Rating: 
Summary: A Sharp Mind
Review: "Expiration Date" opens with Koot Hoomie Parganas, running away from home and into trouble, in L.A. in the early 90's. After a couple of chapters the viewpoint switches to Pete Sullivan, a "ghost-sensitive" (we slowly find out what this means) electrician in Arizona, soon to return to L.A. when he gets a panic-struck phone call from his sister. Then we get more viewpoints: Angelica Elizalde, a psychiatrist who had a disastrous seance a few years ago; Sherman Oaks, who seems at first just to be a crazy homeless person; Solomon Shadroe, a strange L.A. landlord who has some long ago connection to Sullivan's boss, Loretta deLarava; Neal Obstadt, who still works with deLarava.It's a little too much. The stories eventually entwine, but to start with almost all these threads are separate, and it's difficult to keep track. It may be more of a problem if you read the book in twenty or thirty page chunks, as I did, instead of sitting down for a couple of hours at a time and absorbing large parts of it. Having said that, the story is strong and interesting, with well-drawn characters and a helter-skelter ghostly denouement on the moored luxury liner, Queen Mary. The internal logic of "Expiration Date", where ghosts are visible to some people, is perfectly done. In this world some people have become addicted to absorbing--"eating"--ghosts; snorting them up like powdered cocaine, swallowing up their essences. This unpleasant habit drives much of the book, though you're halfway through before you start to piece all the information together. As a result the first half of the book is a little dream-like, with so many disconnected storylines, and so much unexplained weirdness. The book works, in the end, and is a fun read. But it really doesn't need to be over 500 pages.
Rating: 
Summary: A bit too long and complex, but original and fun
Review: "Expiration Date" opens with Koot Hoomie Parganas, running away from home and into trouble, in L.A. in the early 90's. After a couple of chapters the viewpoint switches to Pete Sullivan, a "ghost-sensitive" (we slowly find out what this means) electrician in Arizona, soon to return to L.A. when he gets a panic-struck phone call from his sister. Then we get more viewpoints: Angelica Elizalde, a psychiatrist who had a disastrous seance a few years ago; Sherman Oaks, who seems at first just to be a crazy homeless person; Solomon Shadroe, a strange L.A. landlord who has some long ago connection to Sullivan's boss, Loretta deLarava; Neal Obstadt, who still works with deLarava. It's a little too much. The stories eventually entwine, but to start with almost all these threads are separate, and it's difficult to keep track. It may be more of a problem if you read the book in twenty or thirty page chunks, as I did, instead of sitting down for a couple of hours at a time and absorbing large parts of it. Having said that, the story is strong and interesting, with well-drawn characters and a helter-skelter ghostly denouement on the moored luxury liner, Queen Mary. The internal logic of "Expiration Date", where ghosts are visible to some people, is perfectly done. In this world some people have become addicted to absorbing--"eating"--ghosts; snorting them up like powdered cocaine, swallowing up their essences. This unpleasant habit drives much of the book, though you're halfway through before you start to piece all the information together. As a result the first half of the book is a little dream-like, with so many disconnected storylines, and so much unexplained weirdness. The book works, in the end, and is a fun read. But it really doesn't need to be over 500 pages.
Rating:
Summary: Do not read when over-tired.
Review: I respect Tim Powers' writing, so much so, that sometimes I am not in the mood to read it; I had forgotten this fact (ok, I was really sleep-deprived) when I started Expiration Date,thinking some recreational reading might encourage a little mental downtime. Yeah, right. Reading this book (when over-tired) is like playing Concentration and War at the same time. Powers' hail of ghost lore, hard luck stories, and historical references put me in trivia mode; I was slapping pages as though I was memorizing flash cards. I have read most of Powers' work (with the exception of Last Call) and I feel this is his most ambitious attempt. Powers has already proven he can intermingle history and fantastic premises; he excels at blurring the borders between the possible and the outright absurd. I enjoyed his 20th century references (Edison, Houdini, and Ford) this time around. The near-past setting (Los Angeles, early 90's, and earlier) provides great material, but also makes the reality/fantasy curtain rather opaque in spots. For example, I mentally approved the science of ghost-catching, but stray thoughts the writer probably didn't plan intruded; for example, "if Kootie made X dollars panhandling, and bought A,B,C, and D, then did he really have enough money left for E two days later?", or, "Could any woman wear a polyester jumpsuit over a full set of clothing *in October in LA*, and not go postal from the misery?" - the danger of being in trivia mode. The most ambitious aspect, however, is the number of characters and subtexts; although he lays most ghosts to rest, the unresolved issues make you wish for fewer concepts,greater detail, and more even character development. But maybe that's just me; read it when you're NOT tired, and judge for yourself!
Rating: 
Summary: POWER Bar!
Review: As soon as I saw the cover, I knew Expiration Date was going to be a thrill. And, I was right! The story about a boy who swallows the ghost of Thomas Edison and as a result is being hunted down the streets of Los Angeles did not let go of me, even after I had finished reading. What's more, despite the absurdness of the whole story, it struck me as very realistic. Having taken the bus in LA for a year and recognizing much of the surroundings, this book was a trip through a different layer of a city I thought I knew. Thumbs up, I can't wait to read more by Tim Powers!
Rating: 
Summary: Not his best work
Review: I absolutely adored Anubis Gates, and thought Last Call was OK, but this book really left me flat. I actually had trouble finishing it, and got the sense Tim did as well when he wrote it; it has a plodding feel to it towards the end.
I never managed to fully suspend disbelief, and had a hard time getting over the silliness of much of the plot. For the real out-there, wacko stuff, he should stick with more fantastic settings, and not post-riot LA.
Rating:
Summary: I wanted to like this book much more than I did.
Review: I expected to be stunned by Expiration Date, much as I was by Powers' previous novel, Last Call. Oh, sure, I knew it would take me a little while to get into it, to warm up to the characters, to comprehend the kinds of plot twists and turns that functioned so perfectly in Last Call. When I read Last Call, Powers' tour de force spanning tarot cards, Las Vegas and the Fisher King, I felt like I'd lived with its characters, and I understood their motivations and actions. I was stunned all right, but not in a good way. Expiration Date left me cold. Instead of relying on a mythology with a deep and complex foundation, as Last Call does, Expiration Date makes use of what amounts to an old wives' tale--the idea that people can eat the ghosts of others to rejuvenate themselves. Powers' technical expertise and thorough research helps to make up for this flimsy premise. In the end, though, I realized I just didn't buy what he was selling. This may have as much to do with the way Powers portrays the characters in Expiration Date as with the unwieldy situations in which he places them. I found the characterizations flat and slippery, much like the giant dead fish that washes up on Venice Beach towards the middle of the novel. The novel's young hero, Kootie, reads like the kind of Generic Kid character that I expect to see in a Michael Crichton novel. Then there's the inexplicable romance that occurs between the two adult protagonists. The basis for their relationship seems to be a shared ability to detect the presence of ghosts, which is not something that bespeaks true love to me. Perhaps most disappointing is the way Powers develops the ghost of Thomas Edison, who inhabits Kootie's mind for about two-thirds of the story. To me, it's sad that the book's only "real" character displays few of the quirks and contradictions that Edison himself must have had. I tried really hard to enjoy this book. It's rare that reading turns into a task for me, but Expiration Date was a chore that I just wasn't up to
Rating:
Summary: The long and winding road
Review: I love Tim Powers but I was initially hesitant about this book, mostly because of its length and the fact that I had heard several mixed reviews about it, generally a new Tim Powers book is a cause for celebration of his writing genius. This time folks seemed unsure. I can see why, this is his longest book by this point as far as I know (Earthquake Weather, the sequel, might be longer, I can't remember, not having it) and I think his typical ultracomplicated plotting can wear thin over the course of five hundred pages when maybe four hundred isn't so bad. But with a premise like this I just couldn't resist: Los Angeles in the present day (1995) is home to ghosts and ghost hunters and people addicted to ghosts and basically the plot centers around a boy who has accidentally inhaled the last breath of Thomas Edison and now everyone is looking for him because Edison was such a powerful figure in life that his ghost hasn't diminished a bit. The twists and turns of the plot are left for the reader to discover but rest assured this is a book that commands patience. For those who like instant thrills, there are those here, Powers still has his ability with words and he strings along a bunch of cool moments together enough time to make this into a near page turner. But it's not totally addictive as his other books are, you finish it because you want to know what's going to happen and he has you really interested but it's not "bring your flashlight under the pillow to read it after bedtime" material. Indeed, this is probably not for the Tim Powers novice, those would probably be better off cutting their teeth on the Anubis Gates or Last Call (both highly recommended) but when they're done with those and want more they should come here for more of his utterly unique take on fantasy. No elves and forests here, this is urban fantasy.
Rating:
Summary: I love this book.
Review: I loved this book. It must have been a year ago that I read it and I still keep it in mind (along with Last Call) as the kind of book I'd like to find more of.
Rating:
Summary: Ghostly Thin Entertainment
Review: I normally can read a novel of this length in a couple of days. This one took me ten to finish. When this happens, it indicates one of two things: either the book is an extremely complex, difficult read or it simply did not engage me as a reader, did not make me want to hurry back to its pages. And for this book, both reasons apply. The story line itself is a very convoluted mating of urban ghosts, two rather well known historical figures, and a large set of major characters who are apparently unrelated to each other at the beginning but who eventually are all intertwined. The driving force behind the plot is the idea that ghosts can be captured, bottled, and inhaled by the living, imparting their memories and life essence to the inhaler. Certain people have become addicted to this habit, and will do anything to capture a really strong ghost, murder being almost the least of that 'anything'. Into this idea Powers drops the ghost of Thomas Edison, a man almost reverentially talked about in schools for his multitudinous inventions, but not exactly the nicest man in the world, as a really powerful ghost that everyone who is capable of sensing his presence wants to get. The set of ideas that Powers introduces here is impressive: inhaleable ghosts, 'rotten' ghosts that once inhaled make it impossible to inhale more ghosts, the possibility of a freshly dead person's ghost continuing to use his body, ghosts who slowly obtain a substantial physical form by ingesting trash, an ingested ghost's personality may take over the consciousness of the inhaler, and many more. None of these ideas are directly laid out at the beginning of the book, but slowly become obvious as you proceed through the story - but while you are learning Powers' ghost rules, you are likely to feel somewhat confused. Also impressive are the portraits Powers paints of Edison and Houdini, combining known historical facts and foibles of their characters with his story line in an almost seamless mix. His descriptions of Los Angeles, both past and present, add to the sense of realism that is so necessary for a book of this nature to succeed. The large set of characters, though, is the major problem with this book. While Pete Sullivan, Angelica Elizalde, and Koot Hoomie Parganas, the three major point-of-view characters, are each described with enough detail about their past and their current thought patterns to enable me to recognize them as real people. What they failed to do was emotionally engage me. And this same problem applied to Solomon Shadroe, Sherman Oaks, Neal Obstadt and all the other characters here - I could not find myself caring what happened to all of them. Perhaps this is because for a large portion of the book, there does not seem to be any definite goal that these characters are trying to reach - a real plot direction doesn't emerge until almost two thirds of the way through the book. While this is certainly a common trait in the modern 'life realistic' novel, where things 'just happen' and people bounce from one experience to another with no goal or direction, here it hurts, as the point is not to paint reality but to present the fantastic as commonplace. This also points up the fact that there is almost no deeper level of meaning to this book. The actions and events portrayed do not have any relevance to everyday living, nor are the character's reactions explored in enough depth to provide new insight into the human condition. This leaves the book as an 'entertainment' only type story, which is perfectly fine as an objective for a novel, but without strong reader engagement with the characters or a strong plot, the entertainment level does not tip the meter very far into the 'enjoyable' range. Some great ideas, some impressive historical research, but stretched across too nebulous a plot from too many viewpoints to be a real page-turning grabber.
Rating:
Summary: "You got your Last Call in my Expiration Date!"
Review: I read Last Call, and thought it was wonderful; if I ever go to Las Vegas, I'll be sure to watch the patterns the smoke makes around the poker table. The Tarot imagery was great, and the entire book was just one big cool concept. I read Expiration Date, and thought the ghost-chasing and eating plots were wonderful, especially since so much of it derived from known eccentricities. And then, comes Earthquake Weather, where the protagonists from each novel meet and work together to raise the King of the West from the dead, along with a host of new characters. It's not a bad novel at all; that's why it gets four stars. As usual, Powers writes very well, with good characterization and intelligent plotting. My issue with it is...it's a team-up book, like Spiderman Vs. Superman. Part of the fun is the learning experience of the main characters, as they figure out what the heck is going on and how to survive. We see that from the main character, but then we have the characters of the previous two novels, who should know what to do...but don't. Somehow, that aspect bothered me far more than I'd've thought. It's still a good novel, but I'm pretty sure it could've been better.
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