Crystal Rain

Author – Tobias Buckell

Paperback
Pages: 384 pages
Publisher: Tor Science Fiction
Release Date: Feb 7 2006
ISBN-10: 0765350904
ISBN-13: 978-0765350909

When I first heard of Buckell’s novels, Crystal Rain and Ragamuffin, I wasn’t sure quite what to think. They were short (always an oddity in the field of Science Fiction and Fantasy), they had a strong Caribbean flair and, well… I thought the name Ragamuffin was kinda silly.

Still, the more I read about him and his novels, the more interested I became to see just exactly what they were about. So, I got my hands on copies of his two novels and quickly set to work forming an opinion of my own. And its a positive opinion, more or less.

Let me start off by saying this about Crystal Rain: Buckell manages to fit more into this lean novel than most authors do into novels twice as long. I don’t know how he does it, but other authors (and editors) need to take note; this is how you tell a lean, fast paced and frenetic story without any wasted words. Each and every one of Crystal Rain‘s 384 pages burst at the seams with creativity: a vivid world inhabited by real people all wrapped up in a plot that races towards the finish line at full steam ahead.
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