TBR Pile Review: Hel’s Eight, by Stark Holborn

Blurb

Ten Low and her ragtag comrades take on an ultra-rich tycoon who owns entire planets in this high-octane clash of law and lawlessness across the stars, for fans of Gideon the Ninth , Anne Leckie and Becky Chambers.

Who controls the future, controls it all…

Ten “Doc” Low is a medic with a dark past, riding the wastes of the desert moon Factus, dispensing medicine to the needy and death to those who cross the laws of the mysterious Seekers. Cursed by otherworldly forces, she stays alone to keep herself safe, and to keep others safe from her…

But when she experiences a terrifying vision of conflict and the deaths of those she once called friends, she must drag herself back to the land of the living to stop a war before it begins. With rebellion brewing, the Accord’s grip on the Outer Moons weakening and a sinister tycoon buying up all land in sight, Ten must find allies where she can and face the past in order to save the future. The cost will be greater than she could ever have imagined…

A wild, adrenaline-packed, whip-smart crash of storytelling and shoot-outs, ideal for fans of Becky Chambers’ Wayfarers and Alex White’s Salvagers .

My Review

I told you I was going to read this book immediately after I finished Ten Low. Well, I went up to bed to read a few pages and five hours later I put the book down, finished. I slept badly last night, because I was so full of adrenaline from reading this book. I’m really tired now, but I have to go out to get my prescriptions. I won’t get them before Tuesday if I wait for Lloyds Direct to deliver them. So this might be a shorter one than I want to write.

We open twenty-five years before the events of Ten Low, with Esterhazy’s arrival on Factus as part of a work cohort. We’re getting some background to the origins of events in both books, through Esterhazy’s eyes. We then jump to five years after Ten Low, and find Doc Low hiding out in the U Zone, far from anyone, under the guise of a witch doctor, a blood doctor. She still has her debt to the Seekers to pay and she’s paying in blood. Gabi comes for a visit, warning her of the potential rebellion and their need for her help. In a trip to Paranoia, a small settlement with an actual Doctor as opposed to an Army Medic, she lets the Ifs , and her scalpel, loose on some Metaldogs, a gang that raids settlements and are currently working for Xoon, a tycoon from Delos, another moon.

We go back and forth between current events from Ten’s perspective and historical events from Esterhazy’s perspective, and a narrative emerges, of the Xoon family’s obsession with the Ifs, and their determination to control them for their own advantage.

Eventually there’s a battle as the gangs of Factus led by Ten, in her guise as Hel, attack Sagacity, the base for Xoon’s mercenaries, and Ten/Hel pays her debt to the Seekers.

I have lots of thoughts.

Hel is the name of the daughter of Loki, who rules over Helheim, the place the dead go in Norse mythology (warriors go to Freya’s Realm, or second choice, Valhalla – Freya gets first choice). Helheim is cool and dark, a place for rest. There’s a room where really bad people get tied under angry snakes, like Loki in his cave, but they’re already dead and are having an eternity of punishment, collectively. For a character that brings death and life, Hel is a good name. In battle, Hel is death, but as Doc she brings life where she can.

The corruption that money and pretty toys brings to the starving Factus, and the way the Accord ignores what’s happening despite their claimed righteousness and authority is fascinating. Even though the money is company scrip, an insidious form of control over workers by preventing them from saving money that would allow them to leave, the people are willing to take it because they are so starved for money and the food that it brings.

I’ll come back to finish the thoughts. I’ve got to go.

Enjoyed this sequel , rollicking adventure.