Author note: I was provided with a free Advance Reader Copy of this book from NetGalley. This review is my personal opinion, and is otherwise unsolicited and unpaid.
LIESMITH, by Alis Franklin.
Many modern media interpretations of the god Loki leave out some of the more obscure, problematic, and often gruesome details of his stories in the Norse Eddas – and most often, the existence of Loki’s wife Sigyn.
Not Alis Franklin. In her debut novel LIESMITH, she takes on and fearlessly adapts the myths of Sigyn, in an urban fantasy/horror/romance tale that establishes its own unique view of the Loki mythology.
Sigmund Sussman is a young IT professional coasting through an obligatory job in a high-tech city that seems to be a slightly-sideways version of Canberra crossed with Silicon Valley (and given its own darkly intriguing backstories). Sigmund is also a gamer (with vast familiarity to game and fantasy culture tropes); an important plot-point navigating around the usual ‘denial of magic’ themes found in many older urban fantasy novels.
You can read plenty of synopses of this book already. I won’t waste time with them. So beware, there are spoilerish things ahead.
What I didn’t like: precious little, to be honest.
While this book can be partially classed as a M/M romance, it’s a sweet one. There’s nothing explicit here. (Regular SFF readers, if you can handle Lynn Flewelling’s Seregil and Alec, you might enjoy reading about Sigmund and Lain.) Franklin gives plenty of good reasons for her star-crossed boys to take things slow. This may put off M/M romance readers wanting more overtly erotic fare, but I’d say be patient with the characters and the story.
Some of the action scenes can be a little jarring, but they’re meant to be. This book has a strong horror element in it, one necessary to the plot and character development.
There are several stories and viewpoints woven into this book, taking place in different timelines and realities. I could follow them (because I’m kind of a freak, that way), but readers accustomed to a single storyline might have to stop and reorient themselves every so often. Do it. It’s worth the payoff.
The cover: it’s a tiny bit of nit-pickery, but I bristle when image-collage covers don’t quite fit the story. Sigmund is perfect. The font choices are wonderful. That spear? Poor job, Random House. Photoshop covers do not have to be cut-n-paste! The text doesn’t describe quite that kind of weapon in that particular moment of the story. Any propsmaster or illustrator in NY could have created the ‘right’ spear in actuality or in Photoshop, in a few hours, especially given the filters applied to the imagery. This was a credible effort to get the ‘feel’ of the book, so I’ll hope for a better effort on the next cover. (Whattaya want? I’m an art geek, okay?)
What I loved:
Sigmund being not only a gamer geek and an IT guy, but somewhat pudgy and very much a Person of Color, and being unsure enough about himself to be somewhat asexual, to boot. I loved Sigmund’s unerring knack for hearing truth and lies.
Lain, Sigmund’s love interest. I adored Lain’s characterization, and the sneaky, underhanded way Franklin showed very early that there was Something Very, Very Wrong with Lain – I knew it, saw part of it coming, and the author still snookered me. I love it when I’m utterly surprised by plot twists.
I really liked the supporting characters: Sigmund’s friends, who show a sensitive but no-nonsense portrayal of gender-neutral expression (as well as a lot of very fine humor and true friendship). Sigmund’s dad, who has his own character arc and poignant backstory. An Artificial Intelligence who is the second-in-command of one of that world’s most powerful companies, and still has major flaws. A snake named Boots. A Valkyrie’s sentient automobile.
And last but certainly not least, the Godmonster. He’s tough but fragile, inhuman but personable, an (anti?)hero swept up into machinations that he can barely control. If nothing else, he proves that Alis Franklin and I both have high esteem for feathered theropods. Franklin’s portrayal of the Godmonster reminds me very much of this Wallace Stevens poem, in tone and imagery.
Is this a perfect book? Nope. But for an ambitious debut novel that attacks on several fronts, it’s far better than many recent urban fantasies by established authors.
I wouldn’t give this book a pass just for containing an open M/M romance published by a mainstream SFF imprint. (My interests have been recently burned by other mainstream authors who tried but had no idea how to write convincing M/M fantasy romance.) Even from seeing the early synopsis, I knew LIESMITH had to fulfill all the previous promise I saw in Franklin’s fanfiction stories several years ago. And judging from those? She’s just getting started. I look forward to the journey.
Buy links and official synopsis here. (Added 1-1-2020: Alis has reissued her series on her own!)
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