I received this book for free from the library in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Moonbreaker
by
Simon R. Green
science fiction, urban fantasy in Hardcover edition that was published by Ace Books on June 6, 2017 and has 352 pages.
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Other books by this author which I have reviewed include Something From the Nightside, Mean Streets, Agents of Light and Darkness, Nightingale's Lament, Paths Not Taken, Sharper Than a Serpent's Tooth, Hell to Pay, Just Another Judgement Day, The Good, the Bad, and the Uncanny, A Hard Day's Knight, Hex and the City, The Unnatural Inquirer, The Bride Wore Black Leather, Home Improvement: Undead Edition, Hex Appeal, Man with the Golden Torc, Daemons are Forever, The Spy Who Haunted Me, From Hell with Love, Live and Let Drood, Casino Infernale, Blue Moon Rising, Tales of the Hidden World, Blood and Honor, From a Drood to a Kill, The Dark Side of the Road, Dead Man Walking, Very Important Corpses, Dr. DOA, Property of a Lady Faire, The House on Widows Hill
Eleventh in the Secret Histories urban fantasy-science fiction spy series revolving around Eddie Drood, a rebellious boy with a conscience in the Drood Family.
My Take
Green does have fun poking away at secret agent stories, especially James Bond…Bond wishes he had any of these toys! The villains are more über than the Bond ones. The monsters are worse. The destructive capabilities are more outlandish. And Eddie and Molly are more self-assured — if that’s possible — than Bond.
Turns out that “anything for the family” is only really true for the super-secret agents, lol.
Using that first-person protagonist point-of-view for those peeks in at Eddie’s thoughts are both a crack-up and a downer as his life’s energies drain away.
It’s that combination of magic and sci-fi that keeps me entranced and laughing even as I hold my breath, wondering how events will fall out.
I dunno, but it seems kind of hypocritical to repress your own history but keep hold of every little thing/person in case you’ll need ‘em again. What if you don’t know what you’ve got because you’ve suppressed it? Of course, they do have Green — he did have fun with creating lots more aliens, alien worlds, and secret-secret histories of past battles — to “remember” it all for them.
It’s the good guys against the bad guys with a multitude of layers of virtues and evils in each side.
The Demon and Angelic Droods battle in Moonbreaker does raise an interesting question. One that I suspect Green is holding for Night Fall, which is intended to be the last in the series.
The Story
Eddie’s dying, and he’s determined to take his killer down with him.
With Molly Metcalfe at his side, they’ll battle a secret army, search for a forgotten weapon, and face off against two terrible Drood secrets, as they bounce from one dimension and planet to another.
The Characters
Edwin “Eddie” Drood, a.k.a., Shaman Bond, is a secret agent and part of the Drood family. Charles and Emily are Eddie’s parents. Molly Metcalf, the witch of the wild woods and a former supernatural terrorist, is his girlfriend and former enemy, untrusted by the family. Isabella and Louisa are Molly’s even more terrifying sisters.
The Droods are…
…a centuries-old family whose business it is to stand between Humanity and all unnatural forces that threaten it. Capability Maggie is the current Matriarch. Cedric is the Serjeant-at-Arms. Peter is the very absolute last of the very-secret agents. Uncle Jack had been the Armourer, now it’s in the hands of Maxwell and Victoria. William is the Librarian; Ammonia Vom Acht is the world’s most incredible telepath and William’s wife. Yorith is the Assistant Librarian who takes care of William. Dr. Indira Drood is one of their medics. Mark is a messenger for the Matriarch.
The Drood family Armoury has a huge collection of toys, including Alpha Red Alpha, a dimensional engine; the Lion’s Jaws, which are a last-resort storage facility; and, the Immaculate Key that opens a prison. The Diary Room contains personal diaries written since the beginning of the Droods.
The Heart had been the original source of the Drood armor, now Ethel, a different alien entity, provides something better. The Pook loves the Library. The dragon head Eddie brought back to Drood Hall in From Hell with Love , 4, has regenerated. The Rainbow is alive and comes if it wants. The Museum of Unattached Oddities is more of a storehouse for excess Drood finds and includes the Dead Drood, a mummified one who refuses to admit to being dead.
And we meet the Angelic Droods and Demon Droods. Mmm-hmm. They’re part of the deal the first Droods, actual Druids, made with Heaven and Hell and the alien entity. The Grim Gulf is a prison that was forced outside our reality. Uriel Drood is the leader of the Angelic Droods who believes the only good Drood is a dead Drood. The Drood oracle has been caged for years.
Grendel Rex is the Unforgiven God, an 11th century Drood who became a megalomaniac, a.k.a., Gerard Drood, who had helped to design and install Moonbreaker as part of a team with his wife, Elspeth.
The underground city that…
…belonged to the Selenites, aliens who lived inside the moon. After a few hundred years, they got nervous about Moonbreaker.
Black Heir is the organization in charge of clearing up after alien incursions and salvaging their tech with the Droods getting first pick (more on Black Heir in the Ishmael Jones series). I’m thinking the Droods need to research Wulfshead Club Management that supplies all their food and Wulfshead Management Museum Trust which oversees special-interest museums. The London Knights had been in a vicious war with the Droods back in the 16th century; the Sequestered Square commemorates the, ahem, quarrel. Shadows Fall is the place where legends and fairy tales go when the world stops believing in them.
Some of the bad guys include the Springheel Jacks, the Accelerated Men, the Dancing Dead, and the Grey, a crafty alien type you can’t trust. Morgana La Fae was the greatest witch of all time and had been killed by Merlin. Merlin Satanspawn is a descendant of Merlin’s (Nightside series).
On an alternate earth
The other Droods are…
…from an alternate earth, a different Drood family utterly unlike this earth’s Droods. Dr. DOA, a.k.a., Edmund Drood, has always had control over the Merlin Glass, and he has poisoned Eddie. Penelope was their Matriarch. Uncle James was their Armourer while Uncle Jack had been the super-excellent secret agent. Grandmother Martha had been the previous Matriarch; Arthur had been her husband. The Blue Fairy had allied with his Drood half.
Major Benson is the man in charge of the attacking army.
The transmorphing battle droid from the 23rd century is a prisoner of the alternate Droods, forced to follow their orders. The Swarm is an earth enemy the droid had been fighting.
The Cover and Title
The cover is bright in the night with the yellow-orange explosions from the attacking soldiers with their tanks, grenade launchers, and more. It’s Eddie Drood closest to us, partially armored-up and facing the oncoming army with Molly Metcalf slightly ahead of him and also facing them, her pistol pointed to the ground. It’s a bit odd that the soldiers are between Eddie and Molly and the darkened Drood Hall in the back, but I suppose it’s artistic license. The light from the explosions and from Eddie’s armored hand show off the green grass and Eddie’s navy jacket. The green is continued in a splotch at the top of the cover with the series information inside it in white. The title is in white and orange against a transparent green band, angled upward from left to right. The author’s name is at the bottom in white.
The title is the last resort chance that the Drood Family planted inside the moon, Moonbreaker, and a play-off on the James Bond title, Moonraker.
