Tigerman

Unwitting hero
just right for a doomed island
and a not-quite-son.

I'm sorry to say I wasn't very impressed by this.

It had such an interesting premise: an island, subject to its own unique brand of natural disaster, the Discharge Clouds that have a strange and inexplicable effect on the residents. Harkaway uses it for a great setup, an island doomed by international consent and useful, therefore, as cover for skulduggery on a grand scale.

Unfortunately, he doesn't do much of interest with it beyond the setup. The writing is lacking, and he damages one of his major characters by trying too hard. The kid talks like a caricature if the Internet: zomg. Full of win. And so on.

I loved Gone-Away World; I'm sorry to say this isn't up to that standard.

Lester Ferris is the Brevet-Consul to Her Majesty on the tiny island of Mancreau, somewhere off the coast of North Africa. Years of irresponsibly disposed chemicals have been stewing merrily underneath the island, resulting in potentially deadly Discharge Clouds erupting periodically. So the island is slated for destruction and in the meantime lives in an international limbo that attracts a lawless cadre of ships called the Black Fleet where one might partake in illegal surgeries, trafficking of all kinds and military torture.

It's in that sun drenched Gotham we witness the transformation of Lester Harris into Tigerman, prompted in no small part by his mysterious and unnamed young friend who flippantly refers to himself as Robin. He is the Obi Wan to Lester's Luke. Full of win and rocking it Gangnam style he is the connected, new world to Lester's old.

Despite being firmly rooted in the comics tradition, the book is nonetheless a more serious work compared to the steampunk aesthetic and apocalypse bees of Angelmaker. Pulpy, shadowy, Graham Greene tropical thriller with a chewy heart.