vice versa.
But. This is a civilization which can jump from Pluto to Earth, and they don't have ubiquitous e-mail. Or cellphones. Or anything resembling a police force that would like to notice these interesting characters running around with guns. Not are there barely any characters surrounding the protagonists, there's barely a sense that the world reacts to their presence. It's a backdrop.
And looking at it more closely: what in this story had any science behind it, or …
I had a hard time reading this book. It's one of the few science fiction books where I couldn't hold my suspension of disbelief.
Forget the haunt-tech bringing the spirits of the underworld back to life to serve in machinery. I'll buy that, I'll buy a time travelling 9 year old, I'll buy that all the males are dead and that people on Mars believe that they colonized Earth rather than vice versa.
But. This is a civilization which can jump from Pluto to Earth, and they don't have ubiquitous e-mail. Or cellphones. Or anything resembling a police force that would like to notice these interesting characters running around with guns. Not are there barely any characters surrounding the protagonists, there's barely a sense that the world reacts to their presence. It's a backdrop.
And looking at it more closely: what in this story had any science behind it, or any kind of scientific thinking? You could transplant this story very effectively into a Lord of the Rings type setting and be none the wiser -- the ghosts would still be ghosts, the one dimensional warriors would still be one dimensional warriors, and the kind nursemaids, the plucky young girl with mystical powers and the evil monsters would all be exactly intact. And it would be more believable.
Anyway. The plot is forgettable, the characters hackneyed, and the world ridiculous. Apart from that, it's great.