Review: Broken Monsters by Lauren Beukes

Broken Monsters by Lauren Beukes

Published: Mulholland Books (2014)

The Book:

“Detective Gabriella Versado has seen a lot of bodies, but this one is unique even by Detroit's standards: half-boy, half-deer, somehow fused. The cops nickname him "Bambi," but as stranger and more disturbing bodies are discovered, how can the city hold on to a reality that is already tearing at its seams?

If you're Detective Versado's over-achieving teenage daughter, Layla, you commence a dangerous flirtation with a potential predator online. If you are the disgraced journalist, Jonno, you do whatever it takes to investigate what may become the most heinous crime story in memory. If you're Thomas Keen, you'll do what you can to keep clean, keep your head down, and try to help the broken and possibly visionary artist obsessed with setting loose The Dream, tearing reality, assembling the city anew.” ~mullhollandbooks.com

I’d been waiting to finish my review of The Shining Girls before I read this, and now I am once again caught up with reading all of Beukes’s novels. I’ve also heard that this one is going to be adapted as a television series.  I’m going to keep an eye out for that!

My Thoughts:

Broken Monsters shares a number of similarities with The Shining Girls (which I reviewed few weeks ago). They’re both serial killer stories with a supernatural twist, and so tend to lean toward thriller and horror genres. They both also have viewpoint chapters from the killer’s perspective.  They are also both set in a major American city, and the culture of the city is a heavy influence (Chicago for The Shining Girls and Detroit for Broken Monsters).  However, the focus and structure of the two novels are quite different. In terms of structure, I felt like Broken Monsters was moving a little bit back toward the style of Moxyland, where there are multiple characters with separate storylines, which intersect at different points.  I liked that there was a lot more going on in the plot besides the central murder mystery, and I think this was a major reason why this book captured my attention so completely.

A major focus of the story involved social media and modern art, and the intersection of the two in terms of presentation, audience and meaning.  I think it is pretty tricky to involve a lot of social media and communication technology, because the trends through which people communicate can change so rapidly.  In relation to the current world, I thought the memes, teenage behavior, and txtspk felt fairly accurate, though I don’t know how gracefully these aspects will age.  For example, will anyone know what Nyan Cat was in ten years, and what will Facebook become? On the other hand, I doubt that the basic idea of the use of social media as a kind of form of performance art and identity construction will change anytime soon.  The creative aspect of social media is seen in both Jonno’s journalism and the risky online activities of Layla and her best friend.  The Detroit modern art scene plays a prominent role as well, and even the murders can be seen as horrific attempts to bring dreams to life. I enjoyed how many of the storylines explored the connections or lack of connections between the artist’s intent, the observer’s perception, and reality.

The focus on social media and art was a major part of what I liked about the novel, but I also enjoyed the characters (though their actions sometimes stressed me out).  I feel like all of the primary characters are ‘broken monsters’ in their own ways.  The killer is a monster, but his murders are more related to mixing dreams and reality than homicidal intent.  The other main characters are less monstrous, but still deeply flawed. For instance, Jonno wrecked his previous relationship and career, and is so desperate to recover them both that his sense of morality has started fraying.  Layla’s problems mostly come from her inexperience and poor decision-making, and her mother struggles to balance her loyalty to the police force with her loyalty to her daughter. TK is probably one of the kindest of the main characters, but he also has a lot of mistakes and heartache in his past.  It was fascinating to watch each of these characters struggle to cope with situations spinning far out of their control, and I ended up staying up far too late one night to see how things would come out in the end.

My Rating: 4/5

Broken Monsters is another of Lauren Beukes’s novels that fall outside of my usual favorite genres (SFF).  Like Shining Girls, it is a horror and thriller about a supernatural-tinged serial killer, but the many viewpoint characters and separate storylines reminded me a little of the style of Moxyland. The post-collapse city of Detroit and its culture plays a large role in the story, and the usage of communication technology feels very contemporary and accurate.  I really enjoyed the role social media, art and ideas of perception vs. intent played throughout various plotlines. In the end, I thought this novel was excellent, and I’m looking forward to seeing what kind of story Beukes will write next!

Review: The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes

The Shining Girls by Lauren Beukes

Published: Mulholland Books, 2013

“Harper Curtis is a killer who stepped out of the past. Kirby Mazrachi is a girl who was never meant to have a future. Kirby is the last shining girl, one of the bright young women, burning with potential, whose lives Harper is destined to snuff out after he stumbles on a House in Depression-era Chicago that opens on to other times. 

At the urging of the House, Harper inserts himself into the lives of the shining girls, waiting for the perfect moment to strike. He's the ultimate hunter, vanishing into another time after each murder, untraceable—until one of his victims survives. Determined to bring her would-be killer to justice, Kirby joins the Chicago Sun-Times to work with the ex-homicide reporter, Dan Velasquez, who covered her case. Soon Kirby finds herself closing in on the impossible truth…” ~Goodreads.com

This is the third book I’ve read by Lauren Beukes, and it is very different from Moxyland and Zoo City. I’m currently in the process of reading her latest book, Broken Monsters.  Also, this is the first of my 2014 Christmas backlog reviews, which I will post in between reviews of books I am currently reading in 2015.  My biggest 2015 resolution is to find a way to keep from getting behind in my reviews like this in the future!

My Thoughts:

The Shining Girls fits a very different collection of genres than either of Beukes’s first two novels, and one that happens to fall a little outside my usual tastes.  From my perspective, The Shining Girls fits mostly into horror and thriller categories, and I think that knowing this helps one to calibrate expectations.  For instance, one shouldn’t expect for a detailed explanation of the time-traveling house and the shining girls to be a major part of the story. I’m not saying there are no answers at all, but those that exist lean more towards the style of horror.  More than their causes, the supernatural elements are important for their effects on the story. For instance, the time-travel allowed for a look at Chicago throughout the decades, which I found pretty interesting (I’ve only been to the city a few times). It also made Harper a difficult killer to catch, as he darted through history to attack women of great potential.

For me, the shining girls were the most compelling part of the book.  Each of the victims lived in a different time, and was working to overcome or defy different societal problems.  I found it incredibly sad to know from the beginning that they would not survive to fulfill their potential. The lone survivor, Kirby, is the main viewpoint character in her hunt for Harper.  Though she hits some of the typical buttons for a spunky heroine with a tragic past, I appreciated that she was not particularly angsty.  She doesn’t wallow in self-pity, but is instead driven to the search for her would-be killer in order to help gain some closure over what was done to her. I felt that she was a very easy character to like, and I hoped that her search would bring her what she needed in order to heal.

Though the plot is non-linear in time, beyond the horror elements it is the familiar tale of a survivor whose life revolves around her search for her would-be killer.  Everything proceeds more or less as expected, but there were a few things I especially liked about Beukes’s take on this kind of story.  For instance, Harper Curtis, the murderer, was not romanticized in the least.  He was a disgusting, mean-spirited, violent man, and I found myself wishing he had far fewer viewpoint chapters.  However, when he did murder a young woman, the scene was given from her perspective. The reader was clearly meant to identify with the pain, shock and fear of these girls, and to see them as people. On the other hand, there was very little time to get to know each victim, and it was difficult to read about young woman after young woman being brutally murdered.  I would have liked for the narrative to have spent more time with the shining girls while they were alive, so that the pattern from character introduction to murder would not have seemed to repeat so many times. However, all of this definitely cemented Harper as an irredeemable person, and one who I was eager to see meet his comeuppance.  Though the story was a bit predictable, I still found it entertaining and felt that the ending gave the story a satisfying conclusion.

My Rating: 3.5/5


The Shining Girls, as a horror/thriller story set in Chicago, is very different than either of Beukes’s previous novels, and it shows the range of her writing skill.  It is not my favorite of her work, but that is likely due in large part to the fact that the genre and subject matter correspond less closely to my personal interests. I appreciated that the serial killer was not glamorized, and I was particularly drawn to the shining girls, including the survivor and protagonist, Kirby.  I wished there could have been more time spent with the shining girls throughout history, since the repetition of character introduction to brutal murder could get numbing.  Overall, I enjoyed seeing another side of Beukes’s skill as a writer, and I am already reading her next novel, Broken Monsters.

Review: Moxyland by Lauren Beukes

Moxyland by Lauren Beukes

Published: Angry Robot Books, 2009

The Book:

“A frighteningly persuasive, high-tech fable, this novel follows the lives of four narrators living in an alternative futuristic Cape Town, South Africa.  An art-school dropout, and AIDS baby, a tech-activist and an RPG-obsessed blogger live in a world where your online identity is at least as important as your physical one. Getting disconnected is a punishment worse than imprisonment, but someone's got to stand up to Government Inc. - whatever the cost. 

Taking hedonistic trends in society to their ultimate conclusions, this tale paints anything but a forecasted utopia, satirically undermining the reified idea of progress as society's white knight.” ~from barnesandnoble.com

I’ve previously read Zoo City by Lauren Beukes, which I thought was spectacular.  Moxyland, her first novel, is also a pretty terrific book, and it cements my decision to read any further fiction she publishes. 

My Thoughts:

Moxyland weaves together the stories of four different narrators in a horrific near-future dystopian Cape Town, South Africa.  There were some elements of the society, such as the ID-cellphones that police could activate as tasers, that still happily only exist in the realms of fiction.  Other elements, such as people farming digital items in online games for real money, or people selling their bodies to companies as advertising space, are all too real.  Moxyland’s society is a place that is designed to use its people as a disposable and renewable resource.  In this world, who you are matters much less than who you know, and who you can influence.  Carefully controlled PR and advertising manipulate the crowds to keep the powerful in charge. 

A major factor in how much a reader might enjoy this book is how strongly they feel about the four narrators.  These main characters are the heart of the novel, and they each display a strong, realistic personality.  They are all deeply flawed characters, and I think that the reader’s sympathy for them (or lack of it) will be defined by their specific emotional reaction to each of these distinct types of people.  Moxyland is very character-centric, so it would be difficult to enjoy if you aren’t invested in the wellbeing of the four narrators.

I found the tragically self-destructive characters to be the most compelling.  My favorite narrator was passive, powerless Kendra, the ‘art-school dropout’, who is fixated on the obsolete art of old-style photography.  As an ironic attempt to take control of her own destiny, she accepts an offer to be ‘branded’ by a soda company.  She’s injected with nanotech that improves her physical and mental state, at the cost of an addiction to the company’s brand of soda, called Ghost.  Watching Kendra’s desperate, confused struggle for autonomy was heartbreaking.  Tendeka, the blindly passionate would-be revolutionary ‘tech-activist’, was also a very sympathetic narrator to me.  He wants so desperately to help the disenfranchised that he would give almost anything of himself.  Unfortunately, his passion and his trust in his comrades make him an easy person to twist toward more extreme measures. 

The other two narrators, the disloyal, irresponsible, blogger Toby and the backstabbing, corporate-ladder-climbing AIDs baby Lerato, garnered much less sympathy from my corner.  Toby’s slang-filled, drugged-out narrative segments were often amusing, but I couldn’t stand him as a person.  Lerato’s competence, intelligence, and material success made her stand out from the others, but I found her ever-present contempt for others grating.  However, all of the narrators made necessary contributions to the overall effect of the story.  I felt that the lives of the four protagonists balanced each other beautifully, and each viewpoint highlighted elements of the others.

One minor complaint I have for Moxyland is that it sometimes seemed a bit claustrophobic.  The story is very intensely focused on the four major characters, their thoughts and their perceptions.  None of the other characters are really fleshed out at all, and the locations seem very minimally described.  The first person present narration made it feel kind of like reading four very well written streaming blogs.  Also, since the four protagonists are quite familiar with their community, they never take time out to explain things explicitly to the reader.  As a result, it took me a little while to get used to their society and jargon.  I liked this approach, but I can see where it might make the book hard to get into at first.           

My Rating: 4.5/5

I really enjoyed reading Moxyland, though I think that some elements of Beuke’s dystopian future are frighteningly plausible in today’s world. The novel is very focused on the four protagonists and their thoughts, with little time for development of side characters or scenery.  The four main characters, Kendra, Toby, Tendeka, and Lerato, were very well-developed, and they each had believably flawed personalities.  I found their interwoven stories tragic and moving, but I can see where it might fall flat for readers who don't find themselves sympathetic towards any of the main characters.  It’s a pretty short novel, and the first-person-present narration makes for a quick read.  Lauren Beukes is definitely an author whose career I plan to follow!

Note on Rating:  I’m becoming aware that my 5-point rating system does not quite have the level of finesse I would prefer for labeling books.  I thought of using a 10-point system, but I’m afraid that I would just end up using 6-10 as scores instead of 1-5.  My new plan is to include half-points in my current rating system.  Since my blog has only been around for a few months, I’m pretty sure I still remember all my initial reactions to the books I’ve reviewed. Therefore, I’m going to go through and tweak the previous ratings by a half-point where necessary.  

Review: Zoo City by Lauren Beukes

Zoo City by Lauren Beukes

Published: Angry Robot Books, 2010

Awards Won: Arthur C. Clarke Award

Nominated: British Science Fiction Association Award, World Fantasy Award

The Book:

“All it takes is one Afghan warlord to show up with a Penguin in a bulletproof vest, and everything science and religion thought they knew goes right out the window.” ~Zoo City

That event publicly marked the change that has shaped the world of Lauren Beukes’ Zoo City. Those who commit crimes have suddenly found themselves bound to an animal companion, and they face the deadly Undertow if they fail to protect it.  These aposymbiotes, also derogatively called zoos and the animalled, are now treated as the ultimate untouchable caste all over the world.  In some places they are imprisoned or killed outright.  In Johannesburg, South Africa, they have a hard time finding jobs or places to live, and are generally shunned from polite society. The only silver lining in being animalled is the minor supernatural ability that tends to come with it.

Zinzi December, a journalist with a serious drug habit, lost everything on the night she gained her own animal, a Sloth, and a gift for finding things. Zinzi and her Sloth moved to a zoo slum, where she began writing stories for an e-mail scam company and finding people’s lost trinkets to make ends meet. After a client’s death leaves her more broke than usual, Zinzi agrees to take on her least favorite kind of assignment – finding a missing person.  If she can find the vanished Songweza, a teenage girl who forms half of an afropop twin act, she’ll have the resources to start getting her life back together.  Of course, nothing is as simple as it first appears, and soon Zinzi is drawn into a part of Johannesburg even more dangerous than the zoo slums…

This is the first book I’ve read of the 2011 Arthur C. Clarke award nominees.  Zoo City is Lauren Beukes second novel, and I regret to say that I have not yet read her first, Moxyland. After thoroughly enjoying Zoo City, I’m certainly planning to read Moxyland as well as any future novels by Lauren Beukes.

My Thoughts:

The story is narrated in first person, from the perspective of Zinzi December. I am not typically a fan of first person narratives, but I think it works well in this case.  It worked for me primarily because Zinzi is such a fascinating protagonist.  She’s funny, intelligent, relentlessly active, and her perception of the world around her is vividly descriptive. 

I don’t want you to have the idea that Zinzi is some typical urban fantasy heroine, though.  Zinzi has no particularly impressive physical skills, and any situation that ends in violence typically goes badly for her. On top of that, she’s often dishonest and doesn’t always make the best decisions.  However, Zinzi is constantly forced to acknowledge her own mistakes, and, as a result, she doesn’t seem to be afflicted with the narcissism that tends to cling to first-person protagonists.  Overall, I enjoyed seeing this world through the filter of Zinzi’s mind.

Another thing I enjoyed about the novel was how realistic the environment felt.  I’ve never been to Johannesburg, or South Africa at all, so I can’t compare Zoo City’s Johannesburg to the reality.  From Zoo City's descriptions, though, I still have a clear image in my mind of most of the places Zinzi visited. Beukes painted a striking picture of this fictional Johannesburg throughout the story, from the bars and decrepit apartment complexes down to the sewers. 

The social situations and interactions between various classes of society also seemed very natural and human.  Some non-english words were used throughout the dialogue, but they were always given enough context not to confuse the reader.  Zinzi’s constant pop culture references strengthened the sense of the nearness of this world to our own.  While the pop culture added a layer of realism to Zinzi’s narration, it made me wonder how the novel will come across to readers ten or twenty years from now.

My Rating: 5/5

I had no idea what to expect going into Zoo City, but I came away deeply impressed.  The prose was fast, clever, and rich in detail.  Zinzi December was a fascinating protagonist, and her personality alone would have kept me turning the pages.  The story took twists and turns that I didn’t predict, and I never would have guessed the ending.  Lauren Beukes is an incredible storyteller, and I hope she writes many more novels in the future!