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A review by timinbc
The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes
2.0
Meh. I only finished it because I was hoping there would be explanations - and I was disappointed.
I won't classify this as science fiction at all; borderline fantasy, because the House is essentially a Magic Mirror.
If you expect your murder stories to include repeated, loving descriptions of knives and intestines, you can check that off. If you expect the Hollywood movie older-guy-younger-girl-gradually-drawn-together, yep, it's here.
Plus one: thorough research on several areas covered. Maybe a little too thorough, because as so often happens there's a bit of shame-to-waste-this-I'll-put-it-in.
So, back to the House, which may have been telling Harper to do things (assuming Harper still has a shred of sanity). I mentioned that it's essentially a Magic Mirror. Now, put those together and let's say that the House is inhabited by a trapped evil wizard. NOW you've got a five-star story.
The afterword suggests that Beukes simply wanted to write a time-travel story. She put some work into it, but it might have been better to read more previous stories to see what other, expert writers have done with it. As others have noted, this novel could have been written without the time travel.
I never quite got why Harper felt the need the distribute the various, er, let's call them mementos, wherever he went. There were some temporal anomalies, never explained.
I wanted to know why the House existed, and how. The explanation can be the silliest handwaving, but gosh darn it, an author has to try. Just tell me it's a spillover from a dimension where magic works, or something. In the afterword, Beukes mentions wormholes, but that's well-explored ground (as is magic) and authors have to respect what's already out there. It's the only one? It links vastly-separated parts of an infinite universe ... and it's used to let one deranged psycho wander around stabbing people? Nah. Wormholes are for moving galactic battle fleets, and reaching distant civilizations.
I can allow the ending. We knew from about page 10 that there'd be a showdown, and there'd be a "you can't go in there alone!" and someone would nevertheless go in there alone, and so on.
In the end, there's a decent enough story here except that it's totally missing How and Why.
I can only guess that those who liked just wanted to get on to the next gory stabbing, and see if Kirby gets it on with Dan.
I won't classify this as science fiction at all; borderline fantasy, because the House is essentially a Magic Mirror.
If you expect your murder stories to include repeated, loving descriptions of knives and intestines, you can check that off. If you expect the Hollywood movie older-guy-younger-girl-gradually-drawn-together, yep, it's here.
Plus one: thorough research on several areas covered. Maybe a little too thorough, because as so often happens there's a bit of shame-to-waste-this-I'll-put-it-in.
So, back to the House, which may have been telling Harper to do things (assuming Harper still has a shred of sanity). I mentioned that it's essentially a Magic Mirror. Now, put those together and let's say that the House is inhabited by a trapped evil wizard. NOW you've got a five-star story.
The afterword suggests that Beukes simply wanted to write a time-travel story. She put some work into it, but it might have been better to read more previous stories to see what other, expert writers have done with it. As others have noted, this novel could have been written without the time travel.
I never quite got why Harper felt the need the distribute the various, er, let's call them mementos, wherever he went. There were some temporal anomalies, never explained.
I wanted to know why the House existed, and how. The explanation can be the silliest handwaving, but gosh darn it, an author has to try. Just tell me it's a spillover from a dimension where magic works, or something. In the afterword, Beukes mentions wormholes, but that's well-explored ground (as is magic) and authors have to respect what's already out there. It's the only one? It links vastly-separated parts of an infinite universe ... and it's used to let one deranged psycho wander around stabbing people? Nah. Wormholes are for moving galactic battle fleets, and reaching distant civilizations.
I can allow the ending. We knew from about page 10 that there'd be a showdown, and there'd be a "you can't go in there alone!" and someone would nevertheless go in there alone, and so on.
In the end, there's a decent enough story here except that it's totally missing How and Why.
I can only guess that those who liked just wanted to get on to the next gory stabbing, and see if Kirby gets it on with Dan.