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by William Maltese |
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A nominee for ERWI's The Fruity Award for best male/male fiction ISBN: ISBN: nightwares Books © 2005 $16.99 |
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| Maltese has always provided out-of-this-world experiences for his readers, but he's gone several steps farther in his sometimes-very-erotic BOND-SHATTERING that hearkens back to his very first book (the sci-fi FIVE ROADS TO TLEN) published in 1970. And what a treat this book has in store for afficionados of the sci-fi, gay, erotica, and gay-romance genres. BOND-SHATTERING a highly charged interstellar tour de force that explores complicated relationship: between the controlling civilized Warrior Clans and subservient barbarians (AKA everyone else); between Warrior Clan bond-mates (Roynoldo Lasi and Grenar Rajno) and the barbarian Kyle Icru. Gallactic battles, machinations, betrayals, loves, hates, and quests for power play out to sometimes disastrous conclusions against the alien backdrop of a universe in which the aphrodisiac Essence Orchinid is as vital to most everyone's pleasurable existence as The Spice is to bending space in Frank Herbert's monumental DUNE series. Nor, by way of infinite delight for his readers, is Maltese's Planet Jirat any the less dangerous than the barren wind-swept landscapes of Herbert's legendary Planet Dune. | |||
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"BOND-SHATTERING provides a fascinating world wherein testosterone reaches saturation levels, and Warrior Clan warriors run amuck in their determination to - if not rid the entire cosmos of then at least segregate, in the name of their misogynist-God Meedek's doctrines all barbarians (women and those who cohabit with them). The book's complicated plot-line is filled to the brim with just how far men will go, pumped up on testosterone AND on the much-in-demand aphrodisiac essence Orchinid, in their determination to fulfill not only the demanded tenets of their male-based religion, but in order to satisfy their other less high-minded and baser instincts, needs, wants, and desires." -Galenn Frazier, amazon.com reviewer "What we have here is a covert love story, not between two Warrior-clan members, as it would initially seem, but between one Warrior Clan member and a barbarian (who just may not be a barbarian). How Maltese deals with his characters, developing them so that the reader genuinely cares, whether that character be hero or villain, exploring their intricate and sometime intimate relationships, was a pleasure and pure joy for this reader." Roynoldo settled back into the soothing hum of the absorbinet, adjusting his head and arm positions for alignment along its infeed units. His fingers tapped his request on the sensisquares of the curved armrest, and a supplemental screen confirmed that the data was no longer impervious to his entry number. There were a few moments of mood static, while the data banks searched for transmit, followed by the resulting click of commencement. Roynoldo shut his eyes and felt the flow of information quickly and smoothly exiting the cagbinet mechanism and playing across his mentaceptors. Essence Orchinid, the subject of his query to the Clan Julius Archives on WARXII, was unknown in the Warrior Universe until the time of the First Stanlov Peace: That being, like now, a time wherein prosperity reigned, and time without war allowed ongoing searches for rest and relaxation. Likewise, various bond-matings occurred between Clan Julius warriors and inhabitants of certain of those civilized worlds annexed to the Warrior Universe during the preceding period of conquest. One such bond-mating, of minor significance at the time, was between Fornulu Malxno (a minor Clan Julius potentate), and Daniel Forris (a minor Lifarian nobleman). In dowry was Jirat, a minor-consequence planet which had been in the dynasty Forris for tirems, but whose capacities were as yet unexplored and unexploited. There was evidence of deposits of crmolistsm on Jirat, and Fornulu and Daniel, and a crew of six, set down upon Jirat in the third megatirem of the First Stanlov Peace to analyze development potential. The planet was designated sterile as regarded measurable life forms of a civilized nature but contained large mineraforest of mainly minimal exploitable value. Such mineraforest was classified "quasi-living," at the time, in that it was only seen to grow if observed over exceptionally long periods. While the crmolistsm deposits proved too insignificant for mining, there was discovered a unique byproduct of one specific mineratree, unclassified at the time, later classified as minerasistal-Orchinid. The mineratree when damaged until death, the first observable demise occurring as a result of an accidental collision with a malfunctioning explorunit, produced a seedsac that was collected for analysis of potential exploitable qualities. Eight such pods were gathered, upon killing as many minerasistal-Orchinid trees, and later were determined to each contain the non lab producible aphrodisiac designated Essence Orchinid. |
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