Mississippi Roll

The start of a triad of books focussing on the US outside of New York, this consists of five short stories with a mix of new and old characters, all set on a paddle steamer travelling up the Mississippi. The tone is, for the most part, more relaxed and low-key than is often seen in the series, and arguably rather more upbeat, too. Which is certainly welcome after the previous book.

* Wingless Angel - The first story, set in New Orleans, brings back Billy Ray and Angel, and deals with some of the fallout from the previous volume. It's rather atypical of the rest of the book, having more action, and its ties to the earlier triad make this less standalone than one might expect for the first book in a triad. You don't need to know what the Kazakhs are running from to enjoy the story, but it probably helps. Miller also seems to be poking a bit of fun at his editor, in that the story features both a horde of zombies and a dire wolf...

* A Big Break in the Small Time - This brings back on the of the minor characters from Inside Straight, now working as a lounge singer on the riverboat. The story is about heroics and how not everyone with superpowers is really cut out for them, despite their best intentions. Andrew is a charming and fun character, as well as having powers that prove rather useful and makes a significant contribution to the unusually light tone of this particular book.

* Death on the Water - Now we switch to a detective story, bringing back characters from Fort Freak who don't happen to have any superpowers. The story is fairly straightforward, and it's immediately obvious what secret one of the suspects is hiding, but, again, it's good to see something low-key, relying on the prejudices of the Wild Cards world rather than on superheroics.

* Find the Lady - The central character here is another interesting one, something that's not been tried in the series before, to my recollection - a nat pretending to be a joker with minor ace powers. In large part, this is a romance story, and those elements of the plot do seem to move rather too quickly, although that may be more a product of the tight page count than anything else.

* Under the Arch - The steamboat reaches St Louis and a character who has been in the background of all the previous stories finally reveals his secret. Although it's not a secret to anyone who has read the whole series, since he was in some of the earlier books, and, even if he's now in his seventies, you'll have known this was coming since his first appearance in this one. When it does come, it's part of a tense battle that's also been brewing through the course of the book. The romance elements, however, feel very much tacked on.

* In the Shadow of Tall Stacks (interstitial) - The framing device for the other five stories features a new character, basically the ghost of a former captain of the riverboat doomed to haunt it for eternity. (Obviously, he's actually a wild card, but he may as well be genuinely supernatural). Rather topically, the story also concerns ICE agents trying to arrest illegal immigrants, as well as the boat being threatened with retirement, and it ties together the short stories rather more than is typical in the first books of these triads.

2 stars, Metaphorosis Reviews

Summary:

The 24th book in a shared world anthology in which many humans have been transformed by an alien virus either into jokers (deformed) or aces (super-powered). A varied collection of people on a riverboat aim to help Kazakh refugees seeking asylum in the United States.

Review:

I'm a long-time fan of George R. R. Martin, but I've never taken to his Wild Cards series. I read the first one a very long time ago but despite the big-name authors involved, the stories and world just didn't interest me. I've never been very excited about superheroes, and this darker take didn't entice me either

Howver, it's been a long time, and Wild Cards has kept going much longer than most shared world projects. When I saw Mississippi Roll available on NetGalley, I took a gamble that either the series or my tastes had changed. They hadn't.

I liked this book even less than the original, way back in the distant past. While some of the stories are adequate, and some of the writing is good, the overall story is dull. For one thing, it makes a point of setting up Kazakh refugees as a key plot point – and then mostly ignores them. They're a plot device and very little more. That's a big missed opportunity, and an own goal.

Some of the writing is also definitely not good. At least one of the stories is so unfocused that I never did decide what it was about, other than following a not very interesting lead character through his days. The overall plot arc of the book is almost entirely predictable. It ends where it should, but you know where that will be from the first few pages.

There's not even much imagination in the shape the jokers (people who fared poorly in the change) take. In the earlier books, there was quite a lot of variety. Here, a disappointing number of jokers are simply normal-looking humans with horns. I don't know if the horns were meant to be a subtle nod to Memphis soul, but I really don't think so. With a whole world of mutation options to play with, these writers mostly chose the same thing.

I wish I could point to a standout story or two, but there simply wasn't one. Some of the writing is good, and some of the authors do their best, but not one of these stories caught my attention. Overall, this book is an argument in favor of ending shared world anthologies early.

I received a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.