Archive for the ‘Peter Higgins’ Category
Wolfhound Century, by Peter Higgins
Posted on: April 6, 2013
Wolfhound Century, by Peter Higgins
Published March 2013
where I got it: received review copy from Publisher (Thanks Orbit books!)
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Musicians, think about the 7th for a moment, a minor 7th, if it makes you feel better. To oversimplify for everyone else, the 7th is the musical cue to move on. A 7th can certainly take you right back to the beginning of the chord progression, or the key could completely change in the next moment. That’s the thing about the 7th, it’s all potential, all possibility. For a split second, you’re not sure where the song will go. For a split second, the song is free of it’s predetermined chords. But all that potential has to go somewhere, because a 7th is unresolved. You can’t end a song on a 7th.
I’ll be back to this metaphor in a bit.
In the alternate Russia of Wolfhound Century, angels have been falling from the sky for generations. Along with control of the angel flesh, the totalitarian government controls everything, reports everything, defines everything. Mothers still tell the cultural myths to their children, but only in hushed voices. The ancient words are not to be used, the Pollandore is not to be spoken of or even thought of, because the Pollandore doesn’t exist. Lock something away for long enough, and people will forget it as quickly as they forget the events that birthed their own myths.
Higgins doesn’t just write, he doesn’t just put words on a page to get the reader somewhere, this man is an artist when it comes to prose. I’d quote passages to show you what I mean, but really, just open the book and choose a paragraph and random, and read it out loud. You’ll be transported. This really is some damn beautiful prose.
the Little Red Reviewer 
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