E.A. Bass treated me to their eclectic sci-fi novella that's a blend "between comedy, drama, psychedelia and mystery."
It has a general feel of a collection of short stories that seem only tenuously connected at first, until the strings begin to draw it all together.
Before I get into the review, let's drop a link to its amazon page here.
Coffee with Golconda will tell you what you want to know when it is good and ready, and you will mind your manners until it does. You will flow between unique locales, imagery and thought-teasing metaphors that bring vastly differing settings vividly to life.
There were many moments when I felt strong Terry Pratchett influences, quirky yet meticulous, though that could just by my perspective- then in the next moment, things might turn surreal, or gently philosophical from the unique perspectives of Golconda and those that encounter him- only to shift to back quirky on a dime, then back again.
The world-building is gradual, doling out dollops of information casually, sometimes paying intense attention to a tiny detail, or referencing the bigger picture almost dismissively, or casually informing you that some of your assumptions were silly. (You should have known better, and Golconda will set you straight. When it's time.)
Once Coffee with Golconda has told you what it has to say, you might want to go back and read it again to see what you could not see before.
. -oO*Oo- .
Update from me about Rubberman's Exodus, quick status update as long as I'm making a rare blog post (I KNOW I should do more here, sue me!) I am past 60% in my second editing read of the 'final' book, after which it goes to my betas, and an editor, then one last editing read from me. The cover is basically decided, but as a fair warning to my longtime readers who have paperbacks of the rest of the Rubberman series... I WILL be launching with covers in the same style to match a full set, but I DO have general plans to address ALL of my covers. I've been vain (doing them all myself) and/or lazy with my covers so far... they're not laughably bad, but they're not great... the day to fix that is coming.
Oh, by the way, Rubberman's Exodus IS bigger than Cage or Citizens, and very very nearly rivals my biggest book to date, Echoes of Erebus.
.... Erebus' daughter might have something to say about that in the future...
