Rasputin and Lord Simcoe...

It's been a bit over a month since the blog tour for Rasputin's Bastards, and for awhile it seemed like the reviews, mentions, and possibly sales, were going to dry up. But here on Simcoe Day (a uniquely Toronto August long weekend holiday, named after Lord Simcoe (who? This guy)), I can report a few very nice reviews to haul the Fat Bastard's fat from the fire.

First up, came Paul Goat Allen's shout-out over at the Barnes & Noble Book Blog. He writes in part,

"Rasputin's Bastards is an utterly unique novel; I’ve never read anything quite like it before. It’s a mind-blowing blend of science fiction, political thriller, and understated horror."

My hometown paper, The Toronto Star, chimed in with this review by Alex Good, in the Sunday paper. It's a short review (he also reviews John Scalzi's Redshirts, and the VanderMeers' Weird anthology) and he writes this about Rasputin's Bastards:

"Rasputin's Bastards is Toronto author David Nickle's most complex and ambitious work yet, and it's a challenge to keep up with the sprawling plot and large cast of characters. At least one reader will confess to getting lost a couple of times along the way. But it's hard not to warm to an SF thriller that has the fate of the world ultimately hinging on what happens in a remote fishing village in Labrador."

 And on Sunday night, a google alert interrupted a particularly intense episode of Breaking Bad on Netflix to show me this in-depth review in The Winnipeg Review, by Winnipeg author and bookseller Chadwich Ginther.

Ginther concludes (spoiler alert):

"While recognizably “genre,” whatever that may mean to the reader (and their prejudices about the same), Rasputin’s Bastards is not of a genre. Instead it’s an ambitious melange of them all. Nickle’s horror is the theft of body and will; the revelation that one’s father is “A cold, soul-dead killer.” His science fiction feels like 50’s pulps, his fantasy a dark-lensed fairy tale with literary heft. Rasputin’s Bastards is a testament to the fact Nickle can write anything."

So yes -- happy Simcoe Day! The only thing missing is a run (which I should probably go do now)...