Fortune's Pawn

I read this book several years because I love military science fiction and thought that this would be a good one to jump into.

It honestly wasn't. The premise was interesting, though I thought it weird that no one was questioning why a cargo ship always seemed to be getting into all sorts of peril and deadly danger. Of course, the book reveals why - Because the captain is secretly working for the government and doing missions under the guise of being but a humble trader, selling his cabbages or whatever. - but it's just weird that nobody like “WTF?”.

What really bugged me is how under-armed the main character is. Her whole goal with serving on The Glorious Fool is to rack up the required years of experience so she can apply to join an elite special forces unit. But despite the Fool's rep, Devi only shows up with three weapons:

1. A plasma shotgun that can only fire a few shots before it's battery is drained (though it does double duty as a club)
2. A handgun that fires big armor piercing bullets, but with massive recoil (that can break arms if you're not wearing powered armor when shooting it).
3. And a blade coated in white phosphorus...that can only be used for 180 seconds before the fire has to be extinguished, less the phosphorus turns the blade brittle.

I know that it's probably dumb to criticize a book because of that, but I mean...come on. Devi is serving on a ship with a rep like the Fool's and she's only packing three weapons, two of them basically worthless?

For a character that's supposed to be a kicker of ass, Devi sure ends up on the wrong end of the ass whoopings. Almost every fight scene ends with her getting wrecked (or rekted, as the internet likes to say) and having to be rescued. I don't think her chances getting into that elite unit are looking good.

As for the romance, it was rather bland from what I remember of it. A Hallmark Christmas movie does romance better than what this book did. I didn't realize that there even was a romance element when I started reading and still wasn't 100% sure mid-way through.

I don't know, I might re-read this book soon and see if my opinion has changed in the six years since. As of right now, Fortune's Pawn is sitting somewhere between a 2.5 and a 3 stars.

[b:Fortune's Pawn 15790894 Fortune's Pawn (Paradox, #1) Rachel Bach https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1375610325s/15790894.jpg 21512449] is good space opera with a real kickass heroine. The main protagonist, Deviana Morris, is a professional mercenary. She is ambitious, focused on her job, and very aggressive. She takes a job on a trouble ridden trader ship, the Glorious Fool, because she thinks it will get her noticed by the Devastators an elite special forces group she wants to join.Devi soon discovers that the ship deserves its reputation as a danger magnet. The action is fast and violent and Devi is pushed to the limit of her abilities and sometimes beyond on multiple occasions. In addition to the action, mysteries start piling up. Most of them remain unresolved in this story, but I assume they will be addressed in subsequent books in the Paradox series.There is also a romantic element in the story (Devi is pretty aggressive on the sexual front too). This seemed out of place at first; however, by the end of the book the sexy bits proved to be integral to the story (so, OK then).All in all a fun read.

I'd planned on starting off here by saying, “there are shades of Ann Aguirre's Sirantha Jax books here, but just shades.” Then listing off a few other things this reminded of. But I abandoned that because that list was getting too long – and I don't want to paint Bach's work as totally derivative. Which I never thought about until I started thinking about it – it feels like any number of SF (and even Fantasy) worlds, yes, but Fortune's Pawn is it's own world. The fact that it feels familiar just allows the reader to skip all the world-building, all the “this is how we travel great distances without taking generations” stuff, etc.; and just cut to the story.

Devi Morris is a mercenary with ambition and dreams – she's got her eyes set on joining the elite of the elite and will whatever it takes to get there, as fast as possible. Which leads her to a tour on a notorious ship – its activities may not be the most legal, and the security forces on it see more action than anyone else. But when she's done, she'll be light years' closer to her goal. Along the way, she gets to do what she loves – drink more than a little, chum around with the ship's cook, berate her partner and bust a few heads. All in all, just what she's looking for.

Naturally, things don't stay that way – things get mysterious, spooky and even pretty impossible. Not so fun for Devi, lots of fun for the reader.

The supporting characters are interesting and well drawn, the universe that Devi calls home is familiar enough for comfort, distinctive enough to be interesting. There's some humor, some good fight scenes, odd alien races/manners, a splash of something like romance, pretty much everything you'd like in a novel. The major plot complications that show up at the end are more than enough to get me eager for the second volume of the trilogy – and, most likely, the third.

Although it might seem (at least to those who know me only via my reviews) that my primary hobby is reading, I also play a lot of video games. In fact, were it not because of video games, I???d probably get through a lot more books a lot faster than I currently do. But I enjoy playing video games, have done so since I was eleven and was first handed a Nintendo Game Boy. I progressed from there, playing on a Sony Playstation, then a Playstation 2, then an Xbox 360, and most recently to a desktop PC.

One thing, however, has remained constant: the kinds of games I play. I???ve always preferred to play RPGs???role-playing games???that were often long, involved stories wherein the player took on the role of a character in the game, and progressed through the game???s storyline as that character, often assisted and accompanied by other characters, and fighting against a whole variety of antagonists. I started out with Final Fantasy VII on the Playstation, and moved on from there, expanding my repertoire from the rather linear JRPGs (Japanese RPGs) to the broader ???open world??? RPGs that are currently favoured in the video game industry: games like Elder Scrolls: Skyrim and the Assassin???s Creed series.

Video games don???t tell stories the same way books or movies or TV shows or comic books do, though: one necessarily considers not just the ???video??? aspect of the word ???video games???, but also???and sometimes more importantly???the ???games??? aspect of it. But video games are no different from books and movies and TV shows and comics in that, since they???re a kind of storytelling, they must adhere to certain requirements that are important to any kind of storytelling, regardless of what medium it comes in. This means that video games, but RPGs especially, need to have a good cast of characters, a good plot, and a decent thematic base. And, like books and movies and TV shows and comics, video gams can come up strong in certain aspects of storytelling, and weak in others.

One of my favourite examples of the above is Bioware???s Mass Effect series. Set in a far-flung future, where humanity has advanced to a space-faring civilisation after discovering advanced alien technology on Mars, it follows the story of Shepard (who can be male or female, depending on player preference) on their missions as a Spectre, a member of an elite group of soldiers who go around the galaxy going on missions that are too sensitive or too dangerous for members of the regular military or police force. Along the way, Shepard interacts with members of other races, tries to play politics, and find out what, precisely, the Reapers are, before they become a very real danger to the galaxy.

So far, so sci-fi: nothing about the above is foreign to fans of science fiction, and indeed, a great majority of Mass Effect???s fans were drawn to the game (as opposed to its sister series, Dragon Age) precisely because it was sci-fi. It wasn???t entirely perfect, of course: there were portrayals of female characters that most feminists found objectionable, as well as dialogue and in-game choices (both in terms of their lack, and in terms of their presence) that made people chafe because they presented sci-fi stereotypes that they found objectionable (often with good reason). With a new Mass Effect game coming out soon, featuring a new protagonist, there are high hopes that the thematic issues plaguing the original trilogy will have been resolved.

For my part, I can afford to be patient: I???m not completely happy with the Mass Effect series as it stands, but I do have something to fill in the gap while waiting for the new series to come out???thanks, as always, to Hope: Rachel Bach???s incredible Paradox series, which starts with the novel Fortune???s Pawn.

Fortune???s Pawn opens with Deviana ???Devi??? Morris getting out of bed after a very good night with Anthony, a friend with benefits she met while she was with the Blackbirds, the most famous private armored company on the planet Paradox. She???s just told him she???s quit the Blackbirds in order to avoid getting promoted to a desk job, and is now looking for a new opportunity to prove herself so she can join the Devastators, the elite armoured guard who work under the direct command of the Sainted Kings of Paradox. Anthony then tells her about one Brian Caldswell, who???s just arrived on Paradox looking to hire mercenaries as security detail for his ship, the Glorious Fool. Devi???s about to turn the offer down, but when Anthony mentions that those who survive a full tour aboard the Glorious Fool are fast-tracked for Devastator status, Devi decides that she???s got nothing to lose and everything to gain. She heads off to the ship, fully determined to the join the crew, and manages to do so. What follows is everything that Devi did not expect while walking around in circles on a merchant ship: strange crew members, even stranger destinations, and extremely deadly adventures that convince Devi that she???s in for a lots of fights, explosions, and maybe even death.

One of the chief standouts of this novel???and of the series???are the characters, especially Devi. She???s an unapologetic, in-your-face go-getter who doesn???t take no for an answer unless it???s a direct order from a superior. She knows what she wants, and she knows precisely how she???s going to get it, and even though it???s going to hard and very dangerous, she doesn???t care. That sort of characterisation is nothing new, but what makes it special, in Devi???s case, is that she???s a woman. Most of the time, one sees that aggressive go-getter personality in male characters, so to see Devi characterised as such is a lovely, wonderful thing indeed.

Even better, though, is that Devi actually changes, develops as the novel progresses and she interacts with the other crew members of the Glorious Fool. The core of who she is doesn???t change???she???s still hard-headed and courageous to the point of foolhardy sometimes???but the way she views other people, human or otherwise, gradually changes as she gets to know them better. That???s proper character development, and I very much look forward to finding out how she grows in the later novels.

The other characters are equally fun to read about, and even better, stand out in their own right. My particular favourite is Hyrek, the xith???cal doctor of the Glorious Fool. The xith???cal are a lizard-like race, generally described as very warlike, and therefore a threat, to other species that encounter them. Even worse (at least, to non-xith???cal), they eat their dead enemies, and even their own kind. Initially, Devi has some very deep-seated prejudices against the xith???cal, not least because she???s had to fight them quite frequently during her time working as a Blackbird, and probably even before that. Over time, however, she sheds some of that prejudice as she spends more time with Hyrek, learning that the xith???cal aren???t as deadly or disgusting as she first thought???or at least, not all of them. Hyrek is also unique in that he???s a xith???cal who stands outside of the traditional gender-divided structure of xith???cal society, because he???s chosen not to have any gender at all. Why this is important is explained in the novel, but it???s one of those instances wherein Bach shows she???s capable of constructing a very alien race, instead of having aliens who are just humans gussied up with prosthetics and body paint (a flaw many sci-fi writers are trying their best to correct???or not, as the case may be). Another character I have a special fondness for is Nova. She???s part of a group called the ???Unity of the Cosmos???, people who don???t live on planets, but on isolated space colonies. Devi views her, initially, as one of those hippie-dippy, we-are-all-one-with-the-universe types she (and many readers, I???m sure) would normally dismiss out of hand, but over time Nova comes into her own as one of the nicest, most genuine people on the entire ship, maybe in the entire series. This has mostly to do with the way Bach writes Nova: she doesn???t treat Nova???s beliefs as funny, or make Nova an object of fun in any way; rather, Nova is used as the counterbalance to all the other personalities on the ship, the one shining light of true goodness and peace in a rather darker crew.

There are other characters of course, like Ren, Caldswell???s daughter; Basil, the navigator; Mabel, the engineer; and Rupert, the cook, but I won???t talk about them too much here, partly because they haven???t been very well-developed yet, and partly because doing so would give away far too much about the plot. Suffice to say that they are interesting and fun, and will prove very important in the later books.

And speaking of the plot, it has got to be one of the most fun I???ve read in a good long while. It???s a very fast-moving plot, but never once does it feel confusing. It does slow down, from time to time, but it???s the slowing-down one might encounter in a good action movie: a breather before something very, very big happens. Bach also has a very good sense for how to use atmosphere in order to immerse the reader further into the plot: a good example of this is the scene when Devi and her partner, Cotter, are sent to investigate a dead xith???cal tribe ship. There is a lot about that particular moment in the novel that reminds of the movie Alien in all the best ways; this is actually unsurprising, since Bach herself admits, in a brief interview in the novel???s ???Extras??? section, that she drew a great deal of inspiration from the movie, not just in terms of plot, but also in her characterisation of Devi.

But what I think Bach is really very good at is handling twists and reveals. When something is revealed about a character or a plot point, I found it very, very hard to stop myself from from squirming and actively talking to the book (and myself)???indeed, I had a hard time keeping a relatively bland expression at the office, because all I wanted to do was grin from ear-to-ear every time something warranted it. My liveblogging Twitter account is full of caps-locked, keysmashed exclamations because of how very excited I was by what I was reading: probably the best indicator of how much I liked the book, especially given how often I swore at the thing in paroxysms of excitement and anger (the good kind).

Overall, Fortune???s Pawn is an extremely fun novel, and a great opening to what promises to be an amazing series. The characters all stand out, but Devi is something special indeed, and I look forward to reading about her growth in future novels???as well as all the other ways she can get into trouble, because a woman like her doesn???t stay out of trouble for very long. I also look forward to finding out what else is going on in the larger, overarching plot of the novels, because the ending to this one, while it closed the book just fine, just left more questions than answers, and I cannot wait to find out more.

Now, I need to get to Honour???s Knight as soon as possible, because if I don???t, I just might pop from not knowing what happens next.

DNF - PG 61

Why?

It kills me to do this, you know, but it's gotta be done and said. You see, I love Rachel Bach's fantasy series she writes under the name Rachel Aaron, so I thought there was a good chance I'd at least like this book.

I didn't.

Reason #1
Devi Morris is a narrow-minded, bigoted bitch. I might like some people that are bitches, but not the kind that can't seem to see past their own nose. Perhaps she get's better - I just know that when I wanted to slap her for her narrow-minded ways twice in ten pages, I was done.

Reason #2
I don't like the writing style to urban fantasy books. I've never known if that or the stories themselves were the reason that genre wasn't for me. After reading this book - proclaimed as being sci-fi written like UF (to make it more accessible or some such) - I believe I've had the question answered. I don't like that writing style in UF and I don't like it any more in sci-fi. (Now, if you are a UF fan and want to get into sci-fi, this might be the book for you.)