Expiration Date and Earthquake Weather by Tim Powers
Primary Driver: (Plot, World, or Character)
Bechdel Test: Pass.
Technobabble: Mild to moderate.
Review: These two forgo the dark humor and bitter charm of Last Call and are instead ceaselessly miserable to read. It's hard to tell if this is an intentional choice or if the attempts at humor just don't land here. Pacing is spasmodic: one moment there will be an abrupt string of action sequences, and then nothing happens for the next thirty pages. Characters are generally too selfish to be engaging, and lack either an interesting enough motive or a save the cat moment to get us on board. The innovations to the world that we see in Last Call are not improved upon by the details added here. On top of all that, both books are just a chore to read.
He tried to believe the burglar story, which he would probably have to tell to some policeman—he tried to imagine the fictitious burglars, what they had said, what their car had looked like; and after a few moments he was horrified to realize that the tone of the whole thing just rang with kid-ingenuity, like the “concerto” he had composed on the piano a year ago, which had sounded every bit as good and dramatic as Tchaikovsky to him at the time, but later was somehow just meandering and emphatic.
These two don't deserve that much time and attention. They are loose sequels that simply did not need to be. Last Call had no need for sequels and stands better alone.
The excerpt above shows one of the primary reasons for this: Kootie. Our eleven year old narrator for most of both books. Kootie is meant to be smart but nonetheless scarred, and his manner of speaking and narrating is intended to convey that. Instead he ends up as an awkward middle ground between a jaded adult and a child, the style matching neither. At no point does Kootie feel like a child; yet his youth (and to some degree innocence) is essential. When he slips up, Powers errs towards making Kootie more jaded and less childish.
In effect, it would be difficult to distinguish some lines from the internal monologues of Kootie and Scott Crane - one a child, the other an aged widower. Whenever there are scenes where Kootie actually acts like a kid, the reader is immediately and forcibly ejected from the narrative. This has the side effect of butchering pacing, as it's almost impossible to stay engaged when Powers flings you out of the story for the umpteenth time.
It's not really worth going into other characters here. There are a whole slew of different actors here, all with some amount of skin in the game. We don't spend enough time with most to believe their motivations: we just see them do things. Some have intriguing quirks - linked minds, smoking ghosts, having died a long time before - but it's not enough to make them compelling.
A very different aspect of the magical side of our world comes to light here. There are parts that are interesting enough, but far too little to carry a full novel. This feels like the notes that never made it into Last Call being given their own novel. There's simply not enough of substance for these books to justify their own existence. The characters follow the same mold, feeling like castoffs from the first volume.
There is an acute lack of a central plot. There are lots of interwoven sub-plots - whether they are neatly interwoven or contrived is a matter of taste. But there is nothing at the core. Just more subplots mixed together. And these are character-driven subplots starring characters about which it is hard to feel anything but indifferent.
The minor spoiler (as in, on the book jacket) for Earthquake Weather is that it links Expiration Date to Last Call. It's the worst of the three. Even less world building is accomplished, restricted now by the previous two books. And Kootie is still awful. Seeing Crane and Kootie side by side highlights just how poorly Kootie is written.
Honestly, I did not realize until right now, writing this review, that Earthquake Weather also won an award. It probably would have gotten its own post if I'd noticed before now. But... it's just not good. It lacks the wit and bite of Last Call and instead brings through the drudgery of Expiration Date in its stead.
The Long of It
Spoilers Ahead!
There is a dark humor to Last Call that gives it life, even when it drags a bit. This humor is not lacking, exactly, in the later books. It is instead unsuccessful. One major source of hilarity and hijinks is Kootie's partial possession by Thomas Edison.
“Duh,” came his voice then, clear at last. “Du-u-h,” it said again, prolonging the syllable, indignantly quoting it. Then he was looking up at the bartender. “Thanks, boys,” said Kootie’s voice, “but never mind. All a mistake, sorry to have wasted your time. Here, have a round of beers on me.” After a pause, Kootie’s voice went on, “Kid, put some money on the bar.”
The joke should be the contrast between seeing a small child and hearing that same child speak like a full on adult. When Kootie already speaks like an adult, it's just a slightly different tone when he's Edison. Which also means that Edison is stretched to be even more extreme and exaggerated, to distinguish him from the adult-kid who is his host. It just doesn't land.
This is the tone that continues through into Earthquake Weather. Everyone is world-weary, everything is terrible, and so it goes.
To keep this from ending on too negative a note, there was one idea here that I truly did appreciate. It's that some people just don't quit, even if they die. They continue to do whatever it is that they do, driven so hard that they refuse to allow death to get in the way. They drag their bodies around, sometimes not even aware that they've died - maybe the week before, maybe the decade before. They are so focused on their task that they do not realize that they are far beyond deceased. One does not need unfinished business to stick around - it could just be that you love frisbee golf so much that a fatal heart attack won't get in the way.
What would keep you going, Stranger?
And don't forget to read a book!
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