Rating: 
Summary: Did not live up to its promise
Review: Tinker by Wen Spencer introduces us to the character of Tinker, the girl genius. The setting is Pittsburgh after it has moved into Efland, although it flips back to earth once a month. Go figure. The action comes very fast. Tinker is dropped in the middle of a fight between the elves, particularly a high-ranking elf named Wolfwind, and some mysterious, magical assassins. It goes on from there, with Tinker rescuing the elf and getting thrust into the center of elf and human politics in fey Pittsburgh. The book got off to a great start. I really wanted to like it but I by the end I did not. Tinker is too perfect. I get a bit tired of everyone else in the story being clueless. Her relationship with Wolfwind has some very entertaining moments, but there just isn't anything there. By the end they still have no relationship. The bad guys are completely lacking in any vestige of "humanity" and they come off as flat comic book characters. The characters and the situation have potential, but everything about the book is too extreme and there is no subtlety to it. It could have been MUCH more interesting if Tinker had gone off to college on Earth as Wolfwind's main squeeze rather than saving the world from a race of psychotic sadists. I enjoyed Alien Tastes more than the other Ukiah books, which also tend toward extremes in bad guys and in plots. Still Ukiah is a more nuanced character than Tinker. Tinker's lack of depth is the main weakness in the book.
Rating: 
Summary: An author to watch
Review: Tinker is a can't-put-it-down book from start to finish. Smarter than McGyver, cooler than Jesse James (the motorcycle guru, not the outlaw) Tinker combines brains with beauty, dive into this book to see magic. With 4 books published now and the John C Campbell award under her belt, Wen has definitely shown herself to be the new author to watch, I can't wait for the next one!
Rating:
Summary: Tinker
Review: Tinker is minding her own business when an elf she knows jumps her fence chased by the biggest dogs shes ever seen.
Even after the dogs are dead things only get more complicated for her.
By the time the week is out her personal life and Oni/elf/human politics will be so mixed up even she will have trouble getting out alive.
A good book
Rating: 
Summary: Some good, some not-so-good.
Review: Tinker was a book I enjoyed reading, for the most part. The setting and plot were extremely enjoyable, and the book is an interesting blend of sci-fi and fantasy.
The problem I had was with the romance. I don't usually read romance, so I'm not unbiased here, but as I saw it the romance was by far the weakest part of the story. I can't see Tinker feel anything but hormonal attraction to Windwolf; it's possible she believes that this is love, but please don't ask the reader to. I feel ambivalent about how she accepted being an elf and married to him; she was originally angry, and rightly so, because she really despised elven culture and had no desire whatsoever to be one of them. Then Windwolf offers a trite apology, without even fully understanding what exactly he's apologizing for, and suddenly all's right with the world.
After I finished the book, I realized that the thing that bothered me the most was that Windwolf, throughout the whole book, has no character development. He IS a flawed character -- point for that -- but his big flaw, his arrogance . . . he never even RECOGNIZES that there's a problem there, much less begins to address it. He never understands that the gifts he gives, despite the best intentions, are not enjoyed by their recipients. Tinker seems, somewhat amazingly to my mind, to be able to ignore this in him, but will the people who care about her be as forgiving? Lain and Tooloo both seemed adamantly opposed to the whole idea -- does that count for nothing?
(Continued . . .)
Rating: 
Summary: Great fun if you like elves, and I do!
Review: Wen Spencer (Alien Taste, Tainted Trail, Bitter Waters) is one very imaginative writer. Tinker, his latest book, proves that he is here to stay. Tinker is young human woman living in Pittsburgh. She runs her own scrap yard for a living, invents and builds her own gadgets, and is incidentally a genius where hyperphase gates are concerned. Her murdered father was the inventor of the Chinese hyperphase gate in orbit of earth. Its activation twenty years ago, resulted in the veil effect which transported Pittsburgh to ElfHome and a huge section of virgin forest to Earth in its place. One night, Tinker is working in her yard when a pack of magically enhanced dogs called wargs, chase the viceroy (an elf named Windwolf) into her yard determined to kill him. Tinker intervenes and saves his life. As a result, Windwolf owes her a life debt. When he gives her a gift, she doesn't realise that he is proposing marriage. She accepts his gift, and later agrees to a spell that will "prevent her death" (or so he says) without realising that she is agreeing to be turned into an elf! Tinker is wonderfully inventive. I particularly like the idea of Shutdown when the hyperphase gate is turned off once a month so that Pittsburgh reverts to earth for twenty four hours. Buy this book, and pray for a sequel. Reviewed by Mark E. Cooper
The Warrior Within
Rating:
Summary: brilliant book from a very creative writer
Review: When I first read the news that the next book by Wen Spencer would not be from the Ukiah Oregon series, I was disappointed. But that ceased very fast as I got captivated by the story and the characters of Tinker and company. This book blends very different concepts from Hard Science Fiction and Fantasy like Hyperspace Gates, star collonization, elves and other creatures of mythology. The writing style is very smooth. I eagerly await the sequel, which unfortunately will not be releast late 2004. But the wait will be sweetened with her next new novel Dog Warrior.
Rating:
Summary: Another great book from Spencer
Review: With Tinker, Wen Spencer has joined the ranks of my favourite sci-fi/fantasy authors(Julie Czernada Lois McMaster Bujold, S.L. Viehl). Tinker was one of the few books that has made me want to sit down and read it at one sitting. That hasn't happened in a long time, there seems to be a dearth of interesting writing out there at the moment. While all of her books are fascinating and well written, something about this book just struck a chord with me. I can't recommend it enough. One teenie bit of criticsm though, the elves were just a bit too steriotypically elflike.
Rating:
Summary: Tinker Rocks!
Review: Wow. What else can I say? This was an amazing book. Wen Spencer combined the mundane with the fantastic, added in some science and humor, and created one of the best books I have read in a long time. Tinker, the main character, is a wise-ass kid with a genius IQ, an interesting genetic legacy and a future that not even a guru with a crystal ball would attempt to read. She's sarcastic, competant and vulnerable all at once, not an easy combination to either live or write. Wen captures her beautifully, as well as the elf she rescues and the other crazy characters that enter her life. I started "Tinker" with the idea that I would leisurely read my way through it and take my time. NOT! I read the entire thing in an evening - not because it's short, but because I couldn't put it down. Well done, Wen. Can't wait for the sequel!
Rating:
Summary: Oh, man, this book is so good. Solid "A"
Review: _____________________________________________
"The wargs chased the elf over Pittsburgh Scrap and Salvage's tall chain-link fence shortly after the hyperphase gate powered down."
So opens TINKER, which is a very fast-paced book. Amazingly fast-paced. Astoundingly.... well, you get the idea <G>. Boredom will not be a problem if you read TINKER.
Circa 2050, Pittsburgh has been transported (mostly) to Elfhome, as a side effect of the startup of a new Chinese orbital interdimensional gate. Tinker, just turned 18, owns the junkyard, and is a full-fledged Grrl Genius to boot, with a mouth (and steel-toe boots) to match. Oh, and Tink's Dad, the gate's inventor, died 10 years before she was born...
Did I mention Tink's being romanced by the rich, powerful, gorgeous, sexy Elvish Viceroy? Can we say "female wish-fulfillment wetdream?" Wetdreams do play a part, actually, and this is not a criticism.
Oh, man, this book is so good. A light, clever, sexy SF-fantasy-romance that's just a whole lot of fun to read. Right up there with the best of the "scientific magic" books, and a clear "A" -- but you should know that it's the first of an open-ended(?) series [1]. So the ending is just the end of an episode. Regardless, I liked it a lot [2], and I'm ready for #2!
Read the first chapter: Google wenspencer.com +title [1]
-- if you like that, you'll love the book. Trust me.
Influences she mentions:
John M. Ford's _The Last Hot Time_
Terri Windling's BORDERLAND project
CJ Cherryh's atevi (Foreigner and Invader series)
Page Bailey, girl genius in the Star Frontiers RPG game, her model for Tinker
Other influences I saw:
Heinlein, Waldo & Magic, Inc
De Camp & Pratt, Harold Shea stories (Incomplete Enchanter, etc.)
Niven, The Magic Goes Away, etc..
Your favorite kickass, smartmouth female fantasy heroine -- like Anita Blake, but with a LOT less gore and kinky sex.
This was my first Wen Spencer, but for sure won't be the last. Always a pleasure to find a good new author to feed my habit....
Review copyright ©2005 by Peter D. Tillman
First published at SF Site, 2-05
[1] of course, you could use Amazon's lame, crippled, slow preview 'feature'.... Bah.
|
