Repulse: Europe at War 2062-2064 - Chris James

Historians, futurists, and sci-fi fans alike should like Chris James's new book, Repulse: Europe at War 2062-2064.

The novel opens with a bit of a sketchy tale about how this manuscript purportedly fell into the author's hands. Then it goes full-out into history mode, recounting -- from a vantage point nearly 80 years into the future -- the details of a European war that hasn't happened to us yet.

James has done a crackerjack job of world-building, imagining a future where technology is far advanced: medical nanobots make short work of battlefield injuries, brain scans of captured soldiers reveal the enemy's plans, and cities destroyed in battle are rebuilt in a matter of months. The bad guys in this world are a secretive Third Caliphate that intends to destroy the Christian infidels in a reverse Crusade. It's up to a scant few military geniuses to develop the tech necessary to beat back the threat.

The tone is dry, as befits a "history," but those who like reading about military strategy and gee-whiz technology should enjoy this book.

Stories of Genesis Vol. 1 - Chris James

Week 3 in my ad hoc holiday gift guide brings us to a volume of short stories. And why not? I mean, it's the holidays, for crying out loud. Who's got time to sit down and read a whole novel?

Chris James has subtitled his Stories of Genesis "A New Kind of Fan Fiction." He is not wrong. Authors have used song titles and lyrics as springboards for their own creative endeavors for generations, but I don't know of anybody else who has taken the idea to such a fascinating extreme.

The five stories in this collection all have their, uh, genesis in one or another of the songs by the prog-rock group Genesis. And each story has something to recommend it. "Mr. Magrew's Incredible Journey" is a sci-fi coming-of-age story about why, sometimes, it's better just to stay home. "The Chat Show" features a conniving talk-show host who is determined to advance his career, no matter what it costs. "One Regret" is about a dying man who contemplates going to his grave with the biggest secret of his life. "The Final Battle" is full-on weird sci-fi, set in a world where special forces battle the Eternal Sanctuary Man. But perhaps my favorite is "The Agent Lunges," a bit of metafiction in which a copyright agent harasses an author very much like James himself.

The real Chris James needn't worry about that; Genesis lead guitarist Steve Hackett has endorsed the book. So do I. And if you read these stories and enjoy them, I have good news for you: James has written two more volumes of Stories of Genesis.

The Cascade Annihilator (The Second Internet Cafe, Part 2) - Chris James

Lucas Hunter is back in this second installment of Chris James' sci-fi series, and he's still jumping back and forth between historical timelines. But see, that's his job. He's a dimension researcher -- someone who travels to parallel universes that have branched off from ours, to discover what might have been in our world if history had gone a little differently.

In the first book, The Dimension Researcher, Lucas ran afoul of a guy named Dietrich on one of his trips. Dietrich is from a timeline that would like to see the Second Internet Cafe shut down. In this book, Lucas and Dietrich cross paths again, but this time Dietrich is packing the ultimate weapon -- a cascade annihilator, which is a device designed to collapse realities and make alternate timelines disappear as if they had never existed.

While Lucas is chasing Dietrich across realities to thwart his nefarious plan, the Second Internet Cafe itself is under threat of defunding by the international coalition that operates it. Shutdown is imminent -- and that could strand Lucas in unfriendly circumstances. An analyst named Paula Featherstone gets involved in the fight to keep the facility open and its mission intact.

James knows how to build tension, that's for sure. The Cascade Annihilator had me on the edge of my reading chair for a good bit of the book. My one quibble: both Lucas and Paula tell their stories in first person, which is fine, but sometimes I had to read a little way into the chapter to figure out which "I" was narrating. However, it's not a fatal problem by any stretch of the imagination. I enjoyed The Cascade Annihilator and I sure hope a third volume is on the way.

The Dimension Researcher (The Second Internet Cafe, Part I) - Chris James

Here's the other indie novel I mentioned in my list for Book Junkies Journal of my six favorite reads of 2012.

Y'all can breathe now; this one is sci-fi. 

First, let me explain about dimension research. James has taken the process of making a decision and run headlong with it.  In the reality he has invented for his series, every decision you make spawns a series of new realities: one that follows the path you decided upon, and one or more others that follow the paths you didn't take.  Researchers in Europe have figured out how to move from one of these dimensions to another.  Now, a consortium of nations has built a facility called the Second Internet Cafe, from which teams are sent to parallel dimensions to find out what could have been -- for example, how our world would have been enriched if So-and-so hadn't died in the Holocaust.  Think Connie Willis's Doomsday Book crossed with Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials (but without the daimons). 

Lucas Hunter is a brand-new dimension researcher.  On his very first day on the job, not only does he manage to annoy his team leader, ace dimension researcher Jean Bauer, but he also discovers that another nation has figured out how to do dimension research.  All of this is happening at the same time that the Russian prime minister is supposed to tour the  Second Internet Cafe -- and if he doesn't like what he sees, Russia will pull out of the project and the facility will have to close.

There's intrigue involved, of course, and politics, and some less-than-ethical stuff going on.  Lucas brashly appoints himself to figure it all out.  The one thing he can't seem to figure out is that his friend Kasha is in love with him -- but hey, even in our dimension, geeks have that problem.

James has done a great job with the world-building, and his science had me convinced.  His visual of the decision tree has stuck with me in the months since I read the book.  All in all, a good read.