Lowball - Wild Cards 22

Queen Of Clubs 

Lowball - Wild Cards 22
Edited by George R. R. Martin and Melinda Snodgrass
Tor Books ISBN: 9780765331953

Warning: Very slight spoilers if you are
a regular reader of the Wild Cards series.

Wow. 28 years since I first started reading them and 22 novels in, the Wild Cards series of mosaic novels are still continuing to be published and this one, released towards the end of 2014 in its original hardback form, once again demonstrates that, despite the changing characters and scenarios inherent in a lot of different writers of different lengths of association with the series, there’s certainly no drop in quality. Lowball is a real page turner which has left me clamouring for the next novel in the series to find out what happens next... released sometime this year, or so it seems.

This one picks up with a lot of the same crew from the police station at the heart of Jokertown and from which the title of the previous book in the series, Fort Freak, was taken (and reviewed by me here). Like the majority of the volumes in the series, this one comprises lots of short story episodes by various writers but, once again, they are all working towards the same climax. Four of the narratives - Those About To Die, Galahad In Blue, Ties That Bind and The Big Bleed, are much longer stretches but they are all split into multiple installments and dotted between the other sections, used as both connective tissue and the main narrative path to the final showdown of the book between... oh, I’ll kinda get to that in a while... and as a kind of gathering of all the clues and adventures which are leading the book to its dark conclusion. Or lack of one, depending on your viewpoint.


This one is a deadly game and has real life parallels. Remember those awful ‘bum fights’ videos which were being sold illegally a few years back? Where tramps were made to fight for the purposes of gambling and selling dodgy videos? Well the plot line of the story is a parallel hooked right into that. Various Jokers are going missing from the streets of Jokertown and it’s up to the newly promoted Detective Frank ‘Franny’ Black to figure out what’s going on when the troubles are brought to his attention by Wild Cards regular Father Squid, the priest whose character dates all the way back to the third Wild Cards novel Joker’s Wild. Father Squid has enlisted the aid of Black Tongue, the deadly Joker hero from the previous novel but, by the time anyone in Fort Freak are taking the crimes that seriously, Father Squid and Black Tongue are also victims of the kidnappers, who are forcing Jokers to fight in gladiatorial combat for high stakes bets and for bootleg videos.

As usual, the novel features a whole load of characters from the entire history of the Wild Cards series, either as full on inclusions in the plot line...  such as Rusty, Drummer Boy, fan favourite Croyd Crenson (aka The Sleeper) and the aforementioned Father Squid... cameo appearances such as Dr. Finn the Centaur or Jube, the alien posing as a Walrus faced joker on Earth (Goo Goo Ga Jube... get it?)... or just as mentions/references by other characters... like Fortunato, Dr. Tachyon or The Great And Powerful Turtle. If you’re picking up one of the Wild Cards books for the first time on this one then, obviously, all these little nods to the past won’t mean a heck of a lot to you but, to long term readers of the series, it’s like catching up with an old friend and hearing about acquaintances long lost again... bound to bring a smile to the face.

While the novel is a lot of the usual fun and full-on barrage of beautiful little ideas that this series is best known for by its fans, there’s also a sense of urgency and almost desperation to the tale as it hurtles full throttle to its painful conclusion. A couple of regular characters from the series are... well, presumed lost (not necessarily dead... it’s a bit complicated to explain without giving away spoilers) and, given the series’ propensity to hemorrhage main characters on a regular basis, I’m already very much mourning their loss in the Wild Cards universe.

That being said, I was still expecting something of a wrap up to the story and, while it’s true, the climax of the novel when a very, very small cavalry rush to the aid of the Jokers, is absolutely taut and full of blood n' thunder, nothing prepared me for the ending of this tome which suckered me right into an epilogue which I thought was going to bring closure but, instead, put me on one of the most horrible cliff hangers since reading Patricia Cornwell’s Scarpetta book Flesh And Blood at the end of 2014 (reviewed here). Now the cliffhanger is taut enough but what it implies to me is that, the next book in the series is going to be positively dripping with the blood of the regular characters before I even open it up... soaked into every page if what I’m guessing is happening comes to pass. Now, it may not be true that I perceived the ending quite right because it’s been a very long time since I read the books in the series dealing with a specific character but, if I’m right, regular readers of the series who haven’t read this yet will want to look away from the next line after this...

... possible spoiler warning...

... I might be wrong or misinterpreting the last paragraph or so but it looks to me like The Astrologer might be back... which will be the biggest single threat to the world of the Wild Cards universe - Aces, Jokers and Nats alike - for a good few decades.

End of spoiler...

So yeah, I absolutely cannot wait to find out just what happens next in the volume scheduled for 2016 called High Stakes. Meanwhile, if you’re a fan of the books then Lowball is another absolute classic. Like the others in the series, the fragmented nature of the contributions in no way diminishes the flow of the story and absolutely every segment feels like it belongs as just the next part of the story and, as usual, every chapter is a winner. So if you like the Wild Cards universe then you need to grab this one while it’s still around (given the fragmented nature of the series’ release from various publishing houses over the years). If you’re not a regular reader... well you’ll still love the Wild Cards universe but I’d advise you to start from the very first ones and work your way through. The rewards for long term readers in terms of post modernistic referencing and the entertainment gleaned from that are... not something you'd want to miss out on.

Wild Cards Vol. 21: Fort Freak

Like Them On Acebook

Wild Cards 21: Fort Freak
Edited by George R. R. Martin
Tor Books. ISBN: 9780765325709

There’s something about picking up the latest Wild Cards book that always feels like I’m getting reacquainted with an old friend I’ve not seen in a while. Like just a couple of people I know, I first got into the Wild Cards mosaic novels (lots of writers contributing short stories or sometimes just chapters to talk about one specific story arc or series of events, depending on the tone of the volume in question) when the first in the series arrived back in 1987. Now the publishing history of these books have made them very hard to stick with for most people (I’m the only person I know who still reads them) because it’s been, well, pretty erratic to say the least.

With the original “cycle” finished after the first twelve books, or so we all thought, even the second half of that initial run could only be bought in imported US editions. Then with multiple publishing companies, large gaps between these so-called cycles (which are just all continuations of the same alternate reality anyway) and the next ones and also gaps between individual titles, including an ultra rare volume which only shelved a very, very short time (a week maybe?) and with only 600 copies printed before the publishing house of that one went under (and which had a crucial link between different generations of Wild Cards explained)... it’s no wonder some of the original readers (at least the ones I know) didn’t stick with these (I bought my copy of that particular single-writer volume from the writer himself, his last spare copy, on ebay and he was good enough to personalise it for me).

Still, having said that, they’re now back in the habit of publishing one new mosaic novel a year so there must still be something of an audience for these out there. I’m very glad because the Wild Cards novels never fail to move me and the warmth of the collected writers always shines through.

Set in an alternate reality where the adventure hero Jetboy failed to save the human race from the alien Black Queen virus back in the forties (Jetboy’s famous last words were, “I can't die yet. I haven't seen The Jolson Story”), the stories deal with the lives of the surviving population of the planet who are, since that fateful day, split into three groups: nats (unaffected), Aces (superpowered heroes) and Jokers (deformed mutants, some of whom also have powers). There are also “deuces” and “suicide kings” but I won’t go into details here... discover all this stuff for yourself.

This volume is a collection of interpenetrating stories from the Jokertown police precinct and mostly features brand new characters and the two linking stories in this involve a snake powered joker inadvertently the target of corrupt Jokertown cops and a Ramsheaded police sergeant, Leo, who has a few months left before retirement and he’s delving into an old, unsolved cold case from the 80s in his spare time. This story also features a cameo from Bubbles, one of the new generation aces recruited by the government from the Big Brother style reality show American Heroes (covered in more detail in the last four novels in the series) but readers who have been with the series a long time will be interested in the inclusion of some of the characters from the past.

A part of one of the investigations taking part in the Jokertown museum obviously allows for references to such past characters as Doctor Tachyon, Golden Boy and The Great And Powerful Turtle... but in addition to this there are a couple of very minor appearances from Jube, the walrus bodied joker newsstand guy who takes his name, presumably, from The Beatles’ song I Am The Walrus (you know... goo goo ga jube) but who long in the tusk readers might recall is actually an alien masquerading as a joker. There are also much more meatier and recurring roles throughout the novel from fan favourite Croyd Crenson aka The Sleeper, originally created by classic scifi writer Roger Zelazny for his stories and chapters in the original opening novels and kept alive as a character by the writers long after Zelazny’s death... and some very significant inclusions by two characters which a lot of fans of the series will appreciate.

Father Squid, the squid faced ex-soldier priest who founded the principal Joker cathedral in Jokertown is back and his history has been added to. I won’t say too much but he turns out to be very linked in to Leo’s investigation of his cold case, the slaughter of everyone (almost everyone) in a Jokertown diner decades in the past. You’re going to be heartbroken, but also guessing the extent of Father Squid's involvement in this case until right at the end, long after you think you know the answer. A warning for long time readers though... it’s pretty heavy.

More heartbreaking, though, is a character devoted fans will know as The Oddity. The Oddity used to be three people... one of the three’s “card turned” (a euphemism for the emergence of the previously dormant black queen virus), as the stories always went, when the lady and two guys in question were having a sexual threesome and their bodies and minds fused together to make one, hard to look at and painful to move, abomination and self proclaimed vigilante protector of Jokertown, The Oddity. Only something bad is about to happen... another series regular, the chief medical practitioner of the Jokertown clinic Bradley Finn (who also happens to be a centaur) discovers that the reason The Oddity has been going a bit “haywire” just lately is because one of the three people inside his/her personality has fallen victim to Alzheimers. Something must be done and Finn has the solution... but it’s a painful solution and fans of this character will certainly find one door closing and another opening in what may possibly be the final appearance of this character, at least in the way we’ve known The Oddity over the years.

As with all the Wild Cards novels, this one is incredibly well written and never forgets to inject the little details that make the world that is the background for these stories come alive in your mind’s eye. It also never forgets that all the characters have a warm, beating heart and these books are always a bit of an emotional roller coaster ride. You may think the genre format of these things doesn’t allow for the kind of warmth and emotional hit you’d get from novels in other genres but you’d be very wrong and certainly don’t let that put you off delving into the Wild Cards universe.

If you’ve never read a Wild Cards novel before, do the smart thing and seek them out from their very beginnings (a major reprint of the novels is already underway) and read them before some smart TV producer finally realises what an excellent set of mini-series' these novels and characters would make (I’m still keeping my fingers crossed that some day we’ll see a Chrysalis action figure on toy shop shelves). If you’re already a fan of this series, however, then you certainly won’t need my recommendation to tell you to pick this one up in a hurry. It’s another triumphant piece of literature that truly exceeds any genre limitations perceived by people unfamiliar with these kinds of stories. Truly another artistic success.